My Computer Leads to an Instance Dungeon-Chapter 134 - 109: Silk Cave?

Gwendolyn switched on his high-beam flashlight, its intense white light shining on the ambush site.

The two Abnormal Ghosts that came rushing up from behind saw their kin blown to bits and stopped in their tracks. They froze, clueless as to what had just happened.

Fang Zhen had just finished loading a new Hunting Arrow.

Seeing how potent the Blood Burst Secret Medicine was, he no longer fixated on aiming for the head or spine. Instead, he fired an arrow at the torso of one Abnormal Ghost—the easiest part to target.

The Hunting Arrow flew out and lodged itself in the back of an Abnormal Ghost.

A moment later, the area where the Abnormal Ghost was struck by the arrow began to swell.

"BOOM!"

In less than a second, it swelled to several times the size of its body and then exploded.

Fang Zhen reloaded his Hunting Crossbow.

At that moment, Gwendolyn charged out.

Gwendolyn didn't use his Single-Edged Sword, but his shortbow.

The Curse Sealer charged forward, shooting as he went. It was as if he wasn't aiming at all; the moment one arrow was loosed, he was already turning his head to draw another from his quiver and fire again.

'Mongolian archery?' Fang Zhen recognized this rapid-fire technique.

Gwendolyn was formidable. He fired three arrows in just a few seconds, and his aim was decent enough—all of them struck the last Abnormal Ghost's torso.

The Abnormal Ghost's back, shoulder, and thigh were all hit, and they immediately began to swell.

"BOOM!"

In less than a second, this Abnormal Ghost also exploded.

Seeing this, Fang Zhen lowered his Hunting Crossbow.

With the Abnormal Ghost dead, Gwendolyn stopped his volley of shots and used the high-beam flashlight on his belt to scan the surroundings, staying on alert.

Fang Zhen walked over.

"That rapid-fire shooting just now was impressive, and accurate too. Are there any technical pointers?" he asked.

"The key is not to aim. Rely entirely on feel. When you're rapid-firing on the move, you might only brush past an enemy for an instant. There's simply no time to aim," Gwendolyn said. "This is especially true when you're on horseback."

"Just imagine that each arrow you shoot is a gift for the enemy. Sometimes it's a gift for his head, sometimes for his eyes, or his throat and torso. Just send the gift on its way. Whether he accepts it or not is sometimes up to him, and sometimes up to fate."

"I see. I've learned something." Fang Zhen nodded.

He felt an itch of excitement. 'If I can solidify a few more archery-related skills after this trip, I can consider buying a high-draw-weight compound bow.'

He and Gwendolyn walked over to the spot where they had lured and killed the Abnormal Ghosts.

The area was a bloody, mangled mess.

This was especially true where the three Abnormal Ghosts that drank the doctored sheep's blood had exploded. The ground was smeared with a layer of sticky flesh and gore, littered with shattered, pale bone fragments and chunks of viscera. It was a terrifying and disgusting sight.

"The Blood Burst Secret Medicine is really effective. It looks like it might work on other aberrations too," Fang Zhen said.

"More or less. Aberrations share certain commonalities. Some Curse Sealers and Alchemists believe all aberrations have a common origin," Gwendolyn said. "If it's this effective against Abnormal Ghosts, it should work similarly on other aberrations."

"Yeah, we'll probably run into other types of aberrations later. The Abnormal Ghosts are almost all dead," Fang Zhen said.

The Abnormal Ghosts they had just lured over were likely most of the ones in the cave.

According to the information Mark provided, there were only about ten Abnormal Ghosts in the entire cave.

Fang Zhen had killed 2 solo, they had killed 3 in the valley ambush, and now another 6 here. That was 11 in total.

Even if there were any Abnormal Ghosts left in the cave, there probably weren't many.

"Left or right?" Gwendolyn glanced at the path ahead, then turned to look at Fang Zhen.

"Left," Fang Zhen said.

It was a personal habit of his; whenever he encountered a choice between left and right where either seemed viable, he usually chose left.

"Alright," Gwendolyn said.

Fang Zhen switched on the high-beam flashlight at his waist and headed into the cave passage on the left.

Gwendolyn followed close behind, with Mark trailing cautiously after the two Warriors.

After entering the cave passage, Fang Zhen discovered the terrain here was extremely complex.

Within the passage were branching paths of various sizes. The large ones could fit two people side-by-side, while the small ones were like animal burrows that one could only crawl into.

They encountered one of these forks every so often, making the terrain feel convoluted.

However, the main passage remained wide, spacious enough for four or five people to walk abreast. As long as they stuck to the main path, they didn't need to worry about getting lost.

Even so, out of habit, he stuck some fluorescent markers along the way.

It was a new piece of anti-getting-lost gear, an upgraded version of a sticky note. It wasn't expensive, only twenty or thirty yuan for a set, but it was much stickier and glowed in the dark like a highlighter, marking the path back.

Mark was once again full of admiration upon seeing them, and Gwendolyn also seemed to find them very practical.

The three of them lightened their steps, exploring deeper into the cave cautiously but not slowly.

After walking for some distance, Fang Zhen noticed something unusual.

White spider silk began to appear inside the cave, sometimes in the corners of the main passage or within the side paths. In some places, it was woven into webs, which were quite sticky—one had even trapped a rat.

The rats here were quite large, about the size of a newborn kitten, yet this one was stuck fast in the spiderweb, unable to move.

'Holy crap, it's a Silk Cave.' Fang Zhen thought to himself.

"Be careful. This should be a Ghost-faced Spider's nest," Gwendolyn said in a low voice.

Fang Zhen glanced at Gwendolyn.

"Ghost-faced Spiders are very difficult to deal with. They're huge, as big as a child or even an adult. They're fast, they can jump, and they can spit extremely sticky silk," Gwendolyn explained. "What's more, these monsters are social creatures. When they appear, they come in swarms. It's almost impossible for a single person to face them alone."

"If I were alone, the moment I saw a Ghost-faced Spider's silk, I'd consider running. There's no way one person can take down a whole swarm of them."

"But there are three of us today," Fang Zhen replied.

Gwendolyn smiled. "And we have the blood explosions."

Hearing this, Mark straightened his back a little.

Fang Zhen thought for a moment, then said, "Mark, hold up."

Mark obediently stopped.

Fang Zhen walked over and pulled two Molotov Cocktails from Mark's backpack.

"What an exquisite Alchemy Bottle!" Gwendolyn's eyes lit up when he saw the bottle of the Molotov Cocktail.

"If you like it, I can give you a few," Fang Zhen replied. "But the important thing right now is to teach you how to use this."

"This is a Molotov Cocktail, a kind of... alchemical product. It's very powerful. To use it, light the cloth strip at the top, then throw it at your target."

"But be careful. Once it's lit, don't hold it in your hand for too long. Throw it immediately, or it will be dangerous. It's extremely powerful."

He described the power of the Molotov Cocktail.

"What a powerful alchemical product." Gwendolyn exclaimed after hearing about its effects. "Is Molotov the Alchemist who backs you? The name alone sounds like a powerful Alchemist. I wonder if I'll ever have the chance to meet him."

"Uh," Fang Zhen rubbed his nose. "It's probably better if you don't meet him."

'The man's been in his grave for years. His soul has probably rotted away by now.'

'Gwendolyn seems like a decent guy. I don't want him visiting friends in the Yellow Springs just yet.'

'But when foreigners or Otherworldly People die, do they go to the Underworld, Hell, or somewhere else?'

Fang Zhen handed one of the Molotov Cocktails to Gwendolyn.

Gwendolyn was more experienced; giving it to him was the more reliable choice.

Fang Zhen carried the other bottle in his left hand as he continued forward.

"Why are they called Ghost-faced Spiders?" As they walked, he felt the atmosphere was a bit too tense and oppressive, so he spoke up to liven things up.

"Because after this aberration eats a human, a face identical to the person it consumed will grow on its back," Gwendolyn replied. "But this face will be filled with expressions of rage, fear, pain, jealousy, and greed. It looks neither human nor ghost, just twisted and deformed."

"That's why it has the name Ghost-faced Spider."

"You learn something new every day," Fang Zhen nodded.

"I also heard that if a Ghost-faced Spider eats many people, the face on its back will only be that of the most powerful person it ate, just even more pained and twisted," Mark added.

Fang Zhen nodded.

The instance world was vast; anything was possible.

As they spoke, he suddenly felt the space ahead open up.

He had walked out of the cave passage.

Ahead was a massive hollow space within the mountain, two or three times larger than the place where they had killed the Abnormal Ghosts.

The floor wasn't flat but covered in jagged rocks. Running around carelessly in here would be a mistake; it would be easy to accidentally kick a sharp, jutting stone and break a toe, or to fall and sprain an ankle.

As Fang Zhen was observing the area, a warning sign suddenly flared in his mind.

He snapped his head up and looked at the ceiling.

There, on the rock wall of the cavern ceiling, a spider was crawling—he didn't know when it had gotten there!

The spider was huge, half the size of a person, and moved swiftly. It was closer to Gwendolyn and looked like it was already poised to attack.

"Watch out!"

Fang Zhen shouted, sharply raising the Hunting Crossbow in his right hand.

Without a word, Gwendolyn performed a forward roll on the spot, his movements so agile he didn't look like a man in his sixties at all.

Fang Zhen's Hunting Crossbow was already loaded. As he whipped it upwards with one hand, the large spider happened to pounce, soaring through the air.

Fang Zhen didn't aim. Relying purely on instinct, he pulled the trigger the instant the upward swing of his Hunting Crossbow reached a certain angle.

"SWOOSH!"

A red line shot through the air. Like a no-scope flick shot, the Hunting Arrow pierced the large spider's head, passed through its body, and exited out the back.

The large spider instantly lost its strength and fell from the sky, its body still spewing green fluid.

Fang Zhen stepped aside, dodging the falling spider.

Mark let out a shout and, holding his long spear, thrust it into the large spider's belly.

Half a second later, the large spider's belly began to swell.

"Move!"

Fang Zhen yelled and quickly retreated.

Seeing something was wrong, Mark also pulled out his long spear and fell back with Fang Zhen.

The large spider's belly swelled larger and larger, finally expanding to two or three times its original size.

"BOOM!"

A violent explosion rang out.

The large spider...

...exploded!