Chapter 97 – The End of the Dark Green Spider

As time passed minute by minute, the Verdant Spider grew increasingly feeble. It no longer had the strength to shriek, and its bodily mucus had been completely depleted during the earlier acid orb barrage. The souls of the fanatical worshippers were nearly burned out, their spectral faces crumbling into fragmented pieces. At this stage, Punk’s victory was essentially assured.

Yet no matter how weakened the enemy appeared, Punk refused to let his guard down. He knew that alchemical creations like this often possessed some final mutually destructive measure. Until he confirmed the Verdant Spider’s complete demise and absolute incapacity to threaten him, he couldn’t afford the slightest relaxation.

The spider’s collapse accelerated rapidly. Flesh and blood solutions dripped from its body while its eight eyes grew dull and lifeless. Recognizing the monster’s impending death, Punk decided to deliver a final blow to eliminate any possibility of self-destruction.

“Pitiful worms, is this what you call power? Barely two minutes have passed.”

Punk gazed contemptuously at the immobilized spider collapsed on the ground, mercilessly delivering his final taunt to the worshippers.

Unfortunately, their souls were nearing annihilation. The remaining soul fragments could no longer comprehend Punk’s words.

“Boring trash.”

Punk shook his head without further comment. In his view, these ignorant worshippers’ fate had been sealed from the very beginning, with no alternative outcome ever possible.

“Time to end this farce!”

He began preparing a high-intensity containment spell:

Formal-Level Conjuration Spell – Energy Cage: Creates a high-strength energy barrier enveloping targets within twenty cubic meters.

Using Mind Lock, Punk targeted the ground beneath the Verdant Spider and released the Energy Cage spell.

A pale white energy field shimmering with golden runes completely enveloped the spider. Punk could confidently assert that this barrier’s strength far exceeded what the completely exhausted spider could breach – even a self-destruction wouldn’t reach him in the slightest.

Thus, the terrifying monster that once brought slaughter and death perished silently within the Energy Cage, without even a final scream.

Only after releasing three consecutive Kinetic Bursts did Punk confirm the Verdant Spider’s complete demise. He inwardly sighed with relief. Had the enemy boss joined forces with the spider, using this fearless monster as their vanguard, the battle could have turned against him. Fortunately, the enemy never got that opportunity.

With the spider destroyed, Punk hurried toward the iron door. Though his Divination Spell couldn’t provide precise information, it clearly indicated the enemy’s presence behind the door. Golem Number One had sustained considerable damage, but being deep in enemy territory left Punk no opportunity for repairs.

“How troublesome.”

Puck frowned slightly.

“The immediate priority is investigating what lies beyond that iron door, not resting here!”Worried Punk approached the iron door, but then a strange expression crossed his face. He noticed that while no warning or attack arrays were carved on the iron door, it was jointly inscribed with five or six anti-interference arrays along with the surrounding walls. Through the shielding effect of these anti-interference arrays, neither magical fluctuations nor sound could pass through to the other side of the iron door!

Only now did Punk understand why the boss behind the iron door hadn’t noticed all the commotion he’d made outside. It wasn’t because of some powerful Silence Field, but rather due to the combined effect of multiple arrays on this unremarkable iron door.

So… the question arose: why was the other party so afraid of being disturbed that they’d rather significantly reduce security by inscribing so many inward-shielding arrays?

Since the enemy hadn’t discovered him yet, Punk wasn’t in a hurry. He carefully observed the area behind the iron door.

Upon closer inspection, faint shimmering lights could occasionally be seen flashing across the unremarkable iron door. The thick door had been subtly enchanted with magic, with both the array core and energy core cleverly concealed. With his rudimentary understanding of arrays that barely scratched the surface, Punk had no chance of disassembling such arrays without leaking magical fluctuations. This indicated that the enemy took this security threshold very seriously.

Yet they only kept a group of rather weak believers and a spider that could only be considered somewhat tricky as guards on the door… almost no warning system at all!

“Wait a minute”!

Punk suddenly realized that having a warning system didn’t necessarily require installing warning arrays. Living guards were in some ways more convenient – they could provide warnings while simultaneously offering some resistance to enemies. Although they might sometimes cause more harm than good, this was still a decent approach when warning capabilities were severely lacking.

Punk immediately understood why the compound kept a group of monsters in the cave chamber – he quickly pieced together the enemy’s reasoning: “Although these fanatical believers are weak individually, they can use some unknown secret method to merge into a powerful emerald spider. With the emerald spider’s Formal-Level strength, even if it can’t defeat a strong enemy, creating some loud noises would be more than enough.

Moreover, according to System analysis, if the emerald spider chose to abandon attack and defense entirely to create noise, with my current strength I wouldn’t be able to stop it at all. The enemy probably learned about my capabilities through divination means and thought these believers would be foolproof guards.”

Unfortunately, the enemy overlooked one crucial thing – these “guard dogs” were severely lacking in intelligence!

The enemy probably never expected that their subordinates would be provoked by just a few words from Punk and charge into battle like madmen, completely forgetting about warnings and reporting to the point of throwing everything to the winds?

“Poor boss, evil chaotic madmen are the most unreliable. Why do so many villains fail to understand this principle? Well, just as well – I can take a rest now.”After calmly uttering a sarcastic remark, Punk leaned against the wall and took out a bottle of juice and two pieces of bread. Although the air in the inner chamber was foul, the somewhat hungry Punk paid it no mind. He gently pulled out the wooden stopper of the juice bottle and took a calm sip.

“Not bad… The juice from Niailan does have some merit…”

Punk remained vigilant as he finished his lunch, simultaneously restoring his mana to its fullest. Now he was in peak condition, yet even so, Punk still felt that the enemy behind the iron door posed a significant threat to him.

“But… I’ve already come this far—how could I give up halfway? Moreover… the boss of this place seems… to have grand ambitions.”

Punk tossed aside the empty bottle and, under the protection of Golem Number One, walked expressionlessly to the front of the iron door.

“Then, let me see who exactly is the mastermind behind all this chaos.”

(End of Chapter)