The Legend of Fangren

At night, the training team stopped in a forest of stone peaks. The steep stone peaks formed a natural barrier, and the narrow paths that could be seen everywhere were natural barriers against wild animals, making it very safe.

After learning the art of speed for a day, the girls' movement speed increased significantly, putting some pressure on Fang Shi.

Upon reaching the mountaintop, he chose a spot overgrown with weeds, smashed several spirit fruits on a sharp rock, and then gently placed some more plump spirit fruits on top, filling the entire stone peak with their fragrance. He then quietly hid on a nearby stone peak, waiting for the changes to unfold.

According to the text, spiders prefer to hide in steep environments that are suitable for weaving webs. Mountainous forests are usually a good place for this, and although there are no trees in this stone peak forest, the many closely spaced stone peaks are just right for weaving webs.

However, since there are usually very few spiritual plants here, Fang Shi waited for quite a while but no spiders came out.

Upon closer examination of the text, it is mentioned that a type of Xuan Spider beast called the [Great Fruit Spider] leaves "probe silk" everywhere. As long as there are ripe spiritual fruits nearby, the probe silk will emit an aura that only the Great Fruit Spider can detect due to subtle changes in the Xuan Qi in the environment, thus quickly attracting them to spin their webs.

Because the probe's sensitivity is several times greater than that of ordinary smells, the giant fruit spider can often arrive before other mythical beasts notice it.

After much painful reflection, Fang Shi realized that since the logic of the spiritual fruit attracting spiders was valid, the principle must be correct—clearly, it must be a matter of equivalence.

There's nothing that can't be solved by quantity; even firewood, if there's enough quantity, can melt a mountain.

Come on, come on, we've got plenty of spirit fruits, smash them! Smash them hard!

With the spirit of a snowball fight, Fang Shi used both hands to swing the fan, relentlessly pounding the surrounding rocky peaks, casting a wide net to catch more fish. No fishing is without baiting the area, so he pounded! Pounded hard! He pounded until the rocky peak forest was filled with the fragrance of fruit.

And so, an hour later...

The girls sleeping down the mountain smelled a fruity fragrance coming from above, making their dreams even sweeter.

Elder Yun, who was on night watch, looked up and saw the leaping figure overhead. He muttered, "Junior Brother Fang has really gone all out this time."

Thump! A fruit fell down and landed right in her hand.

"Emmm..." After hesitating for a moment, she grabbed her sleeve and wiped herself, "Ooh~"

Do not eat white do not eat.

Back to the beginning, Fang Shi sat dejectedly atop the stone peak.

"This is weird. Could there be no spiders at all here? What was the point of scattering these two hundred or so fruits?"

Is the picture fun?

He held the back of his head with both hands, lay on the rock for a while, feeling sullen, and then decided to build a small hut out of stone blocks and take a nap.

Wait until I wake up.

He could smell the stench of rotten fruit, an unpleasant odor for humans, but a rich "fruity fragrance" for wild creatures.

He knocked down the stone blocks, felt the night wind high in the sky, and began searching for the spider again.

"Oh! I've got it! I've got it..."

This time, without breaking a sweat, Fang Shi discovered a large white net between two stone peaks somewhere.

This net is enormous, with two stone peaks seven or eight meters apart, leaving arcs of light in between, all of which are spider webs that would go unnoticed without careful observation.

Along the edge of the spider web, amidst the weeds on the mountain peak, Fang Shi used his binoculars to spot several spider-beasts with heads as big as their heads. Observing their features, under the moonlight, their dark faces shimmered with a delicate luster.

That's right, this is the giant fruit spider. It's called that because when they curl up, they look a lot like fuzzy fruits that have just formed on a tree.

They always spin webs near ripe fruit, waiting for prey. As the fruit ripens and rots, they eat the rotten fruit and then secrete a rich fragrance from their bodies that is very similar to that of ripe fruit. Many creatures are attracted to this fragrance and eventually fall into their webs, becoming food.

It is evident that the giant fruit spider is a sophisticated hunter who knows how to disguise itself as prey, making it a successful example in nature.

Unfortunately, like the mantis stalking the cicada, unaware of the oriole behind, the poor spiders were unaware that their webs were about to benefit others.

The spider web was already formed, and judging by its size, Fang Shi estimated that dismantling it would yield at least fifty spider silk threads.

However, it is not a good thing to alert the enemy too early; one should not exhaust the resources to catch all the fish.

He had thought it through. Without the alchemy platform and without needing the spider eyes for the time being, there was no need to kill the giant fruit spider; he only needed to dismantle the spider web.

Therefore, it would be better to wait until tomorrow morning and see how much spider silk we can get.

Fang Shi returned to the foot of the mountain and landed by the fire, only to see Elder Yun, who was on night watch, suddenly reach out his hand to him.

"Huh? What?"

Elder Yun said, "I just ate a fruit, and now I feel even hungrier. Do you have any more?"

"That's all." Fang Shi shrugged, indicating that the fruit had been completely used up.

He's so sleepy, he should lean against the rock and get some sleep.

In the blink of an eye, a whole night is over.

When Fang Shi woke up, the elder was already cooking porridge.

"Oh, you're awake." Elder Yun was about to greet him, but the guy didn't reply at all and hurriedly climbed up the stone peak.

Of course, how could Fang Shi not be anxious? He had waited all night, and now was the harvest season. If he didn't hurry, the giant fruit spiders might use up all their silk and then eat it back—after all, resources are very precious in the wild, and spiders, adhering to the principle of thrift, would recycle their silk.

"Heave-ho~"

Climb to the top of the mountain.

Good heavens, the view up there is truly spectacular, a vast expanse of white.

After a night of wind, the spider webs were covered with dust, and the morning water condensed, creating a beautiful scene resembling white frost.

Even the hilltop where he waited for his prey last night was covered with spider webs.

He suddenly realized that the spider's delayed arrival might have been due to him wandering around aimlessly up there.

The text also states that the giant fruit spider is very afraid of large wild animals. Not only can it not catch them, but it also always breaks its web, making it deeply hated by other spiders.

Uh... so that's what it turns out to be.

Oh well, never mind, collecting the spider silk is the priority.

Fang Shi drew his longsword and began slashing and hacking, but unexpectedly, he received a pleasant surprise.

Many spider webs contain tightly wrapped silk balls, clearly the style of spider beasts: they entangle their prey, digest it with digestive juices, and then drink the soup.

He didn't care what the spider had replenished, and simply used his sword to dissolve it.

"Oh? It's a feather."

Perfect timing! With spider silk, I can unlock the crossbow recipe, and these feathers will unlock the arrow [item] recipe.

Having gone through this ordeal, the process of unraveling the spider silk became somewhat like a lottery.

Some of the giant fruit spider's prey hadn't even fully dissolved before he took them away. Fortunately, he didn't treat them unfairly; a thick piece of meat was slapped in front of the giant fruit spider, scaring the spiders so much that they ran away for their lives, but couldn't resist the temptation and returned tremblingly.

That's not impossible—that's what the spiders said.

Even the meat of large beasts is far more cost-effective than the meat of birds in the sky.

Why do giant fruit spiders spin their webs high up? It's because tufted birds are light and easily get caught in spider webs, so their meat content is naturally quite low.

But the pork chop was different—it was so wide! So thick! And solid! I've never eaten such a luxurious meal in my life.

What? Those spider webs? No way, no way, who wants to eat that stuff that comes out of someone's ass?