Chapter 127: The Human Skin Drum (31)

As the alien charged at him in fury, Tang Mu’s mind shifted, commanding countless red threads to erupt violently from the dormant stone walls, piercing through every unhatched white egg in the nest.

The entire nest overflowed with oozing egg fluid.

The foul stench emanating from the egg liquid stunned all the alien creatures.

They had been certain of Tang Mu’s location.

But when all the eggs in the nest shattered, engulfing the entire space in the smell of egg fluid, the aliens were utterly confused, unable to comprehend what was happening.

At the same time, their hearts trembled with fear, their bodies shook uncontrollably. They feared that the “Mother” would blame them upon discovering the truth, and trembled at the thought of the terrifying power she might wield against them once she learned all the white eggs had been destroyed!

Should they run then?

Staying meant death.

Running might just leave a sliver of hope for survival!

No one knew what strange mechanism Tang Mu had triggered by this act, but all the aliens, realizing the eggs were destroyed, took flight.

After ten silent seconds,

Tang Mu indeed sliced through the white silk binding the players with his blade.

Because the white eggs were destroyed, the players regained their strength. Their waists no longer weak, faces no longer pale, and their voices carried power instead of feebleness.

“It seems the ‘Mother’ had long accumulated her authority,” Joe Yuan concluded.

Yet no one except the members of the A-Yu Association paid him any mind.

Not even Tang Mu.

Tang Mu merely glanced at Yan Xingwen. “What’s the situation?”

Yan Xingwen’s face was puffy and tearful, resembling a little crybaby. “Not good.”

This pitiful expression was unusual for Yan Xingwen, who had always appeared as the steadfast leader before everyone else.

Perhaps when she first met him, he was too young to notice his moments of weakness and helplessness. By the time she truly saw him, he had already left his boyhood behind.

“Do you know where the ‘Mother’ sleeps?”

“Yes.” Xingwen nodded and pointed deep into one of the nests. “I was captured there once before. But I escaped. Not just me, many villagers who were caught managed to sneak away. Yet the ‘Mother’ acted as if she never remembered catching us. She relentlessly kept capturing… We ran, and she never seemed to care if there were gaps in her nest’s defenses… It’s like her memory is faulty.”

“When does her memory usually fail?”

“Usually after she sleeps.”

In other words, when Sister Oriole awakens, she might completely forget having captured them?

No wonder she doesn’t personally guard the nest but instead sends the aliens to watch over it. After all, the aliens have continuous memories, not interrupted like hers.

“Take us there,” Tang Mu instructed Xingwen. “Once we get to the place, stay back. Don’t come near the battlefield.”

Xingwen looked puzzled but said nothing. Still, he led Tang Mu and his group to where the “Mother” slept.

It was a massive web woven from white silk. At the very center, Sister Oriole lay asleep.

In slumber, she appeared serene and gentle, as if entirely disconnected from the murderous monstrosities she embodied.

But once awake, she would immediately extend her claws toward the innocent.

“*Pfft!*”

Joe Yuan suddenly produced a dagger from somewhere and plunged it into Sister Oriole’s heart.

The onlookers stared in confusion.

Joe Yuan explained casually, “Learned it from you.” He looked at Tang Mu and gestured to the bleeding wound on his own abdomen.

Though injuries sustained inside the dungeon didn’t carry outside, they would rebound in another form—mental strength.

So Joe Yuan would definitely need several days of deep rest after returning.

“When facing a threat, striking first is key.”

Ha.

Tang Mu rolled his eyes. “You attract what you are. You’re not learning from me; you just want to do it yourself. Don’t pin all the blame on me. I won’t bear consequences that aren’t mine.”

“...Then don’t you want to kill her before she wakes?”

Tang Mu’s expression turned cold. He said nothing.

Strangely, despite the knife wound, Sister Oriole remained peacefully asleep at the center of the massive web, as if untouched. No fluids flowed from her heart.

It seemed these monsters possessed peculiar abilities.

“You can’t kill her with a blade,” Tang Mu frowned. “Even my enchanted red-thread bell can’t harm her.”

“...All the white eggs in the nest were destroyed, her energy sources—white eggs and the female statues—are gone. So why is she still intact?”

“I don’t know.”

Normally, when such monsters lose their source of power, they vanish.

But this woman appeared calm and unperturbed, unaffected in the slightest.

No one could understand.

So they gave up studying the “Mother” and focused on the murals near the giant web instead.

The murals depicted countless small figures.

The first showed a group kneeling around a bonfire, worshipping and performing rituals.

The second depicted the offerings for the ritual: pigs, sheep, and occasionally paper effigies built from bamboo.

The third showed everyone throwing the offerings into the Luo River.

The fourth portrayed a sudden calamity striking the village. Many inexplicably fell ill with a severe disease.

Judging by the scenes, this wasn’t the first outbreak. It had happened repeatedly, all efforts exhausted without solution.

People lost faith in the rituals and sought a shaman.

The fifth depicted villagers consulting the shaman, who explained that because the village was remote and the bloodlines close, fresh blood was needed to boost everyone’s immunity.

The sixth showed many women arriving from distant lands.

The seventh depicted these women continuously bearing children for the village, with barely any breaks.

The eighth showed many women, once drained of value, being buried directly in the graveyard.

The ninth had a bold, harsh brushstroke style, clearly painted by someone harboring deep hatred for the entire village. This artist copied the previous eight murals but marked every small figure with a heavy cross and drew a massive, queen-like creature with a swollen abdomen resembling an ant queen. This queen resided within the so-called nest, which was densely packed with eggs.

She even carefully marked the positions of all the eggs, as if fearing she might forget.