Chapter 233: Chapter 203: The Giant Spider in the Secret Cave
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After stepping into the passageway, Ye Chen and Jiang Yao quickly realized that not far ahead, the passage branched off into various forks, dividing into countless pathways. As they followed these new pathways, even more forks and new passages appeared.
Among these countless passages, there would occasionally be man-sized holes along the sides, sealed by layers of spider silk, and on this silk were engraved strange, large spider sigils.
By the look of it, these holes might very well be the treasure vaults mentioned by the former owner's message, located in the outer reaches of the Azure Blue Mansion!
Just within the one passageway that Ye Chen and Jiang Yao had entered, there split off countless new pathways, with innumerable vault openings. Considering the additional openings in the main hall, the number of pathways and vaults within the Outer Mansion could be in the tens of thousands!
Indeed, just as the tomb owner had said, the Outer Mansion of the Azure Blue Mansion contained countless treasure vaults!
While Ye Chen and Jiang Yao were examining the spider silk and the giant spider sigil within the passage, those Tomb Explorers who had entered before them were elsewhere within the passages.
But by now, they had already become engaged in battle!
Their adversaries were giant spiders, the size of a human being. Upon closer inspection, it became evident that these giant spiders were identical to the ones depicted on the spider silk at the mouth of the holes that Ye Chen and Jiang Yao had seen.
Bang! Bang!
These giant spiders were extraordinarily ferocious; each one possessed the combat power nearly reaching the Rotating Pill Realm, forcing many a Tomb Explorer to retreat repeatedly.
After two Tomb Explorers combined their strength to slay a giant spider, the creature exploded and vanished in the moment it was killed. Next, the layer of spider silk sealing the adjacent hole vanished as well, allowing the two Tomb Explorers to enter it.
Indeed, inside the hole was a secret chamber, about dozens of yards in diameter, but it was eerily empty, with not a single item in sight.
Seeing this, the two Tomb Explorers exchanged a look of despondency: "Nothing again!"
"With the three other vaults we entered before, that's four now, and there hasn't been a single treasure in any of them!"
"It seems that these vaults were already accessed by the tomb's owner, who took the secret treasures long ago. Oddly enough, the seals and giant spiders seem to restore themselves, tricking us into battling in vain!"
"The deeper we go, the stronger the spiders guarding the vaults become. That giant spider just now took us a long time to fight. If we can't find a vault with treasures soon, I'm afraid we won't be able to fend off those more powerful spiders!"
The two of them grumbled a bit, then left the secret chamber to continue forward.
Not long after they left, the spider silk seal and the giant spider sigil at the vault they had entered restored themselves once more.
Shortly thereafter, another Tomb Explorer arrived at the same vault. As he attempted to break into it, the giant spider sigil on the spider silk seal began to glow and transformed into a giant spider the size of a human being, engaging the Tomb Explorer in combat!
This sort of scene was happening at various vaults.
Any Tomb Explorer attempting to enter a vault would be blocked by the spiders from the spider silk seals at the entrances!
It seemed that these seals and spider sigils were acting as guardians for these vaults!
Some were able to kill the spiders and enter the vaults, but as the Tomb Explorers ventured deeper, the spiders they battled became more formidable.
In fact, within half an hour of them entering these vaults, some Tomb Explorers had already perished at the hands of these spiders!
People died at the hands of the spiders, yet no one succeeded in finding treasures within the vaults. All the vaults entered by these people were empty, with the treasures presumably taken long ago by the tomb's owner, the Heavenly Saint!
In these numerous vaults, indeed, many treasures still had not been taken by the Heavenly Saint, but if even the Heavenly Saint could not take them, then of course, others had even less chance to do so!
As the guardians of the vaults became more powerful and slaying the spiders didn't yield any treasures, the Tomb Explorers grew increasingly disheartened.
All of this looked as if they would likely gain nothing and might even lose their lives to the ever more formidable giant spiders!
The former tomb owner had already said that seeking treasures in the vaults of the Outer Mansion was countless times harder than finding treasures in the drops of legacy water. Now, they had finally realized that the words of the tomb owner were by no means idle!
Rotating Pill-level treasures were indeed not easy to come by!
Of course, regardless of the danger and how slim the hopes of finding treasures were, none of the Tomb Explorers gave up. They continued to advance deeper into the passageways, only now with far greater caution.
Bereft of finds in three different vaults after vanquishing their guardian spiders, Ye Chen and Jiang Yao finally sensed something was amiss with these vaults.
"Ye Chen, what should we do? It looks like these vaults have all been entered by the ancient tomb owner. I'm afraid that none of the vaults out here have any treasures left," Jiang Yao said to Ye Chen by her side.
Ye Chen, glancing back at the vault they had just entered, now resealed with spider silk, knitted his eyebrows: "These secret chambers in the Azure Blue Mansion appear to have been used for storing treasures. Once the treasures were taken, the seals would still remain."
"This makes things difficult. There are countless vaults inside here, and even if we spent a whole month searching, we likely wouldn't be able to explore many of them, and might not find any treasures at all."
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"We should head deeper in; the closer we get to the inner part of the cave, the less likely it has been explored by the tomb's owner, and the greater the chance that treasures remain."
Ye Chen said.
"Hmm," Jiang Yao nodded.
Ready to venture further into the depths, Ye Chen and Jiang Yao didn't continue their individual inspections on the outside; instead, their figures flashed as they turned into two streaks of fleeing light, soaring towards the interior.
This flight lasted for nearly half an hour, and behind Ye Chen and Jiang Yao, they had passed over a thousand chambers; finally, they came to a stop again.
At this point, the depth they had reached was already the deepest that any tomb explorer had ever ventured into these chambers.
Many had, like Ye Chen and Jiang Yao, flown deeper into the passage, but those people had not gone as far as Ye Chen and Jiang Yao before fighting with the guardian giant spiders deeper inside and meeting their deaths at their hands.
The spiders that killed these people had combat power that had almost reached the Rotating Pill Realm level!
As Ye Chen and Jiang Yao flew deeper, the guardian giant spiders they faced were even more terrifying!
Truly more terrifying.
When Ye Chen and Jiang Yao stopped and finally decided to brave this new chamber, they had just approached, and a giant spider immediately flew down from its web.
This giant spider was noticeably larger than the ones they had encountered before!
The previous giant spiders all had six legs, but the one they were facing had eight legs!
Eight-legged Giant Spider.
The mere aura of this giant spider descending was enough to change Ye Chen and Jiang Yao's expressions drastically; they could feel that this giant spider gave them the impression of a Rotating Pill Realm powerhouse.
When Ye Chen and Jiang Yao attacked the Eight-legged Giant Spider together, the spider suddenly sprayed out webbing, enveloping both Ye Chen and Jiang Yao within its strands.
These strands of webbing shimmered with a mysterious azure-blue light, which was pulsating with the power of water-based laws!
This Eight-legged Giant Spider had actually reached the level of a Rotating Pill!
A Rotating Pill level Giant Spider could already be called a Giant Spider Demon King, and there was a Demon King Level Giant Spider in this Outer Mansion chamber!
Faced with these azure-blue strands charged with water-based laws, Ye Chen's Sword of True Qi could no longer cut through them; he then drew out his Black Fire Sword.
Clang! Bang! Clang!
The supreme treasure, Black Fire Sword, under Ye Chen's sword intent, was only then able to sever each strand of webbing.
At Ye Chen's side, Jiang Yao also drew her newly acquired supreme treasure, the Ice Spin Sword. Upon activating the Ice Spin Sword's icy prohibition, the ice-blue Ice Spin Sword actually froze each strand of webbing; after a moment, these frozen strands of webbing would break apart, shattered into several pieces.
Ye Chen and Jiang Yao, both supreme talents amongst those who entered the ancient tomb, already had extraordinary combat abilities. After acquiring treasures from the droplet of heritage, they were further empowered like tigers gaining wings. Together, even when facing the Rotating Pill level Eight-legged Giant Spider, they did not fall into a disadvantage.
Seeing that Ye Chen and Jiang Yao had swiftly severed all the webbings that wrapped around them, the Eight-legged Giant Spider roared and pounced towards Jiang Yao among the two of them.
"Whoosh!"
Seeing the Eight-legged Giant Spider, with the strength of the Rotating Pill Realm, attack Jiang Yao, Ye Chen's expression changed.
They could handle the webbing, but facing a real Rotating Pill level Eight-legged Giant Spider in direct combat was immensely dangerous.
Of course, Ye Chen wouldn't let Jiang Yao face such danger alone.
With a quick focus of his mind, the "Crimson Fire" flying sword slashed directly in front of the Eight-legged Giant Spider, and at the same time, with a light tap of his finger, a huge blue flower shot towards the Giant Spider.
This enormous blue flower, like a bunch of blue flames in full blaze, was actually the King of Earth Fragrance Flowers that Ye Chen had obtained back on the Fourth Sea Island!
Ye Chen remembered that a warrior who had recognized this flower said it had remarkable effects on Rotating Pill level Demon Kings, capable of weakening the combat power of a Demon King somewhat. Now, faced with the assault from this Eight-legged Giant Spider, Ye Chen directly utilized the King of Earth Fragrance Flowers.
"Buzz!"
As soon as the King of Earth Fragrance Flowers flew out and sensed the presence of the Eight-legged Giant Spider, it shook on its own, and a fragrant aroma immediately enveloped the giant spider.