Facing the Transcendent (Part Two)

Dormitory Building B2 was an old building.

When it was built, solar water heaters were all the rage, so the engineer who designed the dormitory had included a rooftop specifically for the water-heating equipment.

Later, as the dormitory complex expanded, each building stopped supplying its own hot water and switched to a centralized supply. The rooftop heaters were abandoned, and the school administration had the iron door leading to the roof welded shut.

Two hours ago, the police had found the door, but they had not gone up to check.

It wasn't really carelessness on their part. In a normal person's thinking, since the only door to the roof had been welded shut, nobody could have gotten up there.

If no one had fallen from the roof ten minutes ago, perhaps Chu Ning would have ignored the door too. After all, according to her clever brain, which had never been contaminated by wisdom, going to the roof would have been a complete waste of time.

A few minutes later, the three of them arrived at the welded-shut door.

Su Bai raised his gun, intending to fire a bullet and test the iron door's hardness, but Chu Ning pushed his hand aside and kicked the door to pieces with two successive kicks.

The door's basic frame, however, remained unchanged, its edges still firmly bonded to the cement wall.

Chu Ning withdrew her foot and stared at the two gaping holes she had kicked in the door. After thinking carefully for a moment, she stepped over to the cement wall beside it, held her breath, clenched her fists, and settled into a textbook horse stance. Then she punched repeatedly, smashing apart the ten-centimeter-thick cement wall and exposing the reinforced concrete inside.

The wall looked solid, but once a large hole had been made, the bricks and cement attached to it were easy to dismantle.

If the door wouldn't open, then make a door.

It was like owing you a lot of money: because I couldn't get rid of the debt, I got rid of you instead.

Heaven knew how those two statements had become a matter of "because" and "therefore."

But one had to admit that, simple and brutal as Chu Ning's method was, it worked.

In any case, the "door" was open.

They looked through the "door" and saw the scene on the rooftop.

It was a white world shrouded in spiderwebs.

Sticky silk lay spread flat like a red carpet, extending all the way to the low railing. More than a dozen thick strands of webbing crisscrossed freely in midair, forming a vast, exquisite cave-shaped nest.

A red-backed, black-tailed spider a full eight meters long crouched in the nest. Its eight legs, sharp as cold iron, were covered in jagged barbs, and its two lantern-sized crimson principal eyes gazed silently toward the "door."

In front of it, nine ovaries as large as clocks hung from the cave's rocky wall, wrapped in silk. Three had already burst open, and densely packed little spiders were wriggling out, searching everywhere for food.

Below the cave, more than a dozen men and women, tightly bound in silk, had long since lost all signs of life. Spiders the size of fingernails crawled all over them, wriggling in and out of their mouths, nostrils, eyes, and every other opening into their bodies.

The little spiders kept tearing flesh, hair, hearts, and lungs from the "prey" and stuffing them into their mouths.

There was too little food and too many spiders. Those that couldn't get any food chose to follow the strands of silk, slowly climbing down toward the floors below.

A scene so horrifying and bloody was enough to leave anyone breathless.

The Redback Spider's enormous, monstrous mouthparts slowly opened and closed. Facing Su Bai, it spoke in a human voice. "Great... Sa...tan?"

The hair all over Su Bai's body stood on end. It felt as though a massive mountain were pressing down on him, leaving him unable to move an inch.

This wasn't fear, but a shudder from the soul!

This was the crushing suppression of a higher-level Transcendent creature's bloodline!

It wasn't fourth tier, but third tier!

Under such terrifying pressure, Chu Ning decisively drew her sword and used her Oracle without hesitation. All the lightning elements within ten meters gathered into thick bolts of lightning that crashed down upon the webbed nest.

The white world of webs was torn apart in an instant.

Chu Ning abruptly burst into motion, shooting forward like a bullet from a barrel. In the blink of an eye, she charged into the nest and brought her sword down, aiming straight for the Redback Spider's principal eye.

Clang!!

The Redback Spider easily blocked the blade with a single leg, producing a clash of metal. At the same time, it raised another leg, a cold light glinting faintly along it like the Grim Reaper's scythe, and brought it down on Chu Ning's petite body.

A blood-red light flashed in Chu Ning's eyes. The instant the leg stabbed toward her, she slammed her elbow into its edge. The sharp barbs tore a large chunk of flesh from her body, but that was all.

Boom!!

More than a dozen thick bolts of lightning finally struck, wrapping tightly around the Redback Spider's remaining six legs like chains.

Before the enormous Redback Spider, Chu Ning was as tiny as an ant. The sight of one person and one sword going head-to-head with the Redback Spider was like an inconspicuous little ant at someone's feet lifting a Hummer weighing hundreds of tons. The visual impact was utterly astonishing.

Th-this, haha, this is the fucking Transcendent world!!

Su Bai breathed rapidly, his blood boiling. A perverse excitement actually rose in his heart. He strode down the only passable path, torn open by the lightning, drew the bone sword from his back, and, summoning the greatest courage of his life, slashed fiercely at the bound spider!

Sparks bloomed wherever the blade passed.

The bone sword had a single attribute: burning!

Spiderwebs were naturally vulnerable to fire. The instant the sparks bloomed, the white world caught fire, flames surging to the sky!

Seeing Su Bai fight so fiercely as well, Qingxue shuddered and finally came to her senses. She took two trembling steps forward. "A-Angel Wings!"

Boom!!

A shaft of white light descended from the sky, completely enveloping the world set ablaze.

Within the dazzling white light, wings sprouted from Qingxue's back, and she slowly rose into the air.

Perhaps her angel form gave her tremendous courage. She finally drew the alchemical weapon she carried with her-the stringless bow.

With a light flick of her fingertips, five scarlet blood arrows pierced the flames in succession and exploded against the Redback Spider, the tremendous force nearly flinging it away.

Strictly speaking, the three of them could fight the third-tier Redback Spider not because of how well they worked together, but because laying eggs had exhausted its Transcendent power, causing its bloodline rank to fall again and again.

Had it not been weakened, perhaps they would not even have been qualified to stand before the Redback Spider.

Even so, gaining a slight advantage with the power their bloodlines granted them was something they could be proud of.

The Redback Spider seemed to ignore Chu Ning and Qingxue entirely. Its two crimson principal eyes remained fixed on Su Bai as it spoke again in a human voice. "How... could you stand alongside these lowly humans?"

Su Bai's thoughts paused for a moment, but his movements did not slow in the slightest. He thrust the bone sword into the Redback Spider's mouth at a remarkably bizarre angle, then tensed every muscle and slashed sideways with all his strength, drawing a streak of scorching, sky-blue blood.

The Redback Spider paid no attention to its injuries. It pondered for a moment in a humanlike manner, then said, "It seems you have not yet reclaimed your authority."

Authority?

Su Bai frowned deeply, but before he could think, he heard a tremendous boom!

The Redback Spider suddenly exerted itself and broke free of the lightning chains. Two legs blurred as they lashed viciously into Chu Ning's chest and abdomen. She grunted, her breastbone instantly shattering, and slammed heavily into a wall ten meters away like a truck that had lost control.

Rubble clattered down, burying her, and thick, bright-red blood flowed from the gaps between the stones.

"Sister Chu Ning!"

Terror filled Qingxue's eyes. She could no longer concern herself with anything else and flew quickly toward Chu Ning.

The Redback Spider hooked one leg around Su Bai's bone sword and slowly pulled it from the wound.

Su Bai's thoughts raced. He drew his gun, aimed at the Redback Spider's two eyes, and fired eight shots in rapid succession. Bang, bang, bang!

The instant the eight bullets left the barrel, the Redback Spider's Oracle, Dustless, altered their molecular structure. They became blooming dandelions, one after another, and scattered on the wind.

Guns were simply too feeble against high-tier Transcendent creatures, far less useful than melee weapons.

Then a huge web descended from above and wrapped Su Bai up completely. Held fast by its mucus, he couldn't move so much as a finger and lost all ability to resist.

A ninth-tier Transcendent was just as feeble before a high-tier Transcendent creature.

Su Bai had already prepared himself, but death did not come for him. He found himself lifted into the air—or rather, hung upside down by the Redback Spider from the cave's rocky wall.

At the same time.

The hundreds of little spiders, which had been focused solely on finding food, turned in unison as though they had received an order. Densely packed together, they advanced toward the smell of fresh blood.

Qingxue desperately dug Chu Ning out of the pile of rocks, but before she could do anything else,

Hundreds of little spiders with scarlet eyes surrounded the two of them and slowly closed in.

The flesh and blood of Transcendents were naturally sweeter than those of ordinary prey.

Watching the scene, Su Bai felt something suddenly burst open in his chest, and a scorching sensation slowly flowed through his flesh and blood.

His body trembled violently, and his eyes gradually turned red.

The Redback Spider suddenly said, "Have you sensed your authority?"