Longzang

Chapter 811 Help Me Up
The third mirage demon didn't last long. Just three days after Wei Yuan left, Master Chuhe sent another message saying that the mirage demon was ready to surrender, but wanted to talk to Wei Yuan first.

Although it was a being born from a cave, it was still a mid-stage Imperial Realm cultivator. After materializing, it could hold its own against those who had just entered the Imperial Realm in this world. Therefore, Wei Yuan showed it great respect and rushed over as soon as he received the news.

When Wei Yuan met Master Chuhe, he asked, "What methods did you use to make him submit so quickly? What does he want to talk to me about?"

Master Chuhe laughed and said, "Of the three mirage demons, the two that surrendered first were the females, and this one is the male, who is said to be wild. The male refused to surrender, so I sent two females to deal with him. Their methods were amazing, I was truly impressed! It's only been a little over a day, and he's already submitted."

With hundreds of thousands of mirage demons now under his command, Wei Yuan had learned a great deal about their customs. Mirage demons revered females and placed great emphasis on bloodlines. Male demons were few in number and generally weak, serving primarily as reproductive tools. This male demon's ability to cultivate to the mid-stage of the Imperial Realm was truly exceptional.

Wei Yuan became interested in him and said to Chu He, "Take me to see him."

The male demon was now imprisoned in a separate pond. He had shed his outer shell and was kneeling in the shallow water, his long hair flowing freely. His face was indeed indescribably beautiful. However, from a human perspective, it was difficult to determine his gender.

Upon seeing Wei Yuan, a flash of resentment crossed his eyes, and he gritted his teeth, saying, "Such ruthless methods!"

Wei Yuan stopped by the pool and said, "It's not me who's ruthless, but your people."

A twisted expression, unlike anything human, appeared on the male demon's face as he cried out, "They are not demons! They are unworthy! I, I..."

"You want to get revenge?" Wei Yuan asked.

The male demon's expression shifted, and after a moment he said, "That's enough."

"You said you wanted to talk to me, and now that I'm here, what do you want to talk about?"

The male demon remained silent for a moment before saying, "According to the traditions of the mirage demons, I am wild. We all share the same father and mother, and were conceived at the same time. Half of my other brothers and sisters were born innately, and the other half also took human form before their time was up. Only I was born beyond my time limit, having awakened my intelligence. My parents disgraced the family and abandoned me in the wild."

After that, my sister secretly found me and gave me the cultivation method. We male demons have no status, let alone me, being a wild one, so the days that followed were mostly...difficult.

My sister endured much humiliation to protect me, even... even being mocked by other male demons! Later, I broke through the limits of my family's talent and achieved success in my cultivation, then I killed all my past enemies.

Wei Yuan listened quietly, completely unmoved by the tragic story. There were countless miserable beings in the world, and Wei Yuan believed that only those under his command were worthy of his attention.

The male demon rambled on and on, mainly about how he was being humiliated by the female demon and other male demons in various ways. Many of these ways were quite bizarre, even surprising the old Taoist priest. If written into a storybook, it would surely become a sensation.

Finally, the male demon made his request: if his sister was found, he must bring her to him so that the siblings could be reunited.

Wei Yuan said, "No problem! Name, address, appearance, and aura of the primordial spirit."

Before the male demon appeared the image of a female demon, who was also extremely beautiful and whose gender was equally indistinguishable.

"My name is Shuqing, and my older sister is Shuyan, who is in the late stage of the Dharma Aspect realm."

Wei Yuan memorized the aura of the primordial spirit, then took out a blood pact and a template of an oath, saying, "If there are no other requirements, let's complete the formalities."

Shu Qing said, "I have one more request! From now on, if I don't want to, those two guys can't touch me!"

"no problem."

Shu Qing then signed his name on the blood pact, leaving behind his primordial spirit aura. Immediately, an eight-legged blood spider suddenly leaped out of the blood pact and pounced into Shu Qing's brow.

Shu Qing was taken aback, not expecting the blood pact to be of such a high rank. Violating it would surely have a fatal backlash. As for the oaths, they were all standardized templates, consisting entirely of obligations and liabilities for breach of contract, with no rights whatsoever.

Having experienced the battle with the Sacred Heart, Wei Yuan had little confidence in the binding power of oaths. Since he was also facing the Mirage Demon of the Azure Sky, Wei Yuan dared not be careless. He specially took several leaves from the Red Lotus Bodhi tree, which were bound with karmic energy, and crafted them into blood pact paper. Its efficacy was indeed exceptionally terrifying.

If Shu Qing dared to break his oath, that blood spider could at least devour most of his Heart World. After subduing Shu Qing, Wei Yuan immediately saw a faint aura emerge from Shu Qing's body and then enter his own. As this invisible aura entered his body, the mortal realm trembled slightly, and his vitality rose again.

Wei Yuan hadn't expected this male demon's contribution to be so great, almost matching the total contribution of hundreds of thousands of mirage demons. It seemed that among the mirage demon race, this one was truly a chosen one.

Wild, and a male demon at that—this start is terribly bad. If it were a human, it would be like being born in a dilapidated temple with only a broken bowl as equipment.

The Mirage Demon is completely different from the Silver Blade and Thunder Spirit clans.

Silver Blade Thunder Spirit is formed from the immortal power of a celestial being and is born from the grotto-heaven itself. In fact, its life and death are in the hands of the celestial being, just like those unintelligent creatures in the mortal world, or the next generation born from mortals.

The mirage demons, on the other hand, were creatures that originally existed in the world. They had flesh and blood, but were later suppressed and subdued by immortals who refined their flesh and blood with immortal techniques and raised them in a grotto.

The fundamental difference between the two is that Lei Ling achieved her status as a celestial being only after reaching the level of a celestial being. In contrast, the Star Forest became a golden celestial being only because of the presence of the mirage demon.

Therefore, when Wei Yuan subdued the mirage demon, he gained an extra share of the clan's fortune, making the human world even more complete.

Correspondingly, for every gain Wei Yuan made, the Left Wise King lost the same amount. Moreover, Wei Yuan also spread a virus targeting the Mirage Demons in the Star Forest, almost wiping out the entire Mirage Demon race. This was tantamount to robbing a large chunk of the Left Wise King's fortune.

Looking back now, Yan Shi didn't just pick the mirage demon on a whim, and the Xuanhuang Bell Immortal Technique he gave wasn't chosen randomly either. Otherwise, why didn't he give the Heaven-Opening Axe, the Three Pure Ones Sword, or the Chaos Spear?

And all of this planning and execution began several years ago?
Wei Yuan was overjoyed to have subdued the three Mirage Demons of the Imperial Realm. From then on, his combat power rose to a new level, and he was now able to hold his own against ordinary Imperial Realm Demons.

As Wei Yuan pondered how to deal with these mirage demons, the crowing of a little rooster echoed in his mind: "Where are you? Quick, come help me up!"

Wei Yuan immediately entered the human world and, with a sweep of his divine sense, saw the little rooster lying on a small island overseas.

The island was scorched black, with magma flowing in its center. Seawater would occasionally crash onto the island, instantly sending up a cloud of steam.

In the center of the island grew a fiery red fairy herb, over ten feet tall, its leaves glowing with faint flames. This was the Flame God Grass, which Wei Yuan had specially built a volcanic island to transplant to facilitate its growth.

At this moment, the little rooster collapsed under the Flame God Grass, its feet pointing upwards, with a blade of grass pressing against its belly.

That blade of grass looked so light, yet it weighed down the little rooster, making him unable to move.

Wei Yuan was startled. He went over, parted the grass leaves, and easily lifted the little rooster up. The grass leaves clearly didn't weigh more than two ounces, yet the little rooster was paralyzed and couldn't break free.

"How is this going?"

The little rooster looked at the Flame God Grass with lingering fear: "It was terrifying, so terrifying! Why didn't you tell me there was Flame God Grass here? This thing is so comfortable that even just having a single leaf on you would make you feel like you'd die! If you hadn't come, I could have stayed here until the end of time, and my path to immortality would have been ruined!"

Wei Yuan was both annoyed and amused, and said, "Then shall we go somewhere else?"

"No, I can't stay here any longer. Get me out of here, or I'll have to come back here to lie down again."

Wei Yuan hadn't expected the little rooster to be so persistent, so he carried it out of the human world and into the herb garden, put it down, and said, "This is the herb garden. It's very big, and you can play around as you please. Pick whatever you want to eat, but you must tell me when you leave the garden."

The little rooster looked around, quite satisfied with his surroundings, and said, "This place is very good. It's a remote and impoverished area, perfect for tempering one's will and strengthening one's body. As for your worthless medicinal herbs, I don't care for them. Just take some spirit rice to satisfy my craving. Cultivation doesn't rely on external things; true skill comes from one's own efforts!"

Wei Yuan disagreed with this statement.

The original founder of the Creation Sect pointed out long ago that Dao power is Dao power; what one obtains through inhalation and exhalation is no different from what one receives from elixirs. On the contrary, high-grade elixirs, in addition to spiritual energy, have various other effects that cannot be obtained through personal inhalation and exhalation. All cultivators who criticize external objects as useless are simply those who cannot afford them.

(End of this chapter)