Chapter 17: Compound Eyes

The bandages wrapped around his right leg were soaked through with blood. A Yan slung the bamboo bow over his shoulder and lightly shook the Soul-Capturing Bell in his hand as he hurried through the narrow rock fissure.

He had no idea what sort of background these Black Sheep intruders had, but their methods were ruthless—especially that golden-haired white-faced foreigner, who spoke some incomprehensible dialect and fought with a style unlike anything A Yan had ever seen. Every move was vicious, aimed at throats and eyes, and the bastard had even snuck in a homemade shotgun.

It was his own fault for underestimating them.

Every one or two minutes, A Yan led the tour guide down another branching path. The fissures here twisted like the roots of an ancient tree, so convoluted that an ordinary person who wandered in would likely be trapped alive. But for A Yan, picking out each narrow trail was as familiar as recognizing every bamboo stalk back in the village—a skill every Yelang Hunter had to master.

After a while, he slowed his pace. The wound on his right leg throbbed fiercely, but luckily he’d dodged in time; it hadn’t hit anything vital. If it had nicked a major artery, he wouldn’t have made it out today.

He touched the bamboo carving hanging at his collar, thinking of his fiancée Aqiu—her smiling crescent eyes and apple-like cheeks. A thread of sweet affection welled up from the tip of his heart, and the pain in his wound seemed to ease a little.

A Yan used his teeth to tear a strip from the sleeve of his blue cloth shirt and wrapped another layer around his leg.

After a brief rest, he leaned against a cold boulder and eyed the dark-skinned outsider beside him.

“Blame your rotten luck. The Fly Ghost hatched too fast on you, and the Cave Lord doesn’t like spoiled meat. You’ll just stay in the Water Dungeon and make a nest for it.”

The tour guide’s face was ashen and stiff. He stood rigidly at A Yan’s side, his bloodshot eyes vacant, showing no spark of life. Aside from the faint rise and fall of his chest, he was no different from the White Stiff under A Yan’s control.

Seeing the man like this reminded A Yan of his own Cicada Spider Ghost, lost just recently to that white-faced foreigner’s shotgun. A top-tier Yelang Elite could tame only two Natal Gu in a lifetime, and the Cicada Spider Ghost had been one of his.

“Damn Black Sheep.” He spat, cursing bitterly.

And those women from earlier—one of them had kicked over the white zombie he’d painstakingly trained. Those corpses had been willingly donated by the village elders to be refined; preserving them had been no easy task!

If not for that damn driver’s sneak attack, she wouldn’t have lasted this long.

But how the hell had these people slipped into their Gu Cave? Had there been another traitor in the village?

Impossible. They’d all seen what happened to Yuzi. No one would dare harbor a second thought against the God Lord and Grand Matriarch.

Unable to figure it out, A Yan stopped thinking about it. He gave the bell another gentle shake and limped deeper into the fissure.

~~~

In pitch darkness, Gu Xianwang moved lightly along the rock wall, like a serpent coiled around its prey, patiently gathering strength for a sudden strike.

That cunning bowman would never guess she still had the Undying Turtle, a true treasure of the earth. He thought he could shake off his pursuer with the karst cave’s twisting paths, never realizing he was the one trapped like a turtle in a jar.

Footsteps, breathing, the jingle of the copper bell—every subtle sound wove into a vivid scene, painting a hunting tableau in the silent jungle night, rife with hidden killing intent.

The mantis stalked the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind.

Her short blade slid silently from its sheath.

A Yan halted before a sheer rock wall, as flat as if sliced by a knife. Below it yawned a cave opening just wide enough for one person, from which came the patter of dripping water.

He drew a thumb-thick tinderbox from his boot, removed his bamboo hat, and blew on it twice. The fire kindled with a pop, an orange-red flame leaping from the cotton wick to illuminate the cave wall.

By the faint firelight, he scrutinized the tour guide. The man’s clothes were in tatters, with nothing worth salvaging. A Yan grabbed his sleeve, intending to shove him straight into the Water Dungeon.

In that instant as he stepped toward the cave mouth, a patch of shadow exploded from the rock wall before him. Instinctively, he twisted his waist and thrust the tour guide in front of him. But the icy blade was already inches away, as if anticipating his move. It curved around the tour guide and stabbed upward from under his armpit, crippling his right arm in one stroke.

Gu Xianwang had no intention of killing him, but she had to neutralize his ability to fight back in a single blow.

The injury was grievous. A Yan’s grip went slack, and he nearly tumbled into the cave. He leaped to the side, kicked the tour guide toward Gu Xianwang to extinguish the tinderbox, then swiftly pulled three bamboo arrows from his quiver. He snapped them at the tips with his foot and gripped the sharpened points between the fingers of his left hand.

He had secretly observed Gu Xianwang’s skills before and didn’t dare underestimate her. But in this darkness, in this Gu Cave, only he could be the sole hunter.

Gu Xianwang braced her arm lightly against the tour guide’s shoulder and eased him down to the ground. She stepped aside, then walked two steps toward the cave mouth. Reversing her grip on her saber, she deliberately put on a bewildered expression and swung it twice at the empty air. But her eyes remained fixed tightly on A Yan, who was crouched not far away.

“Big Brother, we’re just unlucky ordinary tourists. The ones who really have a grudge against you are the people who captured you. We’re victims too. There’s no need to kill us all, right?”

A Yan remained silent, not moving a muscle.

Gu Xianwang probed further. “I know you’ve lived for generations in these deep mountains, with your own customs and rules. But this is a society governed by law these days. We should all be upstanding citizens, building a harmonious community together. I’m just defending myself here—I don’t really want to hurt you.”

“How about this? Let us go, and we’ll leave right away. We can pretend nothing ever happened. We absolutely won’t come back to bother you, and we definitely won’t call the police. Deal?”

As she spoke, she deliberately turned her body sideways, exposing a half-flaw in her guard. But the hand hidden from view was already pressing down on the hilt of her waist saber.

The moment the opening appeared, A Yan took the bait. He kicked off the ground and exploded forward, his left fist smashing straight toward Gu Xianwang’s exposed neck.

“Sister Gu… are you in there?”

Suddenly, Ye Chan’s trembling, feeble voice echoed from the rock tunnel. Both of them faltered for a split second. Gu Xianwang had planned to cripple his left arm with this strike, but now she hesitated because of Ye Chan. Instead, she dropped low to dodge the punch, then swung the saber’s hilt diagonally, smashing it hard into A Yan’s jaw.

With a thud, A Yan collapsed face-first onto the ground and passed out cold.

Gu Xianwang stood up, sheathed her saber, and called back, “Yeah, I’m here.”

Hearing her response, Ye Chan shuffled in cautiously, feeling her way along the rock wall.

Gu Xianwang picked up the tinderbox from the ground and blew on the wick until it flared to life. Ye Chan took one look at the scene and jumped in fright. “Sister Gu, are you okay? You guys…”

She stared at the bloodstains on the ground and swallowed hard before asking carefully, “Did you knock him out?”

Gu Xianwang knew what she was thinking and didn’t want to stir up trouble. She nodded. “Yeah. Luckily, this guy was already injured from his fight with Sara earlier. I ambushed him from the shadows and knocked him out.”

“Oh.” Ye Chan let out a sigh of relief. “How’s Little Hei?”

“No idea. Put your pack down first and grab the rope and medical kit.” Gu Xianwang glanced toward the rock tunnel. Sure enough, Long Li hadn’t followed. “You tracked the marks I left and came on your own?”

Ye Chan crouched down and rummaged through her backpack for the rope. “Yeah. Sister Long said—”

“What she said doesn’t matter.” Gu Xianwang cut her off expressionlessly.

It was probably something like realizing it was riskier to stick with them, so she’d gone back to find her companions.

Ye Chan thought she had misunderstood. “Uh, do you two not get along?”

“It’s nothing like that. We’re just ships passing in the night. She has her path, I have mine. That’s all.”

“Oh.” Ye Chan pulled out the supplies, feeling caught awkwardly in the middle.

Gu Xianwang said flatly, “Yeah, grab some bandages too. He can’t keep bleeding like this.”

Gu Xianwang picked up a short length of rope and squatted beside A Yan. He lay face-down on the ground, making it awkward to bind him. She reached to roll his shoulder over—only for his head to suddenly turn. A vicious glint flashed in his eyes as his left hand pushed off the ground. He rammed forward with his shoulder.

Caught off guard, Gu Xianwang toppled backward into the cave. In that instant of freefall, she clenched her teeth and grabbed his wrist with a death grip, dragging him down into the water dungeon with her.

“Holy shit!”

There was a massive splash from below. Ye Chan, still clutching the hemostatic bandages, didn’t react in time. She rushed to the cave mouth and shouted, “Sister Gu, are you okay!?”

Gu Xianwang bit back a groan through gritted teeth and caught her breath. She flipped over, straddling A Yan, and swiftly bound his wrists behind his back with a knot sturdy enough to hold a water buffalo.

“I’m fine.”

“Be careful!”

“I’ve got him tied up. Don’t worry.”

Gu Xianwang quickly looked around. This place was called the water dungeon, but it was really just a cramped rock cavity. The ceiling was low, the floor was a branch of an underground river, and both the inlet and outlet were sealed with layers of flat stones, leaving only a narrow opening.

A stone door was embedded in that narrow gap, but the wooden pivot had long since rotted away. Right now, the door hung half-open. It was about a handspan thick—far too heavy to budge by hand.

Gu Xianwang looked back at A Yan. Even with his hands bound behind him, he was still struggling restlessly.

His vitality was impressive, that was for sure.

“Looks like you really do want to kill me.”

As A Yan struggled, his blood flowed even faster. Gu Xianwang leaned down to his ear and whispered, “But I’m a good citizen, so I’ll give you one more chance. Answer two questions. First, where’s the antidote for the Gu worms on us? Second…”

Gu Xianwang activated the electronic display on her wristwatch with one hand while pulling a sheet of printed paper from her inner pocket with the other and unfolding it. “Have you ever seen this place?”

A Yan stared intently at the printed photo, his eyes flickering with sudden change before quickly settling back into his lifeless, monstrous expression.

He knew. Gu Xianwang caught that fleeting look in an instant.

But after a long wait, he still said nothing.

Gritting her teeth, Gu Xianwang grabbed his hair and shoved his face into the water. “Do you really think my temper is that good?”

A Yan choked on a mouthful of water, thrashing to lift his head above the surface. He coughed violently for a moment before finally rasping, “I… I got nothin’ to say to dead folks, ga.”

Suddenly, Gu Xianwang heard an extremely faint buzzing from his mouth. The sound quickly grew louder, reverberating off the walls of the Water Dungeon. Her heart lurched as her hand instinctively gripped the hilt of her knife.

In the next moment, A Yan let out a eerie chuckle. A thin membrane seemed to well up over his pale eyeball, and within it, another golden slit pupil emerged.

It was just like the one in Ye Chan’s eye—except his had fully manifested, indistinguishable from a Snake Eye.

The buzzing grew clearer, resolving into the sound of wings vibrating. Gu Xianwang glanced at the rock walls and saw countless cicada-like wings cracking open across their surface. Beneath those wings, the abdomens of rock-camouflaged beetles revealed patterns like countless staring eyes.

They formed a single, vast compound eye.

The flying insects resembled flies yet weren’t, cicadas yet weren’t—precisely the fully hatched form of the Fly Gu Worms.

This place… was actually a nest of Fly Ghosts.

Clatter.

As the Fly Ghosts took flight, bits of rubble broke loose from the walls and plummeted into the underground river below, sending up tiny splashes.

Countless Fly Ghosts swarmed toward Gu Xianwang like a black tide. With her freakish luck for attracting monsters, she didn’t hesitate. She threw herself backward into the river, and in an instant, shadows slammed into the surface after her. Their thin, translucent wings spread in layers atop the water but could advance no further.

It seemed these insects, even in their mutated state, couldn’t swim.

Gu Xianwang held her breath and clutched her knife hilt tightly. Her legs were still locked around A Yan’s ankles, leaving them both immobilized for the moment.

“Don’t think you’re getting out of here alive,” he said.

A Yan craned his neck and spat a Golden Silkworm Gu from his mouth. It fluttered its wings and landed on his back, dissolving the rope knots in short order.

His hands freed, he flipped over and sat up. Wisps of pale red drifted on the water’s surface beside Gu Xianwang.

She must have been gashed by the jagged rocks in the riverbed when she dove in earlier. It looked serious.

A Yan glared at her murderously. Then his nostrils flared as if he’d caught a strange scent.

A moment later, his expression twisted in horror. “Why… why do you have Fallen God Fragrance on you?”