Blurb：
At 16, Alex’s rural settlement program in Nectar Valley takes a terrifying turn when he encounters the legendary Temptress spider. After falling asleep while herding cattle, Alex wakes to thick fog and hears his sister Sarah Barnes calling – but local guide Nutty Walters reveals the horrifying truth: the voice belongs to a deadly creature that mimics humans. Nutty Walters, despite his unfortunate nickname, becomes Alex’s protector against the supernatural threat. The spider, known locally as the Seduction Spider or Temptress, can enchant victims through voice mimicry. As darkness falls, Nutty rushes to get his uncle’s help while Sarah Barnes must guard Alex with a protective amulet. This chilling coming-of-age horror story combines rural folklore with supernatural suspense. Follow Alex’s harrowing journey as he navigates the dangers of Crimson Mountain with his sister Sarah Barnes and the courageous Nutty Walters. Will the amulet protect them from the Temptress’s call? Discover the secrets of Nectar Valley in this gripping tale of survival against ancient evil.
Content：
At 16 years old, I travel with my sister, Sarah Barnes, to the remote mountains of Nectar Valley to participate in a program. While herding cattle in the mountains, I fall asleep.
In my drowsy state, I hear strange panting and gasps. Thick fog has somehow risen throughout the forest by the time I wake up.
Suddenly, Sarah’s anxious voice calls out from within the fog. I’m about to respond when someone suddenly covers my mouth with their hand.
A voice whispers in my ear, “Don’t answer. That’s not your sister. It’s the Temptress!”
Chapter 1
When I was 16 years old, I traveled with my sister, Sarah Barnes, to Nectar Valley for the rural settlement program. We arrived late, and the youth dormitory was already full, so Sarah and I were housed with Nutty.
Nutty’s surname was Walters, and his given name was Nathan, though his formal name was chosen to match the pronunciation of his childhood nickname. In rural areas, there was a custom of giving boys deliberately crude names to ward off evil spirits and help them survive to adulthood.
A few years earlier, Nutty’s parents had died carrying sandbags to rebuild the burst reservoir dam. His house had a main room with a tile roof and two bedrooms. At night, Nutty and I shared one room while Sarah slept in the inner room.
Despite his unfortunate nickname, Nutty was truly a handsome young man. Nearly six feet tall with thick eyebrows and bright eyes, he had finished high school, loved reading, and was generous and straightforward in nature. Both Sarah and I liked Nutty very much.
That day, it was my turn to herd the cattle. I deliberately drove them deeper into the forest, wanting to find a quiet place to read. After growing tired from reading, I lay down on the grass and fell asleep.
In my drowsy state, I vaguely heard men and women whispering softly, along with panting sounds and gasps. When I woke up, the sounds had disappeared. The sky had somehow grown overcast, and thick fog filled the forest.
The mist rolled and grew denser, white fog advancing directly toward me. The cattle had long since wandered off somewhere. Complete silence surrounded me, and an indescribable fear welled up in my heart.
Just then, Sarah’s anxious voice called out from within the fog. I was about to respond when a hand suddenly covered my mouth, dragging me out of the forest without explanation.
Nutty spoke in my ear in a lowered voice, “Don’t answer. That’s not your sister. It’s the Temptress!”
Nutty released me but remained tense, his eyes filled with terror. His expression frightened me, making my heart pound wildly.
“What’s the Temptress?” I asked.
As Nutty pulled me down the mountain, he explained, “My uncle told me there’s a spider on Crimson Mountain. The villagers also call it the Seduction Spider.
“This creature can mimic human voices, calling people by name. As soon as the person being called responds, they immediately fall under its poison, become entranced, and run to its nest to die.”
Nutty spoke while his feet never stopped moving, dragging me along at breakneck speed. I said anxiously, “The cattle! The commune’s cattle are still in the mountains!”
“How can we worry about the cattle at a time like this? They’ve probably already been eaten by the Temptress. You’d better worry about yourself. The Temptress has targeted you.”
Nutty’s long legs made me stumble constantly as he pulled me along. We quickly reached the fields where Sarah and several other youths were busy fertilizing the radishes with manure.
Seeing Nutty and me from a distance, Sarah put down her ladle and walked toward us. Without explanation, Nutty waved his hand, signaling for Sarah to come home with us.
On the way, he told Sarah about the Temptress. He pushed both of us into the inner room when we reached home, closing the door while instructing, “Sarah, watch over Alex. Don’t let him run outside. I’m going to the other end of the village to get my uncle.”
The door had barely closed when Nutty pushed it open again. He removed an amulet from around his neck and handed it to me with grave emphasis. “Hang this amulet behind the door. No matter who comes, don’t open the door under any circumstances.”
Sarah and I sat in the room, staring at each other in confusion. Nutty had been so urgent and spoke so briefly that we still hadn’t figured out what kind of monster this Temptress actually was.
But we had always trusted Nutty. His extremely nervous manner made both our hearts rise with anxiety.
“Sarah, what’s this all about? We’re in modern times now. Can there really be monsters?”
The moment I finished speaking, someone called my name from outside. I was about to respond when Sarah suddenly covered my mouth. I looked at Sarah and saw her eyes wide with terror, her lips pale with fright.
The female voice outside continued calling sweetly, “Alex, Alex, are you home? Open the door. I didn’t bring my keys.”
I began trembling too because the voice outside belonged to Sarah. Nothing could be more eerie than this.
At that moment, Sarah was covering my mouth, her palms damp with cold sweat and her lips pressed tightly together. Her voice continued circling around the house outside the door, never fading away.
Chapter 2
Sarah and I were terrified, our faces pale as ghosts, not daring even to breathe loudly. We gripped each other’s hands tightly, trembling nonstop.
That voice circled around the house several times, sometimes near, sometimes far, but I refused to answer. After a while, the voice disappeared.
Sarah and I breathed a sigh of relief, but we still didn’t dare move a step. We could only hope Nutty would quickly bring his uncle.
Nutty’s uncle, Peter Walters, was the village’s folk healer. Whenever a child in the village got frightened by spirits, families would seek Peter to perform cleansing rituals.
When Sarah and I first arrived, Nutty would tell us stories about his uncle’s encounters with ghosts and spirits after finishing work in the evenings. We had always listened to them as mere stories. Now that we had encountered a ghost ourselves, we realized those tales were probably true.
Time seemed frozen, unable to flow. In our terror, Sarah and I stared at the door, enduring each minute and second, hoping to hear Nutty’s voice outside.
As if answering our prayers, two knocks sounded on the door. Nutty called from outside, “Alex, open the door!”
His voice sounded hoarse and seemed very weak.
“What happened?” Sarah hurried forward, preparing to open the door.
For some reason, I felt an uneasy sensation in my heart. I rushed forward and pressed down on Sarah’s hand as she reached for the latch.
“Nutty, where’s your Uncle Pete? Did he come?”
Nutty seemed injured. He was breathing heavily as he said, “I… I didn’t make it to Uncle Pete’s house. The Temptress attacked me halfway.
“Cut the amulet in half and give me a piece. I still have a protective charm on me, so the Temptress won’t dare to come close. Open the door quickly!”
He was getting a bit irritated. This wasn’t like Nutty at all. I had been here for half a year and had never seen Nutty lose his temper with anyone.
Doubts clouded my mind. I quietly moved to the door and peered out through the crack. My heart couldn’t help but skip a beat.
The Nutty outside had a very stiff expression and looked extremely strange. Sarah was still urging me from the side. “Open the door, Alex. Do you want to get Nutty killed?”
She reached out to take the amulet from the door, but I pressed down on her hand and put my finger to my lips, signaling her to look through the door crack. She brought her head close to the crack. After just one glance, her body immediately trembled.
She bit her lip and slowly turned around, too frightened to even breathe. When the Nutty outside heard no movement from us, he became even more agitated and started pounding on the door with his hands.
“Alex, Alex Open the door. Open it”
His voice was like that of a dead person, with stiff intonation and long, drawn-out tones. Every hair on my body stood on end.
Outside the door, there was no sound for a good while. But this silence was only more terrifying, like the calm before the storm.
Sure enough, a few seconds later, the Nutty outside began violently kicking the door. Even though Sarah and I were terrified and shaking, we still worked together to block the door.
Dust fell from the ceiling beams under Nutty’s impacts. The old wooden door, which looked fragile, somehow withstood Nutty’s violent attacks. It would spring open a crack, then close again, but never broke.
After Nutty futilely battered the door for several minutes, he finally gave up. The house became quiet once again.
In the tense silence, Sarah’s face was pale, her eyes filled with despair. The Nutty outside certainly wasn’t the real Nutty.
Where was the real Nutty? Could something have happened to him?
I shook my head, trying not to think about that worst possibility. Nutty must have already found Peter and was on his way back.
As I prayed wholeheartedly for Nutty, I suddenly felt a strange crawling sensation on my hand. Looking down, I saw a black spider perched on my hand.
Its body was round and plump, covered in fine hair. Its eight fuzzy, long legs crawled across my skin, immediately causing a burning pain.
Chapter 3
My heart seemed to stop beating instantly. Instinctively, I shook my hand violently, flinging the spider to the ground, then lifted my foot and stomped down hard.
Before I could catch my breath, Sarah let out a terrified scream. I looked up at her quickly and saw her staring with wide eyes, fixed on the top of my head.
Before I could speak, Sarah had already grabbed a feather duster from nearby and swung it forcefully at me. Pain shot through my head as loud smacking sounds echoed.
Just then, something fell from my head. Looking down, I saw two large black scorpions.
Sarah’s face was pale. She gritted her teeth and stomped on each scorpion, crushing them both.
My heart pounded like a drum, my legs went weak, and I collapsed onto the long bench. Sarah also slumped into the wooden reclining chair, gasping for breath.
As my terror began to settle, my eyes unconsciously fell on the mess of scorpion remains. I wasn’t sure if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but the crushed remains seemed to be moving on their own.
Beneath the dead scorpions’ bodies, many small wriggling dots appeared. Those dots rapidly grew at an alarming speed. In no time, they had become more than a dozen large scorpions crawling across the floor.
They quickly scurried toward us. Sarah and I were terrified, jumping around and dodging everywhere. Soon, countless venomous creatures poured out from under the wardrobe, beneath the bed, and from every corner.
Spiders, scorpions, centipedes, and unknown worms writhed rapidly, closing in on us from all directions. Sarah and I had nowhere to escape. In just a few seconds, venomous creatures had covered my body.
I closed my eyes in terror, feeling the poisonous insects burrowing into my skin and frantically devouring my flesh and bones.
“It’s over. I’m going to die here today,” I thought in despair.
Just then, I heard a loud crash as someone burst through the door. The pain in my body instantly disappeared. I hesitantly opened my eyes, and the venomous creatures had vanished without a trace.
Sunlight streamed through the doorway. The floor was completely clean, with no poisonous insects in sight. Sarah’s and my skin was perfectly intact.
A middle-aged man stood in the doorway, his hands forming mystical gestures while he chanted under his breath. It was Peter, Nutty’s uncle.
So everything that had just happened was an illusion. I then sat up, still shaken from the experience.
Nutty had already rushed into the room. He looked at me, then hurried to help Sarah, who was still lying on the floor. “Are you alright?”
After Peter heard about our recent experience, he frowned deeply and said with a grave expression, “It can create phantom sounds and even shapeshift. This creature’s powers are considerable. This is quite troublesome.”
Then Peter looked at me and continued, “Fortunately, you two were clever enough to see through its tricks twice. If that beast had succeeded and devoured you, it would have become indistinguishable from a living person after shapeshifting. Once it reaches that level, there would be no stopping it.”
Peter sighed. “Alex, you have a spiritually receptive nature, which would greatly benefit the Temptress’s cultivation. Since this creature has targeted you, it won’t give up until it devours you.
“However, while this beast is cunning, its core is still buried in the earth. All its demonic power depends on that core, so it doesn’t dare venture too far.
“Have Nutty take you to town after dawn. You can catch a bus back to the nearest city and stay with relatives for a few days. Once you’re beyond its range of control, the creature will be powerless against you.”
After speaking, Peter turned to look at Nutty. “Nutty, after you take Alex to the bus station, go to the community center and take Gus Lane here. I don’t fully understand this Temptress’s behavior. Although I wounded it severely just now, that will only ensure a few days of peace.
“The beast has returned to its nest to recover now. The Temptress holds extreme grudges. After suffering such a major defeat, it’ll surely go on a killing spree once it recovers. Only Gus can save the village from this disaster.”
Nutty seemed hesitant. “Uncle Pete, if the Temptress is so powerful and seems so human-like, won’t it ambush us on the road tomorrow?”
“Of course, I won’t let you go alone. I’ll make each of you a special protective charm that will keep the beast from getting close before dawn.”
As Peter spoke, he untied a bag from his waist and took out many small items. A brush, parchment, chicken feathers, and some yellow powder.
Peter glanced at the items spread across the table and said, “I’m out of blessed salt. Go get some from the salt jar.”
Nutty looked embarrassed. “I don’t have any salt either.”
Seeing Peter’s frown deepen, he quickly added, “I had some earlier, but Scrooge borrowed it a couple of days ago to make corn fritters. He said he’d return it in a day or two. I’ll go get it now.”
Sarah quickly tried to stop him. “No, it’s too dangerous. You can’t go.”
Peter said, “Don’t worry. The Temptress is severely injured and can’t come out for now. Let Nutty go get it.”
Sarah had to give up, though worry still showed on her face. Nutty took a flashlight and left.
Scrooge’s house wasn’t far away. Walking there and back would take less than ten minutes. But Sarah couldn’t sit still during the few minutes Nutty was gone. She kept getting up to peer out the door.
Sarah’s anxiety was contagious, and I felt my nerves stretched to the breaking point. Our worst fears were about to come true.
The village was shrouded in pitch blackness. Suddenly, Nutty’s agonized scream echoed from the distance.
Download the GoodNovel app, Search 【 467575 】reads the whole book.
