Yun Ting woke with a start.
Her neck ached, stiff from sleeping upright on the metal chair. The rusted railing behind her had dug into her back all night, leaving a dull throb in her spine. Morning had come with its usual stench—the humid air reeked of mildew, old blood, and the sickly-sweet rot of the Widow's corpse still sprawled across the balcony floor. Its limbs were curled inward like a withered blossom, skin blistered and swollen.
But something was off.
A quiet, wet sound echoed through the ruined buildings around her.
Shlk. Shlk.
She stood abruptly, instinct taking over, her half-numb legs barely steady beneath her.
A figure crouched beside the Widow's bloated carcass, peeling away its hide with a serrated blade. The knife caught a sliver of dull light, flashing silver. Hands dug into the steaming remains, rooting through viscera as if searching for treasure.
This wasn't looting for meat or materials.
It was more like a thief desperately hunting for something specific.
Yun Ting's stomach turned.
"Hey!" she shouted, voice raw from sleep and the cold.
The man looked up.
He had a striking face—sharp cheekbones, smooth skin stretched too tightly over a face that looked both young and ancient. His lips were pale, almost bluish, as if untouched by warmth in years. One eye was lifeless and glassy, the other eerily sharp and unreadable.
But the smell hit her harder than anything else.
Even from several meters away, it rolled toward her like a physical force: rusted metal, sour blood, and something older—something wrong. Like time had abandoned him, and he'd continued to exist out of sheer defiance.
He stared at her in silence.
Then, without a word, he backed away and leapt from the balcony's edge.
Yun Ting didn't follow. Her legs were still trembling from sleep, half-asleep and numb. And honestly, she didn't care enough. Chasing after freaks in the morning was a waste of time.
Instead, she stayed put, breathing hard. Her gaze returned to the Widow's corpse.
"Damn freak…"
Then—something tickled her scalp.
Her hand shot to her head, fingers brushing against something soft and alive. Tiny legs. Curling and retracting through strands of her hair.
She froze.
Slowly, carefully, she reached in and pulled it out.
A widow hornet spider.
The damn thing had curled up and slept in her hair all night.
Yun Ting blinked at the creature.
It clung to her finger, unmoving but warm. Almost weightless. Its body pulsed faintly, a strange heat radiating from it despite the chill in the morning wind. It blinked—or at least pretended to. She wasn't sure if spiders could blink.
Yun Ting let out a breath somewhere between a laugh and a groan.
Figures.
She didn't even stop to shower. She tossed on a pair of clean jeans, zipped up a worn but stylish black jacket, and headed out. The spider curled in her hand like a charm.
The slum's old road cracked beneath her boots. The concrete had split into long, jagged veins, and weeds pushed through the cracks like stubborn survivors. Makeshift stalls lined the lower market—scrap traders, spice hawkers, and merchants too tired to pretend they weren't starving.
She walked past them all. But people were staring.
Like she'd grown ten heads.
Yun Ting lowered her head slightly, heading straight for the clearing up ahead. That was where the teleportation tower stood—the only one in the slum that could transfer her to the Eastern Island's central hub, the city of Bright Moon.
It only took a minute to cross the rotten market into the courtyard where the teleportation tower loomed. The Thousand-Fall Tower, its frame sleek and mechanical, contrasted the ruins around it. A line of people stretched before it—silent, wary.
This tower was no small thing.
It was a worldlink node, connected to dozens of other towers across Taixu, even linking to Bright Moon City, one of the Five Great Cities of the island. Only black-ranked warriors could forge teleportation towers of this level. Yun Ting's mother had built one of the most powerful: the Kingdom of God Teleportation Tower, which Yun Ting had used to arrive in Taixu.
Her presence caused a stir the moment she stepped into view.
People stared.
Whispers followed her like shadows.
"Isn't that her…?"
"She's the one. No wonder the young master couldn't control himself."
"Pity. Messed with the wrong girl…"
Yun Ting ignored them, her gaze locked ahead. The line stretched too long. And if she stayed here, she'd have to listen to more of these fools whispering behind her back.
She clenched her fists and stepped forward—right to the front of the line.
No one dared stop her.
Because everyone knew her name.
Yun Ting.
Or more mockingly, "Miss SXS." The Sexy Stabber.
She hadn't always been feared. When she first arrived in Taixu, she was just a stranger in a strange land, wandering Bright Moon City like a lost traveler. It had taken her days just to find a halfway decent hotel. She had no name, no allies, no home.
Then came Yan Chen, young master of Mist Veil Pavilion, one of the four elite clans in Bright Moon.
He seemed charming at first—helpful, warm, even protective. But behind that smile was something rotten.
He tried to force himself on her.
Yun Ting didn't know who he was. Didn't care.
She stripped him naked in front of a crowd.
He panicked. Tried to save face by claiming it was a joke—some flirtatious game between lovers and lunged forward to kiss her just as his Pavilion elders arrived.
The moment was immortalized: him kissing her, her shoving him away, crowd laughing, elders stunned.
Yun Ting responded the only way she knew how.
She stabbed him in the chest.
From that day forward, she became a myth. A joke. A legend.
The girl who stabbed a young master.
They whispered behind her back, called her Ms. SXS—Sexy Stabber X. It was meant as an insult, but over time, it became a warning.
No one dared steal the corpse of the Widow Hornet Spider from her and no one dared block her path to the front of the line.
Not even Yan Chen could say a word. He had survived, but his pride hadn't. And mysteriously, Yun Ting had walked away unharmed, untouched by punishment. It left the city buzzing with fear and curiosity.
Now, at the tower, a square-jawed man stepped forward with a ledger and a frown.
"Destination?" he asked, his eyes cautious.
"Bright Moon City," Yun Ting replied coolly.
He nodded. "Payment?"
She dug into her pocket and pulled out two gold coins—all she had.
He glanced down. "Fee is seven. Unless you're applying for a merchant loan."
"I am," she said without hesitation.
He scribbled a few notes, marked her for a 5-gold loan. "Eight gold on return. You agree?"
"Yeah."
These loans were a trap, really. Five gold now, repay eight later. Interest climbing by the day. The poor got poorer. The rich? They just got creative.
Still, she paid. She needed this.
Around the circular platform, other passengers stood waiting—ten was the maximum number required for stable teleportation. Any more was risky. More than twelve? Suicidal.
As she joined the circle, she looked down at the spider still cradled in her palm. It had curled tighter now, sensing something. Maybe the hum of the teleportation crystal.
What are you? she thought.
She'd seen thousands of scavenged creatures—some burned, some bred, some half-alive. But nothing quite like this.
The tower began to glow. Magic surged upward in lines of pale blue light.
And the spider twitched.