Chapter 82: Special Exam (9)
In the dim subway station, Su Chen looked at the swarm of parasitic spiders rushing in like a tide and chose not to use swordsmanship or magical powers.
Instead, he took out a stack of talismans from his storage bag and threw them out.
Talisman: Red Flame Talisman!
In the next second, a series of explosions erupted in the otherwise quiet underground space.
The shock waves and flames generated by the explosions instantly engulfed a large number of parasitic spiders in the passage.
The flames also burned the surrounding spider webs, causing secondary damage to many parasitic spiders.
Soon, a massive amount of experience value notifications scrolled like a stream of spam messages on Su Chen's panel.
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[You killed a Nine Nether Parasitic Spider (not upgraded) and gained 0.5 experience points...]
[You killed a Nine Nether Parasitic Spider (not upgraded) and gained 0.5 experience points...]
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For Su Chen, dealing with these parasitic spiders, which resembled minions, was not a difficult task.
Using swordsmanship or magical powers would feel wasteful in terms of spiritual energy.
It was more cost-effective to use talismans.
After all, he could save a lot of spiritual energy and preserve his strength for any Foundation Establishment Stage evil creatures that might arrive later.
Additionally, it would not affect his monster-killing efficiency too much.
Anyway, these talismans could not be taken away, so they were best used. Su Chen did not feel regret about it at all.
However, although these red flame talismans were powerful, they were only effective against those parasitic spiders that were not of the highest level.
For the spider-faced men, who already possessed human traits, the talismans were somewhat lacking.
More than a dozen spider-faced men who managed to survive the red flame talismans rushed through the raging fire toward Su Chen.
In response, Su Chen walked toward them calmly.
Puff...
With the interplay of light and shadow, every time Su Chen passed by a spider-faced man, a cold light flashed across their bodies.
Every time a flash of cold light disappeared, the spider-faced man's head would suddenly fall to the ground, leaving a headless corpse.
Su Chen drew his sword so quickly that onlookers couldn't even tell he had drawn it; they would just think he was taking a casual stroll in the passage.
Faced with such terrifying swordsmanship, the dozen or so spider-faced men who had escaped the wall of fire could only close in within five steps of Su Chen before they could advance no further.
After dispatching all the evil creatures in the immediate area, Su Chen looked deeper into the subway and walked straight forward.
He had seen many parasitic spiders and spider-faced men in the passages farther away.
The subway passage that originally belonged to Yushan City now seemed to have completely become a lair for these Nine Nether evil creatures.
Throughout the rest of the journey, whenever Su Chen encountered a large number of parasitic spiders, he used talismans to dispatch them.
If a spider-faced man appeared, he countered with his Traceless Sword Technique.
This approach not only saved time and effort but proved to be highly efficient.
Soon he gained a substantial amount of experience points.
Five minutes later, after traversing about 500 meters of subway passage, he arrived at the entrance of a huge, empty subway station.
The subway station entrance was covered with spider webs, and huge spider cocoons as tall as a person were visible everywhere.
There were at least hundreds of these spider cocoons.
Su Chen looked at the cocoons, and his pupils instantly turned into lotus shapes.
The next second, the tightly wrapped spider cocoons appeared transparent to his eyes.
Looking at the humans who were nearly parasitized in the cocoons, Su Chen frowned.
Although this was just an exam, he knew that what he was seeing was real.
So his mood was somewhat fluctuating.
Just when he was about to kill with one sword those who had not yet completed their transformation,
A seductive, mature woman's voice came from the stairs of the nearby subway station.
"Hey, handsome boy, what are you going to do with my family?"
Su Chen turned his head and looked toward the subway staircase. A pair of white legs in red high heels suddenly appeared in his line of sight.
Soon, a beautiful lady wearing a black backless dress with a pretty face and voluptuous figure emerged from the stairs.
Her elegant and noble posture resembled that of someone attending a high-class party.
She seemed entirely out of place in the dim and dirty environment of the subway station.
What attracted attention most was her alluring feet and the white spider pattern tattooed on her majestic chest.
The spider's eight legs continued to grow and spread deep into her clothes, making people subconsciously curious to uncover the mystery.
The beautiful lady crossed her arms and looked at Su Chen with a smile on her face.
She joked, "What's wrong, little handsome boy? Could it be that you are also attracted by my appearance?"
While teasing Su Chen, she seductively pulled at the hem of her loose dress, as if she wanted to show him something.
If it had been a guy who had never seen a beautiful woman, he might have been stirred by her words and blushed.
But for Su Chen, who had lived two lives as a human and was an experienced 'old driver' in his previous life, having watched countless movies, her so-called teasing was just a small scene.
After all, Su Chen had seen far more tempting scenes than this before and had long been immune to them.
Thus, he was not affected by the actions of this beautiful lady but instead employed the perspective function of the Green Lotus Pupil to see through her essence at once.
On the lady's head, Su Chen saw a white spider with eight curled-up legs.
If the spider were to open up, the lady's face would instantly transform into an ugly and grotesque spider face.
What stood before him was not a beautiful lady at all, but a spider monster in human skin!
However, although the lady's face was fake, her figure was real...
If you removed that disturbing spider head and left only this graceful figure, then this beautiful lady was indeed quite appealing.
This was an objective evaluation made by Su Chen after careful observation with his Green Lotus Pupil; it was not subjective at all and was very authentic.
Just when Su Chen encountered the beautiful lady, the teachers in the conference room suddenly broke out in a sweat.
A teacher from No. 3 High School swallowed hard and said awkwardly, "Do you think Student Su will fall for the white-faced spider's trick like the students in previous classes?"
Hearing this, the other teachers around him cast strange looks in his direction.
They knew very well what becoming infected meant, as the teachers at No. 3 High School had clearly stated.
After all, in previous years' joint examinations, only two evil creatures in the Foundation Establishment Stage were deemed 'candidate killers.'
One was the jade-faced mantis that Su Chen had encountered earlier.
This creature's amazing speed had caused many candidates to be eliminated before they could even react.
The other was the white-faced spider that Su Chen was now facing.
Two candidates considered to be killer threats were right in front of him.
They didn't know whether he was unlucky or lucky.
The reason the White-Faced Spider was known as the candidate killer was not because of her strong strength but rather because she was too alluring for male students. Many male students preferred to be eliminated by her than to fight.
Every time this occurred, the teacher who controlled the exam screen in the background would always specially cut off the elimination screen.
From what they had seen in Su Chen's previous battle with the jade-faced mantis, he still had a significant chance of winning against the white-faced spider.
The scary thing was that Su Chen was not focused and made some common mistakes that all men tended to make...
So they watched as the white-faced spider approached Su Chen, walking with cat-like stealth, drawing ever closer.
The teachers in the conference room secretly worried for him.
"Student Su, please don't let us down."
"It would be embarrassing if you were eliminated early in some incomprehensible way."
In the subway station, the white-faced spider walked within ten steps of Su Chen and finally stopped.
She gazed greedily at Su Chen's handsome face and licked her bright red lips teasingly.
"Handsome boy, do you think I am pretty?"
As she spoke, the white-faced spider pulled the lower part of her dress open a little further.
The slit of the dress reached above her knees.
If it went any higher, it would violate the standards of the examination screen.
Fortunately, the white-faced spider seemed to know how to gauge the situation and halted at the critical point.
Although she thought she had displayed enough charm,
Su Chen on the opposite side appeared as if he had seen nothing.
Not only was his expression calm, but his body also showed no reaction at all.
However, this did not make the white-faced spider doubt her allure.
After all, she had proven on hundreds of prey that her charm was unmatched!
Thus, in her opinion, there could only be one reason for Su Chen's calm demeanor.
That was because he may not be interested in women.
Thinking of this, the white-faced spider became even more intrigued by Su Chen.
Just when she was about to take action, capture Su Chen by force, and perform an act that everyone would enjoy watching,
Su Chen, who had been silent all this time, finally spoke.
"Was it the same scene before you devoured those people?"
The white-faced spider was momentarily stunned before she covered her mouth and laughed sweetly. "Of course! After all, to use the words of your race, they are dying under the peony flowers, and even as ghosts, they are still romantic. Sex is a knife that scrapes your bones, isn't it?"
"Don't worry, little handsome boy, you will be like them soon."
In response, Su Chen placed his hand on the hilt of the sword at his waist and said calmly, "While 'sex' may scrape bones, my bones may be much harder than you think."
Hearing this, the white-faced spider tilted her head and said, "Don't be so confident, little handsome boy."
"I hope that by then, not only your bones but other parts of your body will be harder than I thought. Otherwise... I will be disappointed."
As soon as her words fell, the white-faced spider rushed toward Su Chen.
During her sprint, she raised her jade foot in red high heels and kicked towards Su Chen's face.
Bang!
Su Chen swung his sword and struck the white-faced spider's jade foot directly.
But this sword did not feel like it was cutting flesh and blood and instead made a crisp metallic sound.
Su Chen was not surprised by this.
It was just like the jade mantis evolving its arms into exclusive weapons.
The evolutionary organ chosen by the white-faced spider after her evolution was a pair of jade feet.
So even though this pair of jade feet looked very tempting, a kick from her could be fatal.
Bang, bang, bang!
In the dim underground space, there was a series of explosions, and countless sparks erupted.
The white-faced spider's jade feet transformed into unclear afterimages and kept kicking toward Su Chen's vital points.
Each kick was not only incredibly fast but also extremely powerful.
Su Chen held the sword in one hand, forming a tight sword barrier in front of himself, constantly resisting her attacks.
As Su Chen blocked her series of attacks, the smile on the white-faced spider's face gradually diminished, and her expression became serious.
This kid doesn't seem that simple.
At first, when she discovered that Su Chen was just a cultivator in the Qi Gathering Stage, she felt that he posed no threat to her.
Moreover, she was quite attracted to his looks.
This is why she ignored the Gold-Eating Ant's warnings and came to this underground passage alone to look for Su Chen, the interesting and delicious prey.
However, after this initial face-to-face encounter, the white-faced spider found that she had underestimated Su Chen.
With his level of swordsmanship, could this be something a cultivator in the Qi Gathering Stage could achieve?
Although the white-faced spider was surprised, she still did not associate Su Chen with the mysterious cultivator who had killed previous opponents, like the jade-faced mantis.
Because, in her memory, she had never seen or heard of a Qi Gathering Stage cultivator defeating a Foundation Establishment Stage cultivator.
Therefore, although she felt that Su Chen was a bit troublesome at this moment, she still did not consider fleeing.
She had the advantage, so why would she run?
Perhaps feeling that the stalemate was not a solution, the white-faced spider's jade feet suddenly shed their disguised human skin and transformed completely into sharp leg knives.
Then she supported herself with both hands on the ground and suddenly kicked toward Su Chen at a tricky and unpredictable angle.
After the two figures crossed each other, they halted temporarily.
The white-faced spider stood on one leg, with her right leg half bent and raised.
The special leg knife below her thigh turned into a sharp blade, emitting a cold light in the dim underground passage.
A trickle of blood dripped from the tip of the raised leg knife onto the wet ground in the passage.
Looking at Su Chen, now with a small wound on his cheek, the white-faced spider jokingly remarked, "Handsome boy, it seems that your bones are not hard enough."
"If this is all you have, little handsome boy, then I, your elder sister, will have to teach you well."
What she intended to teach was self-evident.
Although her leg knife had lightly scratched Su Chen's cheek,
He maintained a blank expression on his face and didn't seem to be affected at all.
He looked like a piece of emotionless wood.
His lotus-shaped pupils kept shifting, staring at the white-faced spider's two jade legs.
When the white-faced spider noticed this, she deemed it was her charm at work.
So she spoke in a charming voice, "So you like this, handsome boy? Why didn't you tell me earlier? If you had told me earlier, I might have let you play with it."
Su Chen did not reply but simply continued to look calmly at her blade-like legs.
Although the white-faced spider mentioned it lightly, she instinctively sensed that something was off.
This guy kept staring at her legs; it appeared that it was not solely due to some special allure but for some other purpose...
Thinking of this, the white-faced spider decided not to play with Su Chen anymore.
Because she was beginning to feel uneasy.
It was simply because Su Chen appeared too calm.
When this happens, there is only one indication.
That is, he believes he has not yet reached a desperate situation, and everything is currently under his control.
This was undeniably a very bad signal for the white-faced spider.
Because this meant Su Chen might possess some hidden cards she was unaware of.
As soon as this thought crossed her mind, her muscles began to tense up as she prepared to accumulate strength.
"Little handsome boy, your sister has limited time, so I won't play with you anymore."
"After I cut off your limbs and bring them back, I will have some real fun with you."
As soon as the words fell, the white-faced spider attacked Su Chen again.
This time, her speed was double what it had been before.
Ding ding ding...
When the white-faced spider got serious, the intensity of the fight between the two escalated.
But what shocked the white-faced spider was that despite her efforts, she still couldn't overcome Su Chen.
As she accelerated her leg techniques, Su Chen's sword skills also became faster.
Something is off. Something is very off.
This guy is not an ordinary Qi Gathering Stage cultivator!
Just as the white-faced spider was caught by surprise, Su Chen deflected her jade feet with his sword.
Then he turned around, raised his right leg, and kicked her in the face.
Due to the suddenness of the attack and the precise timing of Su Chen's kick,
The white-faced spider could only turn her head to avoid the blow.
Even so, the strong wind from the kick left a long and narrow wound on her face.
The white-faced spider quickly distanced herself from Su Chen and stood not far away with her face covered, looking at him in surprise.
At this moment, Su Chen put away his magic sword for some reason, stood on one foot in the passage, and raised his right leg.
That movement resembled the attack she had executed against Su Chen just moments prior!
No, not only were their attacking capabilities similar, but even their wounds...
The white-faced spider glanced at the small wound on her right cheek.
Aside from some variations in length, the location of the wound on her cheek was identical to the wound on Su Chen's face.
Was this a coincidence, or...
The white-faced spider didn't dare to think about it too much, as the possibility was too horrifying.
However, one thing the white-faced spider was certain of was that Su Chen seemed to have learned her leg techniques in just a few exchanges.
There was undoubtedly something wrong with this human!
Thinking of this, the white-faced spider's entire mentality shifted.
This was not a prey that could be toyed with, but rather a formidable opponent that required her full effort!
Just as the white-faced spider changed her mindset,
On the other side, Su Chen maintained the leg technique for a moment, then silently lowered his foot and drew out his sword again.
After all, although the white-faced spider's leg skills were impressive, they still did not surpass his swordplay.
At best, they could only serve as an auxiliary means.
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[Foot Blade Technique (Special Skill)]
[Effect: Part of the knife/sword skills can be performed by leg techniques.]
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"Human boy, you have succeeded in provoking me."
As she spoke, the white-faced spider's head suddenly split open, and a hideous white jade spider head replaced the charming face of the noble lady.
Then she raised her hands, and countless transparent spider silks, invisible to the naked eye, began to emit from her fingers.
These silks quickly enveloped most of her body, as if an invisible net had trapped her and Su Chen.
In response, Su Chen looked on curiously, with no intention of stopping her.
Having done all this, the white-faced spider may have felt that she was on the verge of victory.
She confidently declared, "Even if you can learn my leg knife, can you learn this?"
Su Chen examined the mysterious black lines appearing on the surface of the white-faced spider and then looked at the transparent spider silk spreading throughout the area.
After a moment of silence, he suddenly smiled.
This smile rendered the white-faced spider nearly breathless.
No, this is a special ability unique to her. Don't tell her that he can learn it too.
He can't be a spider too!
Seeing the nervous expression on the white-faced spider's face, Su Chen seemed to have guessed her thoughts and said calmly, "I'm not a spider, so I really can't learn this."
"Call..."
As soon as he spoke these words, the white-faced spider breathed a sigh of relief.
If Su Chen could learn all this, then she wouldn't know what to do.
But Su Chen's next statement shocked the white-faced spider so much that her pupils constricted.
"I can't learn it... but I should be able to imitate it."
As he spoke, Su Chen's green lotus pupils began to emit a faint emerald green light.
Then a large number of lines began to form at the corners of his eyes and eventually spread across his entire body.
In the next second, countless spiritual threads similar to spider silk were released from Su Chen's body, occupying the positions of many spider silk lines that originally belonged to the white-faced spider.
Seeing this, the white-faced spider was so shocked that she was rendered speechless.
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