Translator: Cinder Translations
In one corner of the cave, there were more than a dozen unconscious won.
All of these won were around twenty years old, with swollen bellies, clearly nearing full- term pregnancy and close to giving birth.
One of the Su family cultivators placed the skeleton, along with the Yellow Essence Mushroom growing on it, onto one of the won.
The fungal filants entangled around the skeleton seed to co to life, wriggling like worms. They started to detach from the weathered bones and slowly crawled toward the woman below.
The filants landed on the woman's skin, then gradually pierced through her flesh, extending into her body.
The woman, feeling the pain, suddenly woke up, her eyes wide open.
Fear, panic, terror...
She wanted to scream and struggle with all her might.
But how could the Su family cultivator stand by and let that happen? He cast a spell.
The woman was imdiately rendered speechless and immobile.
Only her trembling body silently conveyed the boundless fear and pain in her heart.
As the filants fully transferred to her body, the skeleton on top of her suddenly shattered into countless tiny bone fragnts.
Without the skeleton's support, the Yellow Essence Mushroom suddenly fell, landing precisely in her left eye socket.
At that mont, the woman's eyes widened to an extre, as if her eyeballs were about to pop out, her fear reaching its peak.
The root of the Yellow Essence Mushroom quickly grew many fine filants, which pierced through her eyeball and burrowed into her brain.
Amidst the woman's endless agony and terror, her life slowly faded away.
The Su family cultivator didn't stop. He continued casting spells on the woman's corpse.
He sealed the corpse with spiritual power, slowing the natural decay, or else, within a month, the body would rot away, leaving only bones.
Even Song Wen, a corpse expert from the Corpse Demon Sect, felt a trace of discomfort seeing the entire process of cultivating the Yellow Essence Mushroom.
The Su family was using living people, specifically pregnant won, to cultivate the spiritual herb. The hosts were killed by the parasitic fungal filants of the Yellow Essence Mushroom.
The cruelty of it was no less than the practices of demonic sects-perhaps even worse.
At the sa ti, Song Wen was puzzled.
According to the alchemical knowledge left by Rong Jingyun, the Yellow Essence Mushroom cultivated by the Beast Master Sect was grown from the corpses of demonic beasts.
The spiritual energy contained in demonic beast corpses was far stronger than that of ordinary pregnant won. In theory, demonic beast corpses should be better for the growth of Yellow Essence Mushroom.
Why, then, did the Su family use living, ordinary pregnant won as hosts?
Apart from being slightly more "alive" than demonic beast corpses, Song Wen couldn't think of anything particularly special about them.
...
Inside the cave, six mbers of the Su family were thodically handling the Yellow Essence Mushroom.
After they had finished transplanting the mushrooms onto the dozen or so won, they brought out a large quantity of spiritual stone powder and scattered it over the corpses, allowing the filants to absorb it.
Suddenly.
One of them collapsed to the ground without any warning. Under the skin of his chest, a bulge the size of an egg appeared, moving rapidly through his body. His body began to shrink at a visible rate.
The sudden change caught the attention of the other five. Before they could react, they too suffered the sa fate.
Within the span of twenty breaths, the six Sacred Gu had devoured the six cultivators' bodies entirely, leaving only their clothing behind.
One of the Sacred Gu crawled out from beneath the clothing, lightly vibrating its wings. In an instant, it flew toward one of the cave exits.
It picked up a blue ring from the ground and returned to the cave.
The other five Sacred Gu flew around the cave, uprooting one Yellow Essence Mushroom after another and bringing them to the ring.
The ring flashed with blue light, drawing the Yellow Essence Mushroom into it.
In just a few dozen breaths, more than a thousand Yellow Essence Mushroom in the cave were harvested, with only a few dozen plants under ten years of age remaining.
After collecting the clothing left by the six people, one Sacred Gu grabbed a storage ring, while the other five took the six storage bags and rushed out of the cave.
Ensuring that there were no other people around, Song Wen surfaced from the pool, retrieved the storage ring and the Sacred Gu, and headed back to his residence.
While the six in the cave were ventilating it, Song Wen had the five Sacred Gu take a storage
ring and slowly fly into the cave.
Then, he suddenly launched a sneak attack, killing all six.
After establishing their foundation, cultivators can manipulate storage rings from a distance within the range of their spiritual sense.
About a quarter of an hour after Song Wen left, a su family male cultivator with thick brows and a square face arrived at the cave entrance on his sword.
Every day at midnight, the Su family mbers would activate the cave's formation to replace the polluted air inside and tend to the Yellow Essence Mushroom, which usually took about
fifteen minutes.
Today, it had been a quarter and a half since the six family mbers entered the cave, and they still hadn't returned, causing him to feel suspicious, so he decided to check it himself.
Upon reaching the cliff's edge, he noticed that the more than ten openings in the cliff were still open, and there was no sign of any living presence in the cave. A bad premonition rose in his heart.
He quickly entered the cave and, upon seeing the ss inside, found that nearly all the Yellow Essence Mushroom had disappeared, along with the six family mbers.
The square-faced cultivator's expression turned extrely ugly. He hurriedly exited the cave, took out a jade slip, and crushed it.
A beam of white light shone above the spirit field, illuminating the entire area as bright as
day.
The sudden appearance of this phenonon caught the attention of all the Su family cultivators in the spirit field, including those on Qingping Mountain.
After a few breaths, more than a dozen figures appeared beside the square-faced cultivator.
"Su Yuan, what happened that warrants you activating the family's ergency
communication symbol?"
A tall, broad-shouldered middle-aged cultivator with thick brows and large eyes asked.
This person was Su Anqing, head of the Su family.
The square-faced cultivator, referred to as Su Yuan, looked at Su Anqing without caring for etiquette and directly stated, "The Yellow Essence Mushroom has been stolen!"
He then briefly explained the situation in just a few sentences.
Su Anqing's expression turned ashen, a suppressed fury seeming to boil within him. His voice
was low and filled with murderous intent.
"Find them for ! Mobilize all forces of the Su family. Search the area thoroughly and bring
back the Yellow Essence Mushroom!"
Imdiately, the more than ten su family cultivators took their orders and began mobilizing
the entire Su family to search the surroundings.
An elderly man, frail and with darkened skin, who appeared rather sinister and seed to
have very little flesh on him, did not leave.
He coldly glared at Su Anqing, clearly displeased with him.
Su Anqing glanced at the sinister elder and coldly said, "What? Does the Grand Elder have any
objections to my orders?"
The Grand Elder, Su Wenshi, snorted coldly.
"Su Anqing, the Yellow Essence Mushroom is crucial for the ancestor's longevity. Now that
the Yellow Essence Mushroom is missing, your Su family cannot evade responsibility. If this delays the ancestor's longevity, I'll be curious to see how you explain it to the ancestor and to
the Su family's predecessors."
After speaking, Su Wenshi turned and left.
(End of the Chapter)
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