Sudden Incident

That patch of ferns spanned dozens of meters.

At its center, the thickest fern tree had a trunk as thick as a person's waist and stood seven to eight meters tall.

The flying stones whistled through the air, smashing into the fern patch. Two stones easily pierced the central fern, sending large chunks of debris flying seven to eight meters away. A dozen lush ferns were snapped in half.

The stones landed, then flew up again, like maddened hornets, smashing into the remaining ferns.

They landed, flew up, landed again, and flew up again.

The fern patch was smashed to smithereens, its broken branches scattered across a hundred-meter radius.

"This is my territory, no fighting allowed!" Wu Tie released his left fist and pointed forcefully at Luolin and his two companions.

For some inexplicable reason, Wu Tie felt inclined to protect Shi Lingqing and her group. Perhaps it was because Shi Lingqing and he had their entire families massacred at the same time, or perhaps Luolin's aggressive behavior irked Wu Tie, or perhaps there were other reasons...

Who knew?

Shi Lingqing smiled. She lightly tapped the ground with her dislocated foot and beamed at Wu Tie.

When she saw dozens of stones repeatedly flying up and falling, smashing the thick ferns and scattering leaves and branches, her smile bloomed brighter than spring flowers, her beauty captivating.

Luolin's expression changed drastically. He let out a sudden roar.

The young man beside him, holding a longbow, shouted and strode towards Wu Tie, covering seven to eight meters with each step. In moments, he had advanced over a hundred meters.

He drew his longbow taut, and with a muffled thud, an arrow shot through the air, aimed directly at Wu Tie's vital chest.

Wu Tie took a deep breath, clenched his left fist, and a formless force field within a hundred-meter radius vibrated violently. Layers of invisible power surged towards the arrow, causing its speed to suddenly decrease, visibly slowing down.

With a "swish-swish" sound, faint milky-white gas rings could be seen erupting from the arrowhead. Finally, when the arrow was three feet from Wu Tie's chest, it slowed to a halt, suspended motionless in the air.

Wu Tie looked up and glared at the young man with the longbow.

The young man roared, and his longbow suddenly erupted with a continuous barrage of booming sounds. Seven to eight arrow shadows shot out, flying straight at Wu Tie.

Wu Tie frantically manipulated his force field to intercept. He had never encountered such a fierce assault. Caught off guard, two arrows hidden behind two others curved slightly and struck the tail of the first arrow.

The first arrow, only three feet from Wu Tie, suddenly accelerated, letting out a piercing sonic boom that tore through the force field and slammed into Wu Tie's chest.

A spark flew from the pale, tight-fitting armor. The arrow's pure steel tip shattered, leaving no trace on the gleaming armor.

Luolin and his two companions' pupils contracted. They simultaneously let out sharp cries and turned to flee without a word. They retreated with incredible speed, disappearing into a grove of tall mushrooms within a few leaps, and then vanished.

Wu Tie broke out in a cold sweat, gasping for breath. He gritted his teeth and turned to run as well.

He already foresaw his miserable fate.

He had been shot at point-blank range. If not for his armor, his heart would have been pierced.

This place was quite a distance from the Ancient Divine Weapon camp. The metal spiders couldn't reach here. If he were injured, he would be powerless to return.

In other words, if not for the armor, he would be dead!

Heaven knew how Old Tie would deal with him this time.

Shi Lingqing called out softly from behind, "Young sir, young sir..."

Wu Tie didn't hear Shi Lingqing's calls. He just ran forward with his head down, leaping high and gliding forward, covering over a hundred meters with each glide. Soon, he escaped back into the metal spiders' operational range.

He glanced back. The rolling small hills and the fern forest blocked his view, preventing him from seeing what was happening on the other side.

Wu Tie exhaled, his face grim as he walked towards the Ancient Divine Weapon camp.

Still several hundred meters from the entrance, Wu Tie stopped in astonishment.

Where the original deep pit had been, a neatly constructed wooden shed now stood.

It used fern branches as its framework, with thick mud plastered on the walls. The mud had been applied evenly and smoothly, then baked at high temperatures until exceptionally hard. The roof was covered with a thick layer of fern leaves, making it look quite sturdy.

When did this wooden shed appear?

Wu Tie had only been out for about half a day. How could this shed have appeared?

Over a dozen metal spiders scurried out from the surroundings, quietly gathering around Wu Tie before darting into the wooden shed.

Wu Tie stared blankly, then quickly followed the metal spiders into the shed. He discovered that the original deep pit was covered with a thick layer of fern branches, topped with a thick layer of soil, and then a thick layer of hippopotamus hide, which looked quite comfortable.

The metal spiders went to a corner of the shed and nimbly lifted a square lid about a meter wide.

Old Tie's voice came from beneath the lid: "An outsider has entered. Neither side is easy to deal with. I'm too lazy to interact with them... so I quickly built a shed to cover this entrance. What do you think of my house-building skills?"

Wu Tie suddenly relaxed. He went to the entrance leading to the Ancient Divine Weapon camp and looked down at Old Tie, who was being held up by four metal spiders. He snorted, "You didn't do the work yourself, did you? You don't have any limbs, how could you build a house?"

Old Tie fell silent. A dazzling electric light flashed from his two rows of large teeth.

Wu Tie quickly raised his hands: "I was wrong! This house is built wonderfully. Old Tie, you are truly wise and mighty, divine and extraordinary!"

Before Old Tie could speak, Wu Tie proactively lowered his head and confessed his mistake: "I was wrong. I should have dodged those arrows instead of trying to block them... I also didn't expect that guy's arrows could curve?"

"Not just arrows, people can be crooked too, have you seen that?" The electric light on Old Tie's teeth gradually faded. He snorted, "You still have a lot of Foundation Establishment Potions stockpiled. You don't need to come down for the next few days. Just cultivate by yourself every day..."

Old Tie's tone suddenly became very strange: "Also, try to get along with them properly. Some things you only understand when you experience them yourself... especially, those little affairs between men and women, ha, ha, ha, ha..."

A flash of electricity flickered through the passage to the Ancient Divine Weapon camp. The silvery-white metal lid rippled, and Old Tie and the four metal spiders sank into the tunnel below.

Wu Tie's face flushed red. He muttered to himself, "Affairs between men and women? What kind of affairs are those?"

Old Tie's words made Wu Tie feel uneasy, excited, hopeful, and yearning...

He instinctively recalled topics that Wu Jin and Wu Yin, the two brothers, had secretly discussed late at night in the Wu Family's stone fort.

They had tried their best to whisper quietly to the side, but Wu Tie was hidden well, and he still overheard some of their words.

"Old Tie, what are you talking about?" Wu Tie blushed a little, his heart inexplicably beating much faster.

He inexplicably thought of Shi Lingqing's beautiful face, especially her delicately painted pale purple lips... Wu Tie felt his lips grow a little dry.

Two agile figures quietly approached the wooden shed. They stopped about two hundred meters away, hiding behind a small mound of earth and secretly observing. The solitary wooden shed was so out of place, and the two guards belonging to Shi Lingqing looked at it with surprise.

"Check the surroundings for tracks," one figure grumbled in a low voice. "Only one person?"

"One person is fine. He seems to be able to hold off that brat Luolin and his two companions," another figure said, taking a deep breath. "He's not old, yet he has such strength. Just one person... that's great."

The two figures quietly retreated.

They had been extremely careful, but they didn't notice that in the distant mushroom patch, two metallic spiders with scarlet eyes were staring intently at them. Countless invisible red beams swept over them.

Wu Tie sat alone in the wooden shed, lost in thought for a while. He didn't know what to do now.

After a long pause, he shook his head. From the corner of the shed, he dug out a hind leg of a Gray Rock Lizard, a section of the fattest meat from a Black Ring Snake, and a large piece of fatty meat from a giant hippopotamus's belly. He drew his long knife and began to work outside the shed.

After a while, he cut the meat into strips and hung them on wooden poles outside the shed. Wu Tie took a section of snake meat, used dry mushroom stems to start a fire, and roasted the snake until it was golden brown and its fat sizzled enticingly.

He took out a piece of rock salt the size of a fist, scraped some salt powder onto the meat with his long knife, and took a big bite of the snake meat. He immediately grunted with satisfaction.

His mouth filled with the aroma of meat. The fragrant snake meat was swallowed, and his powerful body quickly digested it. A warm current called 'satisfaction' spread outwards. Wu Tie shivered comfortably all over.

"Young master!" Shi Lingqing's gentle voice drifted from afar.

She was wearing a black long dress, cleaned by some unknown means. Her hair, which had been covered in mud, was now washed clean and hung down her back, still damp.

Her delicate face was also clean. Her pale purple lips had returned to their natural, faint rosy color, smooth and plump, like the newly opened bud of a flower.

Compared to when her lips were pale purple, Shi Lingqing now looked elegant and pure, like a Epiphyllum that had just bloomed in the night, exuding an intoxicating beauty.

She stood delicately under a patch of ferns dozens of meters away, her large, watery eyes looking at Wu Tie timidly. Her lips moved slightly, as if she wanted to speak but dared not.

"Young master, I, Shi Lingqing, thank you for saving my life." Shi Lingqing's slender, delicate body trembled slightly, like a flower branch about to break in the wind, and she suddenly knelt before Wu Tie.

Wu Tie was stunned.

Old Tie had taught him how to hunt, how to sneak and ambush, how to butcher prey, and how to survive and escape.

Old Tie had not taught him what to do when a beautiful, charming, and incredibly delicate young woman, not much older than him, suddenly knelt before him.

Wu Tie's face was stiff, and his body tensed up.

He was extremely nervous, but because his face was so tense, he appeared calm, stern, and ruthless, as if nothing could shake him.

He even instinctively raised the snake meat and took another big bite.

Having completed the first level of Foundation Establishment, Wu Tie's powerful physique made his teeth incredibly strong, like a pair of stone mills grinding the snake bones with a 'creak'. He chewed the snake bones into pieces and swallowed them.

Shi Lingqing's expression changed slightly.

She secretly watched Wu Tie's cold, 'heartless' face and listened to the sound of snake bones being crushed in his mouth, unsure of what Wu Tie was thinking.

Shi Lingqing had no contingency plan for this situation.

How could Wu Tie be so indifferent to her?

Her fair, delicate hands trembled slightly. Shi Lingqing gritted her teeth and placed her hands on the slippery, moss-covered ground. Her delicate hands immediately sank three inches into the mud, and black, fertile mud surged through her fingers, completely covering her snow-white hands.

Shi Lingqing's whole body trembled. Combined with her pale face and slender, weak body, it was truly heartbreaking.

"Young master, I, Shi Lingqing, am in distress here. Please, sir..."

Shi Lingqing's eyes turned red, her voice trembled, and tears welled up in the corners of her eyes.

Wu Tie's entire attention was focused on Shi Lingqing. He completely ignored all external movements.

Therefore, Wu Tie naturally didn't notice that behind Shi Lingqing, a completely black 'Blood-Scarred Fang-Breaking Snake' with a blood-red stripe running down its back was stealthily and sneakily approaching Shi Lingqing.

He also didn't notice that this venomous snake, which breaks its fangs filled with barbs inside its prey after biting, was opening its large mouth and lunging towards Shi Lingqing's upturned buttocks, exposed as she knelt on the ground.

Wu Tie's mouth felt dry, his throat like it was stuffed with sand.

He looked at Shi Lingqing kneeling on the ground, wanting her to get up, but he didn't know how to speak.

Old Tie had taught him a lot about 'survival' and 'combat', but he had never taught him how to handle interpersonal relationships, how to socialize, especially how to interact with a captivating young woman.

And yet...

Neither Wu Zhan, Wu Jin, Wu Yin, Wu Tong, nor even Master Hui, who had been single his whole life, had taught Wu Tie these things.

Wu Zhan only knew how to expand the family's territory and how to discipline unruly neighbors with his fists and knives.

Wu Jin, Wu Yin, and Wu Tong... they hadn't even interacted with girls their age yet.

As for Master Hui, besides reciting 'Listening to Spring Rain in a Small Pavilion All Night'... when had he ever seen real 'spring rain'?

Wu Tie stared blankly at Shi Lingqing, his mind filled with her delicate, beautiful face.

Then came a sharp, piercing scream.

The Blood-Scarred Fang-Breaking Snake bit Shi Lingqing's backside fiercely. Its inch-long fangs, covered in fine barbs, snapped off at the root, along with a large amount of neurotoxic venom, remaining inside Shi Lingqing.

Shi Lingqing leaped up as if her backside were on fire, screaming and flailing her arms.

After only calling out a couple of times, the neurotoxic poison took effect, and Shi Lingqing began to foam at the mouth, collapsing to the ground in violent convulsions.

A dozen figures came sprinting from afar like a gale. They frantically helped Shi Lingqing up and then fled the scene in disarray.

Left behind were a dumbfounded Wu Tie.

And an equally dumbfounded Blood-Scarred Fang-Breaking Snake—its prey had vanished before it could even blink!

Sigh, what a pitiful girl... A night of listening to spring rain in a small tower, and today a snake bites her backside!