At the high cliff above the Radiant Thunder Pool.

Perfected Master Lingxi drew out a formation-plate and held it. It was a birthday gift Junior Brother Tong had once given her.

Looking at the plate, her eyes reddened again.

She rubbed them hard, cast aside the stray thoughts, and hesitated over whether to lay a formation and make some preparations before the lion returned.

Perfected Master Lingxi had never once imagined she could be reduced to such helplessness before a small demon whose cultivation was far beneath her own.

In the past, she'd have simply struck out with a palm long ago.

Yet it was precisely such a palm-strike that had brought about an outcome no longer possible to salvage.

And in that very instant, while her mind wandered—

a mocking voice sounded abruptly from behind her.

"Who are you waiting for?"

"..."

Perfected Master Lingxi's heart stopped dead. She whipped her head around in terror — and saw an immensely imposing figure.

Those brilliant golden eyes were watching her quietly.

And there, beside the lion, an enormous shadowy-black spider was likewise staring at her with its dense, teeming multitude of eyes — cutting off, unmistakably, every route of retreat.

In the next instant, that spear-like spider-limb stabbed out and shattered the formation-plate in her hand.

The Nether-Gloom Spider Emperor shot Shen Yi a look of displeasure.

This stupid pig, so thoroughly steeped in demon habits, might as well have been cast from the same mold as that tigress.

They could plainly have ambushed her.

Yet before making a move, it simply had to run its mouth a couple of times, as though it couldn't display its own majesty otherwise.

Never mind...

The Nether-Gloom Spider Emperor slowly propped up its body. At least, before revealing itself, it had swept the surroundings warily and confirmed there was no ambush.

And looking at the unfeigned terror on Perfected Master Lingxi's grimy face — she was even more pitiable than the Gold-Winged Demon Emperor had described.

Ambush or no ambush, it seemed to make little difference.

"Why."

Perfected Master Lingxi murmured woodenly to…