"Found it! Found it! This demon has discovered a cave, and found traces of the snake demon's blood near the cave. This is definitely the snake demon's lair!"

"Maybe the treasure is hidden in that cave," the dodder flower fairy exclaimed excitedly.

After all, if they find treasure, they can also get a share of the spoils.

Shen Sanruo stood up and went with Xiaoshi.

When they were still several hundred meters away from the cave, he said to Xiaoshi, "You stay here, I'll go take a look first."

"Sister, here's your spirit beast." Xiao Shi held Zhu Miao in her arms and handed it to her. "I have enough protective charms. If things go wrong, I'll run away."

She took the little dumpling and hung it on herself.

After reminding Xiaoshi to be careful a few more times, he headed towards the cave.

After walking a few dozen meters, a little girl's soft voice sounded behind her, "Sister, be careful."

She turned around and saw Xiao Shi looking at her with concern and anxiety.

Shen Sanruo smiled and nodded, giving Xiaoshi a reassuring look before turning around and continuing forward.

As she turned around, both of their expressions changed.

Xiao Shi's lips curled slightly into a smile, her lips parting and closing silently, "Sister, don't disappoint me."

Shen Sangruo over there also suppressed her smile and looked at the cave with a meaningful gaze.

Once she enters that cave, her conjecture will be verified, and the whole truth will come to light.

As they approached the cave, a faint smell of blood filled the air.

It smelled the same as the bloodstains in the village.

The severely injured snake demon is most likely recuperating in this cave.

Shen Sanruo became more vigilant, held the Purple Gold Serpent's spirit core in her hand, and stepped into the cave.

This cave is not large, only half the size of the previous dragon cave.

"It's so small, is there really treasure inside?" The dodder flower fairy couldn't help but be a little skeptical.

She didn't speak. She wasn't sure yet, but if her guess was right, there must be treasure here.

Spiritual energy generated flames in his hands for illumination.

Only then did she notice the drops of blood on the ground, which stretched deeper into the cave.

He crouched down to examine the bloodstains and confirmed that they were indeed the snake demon's blood.

With a focused gaze, Shen Sang walked slowly into the cave.

The cave was completely silent, except for the slight rustling sound of her footsteps.

It also exuded a chilling aura, and there had been no signs of monsters being active for a long time.

She had brought out the spirit core of the late-stage Nascent Soul Purple Gold Serpent for quite some time; such a great temptation was practically on her lips, yet there was still no movement in the cave.

She merely frowned and followed the sparse drops of blood all the way to the end of the cave.

The space at the end had become several times larger, but what Chen Sangruo noticed first was the pile of white bones in the very center of the space.

"This is..." the dodder flower fairy froze, "...the bones of that snake demon?"

"Where's the promised treasure? All we get is a pile of bones!"

She approached the pile of bones, scanned them with magic to confirm, and said, "Yes."

The dodder flower fairy's thoughts were in disarray. "Didn't that snake demon say he was seriously injured? Seriously injured, with only a pile of bones left?"

"Who killed this snake demon again?"

"And judging from this pile of bones, it must have been dead for a long time. How come there are traces of its blood in the village and the cave?"

The dodder flower fairy had a lot of questions in her mind.

Shen Sanruo had confirmed her conjecture and roughly understood the truth of the matter.

If the snake demon had died instead of being injured, it would correspond to the amount of blood loss in the village.

She spoke in a deep voice, certain: "There are two snake demons."

"Two snake demons?" After a moment, the dodder flower demon suddenly realized, "You mean the other snake demon ate this one?"

"What about the other snake demon?"

Shen Sanruo's eyes deepened, "Another snake demon..."

Before he could finish speaking, the hand holding the Purple Gold Serpent Core was suddenly grabbed by the wrist and lifted up.

"Is my sister looking for me?" A seductive voice rang in her ear.

She turned her head and met a pair of alluring vertical pupils. It was a woman with a bewitching appearance who looked somewhat similar to Xiao Shi.

The woman stood behind her, seemingly embracing her, a smile playing on her lips as she opened her red lips and bit the spirit core in her hand.

The sound of the spirit core shattering was particularly clear in the empty cave. In the blink of an eye, the spirit core was absorbed and disappeared by the woman.

"Thank you for the gift, sister. I really like it."

Shen Sangruo broke free from the woman's grasp and stood in opposition to her.

The dodder flower fairy on her head was so frightened that her vines burst open. She was only slightly surprised, but not flustered.

Without a doubt, the woman in front of us is Xiao Shi, or rather, another form of Xiao Shi.

Shen Sanruo was surprised precisely by the impact of the opponent's two forms.

One is an innocent and harmless little girl, the other is a charming and dangerous femme fatale.

It's actually the same demon.

That was also her true form, because she could sense the spiritual energy emanating from her.

It was not just a mid-stage Nascent Soul cultivator, but a powerful demon no less than that dragon, possessing the strength of a late-stage Nascent Soul cultivator.

It seems that his cultivation level has increased significantly after he devoured another snake demon.

But she was only surprised for a moment before returning to normal.

She looked at the woman before her, calmly raising an eyebrow. "What should I call you? Little Poet? Snake Demon?"

"I prefer to be called Snake Woman." Snake Woman licked her lips, still wanting more.

"Judging from my sister's expression, she doesn't seem very surprised or afraid of me."

"That's right. My sister must have noticed something was wrong with me a long time ago, which is why she took back the bamboo bear and deliberately gave me the opportunity to act alone."

"I'm curious, when did you start to doubt me? Was it because I didn't portray the little girl convincingly? Or was it that village?"

The snake woman stroked her chin. "But that village is indeed an ancient village here. Could it be that because no one lives there, you didn't find the body?"

There was no massacre of the village; that village was just an empty shell she happened to encounter and used for a staged performance.

“You acted very well, and the village is also fine; the fact that no body was found is also plausible,” Shen Sangruo said.

Even when she deliberately tested her later, the snake woman didn't give herself away.

Of course, when the snake woman turned into a little girl, she had no spiritual power to begin with, so she could only use her hands to defend herself.

And through contact, the snake woman knew that she wouldn't really harm her.

Why is that?

Her gaze fell on the snake woman's skirt, and the snake woman transformed back into her true form, naturally changing into a completely new outfit.

The snake woman looked down but didn't find anything wrong. She looked up at her in confusion.

"I guess what really happened in the village a few days ago was that you wanted to devour another snake demon, and you two happened to be fighting fiercely in that village."

"In the end, you devoured that snake demon."

That's why the village became ruins, covered in the blood of the snake demon.