The scene before them was so unexpected, that Jin Shu didn't even have time to wonder why Li Xue had brought her gun into the pool.

Click! Click! Click!

Her gun ran dry, the Vector coughing uselessly as she dumped the last of her rounds into the creatures spilling from the forest. She fumbled with the magazine, tugging at it without hitting the release. Not that it mattered—her storage pouch with her spare mags was hanging from the same tree as her soaked robes.

Jin Shu shuddered, skin crawling as black-and-red spiders surged out of the treeline by the dozen. The five or six Li Xue had shredded lay scattered across the ground, severed limbs twitching, neon-green ichor dripping from bushes and rocks. Each spider stood over a meter tall, their barbed legs glinting sharp enough to shear flesh like paper. On their broad backs writhed patterns of twisted red faces—demonic, leering, alive.

"Spiders…?" he muttered absently. "I hate spiders."

"Demonic wood spiders," Biyu whispered from behind him, trembling. "They shouldn't be down here."

He had no time to ask what she meant. The swarm closed on the hot spring, Li Xue still fumbling with her weapon, fear written across her pale face. Of the group, only Yin'er, Ji Ji, Tian Li, and himself kept their composure. He was mildly surprised by Tian Li's calm, but not by the other two. One was a bird—an insect's natural bane—and the other… Well, she was Yin'er.

"Out of the water!" Jin Shu barked. "Get to the far shore!"

Li Xue hesitated, eyes wide with terror, Tian Li swam to her and dragged her away through the water. The same couldn't be said for the little ones. With a burst of light, they streaked forward as gold and silver beams of destruction, cleaving spiders in half wherever they passed.

"Call them back!" Biyu cried. "Spiders like these don't fear flying foes!"

Her warning proved true a heartbeat later. The surviving spiders reared back, spitting thick white strands. Ji Ji and Yin'er twisted through the air, dodging frantically, but their blazing forms faltered, speed bleeding away until they hovered sluggishly above the battlefield.

Bang! Bang!

Jin Shu leveled his Desert Eagle and fired into the swarm. The deafening cracks and sudden deaths pulled their attention—most of it, at least—toward him.

"Yin'er! Ji Ji! Retreat!" he shouted.

This time, they obeyed, wings beating furiously as they darted back to safety.

With everyone clear, Jin Shu finally had a moment to think.

Li Xue sat frozen, trembling uselessly in Tian Li's arms by the spring. Biyu stood behind him, shaking nearly as hard—both of them paralyzed by fear of the spiders. The little ones were safe for now, but with the air clogged by sticky webs, they'd be more hindrance than help.

His eyes twitched. He'd have to hold the line alone until the others pulled themselves together. Tian Li could fight, but only if he got her free of Li Xue first.

"Biyu, take care of Li Xue and the girls," he said, never taking his gaze off the tide of spiders spilling from the trees.

Her trembling hand slipped away from his back. "O-okay," she stammered.

"Tian Li, back me up!" He swapped his Desert Eagle for his shotgun.

"Wait—!"

Boom!

The shotgun roared, belching flame. A blazing wave engulfed the webs—and the spiders lurking behind them.

"—they're fire attribute beasts!" Biyu cried a heartbeat too late.

The flames clung to their bodies, yet the spiders only chirped in delight, barbs glittering in the firelight.

"Fire strengthens them," Biyu explained weakly. "So Tian Li and I… can't help."

Jin Shu blinked, cursing himself. He should have asked before firing.

"Didn't you call them wood spiders?"

"Yes. Because they live in the demonic woods—"

"Which genius thought that was a good name?!" he snapped.

Grinding his teeth, he risked a glance back at Biyu and Tian Li. "You two only have fire techniques?"

"No. We can fight at close range," Biyu admitted, "but that's suicide. Their webs turn impervious once they're lit."

A headache pulsed at his temple. He'd completely screwed himself.

"Your guns?"

"Over there…" Tian Li pointed at the robes hanging from the trees—on the spiders' side.

At least the flames hadn't reached them yet. If anything, the heat was speeding up the drying, though that did little good now.

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The spiders ignored them for the moment, too busy spreading their fire-fed webs. The glowing strands crawled outward, sealing the clearing in a burning cage.

He needed a new plan—fast.

Assault rifle? He'd given it to Biyu. Shotgun? Only fire rounds, pepper spray, and rubbers. Worthless. Desert Eagle? Reliable, but just seven rounds a mag.

Wait… I made another SMG!

His heart kicked. Diving into his space earring with his mind, he found one of the weapons he'd crafted back when Liu Hua kidnapped him—an MP7. Only one thirty-round magazine, but it would have to do.

Setting the fire selector to single, he leveled the MP7—then paused. Stepping back, he shoved the Desert Eagle and two spare mags into Tian Li's hands.

"Use the silence formation so you don't draw more attention. Watch the recoil—it kicks like a mule," he warned, eyes still on the swarm. "And don't shoot me."

Then he did something very stupid.

Instead of falling back to find cover, he stepped toward the tide of spiders. Retreat meant breaking through the flaming webs he himself had created—supposedly impervious once lit. That option was gone. Which left only one role: bait.

The swarm spread, surrounding him in a half-circle. Most fixed on the women behind him, saliva hissing as it dripped from their razor maws.

Bang!

One shot echoed, two spiders fell—one from his MP7, the other from Tian Li's Desert Eagle.

He flinched at a startled yelp from behind. Glancing back, he saw Tian Li drop the pistol, lip split and bleeding from the recoil. She wasn't out of the fight, but she'd learned the hard way what his warning meant.

No time to worry.

The whistle of something slicing air snapped his attention forward again.

He rolled hard, just missing a spear-like barbed leg that gouged the earth where he'd stood.

Bang!

Half crouched, he blew its head apart from below. Neon-green ichor drenched him head to toe, stinging cold against his skin.

"I hate spiders!" he snarled.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Three more dropped in rapid succession.

Thud!

The ground trembled as a fifth collapsed behind him—already headless.

Bang!

Another fell, and another. By his twelfth kill, his breath hitched. A sudden weakness flooded him.

"Your qi is dangerously low," Nano warned.

Every pull of the trigger demanded a thread of qi to spark the weapon's runes. With only the meridians in his right arm filled—barely a percent of his total—it drained faster than he'd accounted for.

"I'll flood your meridians," Nano urged.

"Don't!" Jin Shu snapped. "My qi is your brain. If you push it, you'll burn out, dying for real. I will replenish fast enough—I can make it work… somehow."

Another barbed leg slashed down. He rolled again, but not cleanly—its tip ripped open his thigh. Pain lanced through him, hot and wet.

"Shuang," he hissed between clenched teeth. "You've been studying martial techniques. Tell me you've got something before I bleed out."

"I've staunched the wound," Nano cut in quickly.

"I can't explain in time," Shuang's voice pressed, urgent. "Let me take over."

Jin Shu didn't hesitate. His soul slipped free, plunging back into the soul space—where Shuang stepped forward to take his place.

His entire demeanor shifted. The forced calm Jin Shu carried gave way to a seamless stillness—an aura of oneness, as if a martial master had stepped into sudden enlightenment.

Spiders swarmed in by the dozens, spitting threads in an effort to bind him. Yet with the faintest motions—a tilt of his shoulder, a step half a beat early—he slipped past every strike without needing to even look.

The sight drove the creatures into a frenzy. A piercing screech split the forest, and the swarm surged. They abandoned the women, directing every leg, fang, and strand of silk toward him. In seconds, he stood ringed by a writhing sea of grotesque, human-eating spiders.

And still—not a claw, fang, or web touched him. Their wild strikes shredded the ground into a cratered mess, yet his body remained untouched, flowing like water through every gap.

All his martial knowledge—drawn from Earth, from this world, from three lives—melded together, infused with the elemental currents around him, forming something wholly new. This wasn't mere evasion.

Wind rose at his heels, churning into a mist laced with black and white lightning. Every step cracked like thunder, the sound of a storm made flesh, as if a thunder god had descended among mortals.

For the first time, the spiders recoiled. The red demonic faces etched across their backs warped, shifting from menace into raw, twisted fear.

He advanced. Mist, wind, and lightning swirled with his every breath. Raising the MP7, he squeezed the trigger.

The bullet leapt forth wrapped in elemental fury, its form a spearpoint forged of storm. It tore through the clustered horde like a raging bull. Lightning danced across their bodies, locking them in place as the winds pulled their jagged legs into a spiraling cyclone.

A dozen spiders shredded into pieces, their limbs turned into blades, their death cries drowned beneath the howl of the storm.