Chapter 394: Sending You a Nightmare
(To be revised later) "That's why it's such a remarkable trait. What's even more interesting is that if the young spiders are male, and they are artificially separated, the males will grow up and track down the females and other males by scent to devour them—this ratio is also one hundred percent and seventy percent respectively."
"But if the young spiders are female, they will definitely eat their parents, prioritizing the female first, then the male."
"Spiders have limited lifespans," Xu Huo remarked.
Butterfly Lady's brows curved. "That's where it gets interesting. Among butterfly spiders, males can live for decades, while females live multiples of that. Some scientists have reportedly raised them from a young age, only to die themselves while the spider was still alive and well."
"So if a young spider fails to eat its mother before it matures, it will begin a century-long hunt for its mother, until the female dies or its scent fades."
"How terrifying," the woman said, opening her fan to cover her red lips. "The vast majority of un-evolved spiders live less than two years. After mutation, the lifespan of butterfly spiders is comparable to human immortality, isn't it?"
"Some scientists have even questioned whether female butterfly spiders can truly die. To prevent the species from overrunning, they developed the habit of hunting their parents across thousands of miles."
Xu Huo laughed. "Immortality? Seeking immortality in a spider?"
Butterfly Lady laughed too. "Exactly. That's why most butterfly spiders die in laboratories. Whether they truly don't die naturally was never figured out—instead, they turned this spider into a rare species."
"Perhaps that's the worst of humanity—wanting all the good things, trampling everything to get them. If they had actually succeeded, it might have benefited mankind, but unfortunately, they're all mediocre people."
She was talking about one kind of spider, but it was obvious that the species used in experiments were far from limited to that, and even humans themselves were among the test subjects.
"That's why the world needs to change. Why live so long? Great love knows no bounds. If a person can make extraordinary contributions beyond individual limits, isn't that a form of immortality?" Butterfly Lady turned back and winked at Duke Tal. "Don't you think so, Duke?"
"Makes sense, makes sense," Duke Tal said admiringly. "So this is the philosophy of the New Wheel Sect. Your words could elevate one's soul. The life and death of the flesh are insignificant; only the spirit of dedication can endure."
Butterfly Lady lowered her eyelids, looking somewhat bored as she turned her head away. She touched her cheek and said, "I need to get my beauty sleep."
Since the beauty had spoken, Duke Tal naturally agreed wholeheartedly. He saw her back to the castle with great attentiveness, had beauty sleep snacks sent up, and even personally picked a bouquet of fresh flowers for her so she could fall asleep with the fragrance of blossoms.
Butterfly Lady shut out his probing, and Duke Tal, ignoring Xu Huo who was still accompanying them, stroked his chin and entered the room next door. Not long after, a bodyguard left the castle.
Xu Huo's bedroom was on the third floor. After seeing the two off, he returned to his room.
With Mr. Dong around, he naturally knew the bodyguard had left the castle, but the bodyguards around Duke Tal were clearly players with considerable skill, so he couldn't afford to track them.
However, this Butterfly Lady was quite interesting.
"Sir, I found two more of the previous gentleman's notebooks," Mr. Dong said, entering with booklets and food.
"Just put them on the desk," Xu Huo said. There was also a desk in his bedroom.
Mr. Dong set them down as instructed and, as he was leaving, said, "Sir, please get some rest early tonight."
Xu Huo couldn't help but glance at him, but the other man said nothing more, gently closing the door behind him.
After a brief pause, Xu Huo propped open the Umbrella of Justice on the terrace. Only after it started raining outside did he return to the desk to continue reading He Pu's notes.
The servants and Mr. Dong had gone to rest one after another. In the rainy night, the lights in the castle went out one by one. Aside from a faint glow on the third floor, the rest of the massive building seemed to merge completely with the darkness.
After an unknown amount of time, a peculiar sensation enveloped the castle.
Xu Huo, who was reading the notes, stopped and looked up toward the window. Through the curtains, he saw pairs of red lights, like eyes, staring into the room.
He put down what he was holding and walked over. As he pulled the window open, the red lights outside vanished. The night breeze blew in, and the hanging gauze curtains and the flowers in the garden below swayed at the same frequency. His gaze shifted downward, and there, in the garden where she should have been long asleep, Butterfly Lady stood alone before the maze garden. She glanced back in his direction before turning and walking into the maze.
After she entered, a glowing butterfly flew out from among the flowering trees, fluttering unsteadily to his window.
He reached out to catch it, but the butterfly dissolved into specks of light and vanished into the air.
There was no other movement in the castle. After a moment's hesitation, Xu Huo took his umbrella and went downstairs.
At this time, the castle looked different from when Mr. Dong had been controlling it. The corridor and the first-floor reception hall still had lights on, but aside from these areas, everywhere else was pitch black. As he walked, he occasionally felt as if something was watching him from the darkness, making his scalp tingle.
This sensation was not unfamiliar to Xu Huo. He went downstairs according to his memory, then circled from the side corridor to the outer hallway behind the main building, passing through the botanical garden toward the maze garden.
But before he could get close, the things hiding in the darkness crawled out with a rustling sound. The ground, tree trunks, and even the branches and leaves were densely packed with small, bristly creatures. They looked slightly different from one another, but each had plenty of legs. Some were non-venomous, some highly toxic. They surrounded him for a few seconds before all crawling toward him en masse.
Xu Huo didn't stop. Ignoring the spiders crawling up his pant legs, he walked straight into the garden maze, bypassed two giant spiders blocking the way, and followed the maze path toward the center.
He had been in this maze once before, so he roughly remembered the layout of the first section. Thus, he wasn't stopped by the visually altered passages and quickly found Butterfly Lady, who had entered the maze.
She stood alone, her light purple silk nightgown stained with raindrops into a deep purple pattern. Her beautiful face was also dotted with water droplets, but she seemed unconcerned. She didn't mind being watched either, slightly tilting her head up toward the air, reaching out her hands as if to catch something.
Xu Huo followed her gaze and looked closely at her hands. After a few seconds, he saw a pair of translucent wings flash briefly, but the fleeting image was incomplete. In the blink of an eye, there was nothing in her hands again.
"Has your brain undergone secondary evolution?" Butterfly Lady then clapped her palms together. To the naked eye, it looked like she lightly slapped the air, but an invisible force dispersed.
Xu Huo knew he wouldn't get to see that butterfly again. Holding his umbrella, he faced the woman. "You want to kill me."