Insect Woman

"Captain Wang!"

Xu Tong raised an eyebrow and asked tentatively.

The shadow in the darkness didn't answer. It only nodded.

"Hiss..."

He drew a deep breath and tightened his grip on the hand. Then he glanced at Xiong Tao walking ahead. With a flick of his wrist, he let go of Xiong Tao's hand. "Go on ahead. I need to tie my shoe."

Xiong Tao didn't know what was going on, but he didn't think much of it. He just told him to hurry up and continued walking.

In the darkness, faint light shimmered. Xu Tong held the icy little hand behind him and made his way toward another path, sometimes taking quick steps, sometimes slowing down.

As they walked, he said, "Captain Wang, actually, there's something I need to confess to you. No! Make that a declaration of love—no, that's not right either. I should say... I'm turning myself in!"

As he spoke, he led the hand forward and, without drawing attention to himself, summoned two Paper Dolls and sent them into the darkness.

"Ahem. The truth is, I took your precious thing. I've loved playing with guns since I was a kid. When I saw your precious thing, I couldn't resist, so I took it and fired a few shots. I mean, what boy doesn't like shooting guns?"

As he spoke, he gave the hand a tug, pulling the shadow in the darkness closer. As it approached, its blurry outline grew slightly clearer, though he still couldn't make out its features. He could, however, see long hair spilling over its shoulders.

"Captain Wang, look! What's that?"

He pointed ahead. The shadow hesitated, but before it could see what he was pointing at, Xu Tong gave its hand a gentle push. Something beneath its feet seemed to heave it up.

With a splash, the shadow vanished into the deep pool before him.

Watching the water spray across the surface, Xu Tong clapped his hands and called down, "Captain Wang, I'm counting that as turning myself in!"

When he finished, ripples shimmered across the water. The blurry shadow slowly floated up from beneath the surface, waving both hands at him and letting out a shrill "Ka-ka!"

Xu Tong waved back, then turned and walked away without looking behind him.

But he hadn't taken more than a couple of steps when he suddenly froze, staring fixedly at the two shadows in the darkness ahead.

The shadows swayed as they drifted forward in tiny, soundless steps. In the faint light, one of them slowly raised a hand.

It was a pale, slender hand, its knuckles sharply defined, delicate and shapely—a woman's hand.

In another place, he might have admired it and wondered whether its owner was as beautiful as her hand.

But here, in the pitch-black darkness, he couldn't summon the slightest interest.

Just then, the woman on the left suddenly lunged at him. Her slender, pale hand had become as hard as iron. She seized his shoulder and yanked, trying to pull him into her arms.

But the instant she dragged Xu Tong toward her, a hand clamped around her throat first. "Demon Power!"

The instant Demon Power activated, pale blue flames suddenly blazed in his palm. By their light, he finally got a clear look at the woman's face.

She had a high nose, cherry-red lips, and a touch of blush on her cheeks. Her heavy makeup made her look like a bride, but her eyes had no pupils—only a dull gray sheen.

The demonic flames caught in the woman's hair, instantly setting her head ablaze.

"Eek! Eek! Eek!"

The woman let out a strange shriek. As the flames burned, something forced her mouth wide open. Xu Tong peered inside and saw a plump gray worm writhing in her mouth, as if it were struggling to crawl out.

"Eek! Eek! Eek!"

The fire damage from Demon Power wasn't particularly strong. Even though the woman's head was burning, the flames didn't blister and char her flesh the way an ordinary fire would.

But these worms lived in a place this cold, so they were clearly extremely sensitive to changes in temperature. Even a slight rise in heat was enough to make them suffer.

The worm frantically wriggled its fat little rear, trying to crawl out of the woman's mouth. Its backside had barely emerged when a finger poked it right back in.

The worm shrieked in a voice like a puppy's, twisting around and turning its chubby head toward him. It had a cherry-pink head, big, black, jewel-like eyes, and a round little mouth. It let out a pitiful, shrill cry at Xu Tong.

Xu Tong merely grinned and swung a fist into the female corpse's chin.

"Bang!"

With Demon Power reinforcing his punch, he smashed the corpse's chin straight inward. Something burst inside with a pop, and milky-white fluid sprayed from the split corners of her mouth and her nostrils.

After finishing off the corpse, Xu Tong kicked it into the other female corpse. As the second corpse was knocked over, he turned around and did the first thing that came to mind... ran!

Come on. If he didn't run, was he just supposed to wait around to die?

Demon Power lasted only thirty seconds before going on cooldown. He did still have other Prop Cards on him.

But it wasn't worth using them.

Take Demon King Descent, for example. He could easily take out the female corpse behind him after activating it, but when the backlash hit, he wouldn't be able to withstand it in an ice cave like this.

Aside from the Red Mandarin Lantern, which he couldn't use, he had very few Prop Cards available. There was the Paper Craftsman Manual, the Ghost-Charming Bell, and Demon Power.

Then there was the Prop Card Yang Zixuan had given him when they'd agreed to work together: The Angry One.

It came with a skill that temporarily increased his strength in proportion to how angry he was.

But he was only mentally ill, not prone to explosive rages. Where was he supposed to get an endless supply of anger?

As for what was truly useful, the Leopard Soul Cloak was the best choice. Its passive effect increased his movement speed by 20 percent. It didn't cost any Script Points or weigh him down, making it the perfect tool for escaping.

It seemed Yang Zixuan had been right. Prop Cards had powerful effects, but without a suitable set to combine, the boost they provided was limited.

He ran through the darkness, feeling his way along. He had no idea how long he'd been running when he suddenly realized something was wrong: he seemed to have gone the wrong way.

Before him, rippling water shimmered in the dim light. He could just make out a small path ahead. At that point, he didn't have time to worry about anything else, and ran straight toward it.

He hadn't gone far before the light ahead gradually began to grow brighter. He cautiously followed it onward.

After a while, he heard bursts of women's laughter.

At first, he thought he'd imagined it. But when he listened closely, he could indeed hear women laughing.

Could there really be ghosts in this place?

Anyone else would have been scared out of their wits by that eerie laughter in a place like this.

But Xu Tong, of all people, felt a powerful curiosity instead. He wanted to see what kind of fairy sister was making that sound.

He slowed his pace and crept toward the laughter. When he reached a corner, Xu Tong cautiously poked his head around it.

"Huh!"

His eyes lit up, as if he'd found something fun.

Before him was an enormous pool, covered in white mist. A pavilion stood on the water, appearing and disappearing in the fog.

Even stranger, the vague silhouettes of women could be seen inside. White silk draped over their bodies. He tried to see them clearly, but no matter how hard he looked, he couldn't make out their features.

He couldn't see the women clearly, but he did notice something rather interesting.

He saw Captain Wang. At that moment, Captain Wang was tied to a large wooden board and being carried by four completely naked women, who were standing outside the pavilion.

The scene was just like something from a TV drama: a concubine, washed and wrapped in a quilt, waiting outside the emperor's bedroom.

"How did he end up here?"

Xu Tong was puzzled. Then he glanced to the side and spotted several pieces of women's clothing hanging from a nearby tree branch. His eyebrows lifted slightly, and he quietly felt his way over.

The laughter from inside the pavilion grew more and more piercing.

After being unconscious for who knew how long, Captain Wang finally opened his eyes. Seeing himself tied to a wooden board, he froze. "Is this another hallucination?"

But after struggling a couple of times, he realized something was wrong.

He began to struggle desperately. At his movement, the four women carrying him kept their bodies still but turned their heads toward him in unison.

Their grayish-white eyes stared at him. A chill ran through Captain Wang from head to toe, shooting straight into his skull.

What terrified him even more was what came next. The four women slowly opened their mouths. Their jaws seemed to come unhinged, widening like snakes' mouths. Then, amid a series of "ka-ka-ka" sounds, a huge worm poked its head out of each woman's mouth.

Even Captain Wang, whose heart was as hard as iron and who firmly believed in Marxism, was so terrified that he didn't know what to do.

Fortunately, the laughter from inside the pavilion grew even more piercing.

At last, the four women turned their heads away, and Captain Wang breathed a sigh of relief.

But before he could even exhale, a chill suddenly brushed his ear. It felt as if a hand were caressing his earlobe, and he shuddered so violently that every hair on his body seemed to stand on end.

He mustered his courage and looked up. Beneath a mass of white sleeves, a figure stood above his head.

"I'm done for! Is it going to eat me?"

Captain Wang's heart sank. As if resigned to his fate, he closed his eyes, only hoping it wouldn't hurt too much when he died.

The hand explored his body. Each time its fingers touched a spot, the muscles in Captain Wang's face twitched violently.

Just as the hand was feeling its way toward his wrist, Captain Wang suddenly sensed something. He reached out and grabbed it. Something cold slipped into his hand.

He opened his eyes and saw a small knife gleaming with silver light.

"A knife?"

He froze, then turned his head and looked sideways. Xu Tong was beside him, watching with narrowed eyes. When he saw Captain Wang looking at him, he slowly raised a finger to his lips. "Shh!"

Then, holding up a finger in a delicate gesture, he pointed toward the pavilion. Captain Wang followed his gesture and forced himself to raise his head.

"Hiss..."

He sucked in a breath of cold air, and his expression turned utterly grim.