Graffiti in the Demon Nest

It had always been others seeking his expertise; when had Dong Rui ever suffered this kind of embarrassment? "The scrolls left behind by my ancestors mentioned..." The moment those words left He Lingchuan's mouth, Dong Rui rolled his eyes. "...that an unknown monster once occupied the Chifeng mine tunnel in northwestern Chipa Plateau. It didn't just prey on miners and villagers; it even devoured many guards who entered the tunnels to confront it. It could merge its human mother with the mine tunnel to transform it into a nest, which is why the interior structure so closely resembles a human body!" He Lingchuan pointed to the soft, leathery tissue. "Once the human mother lost consciousness, the tormentor used these tendons to link and reshape her together with the cavern." "A nest?" Dong Rui's brow furrowed tighter. "Resembling a human body?" "The tormentor is also an offspring of a god," Zhu Erniang murmured softly, joining the conversation. "Among the gods, the ferry mother is hardly considered powerful, yet she can birth ghost whelps. The most formidable among them is the tormentor, possessing power that can even surpass its mother! From the moment it is born, it seeks out a place to build a nest. Once that nest is built, defeating it inside becomes almost impossible." He Lingchuan feigned astonishment. "How do you know this?" "I dealt with them back in antiquity," Zhu Erniang said proudly. "Those so-called... heavenly gods!" "A godchild of the ferry mother?" Dong Rui looked around. "Then where is this godchild—no, this tormentor—now?" "Most likely eradicated," Zhu Erniang said. "When I took up residence in this Demon Nest, it was already deserted." He Lingchuan was deeply intrigued. "If it wiped out the entire Jiana tribe, and even this entire swamp is named after the Demon Nest it created, who could have possibly slain the tormentor?" "The Beijia Kingdom." That answer came as a surprise. "Back then, this swamp was home not just to the Jiana, but to seven or eight other tribes as well. Beyond the swamp lay Xishandang, where villages and towns were scattered like stars, bustling with people. Once the tormentor finished devouring the Jiana, it ventured outward to hunt. In the span of a dozen years, it nearly wiped out all living things within three hundred li. Later, it pushed west and annihilated two border garrison towns belonging to the Beijia Kingdom. With such a demon encroaching on its territory, Beijia could hardly sit by and do nothing, so they dispatched powerful masters to eliminate it." Zhu Erniang waved a front claw. "Of course, this is all based on what surviving Jiana members claimed; I don't know any further details." The tormentor here had been eliminated by the Beijia Kingdom? "Still, once the human mother placed on that stone dais loses her connection to the cave, the stone cavern ought to revert to normal," He Lingchuan said, puzzled. "There's no one left on the platform now, so why has the entire Demon Nest remained in this state instead of reverting?" "I don't know." Even with Zhu Erniang's vast experience, she could only offer two guesses. "Either she lay there for far too long, long enough to permanently alter the entire cavern, or this tormentor was exceptionally powerful." Whichever the reason, she did not care. Dong Rui, on the other hand, carefully inspected those so-called tendons, even drawing a knife to slice off several pieces. "Since this is related to the ferry whelp, it has value! Definitely worth studying, very worth studying!" He Lingchuan strolled around the stone chamber and suddenly noticed a pile of rubble in the deepest corner, looking as though it had been heaped to bury something. When he walked over to inspect it, he saw a deep pit dug beneath the rubble, containing a skeleton with roughly a third of it exposed. "I brushed that open to look at it." When Zhu Erniang first arrived, the rubble had been neatly piled over it. Why had these bones been buried here? Before the modest mound of rubble stood a square stone slab like a grave marker, yet it was blank of words and had a design drawn upon it. It looked like half of a maple leaf, though he could not be certain. The lines were black, as if drawn with charcoal. He Lingchuan immediately recalled that ever since entering this underground palace, he had occasionally spotted various charcoal sketches on the stone walls—depictions of flowers, birds, insects, fish, and all sorts of indecipherable lines, like a child's scribbles. "Who drew this?" Dong Rui noticed the design as well and said casually, "Probably some wild child who wandered in here to play and scribbled around." He glanced at Zhu Erniang and added, "Before these great demons moved in, that is." Zhu Erniang immediately countered, "When I arrived, the entrance to this underground palace was sealed with sandstone." A chill ran down He Lingchuan's spine. If no one had entered this cavern after the tormentor vanished, who could have made these drawings? Unconcerned with such trifles, Dong Rui squatted down to examine the bones. "Hmm, a woman. Judging by bone age, roughly in her forties." A woman found in the very heart of the Demon Nest's central chamber? "Is she the tormentor's human mother?" He Lingchuan turned and pointed toward the stone platform. "She was supposed to be lying over there. Who would have buried her here?" "Could it have been the Beijia people who slew the tormentor?" "Perhaps." Yet He Lingchuan kept his eyes fixed on the square marker. He had just fought a tormentor in his dream. There were several claw marks on the ground here that looked remarkably similar to those left by a tormentor. What Dong Rui said made sense; burying the dead was something only humans did. Yet deep inside, a strange, absurd hypothesis took root. Could it be possible? "Enough. I have granted your request, and the herbs have arrived. Get to work for me!" Zhu Erniang began shooing the two men out. She understood that haste made waste and was in no rush. Having waited hundreds of years, what did another month or two matter? On the walk back to Dong Rui's workshop, He Lingchuan's mind was a tangled mess. He truly had not expected his last dream to connect so directly with reality. Two demon nests, two tormentors... Had they both really existed? Had the Dafang Pot sensed he was about to drift down the Han River into the Demon Nest Swamp and arranged the Chifeng mine tunnel mission in his dream beforehand? Was it meant to help him better understand reality? He Lingchuan felt there was more to it than that. His missions and actions in the dreams were always guided, intentionally or unintentionally. Who was doing it? The Dafang Pot? Did this divine artifact possess a consciousness of its own? A thousand threads of thought swirled in He Lingchuan's head. He kept feeling as though a clue was flashing right before his eyes, just beyond his grasp. Just a sliver away. Always just a sliver away! The feeling was utterly maddening. "Hey, we're here!" Ahead of him, Dong Rui stopped and waved a hand in front of his face. "Did Zhu Erniang suck your soul out?" Unless Erniang was a fiery young beauty. He Lingchuan slapped his hand away. "What do you want?" "To help, of course." Dong Rui pointed to the small mountain of medicinal herbs stacked in the corner, then to two square stones larger than millstones. "First, craft a stone roller mill and grind all of these into powder!" "Don't you have a medicine roller?" Young Master He was not fond of manual labor. "How big is my medicine roller? It can't grind much. You need to make me one larger than a millstone." Dong Rui eyed him sidelong. "I specifically asked for you as my assistant. If you don't want to work, head back to Zhu Erniang." Loitering around a man-eating spider demon was never wise; it was far too easy to whet its appetite. He Lingchuan sighed, drew his saber, and began shaving down the stone. This kind of work was hardly meant for a saber, but they were in the middle of a swamp without any proper tools at hand. When had the Fusheng Saber ever suffered such an indignity? He Lingchuan cut carefully, terrified of damaging the prized blade. A spider guardian stood at the doorway, keeping watch over their labor. "Chisel it flat and polish it. Yes, flatter—it'll make things easier when you use it later." Dong Rui sorted through the herbs, his mouth never stopping. The spider demons had also brought them some human tools, such as axes and chisels. Picking one up, He Lingchuan asked, "Can you create another Number Thirty-Four? Tell me what raw materials you need, and I'll find a way to catch them for you." Number Thirty-Four was the strange bird that had repeatedly carried Dong Rui to safety. The Demon Nest was surrounded by spiders; taking to the sky seemed like their only hope of escape. "You think I wouldn't want to?" Dong Rui snapped, irritated. "Before its transformation, Number Thirty-Four was a broad-nosed bat carrying a trace of an ancient great demon's bloodline. Do you have any idea how many years it took me to find just one?! You think demon puppets can just be whipped up whenever you please, like cheap wooden puppets sold on the street? Huh?" His voice rose in pitch, his temper clearly flaring. Without a demon puppet at his side, what kind of demon puppet master was he? He Lingchuan smiled. "The puppets you create seem completely obedient to you. Could you...?" Because of the spider guardian outside, he kept his words veiled, merely pointing toward the central chamber. If Dong Rui could control Zhu Erniang through physical modification, that would be an extraordinary feat. Of course, if that ever happened, He Lingchuan would be the very first to flee. "Keep dreaming." Dong Rui sighed. "The demon puppets I modified in the past were either raised from infancy, simple-minded, or severely wounded with shattered consciousnesses. Only then could their past memories be scrubbed so they would recognize me as their master. Zhu Erniang is a great demon surviving from antiquity; her divine soul is likely dozens of times sturdier than either of ours. Trying something like that would be pure suicide." "Then how confident are you in producing the medicine she needs?" Dong Rui fell silent. He sliced the tendons left behind by the tormentor into several portions: some he burned, some he soaked in medicinal liquid, and one he ground into powder. Just as He Lingchuan thought the fellow had no intention of answering, Dong Rui shook his head. "Hard to say. If I still had the liquid medicine you stole, or if I could obtain a physical sample of a ferry whelp, the success rate would be higher." He Lingchuan was surprised. "A ferry ghost whelp can be useful for this too?" "Nonsense, of course it can!" Dong Rui glared at him. "A ferry ghost whelp is half-human and half-god, practically the archetype of a ji beast! When the gods created the ji beasts, they might very well have used it as a blueprint!" Thinking it over, He Lingchuan agreed. Ferry ghost whelps could walk among mortals, were virtually immune to origin power, and possessed formidable, bizarre strength—traits shared by the ji beasts that appeared in the early medieval era. "Yet the tormentor isn't in this Demon Nest either. The only things left behind are these tendon-like tissues. Ah, what a headache." Dong Rui scratched his head. "Now hurry up and grind the medicine! And while you're at it, bring over the weakest spider demon from the corner!" Five test subjects were already lined up. Zhu Erniang felt no pity for her own brood, leaving Dong Rui with even fewer reservations about his experiments. The spider demon had been delivered bound tightly. Its carapace had a reddish tint, reminding He Lingchuan of the hairy crabs harvested every September. Without hesitation, Dong Rui raised his blade and cleanly severed all eight of its legs, sending it into a frenzy of agonized squeals.