"There's a piece of paper inside!"
Heart untangled the mass of rotten rags and found a piece of paper wrapped inside—oiled paper!
"Is there anything written on it?"
The others all leaned in curiously. Heart tossed aside the filthy rags and passed the paper to them.
The paper was coarse, coated in a layer of oil—it must have been waterproofed. When unfolded, it was about the size of two palms.
"Can any of you recognize these words?"
Heart handed the paper to the others. He couldn't read the script.
White Bird took it, glanced at it, and shook her head before passing it to Yang An.
The mont Yang An took it, an information box popped up before his eyes, startling him slightly.
[Xian-Calling Gibberish]: Xian (xiān); a thod for calling upon a Xian. If you follow these thods in action, thought, and delirious speech, you may very well receive a response from a Xian.
Cost of Use: Each ti you speak the gibberish without receiving a response from a Xian, your body will rot a little more, and your sanity will fray a little more. If you do receive a response, the Xian's every demand must be t; you cannot refuse.
Status: Purification possible!
'This isn't an ordinary piece of paper. It records a way to call a Xian!'
'That ans the information on this paper is useful!'
Yang An imdiately thought of the chanting he had heard from those people when they first arrived. 'Could that have been the Xian-Calling Gibberish recorded on this paper?'
But as he looked at the words on the paper—crooked, contorted, like a series of twisted lines—he found he couldn't understand them either. So, he passed the paper to the Child.
Three of them couldn't recognize the script on the paper. Now, the Child was their last hope.
Fortunately, the Child took it, glanced it over, and responded imdiately.
"This is the script of Jinwa Country. I can read it!"
She didn't say how she knew it, but they all understood implicitly. Only soone from Jinwa Country would speak with such certainty.
It was for the best that soone could read the script, so they asked the Child to read aloud what was written.
But after looking at it for a mont, the Child shook her head.
"The things written here can't be read aloud carelessly. I can only tell you the gist of what it says."
Heart and White Bird didn't understand what the Child ant, but Yang An did.
"Is what's written here the sa as those sounds we heard earlier? The things they were chanting?"
The only way to verify his suspicion was to ask the Child.
Heart and White Bird both glanced at Yang An.
The Child, however, nodded.
"But it's not just that. It also explains the full story of this place!
This might be our only clue to getting out of here!"
'So it really is what those people were chanting.' Yang An nodded and asked the Child to give them a summary.
The ti it takes to drink a cup of tea passed quickly. Through the Child's explanation, the group finally learned what this place was.
A century ago, this was a small city in Yundan Country. At that ti, a natural disaster struck, causing widespread devastation.
A legendary Immortal ca here to spread his teachings, hoping to enlighten the local populace.
But the people were stubborn and unrepentant. They captured the Immortal. Amid the disaster, a rumor spread that eating the Immortal's flesh would grant eternal life.
The Immortal was devoured by the crowd, and his bones were buried in a valley outside the city.
From then on, this place beca a land forsaken by Immortals, cut off from the outside world, with no way to reconnect.
The people here gradually died off, but those who had eaten the Immortal's flesh lived on.
They had truly beco immortal.
But soon, these survivors discovered sothing terrifying.
Perhaps because they had eaten an Immortal, they had forever lost their five senses, could never sleep, could never copulate, and could never feel full.
They began to beg—begging for the Immortal's forgiveness, begging for absolution from their sins.
Soone found a thod in the valley where the Immortal's bones were buried.
The valley was filled with plants that had black roots, things that had started growing ever since the Immortal's bones were interred.
They had to harvest those roots to make a soup, drink it every day, and then chant a Spell, waiting for the Immortal's response.
Only when the Immortal responded could they find release.
But if the Immortal didn't respond, their bodies would rot day by day, and their minds would descend into madness.
And so, these people have been begging here for a very long ti, repeating the sa actions day after day.
They would die for a short ti, but would reawaken not long after.
But a long ti has passed, and they still haven't received a response from the Immortal...
After hearing the Child's account, three questions imdiately arose in their minds.
First, if he was an Immortal, how could he have been captured by a group of ordinary people? And eaten, no less?
It sounded impossible no matter how you looked at it.
Forget an Immortal; even Cultivators like them—even a Cultivator at the Fake Food Realm—couldn't necessarily be subdued by ordinary people.
Unless the Immortal allowed it to happen!
Second, if the thod recorded on the paper was real, why hadn't the Immortal responded after all this ti?
According to the paper, a century had passed in this place. Even if it was impossible to know when they found this thod, judging by the degree of decay on their bodies, it must have been a very long ti.
Why hadn't they received the Immortal's response? Could the thod on the paper be wrong?
Third, since this place was disconnected from the outside world—a place its inhabitants called forsaken by Immortals—why had they been transported here? Was it just a coincidence?
Just as they were pondering these three questions, the people who had been lying dead on the ground began to stir again.
One by one, they slowly climbed up from the ground, the loose stones on the ground making CLICK-CLACK sounds as they moved.
Yang An and the others had thought these people were dead, but just as the paper described, they ca back to life after a short while.
After waking, they all looked in unison toward the iron pot over the fire. The thick soup inside was gone. They then turned and began walking outside.
"What are they going to do?" Heart asked.
"They're going to the valley outside the city to get more roots to make soup.
That's where I first appeared. Those roots can coalesce into Demon Fiends, but their Cultivation Level is very weak."
Yang An was the one who answered Heart's question, and this was also a useful piece of information.
"I think we should do as the paper says. It might be our way out of here!" Yang An continued.
There were no other clues here; this was the only way.
If they could et the Immortal, they might be able to leave this place.
"But these people have been trying for so long without getting a response from the Immortal. If we do the sa thing, it probably won't have any effect either."
the Child said. She was the only one who could read the script and understood the details best.
However, having received so information from touching the paper, Yang An already had a theory.
"Perhaps they've been chanting the Spell wrong all this ti! We can test it!"
"Chanted the Spell wrong?!"
The others were all stunned. 'Fellow Daoist He Tou could figure that out just from what the Child told us?'
'If they were chanting the Spell wrong... that seems very likely!'
But this raised a new question: if the Spell these people were chanting was wrong, what was the correct one?
The three of them looked at Yang An in unison. Since he was the one who said it, he might have the answer.
Out of caution, Yang An kept them in suspense. He didn't reveal the answer right away, deciding instead to go to the valley with these people first.
If they were going to follow the thod on the paper, they would also need those roots.
The others had no choice but to listen to Yang An and follow these people to the valley.
There was one problem with harvesting the roots: they would manifest as Demon Fiends. How did these people manage to gather them?
After a long ti, Yang An finally had his answer.
The people moved very slowly. It took them more than half an hour to walk from the city to the valley.
Yang An's group followed behind them, entering the valley as a crowd.
But as these people stepped into the valley, the black roots among the weeds on the ground began to crawl up their bodies and burrow inside them.
Before long, the tattered bodies that had gone in ca walking back out, their forms now filled with black roots.
"Looks like we'll have to just take them!"
No one was willing to imitate that process. Yang An and the others made up their minds.
When the people returned to the city and gathered by the fire behind the earthen wall, Heart knocked down the last person in line and lifted them up.
Inside the people's bodies, the black roots were completely quiet. There was nothing unusual about them, and they didn't manifest into Demon Fiends.
Returning to the fire, the people imdiately began pulling all the black roots out of their bodies with their hands and tossing them into the iron pot.
The red-hot pot imdiately billowed with thick black smoke, but as the black roots were thrown in, the contents soon thickened into a black, viscous soup, emitting a foul, rotten stench.
Watching their actions, Yang An's group found a spot. He used the Lighting Technique to start a fire. Then, following their example, Heart lifted the person he was holding and shook all the black roots from their body into a ding cauldron set over the flas.
The ding was a Magical Artifact belonging to White Bird, but she didn't seem to mind its use.
And now, the question was: who would test it?
"You have to drink this soup, called Xian Ling, imagine the existence of the Immortal in your mind, and chant the Spell these people were just chanting."
the Child repeated.
Heart imdiately volunteered.
"We are all Innate Flesh Mushrooms, so we don't need to fear the consequences. But if anything abnormal or dangerous happens to , I hope my fellow Daoists will lend a hand."
"Don't worry!"
White Bird gave him an affirmative reply. Even if Yang An and the Child stood by and did nothing, she would definitely intervene.
With the preparations made, everyone looked to Yang An.
"The Immortal isn't the sa as the Xian! Change the word 'Immortal' in the Spell to 'Xian'! The character for Xian is a person standing on a mountain!"
Since Heart had bravely volunteered to make the attempt, Yang An let his guard down. The reason he hadn't said anything earlier was that he was afraid the others might have ulterior motives, but it now seed he had been overthinking things.
At the sa ti, he was also very curious to see just how an Innate Flesh Mushroom could suppress the cost. 'What makes them different from ?'
"So it's *that* Xian!"
Everyone was startled. They had never considered such a possibility and couldn't imagine how Yang An had figured it out. They could only attribute it to Fellow Daoist He Tou's vast knowledge.
If it was truly just the difference of a single word that had caused these people to spend a century in fruitless effort, the whole affair was simply too bizarre.
Having learned the answer, Heart nodded. Looking at the viscous black soup in the ding cauldron, he didn't hesitate for a mont. He reached directly into the cauldron, scooped up the thick liquid, and poured it into his mouth.
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