The silent journey within the rock wall lasted about half a stick of incense.

But for the group, that half-stick of incense felt as long as half a century.

Even though the talismans eliminated the heat, the narrow, winding passage within the rock wall was suffocating, its stale, oppressive air making it hard to breathe. The pure, lightless darkness was deeply unsettling.

It felt as if the rock walls could close in at any moment, trapping them here forever. Or as if a terrifying demon might leap out from the dark corner ahead and drag them away.

Seagull and Flying Knife were especially on edge—even though they were in the very center of the formation, they still felt a creeping dread with every step.

"God, this is terrifying," Flying Knife murmured. "And we're getting closer to that giant spider demon, right? What if it's set up some kind of trap?"

"It won't, good sir. Not only is this passage newly formed, giving it no time to prepare," Mystic Cloud Master's voice came from the front of the line, "but this place is also at the boundary of the talisman formation, where the talismans are densest. It's just been overlaid with my new formation. With both the old and new formations overlapping, even if it had any traps or countermeasures here, the talismans would have already detected and cleared them."

"Don't forget, this formation was set up to seal and imprison it. If it could break out so easily, wouldn't that be a problem?"

The old Taoist's explanation gave Flying Knife a temporary reprieve.

But he didn't relax for long. A faint sound from behind made him tense up again.

"Crunch, crunch..."

The faint sound came, like some creature chewing and swallowing.

And though the chewing was soft, it was very clear, as if it were coming from just behind them.

"What's that noise?" Flying Knife said, panicked.

Seagull, behind him, also heard it.

"It sounds like something's chewing on something..."

Seagull's voice was trembling, sounding even more terrified than Flying Knife.

Snowy Owl and High Mountain turned around.

"What are you two talking about?" Snowy Owl said, annoyed. "Don't scare yourselves!"

High Mountain spoke calmly: "This is the interior of a freshly cracked rock wall, and it's so hot... It's perfectly normal to hear rocks breaking and debris falling."

"No, no, no, that's definitely not rock sounds. That's chewing—I even heard swallowing!"

Flying Knife said it with conviction, his voice growing more fearful: "What if it's some demon chewing on a person's finger or something?"

Hearing Flying Knife's panicked words, Seagull got even more scared.

"Bro, bros, please don't say stuff like that! This is a talisman formation space, where would a demon even come from?"

And then...

"Gulp!"

A clear swallowing sound echoed. Now even High Mountain and Snowy Owl heard it.

"What the hell is that?! Those of you at the back, did you hear that?"

Li Nian, who was responsible for the rear guard, spoke up.

"I heard it..."

But after saying just those three words, she couldn't hold it in anymore and burst out laughing: "Hahahahaha! Sister Yao, look how scared you got them!"

After Li Nian spoke, Lin Yu's calm voice came from the back.

"Ah, sorry. I was really hungry from all the physical exertion, so I was eating something just now."

"Sorry, I only brought my own share."

Hearing Lin Yu's explanation, High Mountain and Snowy Owl could only shake their heads helplessly.

"Look at you two... When you hear the sound of eating, shouldn't the first thing that comes to mind be your teammates behind you?" Snowy Owl said, exasperated. "Why do you always have to think about something terrifying?"

At Snowy Owl's words, Seagull weakly defended himself: "Well... this claustrophobic atmosphere is just too terrifying, so I misjudged."

"Besides, the two in the back didn't warn me—you could've said something."

"How was I supposed to know I'd need to announce that?" Li Nian said with a grin. "Of course, honestly, I was just enjoying watching you two freak out too much."

Lin Yu calmly responded: "I was eating. My mouth was full; I couldn't spare the breath to talk."

Seagull and Flying Knife were both at a loss for words.

And Lin Yu had, of course, done it on purpose.

While part of the reason he was eating was to replenish his energy, the other reason was... to stack up some buffs before entering the boss room.

The [Banquet Pendant] given by the Banquet God couldn't be wasted. Unfortunately, the [Reusable Flavor Papers] had already been turned in at Sanyang's place, so Lin Yu was eating [Chate's Supplies] instead.

The quantity and quality of [Chate's Supplies] food were limited, so to activate the buffs, Lin Yu had to rely on another trait of the item.

It could collect surrounding "fear emotions" to charge up and convert into new food.

So, from the moment he started chewing that first biscuit, he was already making use of this trait.

The more he chewed, the more scared the two cowardly ones ahead got. And the more scared they got, the more new food he could generate.

In the end...

After eating eight biscuits, Lin Yu was lucky enough to trigger a new, two-hour buff.

[Firm and Dense: Slightly increases your overall density and toughness, making you heavier, more durable, and more energetic.]

It was a common physical enhancement buff, and the increase wasn't huge. Since it wasn't particularly useful by itself but was the most-needed buff right now for boosting combat ability and survivability, Lin Yu decided not to store it in the [Bliss Immortal Pot] as Immortal Brew. Instead, he just kept it active.

Lin Yu could feel the actual boost—around ten percent.

But... considering the massive baseline of his current vitality and physical strength after stacking all his other buffs, that ten percent was actually quite significant.

"Anyway, not bad."

Lin Yu was satisfied with the result and put away [Chate's Supplies].

And this little incident wasn't without benefit for the two "victims," Seagull and Flying Knife.

At least for them, getting so scared only to find out it was something mundane actually made them feel less afraid.

Soon, they reached the end of the rock passage—around a bend, faint light and the sound of bubbling lava signaled that another runic space was just ahead.

"We're here... Everyone, please be careful!"

The old Taoist, Mystic Cloud Master, said in a low voice, and then...

The group carefully filed out of the rock wall!

The magma-lit, half-lit underground space unfolded before them. In the distance, the ancient, pitch-black shadow of the Willow Town ruins stood, with a giant spider demon perched on top of it.

Seeing a demon as massive as a mountain in plain view, with spider legs as slender as pitch-black towers reaching for the sky, even Lin Yu—who had seen it before—couldn't help but feel a twinge of retreat, now that he was looking up at it from a ground-level perspective.

"I'm afraid... this won't be easy to win head-on."