"Shanshan? Home? You guys..."
Wen Wen suddenly felt that the runaway thoughts he had earlier seemed to be heading in the right direction. Fu Xuerou must have really had something happen with that eel monster.
"A beautiful human girl falls in love with the monster that kidnapped her, isn't this the plot of 'Beauty and the Beast'?"
"Wait, that's not right. Fu Xuerou has only been missing for a few days. In such a short time, could she have fallen in love with a monster?"
Wen Wen carefully examined Fu Xuerou, trying to find any clues: "To make a woman devoted to a man, even willing to risk her life. If it were that simple, all those monsters would have fallen madly in love with me already."
"She wasn't mentally manipulated, but that eel monster must have done something to her... did it permanently twist her mind?"
Fu Xuerou had mentioned before that the eel monster took her to perform a ritual. It was likely that ritual that made her 'fall' for the eel monster uncontrollably.
Therefore, to find out the truth, simply asking Fu Xuerou wouldn't yield answers. The only way was to directly question the culprit, the eel monster itself.
A long spear flew into Wen Wen's hand. He then aimed at a certain direction and hurled it forcefully, towards the location of the monster that had been tailing him.
The spear, carrying immense power, pierced through two towering giant trees but missed its target. The figure distorted eerily, evading Wen Wen's spear.
"Tsk, quite agile. As expected of an eel."
Wen Wen's two strands of hair detached and bound Fu Xuerou to a tree. He then, like a large bird, chased after the eel's location.
Upon being discovered by Wen Wen, the eel monster immediately fled. It knew that despite its own abilities, it was no match for a mid-sequence demon hunter like Wen Wen.
It crawled on the ground like a snake, its movements swift and erratic, making it difficult for Wen Wen to lock onto it.
For an enemy like this, throwing spears was useless. No matter how powerful, they were meaningless if they didn't hit.
The eel monster's aura was somewhere between Disaster-class and Calamity-class. Although not exceptionally strong, its ability to escape was outstanding.
However, it couldn't possibly be faster than Wen Wen. Wen Wen soon flew above it and extended his hand.
Countless black hairs descended like a pile of black noodles, covering the area where the eel monster was, forming a clump.
"Caught it!"
But something astonishing happened. The eel actually squeezed through the gaps in the black hair!
And when Wen Wen tried to control his black hair to capture it again, he found that all the hair that had touched the eel was now covered in disgusting slime. This slime clumped the hair together, making it difficult to control.
"Ruining one's hairstyle is like killing their parents, you're finished!"
Wen Wen bared his teeth, cut off his own hair, and cursed as he continued to chase the eel.
This guy was slippery. It didn't look strong, but it was proving difficult to catch.
"It seems pure physical restraint won't work. Then... let's try this!"
Since throwing spears missed and the hair had gaps, he might as well just freeze it directly.
The Frost Sword was drawn. Wen Wen slashed his sword in the direction of the eel monster.
An arc of ice sword energy struck the vicinity of the eel monster, forming a semi-arc ice mountain. The eel monster, unable to react in time, was instantly frozen within this ice mountain!
Within the ice, the eel monster twisted its body with difficulty, but it couldn't break free from the ice.
With a few slashes, Wen Wen separated the ice block containing the eel monster from the ice mountain and then placed the Frost Sword against the ice block.
The cold air on the ice block instantly intensified. The eel monster, which could still move slightly, was instantly immobilized.
Then, Wen Wen looked with slight amazement at the semi-arc ice mountain, twenty-seven to twenty-eight meters wide and five to six meters high, that he had created.
"The power of my frost sword energy... it's increased ridiculously."
He had originally intended to just chop out a block of ice to freeze the eel monster, but he hadn't expected to create an ice mountain. This power was already greater than when the Ice Queen herself swung her sword.
"It seems that Qin Shuang's ice-attribute abilities have allowed me to truly unleash the power of this Frost Sword. Before, I was just a swordsman using an ice-attribute weapon, but now I possess ice-control abilities myself, hence such a significant difference in effect."
The greatly increased power of the Frost Sword pleased Wen Wen. He then looked at the eel monster, sealed in the ice block.
This monster had a fish tail and a human body. The human part resembled the Ochre Stone tribe of Oye Water City. Its body was yellowish-brown, and it was covered in a layer of slime.
Even though it was frozen into an ice block now, it wasn't dead yet. Its eyes were still rolling around.
Wen Wen cleared the ice around its head, allowing it to breathe without enabling it to escape.
"Speak. What was your purpose in luring me to that pond, and how did you bewitch this ignorant girl?" Wen Wen asked in an interrogating posture.
"I..."
Before the eel monster could speak, Wen Wen stabbed his sword into its abdomen, skewering a kidney, and said fiercely, "If you dare to lie to me, I have more brutal methods to deal with you."
It couldn't articulate its plight. Normally, shouldn't one interrogate first, and only then resort to torture if the subject remained silent or lied? Why was it stabbed before it could say a single word?
However, it was precisely because of this sword stab that the eel monster dared not play any tricks and directly revealed the truth to Wen Wen.
Just as Fu Xuerou had said, that pond was indeed the eel monster's home. The eel monster had no intention of killing Fu Xuerou; it genuinely wanted to live with her.
This affection was incredibly sincere – it had also been very sincere towards the corpses in its cave.
However, it felt that life needed a sense of ritual. So, it took Fu Xuerou out and used a special ritual it had stumbled upon to make her fall in love with it.
Love, in reality, was merely slavery through twisted thoughts. Whatever the eel monster required, Fu Xuerou would fulfill it without hesitation, and would rationalize it as devotion to love.
Just as the eel monster was preparing to take Fu Xuerou back to its cave for their wedding night, it discovered that its cave had been occupied.
Moreover, the person who occupied its home was very powerful, so powerful that it didn't dare to show itself before that person.
However, it was impossible to simply give up its cave, which it had lived in for decades, was ideally located, and was quite hidden. Therefore, the eel monster planned to use Fu Xuerou to summon a powerful demon hunter to drive away the person occupying its cave.
But it never expected that its small plan would backfire, leading directly to its capture by Wen Wen.