The thick, humid mist at the edge of the nesting grounds swirled violently as a massive troupe of figures began to break through the dense foliage. The sound of heavy leather boots, clanking iron armor, and coarse, undisciplined laughter completely shattered the quiet of the valley.

It was a sprawling, chaotic coalition of frontier mercenaries—a rough, battle-hardened mix of men and women who lived entirely on the fringes of the law.

Near the center of the marching vanguard, two heavily bearded thugs with crude iron axes slung over their shoulders were openly groping and manhandling a young canine demi-human girl. The girl, possessing soft dog ears and a twitching furry tail, was purring softly, deliberately flashing a provocative smile and using her sultry charms to keep the brute enforcers wrapped around her fingers so they would protect her if a beast attacked.

A few paces behind them, a massive bovine demi-human woman watched the display with deep, silent contempt. Unlike the canine girl, this minotaur-kin possessed a heavy, unappealing jawline, thick horns, and a bulky, muscular frame that the male mercenaries found utterly unattractive. To them, she wasn’t a woman; she was a simple beast of burden, her broad back forced to carry a staggering mountain of iron crates, heavy ropes, and siege supplies like a common pack cow.

At the absolute front of the massive column stood a terrifyingly large man. He was completely bald, a thick leather patch covering his left eye, and he effortlessly carried a massive, jagged greatsword across his broad shoulders. He took a deep pull from a skin of cheap liquor before spitting into the mud.

"Shut the fuck up, all of you!" the one-eyed leader roared, his deep, gravelly voice instantly silencing the chatter behind him. "We are officially entering the inner territory of the Web Spiders. These eight-legged bastards are a massive, toxic pain in the ass, but their silk is worth an absolute fortune on the black market. Yesterday, some unknown monster beat us to the punch and completely cleaned out the Mist Monkey troop before we could even deploy our scouts! We cannot afford another failure. These are the absolute final days before the inner-province elites arrive for the grand admission exam. Once those wealthy young geniuses touch down, their factions will completely sweep the entire mountain ridge to harvest extra points for their evaluations. There won’t be a single scrap left for trash like us!"

"Huuu! Haaa!"

A roaring, synchronized war cry erupted from the throats of the surrounding mercenaries, their faces twisting into expressions of pure, greedy excitement.

They had meticulously prepared for over three months, investing every shred of their liquid capital to orchestrate a massive assault on the Mist Monkey valley, only for a mysterious phantom to completely annihilate the troop and steal the harvest out from under them the previous afternoon. Driven by desperation and fury, they had pivoted their entire force toward the spider nests.

They hadn’t come underprepared. Scattered across the column were heavy ballistas, iron-reinforced nets, and specialized anti-beast equipment. The front-line leaders held thick stacks of glowing, high-grade explosive talismans alongside expensive spiritual prison matrices designed to lock down a beast’s meridians. To ensure absolute victory against the spider matriarch, they hadn’t just relied on their own crew—they had aggressively pooled their resources, uniting over eight independent mercenary factions.

There were over two hundred heavily armed, bloodthirsty cultivators marching through the fog, completely prepared to lay total siege to the spider nest.

The massive, two-hundred-man column finally crested the muddy ridge, their weapons drawn and their explosive talismans primed for an absolute bloodbath.

"Get the spiritual prison arrays ready!" the one-eyed leader roared, swinging his massive greatsword forward. "Front line, fan out! Don’t let the elite spiders get the jump on—"

The giant stopped mid-sentence. His single eye widened to the absolute physical limit, the leather patch on his left eye twitching violently. Behind him, the chaotic roar of the two hundred mercenaries suddenly died out, replaced by a heavy, suffocating silence that swept through the ranks like a plague.

The entire valley floor was a literal graveyard.

"What in the name of the gods..." a bearded thug muttered, his iron axe slipping an inch from his grip.

"No... no, no, no!" the one-eyed leader suddenly bellowed, his face twisting into a mask of pure, frantic rage as he sprinted forward into the clearing. "Charge, you bastards! Charge! Someone is already here! We cannot let them beat us to the queen! If they steal the matriarch’s silk, we are completely ruined! Move!"

Driven by panic and greed, the massive horde came pouring down the slope, their boots splashing through the mud as they prepared to engage whatever rival faction had dared to steal their target.

But as they advanced deeper along the trail, their frantic sprint naturally began to slow down. The initial fury in their chests rapidly cooled, replaced by a cold, creeping sensation of pure, instinctual dread. The mercenaries stopped running entirely, their weapons lowering as they began to advance with agonizing slowness, their eyes darting around the forest in absolute bewilderment.

They were terrified.

This wasn’t a clash between two rival factions. There were no signs of a grand battlefield, no human corpses, no shattered shields, and no residual traces of a massive army’s formation arrays. There was only a single, perfectly straight line of absolute extermination.

Every single Spiritual Web Spider along the path had been completely, flawlessly annihilated. Their massive carapaces weren’t smashed by heavy warhammers or pierced by ballista bolts; they were cleanly bisected into identical halves, as if the iron-hard chitin had simply offered no resistance at all. More horrifyingly, every single carcass had been meticulously plundered. Their compound eyes were gone, their venomous stingers were severed, their razor-sharp mandibles were pried loose, and their massive abdomens were cleanly sliced wide open from throat to spinneret, entirely drained of their precious silver silk.

"Hey... come look at this..."

-------------------

From this moment forward, to avoid confusion regarding cultivation ranks, I will include this footer with the current established levels.

Note: These are only the ranks mentioned so far to avoid spoilers.

Body Refinement Realm

Skin Refinement / Bone Refinement / Organ Refinement

Spiritual Gathering Realm

Spiritual Perception / Spiritual Mist / Spiritual Condensation

Spiritual Core Realm

Core Solidification / Core Awakening / Spiritual Collapse (Half-step Spiritual Core)

Spiritual Soul Realm

Spiritual Soul Awakening / Soul Nourishing / Soul-Core Fusion

Golden Core Realm

Prime Fusion / Core Perfection / Core Destruction

Spiritual Sea Realm 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

Dao Manifestation Realm

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??

Spiritual Transcendence

Stage 1 ?? / Stage 2 ?? / Stage 3 ??