"Are you okay?" Wang Wei asked.

"I'm fine!"

All things considered, with her cultivation, she wasn't hurt that badly. She had already recovered by now and was just grouchy.

Wang Wei glanced at her, then the cave, looking conflicted.

"Maybe you should head back to rest first, I can retrieve my sword myself! Plus, it's not the most suitable place for a wood cultivator..."

Go back? Now?

There was still quite a while until the puppet would be ready... Mei was very reluctant.

But that being said, she wasn't willing to just loiter outside til he came back out. Mei thought hard to herself for a moment.

"Wait, I have an idea!" she said. "What if Su Qing made me a set of armour to wear?"

"You want to follow me?" Wang Wei seemed confused.

"How can I leave a friend alone in a dangerous place like that?" she coughed. "I have good soulsense, so I can help you detect danger! And since you're scared of bugs, you'll feel worse if you're alone in a centipede nest!"

Mei turned away, embarrassed. She mostly said that in hopes of currying favour and was berating herself for being shameless...

Glancing at him and seeing his touched expression, a sense of guilt set in. He saw her as a concerned friend, but she was just scheming for more pills... Well, she did really see him as a friend though, if nothing.

Su Qing got to work excitedly, quickly putting the armour together. Somehow, Mei felt like she was being suffocated, with how it completely lacked air holes. Shortly, she was completely outfited, covering in blocky vine wood. The little spirit helped her up with glee.

"Mrrrffff... mrrrfff mrff mrfff!" she said.

Trying to take her first step, she fell flat on her face. This armour was way too stiff! And the insides were uncomfortable and scratched her skin!

"Su Qing, maybe just a mask is enough." she said with soulsense.

"Hmph!"

The disgruntled sprit took the armour apart and left her with just a mask. It was still scratchy, but bearable.

"Can you really see like that?" Wang Wei asked. "Maybe we could attach some glass."

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"I think I can get by with soulsense maybe... but glass would be great."

Wang Wei nodded, ransacking his storage bag for a minute. After his frenzied searching, he took out two small glass jars with an awkward look.

"Sorry, this is the best I could find."

"Gimme!" Su Qing snatched them with excitement.

He quickly pulled off her mask and poked two holes in them, attaching the glass jars, then slapping it back onto her face.

"Gah!" Mei said.

Her vision was so distorted, her head immediately started hurting. She stumbled around a few steps.

"It's better than nothing." She said grudgingly.

She probably looked ridiculous right now.

"Hehe! Mei, you look like you have bug eyes!" Su Qing laughed.

Mei: ...

She finally activated soulsense and glanced down the cave. A single long soul was below, squirming and jumping around. That was probably the centipede. She could sense more souls further below, but they were distant enough not to be a concern.

"There's only a single centipede below, so it's fine!" she said.

Wang Wei sighed in relief.

As they started heading back down the cave, suddenly, Su Qing tugged at her shoulder.

"There's scary fire down there..." he whimpered.

"Then do you want to wait here?" Mei asked.

"No! I don't want to be left alone! I'll just, um..."

After hesitating a little, he stashed his puppet body away and hopped into her wooden mask.

"This is less scary?" Mei said in bewilderment.

"I don't know..."

Weirdo.

They began heading down again.

From how much water Su Qing had flushed down, steam was still billowing out. Mei's eyes were no longer at risk, but the rest of her body getting scalded was still rather painful... though bearable. Wang Wei took out a talisman and stuck it on her mask.

What was she supposed to be? A jiangshi?!

A strong cooling sensation washed over her, negating the heat.

"This talisman is actually supposed to be stuck on pots for ingredients that need to be kept cold, but I figured it might work for this too." Wang Wei explained.

Cool, so it wasn't even meant for human use. Surely that wouldn't lead to unexpected problems.

----------------------------------------

Finally, they reached a cavern full of magma pools. Mei could hardly see from all the steam, but she could sense and hear the centipede writhing around. At the side, there was a pile of metal ores covered in bite marks, Wang Wei's sword atop.

He quickly grabbed and stashed it away.

Seeing them, the centipede screeched in anger and charged, only to be hit with a torrent of water from Su Qing. It made a pitiful sound before rushing further down.

"Aren't we going to get out now?" Mei asked.

"Not yet, I think we could find some interesting things down here!"

He picked some strange looking red plants hanging from the ceiling, then grabbed various interesting ores from the centipede's stash.

"You're stealing his rock eggs?" Su Qing frowned.

"Hmph! That's what he gets for attacking us and stealing my sword!" Wang Wei huffed.

He looked around the chamber more before rushing over to one of the walls. Mei wiped the condensate off the glass jars and squinted, seeing he had spotted a cluster of red crystals. They were covered in scratch marks, but otherwise unharmed.

"Maybe the centipede nested here because of this crystal?" Wang Wei got excited. "It looks like something precious to me!"

"Aren't you an alchemist anyway? Why do ores and crystals interest you?" Mei asked.

"Even alchemy uses them at times!"

He tried to hit the crystals with the ores in his hand, repeatedly, but to no avail. Then, he seemed to have remembered something and took out a roseblood pickaxe Shang Qiang gave them.

"Wait, why do you still have that? Did you steal it?" She asked.

Wang Wei looked at her with an odd look.

"He gifted them to us! You forgot?"

Did he? Mei couldn't quite recall. Where did she leave hers then?

Probably left it on a chair somewhere and walked off, clueless.