I transformed into a demonic spider lily.

It was as if she was sharing her experience, or perhaps just chatting with the other person. Kikyo didn't care at all how the other flower viewed her behavior at this moment. She leaned back and immersed herself in the water. Her clothes were completely soaked and clung to her body. She was clearly not young, but she was playing happily like a child.

“Something’s wrong with you,” said the spider lily.

After saying that, she laughed again and added, "No, perhaps it's actually me who's not right."

Water is an innate spiritual substance, its existence predating anything else in the world, so it's not impossible that it possesses the power to cleanse the soul.

No, it does have the effect of calming the mind. Although it cannot completely suppress the inner demons of the other shore flower, it can still provide temporary clarity.

As night fell, the spider lilies lit a bonfire on the shore, the bellflowers warmed themselves beside it, and the shrine maiden's clothes hung to dry on the other side. Putting aside their pride, they played without restraint until now.

The village was clearly just outside the woods, but Kikyo didn't go straight back. It seemed she planned to wait until her clothes were dry and then tidy herself up.

The spider lily used her demonic fire to dry her clothes. She turned to look at Kikyo, who was now only wearing a kimono. She wanted to dry Kikyo's clothes in the same way, but Kikyo reached out a hand to grab the hem of her clothes and shook her head slightly, as if she wanted the shrine maiden's clothes to dry naturally.

Could it be that they're afraid of being tainted by demonic energy?

Shrine maidens are really hard to please.

Kikyo patted the lawn to her left, gesturing for Lycoris radiata to sit next to her. Lycoris radiata did not refuse and sat down with her. Then, she asked, seemingly casually, "Lycoris radiata, when are you planning to go back today?"

"I'll take you home."

The red spider lily answered in this way.

"But I suddenly don't want to go back today."

Looking up at the sky, Kikyo said.

"What's wrong? Did you and Feng have a fight? That little guy is just too naughty, but he actually likes you as his older sister. Besides, Miss Yukiji will help you two make up, so there shouldn't be any problem. Or why don't you come to my house tonight?"

"No, I didn't argue with her."

Hearing the spider lily's incessant words of comfort, Kikyo couldn't help but laugh and say, "I don't know why, but I suddenly really want to spend a night in the wild."

The main problem is that your house and my house are both inconvenient because they have too many people and too many monsters, making it difficult to carry out any actions.

"Phew, autumn nights are indeed cold." Kikyo exhaled a breath, which produced a few wisps of white mist. She then hugged herself and looked up at the spider lily, as if hinting at something to it.

If you're cold, put on some clothes. At the very least, go home. Why do you have to freeze outside? You deserve to catch a cold.

The philosophy of the red spider lily is rather straightforward.

"Hana, do you remember a month ago? That time we went to the beach together..."

Kikyo suddenly started talking about the past.

...Got it!

The red spider lily instantly understood Kikyo's intention and immediately exchanged for a "mountain-bound robe" to drape over Kikyo's body.

You're asking about that thicker version of the shrine maiden's outfit?

How could she dare to give it to the other party now?

Kikyo covered the other flower with half of her clothes, just like before, but this time, her clothes were thinner, and she could feel the other flower's body temperature more clearly.

The red spider lily didn't understand Kikyo's intentions, but at this moment it could be considered as making up for the regrets of the past. No matter what, she hadn't lost anything from beginning to end.

……

Meanwhile, in Maple Village...

"...Why hasn't my sister come back yet?"

Feng and Xuelu sat on the left and right sides of the table respectively, while the front and back were left for Jiegeng and Biyanhua. However, they waited for a long time, from dusk until late at night, and the food was almost cold, but no one came back.

"Looks like it'll just be the two of us tonight."

Compared to Feng's anxiety, Xueji calmly picked up some food. Since those two guys weren't back yet, they could only eat first. As for worrying? A famous Japanese shrine maiden and the strongest local monster, did she need to worry about them? Perhaps she should be more worried about the monsters that these two had defeated.

Hopefully, he'll still have a whole body.

Tonight's dinner was quite lavish, because Maple had added meat as a special treat, considering that the spider lily would also be coming. Three days ago, when they went to play in the forest, Maple and the white wolf secretly took "some" from Wolf Wild Dry's cave.

If Sister White Wolf says it's nothing, then it must really be nothing.

……

Forests, seas of flowers...

"...Why hasn't Lady Higanbana returned yet?"

Sitting on Tu Bi's head amidst the boundless sea of ​​flowers, the white wolf, after learning "Wen She" last time, studied it diligently for three days and seemed to have mastered a new move on her own, which she was ready to show to the other shore flower.

As a result, they waited from noon until late at night.

"—Thump, thump-thump!"

The white wolf was bored and wanted to light a campfire in the flower field to cook something to eat. This terrified Tu Bi. If the flower field were to be set on fire, they would both be doomed. So he quickly got up and threw the wolf outside the flower field.

Taking out the meat she had "taken" from Lang Yegan's house, Shiro started roasting it over a fire, a technique she had learned from Kaede. She then asked Tu Bi, "Do you want some?"

"Thump?"

The coating on the wall indicates that it cannot eat.

……

The scene focuses on the only "tragic" character.

Wolfy stood in the empty cave, still pondering what else hadn't been taken from its home. That bastard White Wolf had taken everything and then run off to the other woman's flower field; how dare it go there to settle scores with him?

Chapter 87 I Don't Like

……

When the spider lily returned from the bellflower for the second time, the demonic obstacle within her vanished into thin air once again. The first time could perhaps be explained by coincidence, but the two consecutive "coincidences" left her no choice but to acknowledge the underlying factors.

The priestess who purified the Shikon Jewel.

The spider lily still remembers Kikyo's title. Could it be that the other party's purification is not a single-target attack but an area-of-effect attack? While purifying the Shikon Jewel, it also dealt with her demonic obstacles?

After getting this idea, Higanbana could only use Kikyo as a temporary tool. This led to a habit of going to Kikyo's house to sleep every few days. In return, Kikyo would come to her as usual to fight monsters together, and take the opportunity to rest.

From then on, the intervals between their interactions gradually changed from four or five days to two or three days more frequently. However, every time the other shore flower went, she would bring the white wolf along, because that was her only reason.

Because of the frequent visits, the villagers had become accustomed to the white wolf wandering around the village, but they would still keep their distance from the spider lily.

Yukiji often criticized Higanbana for this incident, saying that it was one thing for her to kill bandits, but couldn't she have been a little more elegant? If she hadn't lost too much sanity, things wouldn't have turned out this way. So she asked Kikyo to teach her manners.

However, despite this, the Spider Lily doesn't care about how ordinary people see her or what etiquette is. What does that have to do with her, a demon?

Since the spider lily had this attitude, Kikyo couldn't do anything about it and could only carefully coax her, which made Yukiji often grit his teeth and say, "You just keep spoiling her!"

On the other hand, the white wolf is well-behaved and cute, and is loved by the children in the village. This is mainly because of the big-tailed older sister who always brings them some snacks that they are not familiar with but are especially delicious. These are all specialties from the forest.

They'll go with whoever has the candy; that's always been their way.

Most of these specialties are wild fruits from the mountains. As a wolf demon, the white wolf does not actually like to eat meat. To be precise, it is because when she lived alone before, she could not catch any prey at all and was forced to eat vegetarian food. Looking at her body, apart from her chest, she is completely different from that wolf yak, who has been eating meat for hundreds of years.

Besides having plenty of snacks, the white wolf is also very gentle. When she's being silly at times, her adorable behavior is very popular with children. Basically, every time she comes, they get attached to her, which prevents them from practicing their archery skills.

However, Hakuro wasn't annoyed, because Kikyo would always tell her, "I'll definitely do it next time."

The excited voices of village children came from outside, making it impossible for the other shore flower to rest. She opened her eyes and glanced out the window. The white wolf sensed the demonic aura and immediately took the children to play in a more distant place.

“That little one has improved again recently. I clearly haven’t taught her anything, but now she’s no worse than me,” Kikyo said while combing the hair of the spider lily.

"No, she's far from it. That guy's arrows can't even hit the target properly."

Upon hearing this, the other shore flower still remembered the holes on her own painted wall. Two of them were shot by the bellflower, and the remaining dozen or so were inexplicable. They were all shot by the white wolf practicing archery on the mountainside, missing the target and going straight to the opponent's head.

That's pretty outrageous.

I was wondering why Tu Bi, who doesn't have any taunt skills, keeps getting accidentally injured in various ways.

"However, to be fair, even I can't keep up with her speed in learning things. In just over half a month, she has learned almost everything she was supposed to learn, and she can even apply what she has learned to other situations. She no longer needs much supervision from me."

Kikyo spoke the truth.

Even the Spider Lily couldn't refute this point. The White Wolf's talent in archery was simply divine. Last time, he learned the basic attack skill "Literary Shot," and based on that skill, he also learned "Concentration."

The so-called "concentration" is to combine "archery" with "meditation" to enhance the demonic power originally attached to the arrow. Theoretically speaking, this operation is almost equivalent to the paradox of a perpetual motion machine. What kind of demon uses demonic power to enhance demonic power? Even humans cannot do it, but White Wolf actually succeeded.

White Wolf's talent in archery is unmatched, even by Kikyo. Although Higanbana is curious about his skills, she cannot learn them.

The problem lies at its root. Both Hakuro and Kikyo are archers, but Higanbana is a mage. She feels that even the incantations and spells of Yin-Yang magic are more suitable for her than "meditation," but unfortunately Kikyo doesn't know how.

Kikyo is not suitable to be her teacher.

The only conclusion the other flower could draw was that instead of spending time learning those "miscellaneous skills" that might not necessarily increase combat power, she would be better off finding a way to level up.

Skills are fine as long as they're practical.

Learning a bunch of fancy tricks is actually useless.

The spider lily yawned and was about to go back to sleep when suddenly there was a series of urgent knocks on the door, which annoyed her.

Kikyo gave the spider lily an apologetic smile, then quickly got up and went to open the door.

A middle-aged man stood outside the door. As soon as he opened it, he anxiously spoke to Kikyo, who looked serious. Finally, she nodded and said, "Leave it to me."

After saying that, Kikyo turned around and went back into the house to get her bow. Higanbana took the opportunity to ask, "What happened?"

As the bellflower retrieved the bow, it explained the situation to the spider lily.

Oh, it's Sada, a villager from a nearby village. He said that recently, large insects have been coming around at night. These large insects don't refer to tigers, but to real strange insect monsters, which are just scum that haven't yet developed sentience.

Even though they are just trash, they are not something that ordinary humans can deal with. At least in Sada's village, a strong man weighing over 200 pounds was seriously injured.

In order to prevent the women and children in the village from being harmed, Sada had no choice but to come and find the famous (only) shrine maiden Kikyo in the vicinity. As for why he didn't go to find an exorcist?

Exorcists charge a fee, but priestesses do not.

However, the main reason is that there are no exorcists nearby.

"But wasn't it 'that time' recently?"

After the salted fish turned over, the spider lily said.

"Oh, how did you remember that?"

Kikyo was surprised.

The red spider lily naturally remembered, but she did not want to reveal her relationship with the bellflower, so she explained, "I simply smelled the scent of blood."