Led by the driders, the runaway slaves—still resolved to keep up their "resistance"—marched into the boundless darkness.
These driders displayed an unusual spatial transit ability: they could weave spatial conduits out of pitch-black webs, and stepping into one instantly transported a traveler to the location of another web.
No wonder Rose of Decay had searched for so long without uncovering the true mastermind. The method was far too peculiar. Conventional spatial teleportation could at least be tracked, but a form of transit operating on an entirely different principle left no trail to follow.
This shouldn't be an innate drider ability; Anbaixiu guessed it was likely tied to that artifact.
The thought stirred a thrill of excitement in Anbaixiu. Perhaps the artifact would even work in his own hands once he seized it?
Even if it didn't, selling it off would surely fetch a handsome sum.
As for Lolth the Spider Queen, Anbaixiu wasn't all that worried.
After all, deities were bound by their own rules and could not excessively interfere in the mortal realm.
The reason this world still existed at all was entirely thanks to Ao—all praise be to Ao!
It was the Overgod who had bestowed authority upon every deity, and it was also he who restrained them from running amok. Otherwise, the world would have torn itself apart long ago.
Thus, regardless of your alignment, as long as you lived in this world, you owed Ao your gratitude.
Even the devils of Hell dared not harbor any grievance against the Overgod, instead giving thanks to Ao for granting them a place to exist.
Anbaixiu was no different; he held immense reverence for the Overgod. If Ao were ever to give him so much as an encouraging wink, Anbaixiu would swear on the spot to revere only him for the rest of his existence, refusing to betray him no matter how much gold was offered.
After all, nothing could possibly be worth more than Ao.
Precisely because Ao so diligently reined in the gods, Anbaixiu felt emboldened to snatch the artifact.
Melina carried a passive Antimagic Field, while Anbaixiu now stood at the peak of the spellcasting classes. Could the two of them combined really fail to snatch some so-called artifact?
Besides, fate hadn't warned Anbaixiu of danger, which meant no mortal peril lay ahead... Wait, something felt off.
It was one thing to lack a premonition of danger, but why was there no sense of the odds of success?
With the power of fate resting upon him, Anbaixiu could passively sense the probability of success for countless matters when making decisions, even without intentionally invoking it.
Yet this time, he sensed only a void, as if nothing lay ahead at all.
Was it because the artifact was too closely bound to Lolth the Spider Queen?
With Anbaixiu's current capabilities, only matters touching upon the divine remained entirely beyond his perception.
While pondering this, Anbaixiu noticed that their group had been brought into a subterranean city blanketed in webs.
Having hopped through so many portals, Anbaixiu was no longer certain where he was in the Underdark. Still, such a cavernous underground space ought to be easy to recognize. He quickly committed every detail to memory, knowing that showing it to Rose of Decay later would likely pinpoint the location.
The driders led Anbaixiu and the others deeper into the city. From the dilapidated architecture and fresh footprints, Anbaixiu quickly deduced a great deal.
Judging by the architectural style, it bore the hallmarks of ancient duergar craftsmanship. Seeing how deteriorated the structures were, Anbaixiu estimated the city was at least a thousand years old. Yet the cobwebs and footprints on the ground were fresh. This indicated that the rebels had only recently uncovered these duergar ruins and seized the place, not even bothering with proper repairs—they had simply slapped webbing over the cracks and called it a day.
In other words, these rebels hadn't been holed up here for long, or perhaps this wasn't even their main base. Given the teleportation capabilities of those black webs earlier, Anbaixiu grew far more cautious toward all the webbing throughout the city, wary that it might possess other undisclosed abilities.
While Anbaixiu was observing and deducing all of this, Melina was solely focused on badgering the drider, urging him to hurry up and take her to see whatever Matron Mother was in charge.
The child was fully prepared to strike the moment they met, eliminate the mastermind on the spot, and then set fire to the entire city to put an end to the trouble once and for all.
However, the drider didn't take Melina to meet his mistress. Instead, he casually settled the group into a random corner.
"Mistress is occupied with other matters. Once she is free, I will present you to her. Settle in for now. Food and supplies are plentiful here, and it is completely safe. Take this time to rest and relax."
The words sounded reasonable enough. Having lived in terror for most of the day, the fugitive slaves found themselves in a safe place at last and couldn't resist the urge to lie down and rest. Melina didn't want to arouse suspicion by acting out of character, so she had no choice but to accept the arrangement.
Anbaixiu found nothing odd about this either. If he were the mastermind, he wouldn't immediately grant an audience to these newly arrived drow. Who didn't know what drow were really like? Putting them in their place with an initial display of authority was necessary to secure complete submission.
Before long, the measures to establish dominance would surely follow.
Yet Anbaixiu had no desire to waste too much time. After reassuring Melina, he relied on his illusion magic to shadow the drider directly. If it were merely a band of drow looking to make trouble for Rose of Decay, Anbaixiu would have felt comfortable letting Melina take the reins. But since deities and artifacts were involved, Anbaixiu had to handle it himself. Leaving such stakes to a child born only a few days ago would be utterly irresponsible.
The illusions inherited from the Lady of Mists were sufficient to bypass all perception and magical surveillance. Rather than merely bending light, the magic could even fabricate touch and scent, conjuring complete falsehoods across all senses.
Anbaixiu felt as though the illusion essentially warped his very existence. Thus, even when he accidentally brushed against the webs, the resulting vibrations failed to attract the drider's notice.
Following the drider through the web-choked city, crossing sprawling ruins, and scaling several high walls, he finally arrived before an imposing, well-constructed tower.
This tower clearly differed in architectural style from the rest of the city. Built from stacked purplish-black stone, it rose nearly a hundred meters into the air.
Drow motifs adorned the tower's exterior, while the spire was crowned with an exquisite statue of Lolth the Spider Queen.
Seeing this tower, Anbaixiu felt reassured. This was undeniably the enemy's stronghold. The tower radiated a terrifyingly foul, evil aura, having witnessed countless blood sacrifices; it was by no means a temporary shelter.
As a lich, he naturally had no fear of encountering anything inside capable of destroying him, so he followed right behind the drider and stepped inside without hesitation.
The moment he entered, Anbaixiu sensed a faint, sweet fragrance hanging in the air. The interior lacked the dense cobwebs outside, featuring plush, expensive carpets underfoot, golden sconces mounted on the walls, and exquisite oil paintings.
Cruel and venomous though drow were, they remained an offshoot of elves and held high standards for their living conditions.
Hovering in midair, Anbaixiu drifted along, taking in his surroundings.
It was classic Lolthite drow style: the paintings depicted abundant scenes of eroticism, violence, and gore, yet they were rendered with such artistic finesse that each piece packed a visceral punch, as though prolonged viewing would brainwash anyone into this aesthetic of violence.
Anbaixiu calculated how much these distinctly drow paintings might fetch on the surface. Selling one for twenty thousand gold coins shouldn't be difficult, and if he could gather a complete set, the value might soar even higher.
Nevertheless, these furnishings proved that the tower's master belonged to an ancient, established drow house, rather than descending from the drow slaves who had been subjugated by Rose of Decay for generations.
When it came to elves, the older the lineage, the deeper the heritage and the greater the cache of magical gear, making them correspondingly harder to deal with.
Still, it was no big problem. In the worst-case scenario, he could simply hide in some corner of this abandoned city, draw a teleportation array, and have Rose of Decay march an army of undead straight through to flatten the ruins.
For now, Anbaixiu's objective was to locate the artifact and discern its true capabilities—to see just what gave them the audacity to boast that it could obliterate an undead empire.
Following the drider upward past heavily guarded checkpoints, Anbaixiu finally reached the topmost floor of the tower.
At a glance, Anbaixiu recognized that the entire top floor was designed as a massive magic circle. It integrated several potent magical effects, primarily intended for blood sacrifices.
A statue of Lolth the Spider Queen stood at the center of the magic circle. Before the sculpture sat a chair sculpted in the likeness of a spider, upon which a dark-skinned drow beauty reclined languidly.
She wore revealing attire woven like spider silk, which accentuated her curves to perfection.
Such was the nature of drow: inherently wicked yet undeniably alluring.
It seemed an unspoken rule across the continent that prominent figures loved placing their thrones before the statues of their patron deities. Perhaps it gave them the sensation that their god was watching over them, while also borrowing the divine presence to enhance their own majesty.
Approaching the female drow, the drider dropped to his knees in humble submission and reported, "Mistress, the explosion has been confirmed as genuine. The blast dealt heavy losses to the undead, and many slaves escaped in the chaos. However, the cause of the explosion remains unknown for now."
The female drow gave a cold sneer. "No need to investigate. The Spider Queen has already informed me: this is a plot by the undead."
Anbaixiu's brow furrowed. Lolth the Spider Queen was disregarding the rules entirely! How could she directly reveal his plan to these drow?
Surely that crossed the line.
Besides, how could this deity even know? She held no domain over prophecy or divination.
Deities were not omniscient and omnipotent. There was no way every petty scheme Anbaixiu hatched could be detected by a god—Lolth was hardly Oghma, the Lord of Knowledge.
Yet the female drow's next words astonished Anbaixiu even further.
"Kill all those so-called slaves. Undead spies are bound to be hidden among them... Oh, actually, bring them up here. I am preparing a new blood sacrifice and happen to need fresh offerings. This time, it will not merely be to welcome the Spider Queen's descent—several goddesses will be bestowing their blessings upon me."
Chapter 255