Final Lord

Chapter 205 Underground Roots
"Rebel against what?" The face was stunned.

"Tsk, you don't even know about anti-fraud apps! You haven't installed them yet, have you? I find it hard to believe you."

"Install what?" The face suddenly became anxious: "Once I break free from corruption, you can install whatever structures you want around me."

"Well, let me ask you a few questions then." Wang Bufu shook his money bag and said, "As we all know, the three essential elements of investment are safety, profitability, and liquidity."

If I throw away 200,000 gold coins and end up with nothing, wouldn't I be at a huge loss?

First, let's talk about safety. How can you ensure the purification process won't be negatively impacted by the chaos? If you fail to purify successfully and are negatively affected by the chaos, then my gold coins will be wasted.

The sound of cavemen's pickaxes echoed from the depths of the swamp. A large group of cavemen were digging rapidly beneath the swamp. Pheasants and caveborne pathogens were the most outstanding, digging several times faster than the other cavemen.

Gradually, the smell of sulfur began to mix with the earthy stench.

"Dig here!" The pheasant twitched its nose and immediately gave the order.

……

Faced with Wang's unconvinced question, the spore-faced voice suddenly became sticky and sweet: "Child, I swear in the name of the gods..." The lips formed of mycelium suddenly split open in a strange arc, and dark purple viscous fluid seeped from the cracks in the scorched earth, "As long as you throw the gold coin into the spring, within three days, I will definitely be able to dispel the chaos, and I will absolutely not fail."

"But you clearly exude an aura of chaos! If you are so powerful, how could you be corrupted by chaos?" Wang Bufu shouted sharply, his boot heel crushing a wriggling spore sac.

“I already said, that was to help those fern spirits… they forced me to expend my power…”

"Tsk. So that means there's absolutely no security? Let's sign a contract, I won't rip you off. Let's just sign a loan agreement."

"A loan..." The man hesitated for a moment. "So, this 200,000 gold coins is a loan from you? Fine..."

"Alright, then you wait here. I'll help you apply for a loan from the Church of Wealth. Don't even mention 200,000, we can borrow 40 million gold coins. As long as the Church of Wealth's examiner approves your application, they can flatten the Dead Wasteland with gold coins!"

"Brother found you such a great opportunity, it's not unreasonable for me to take 30% of the loan, is it?"

"The Church of Wealth!" the man exclaimed anxiously. "When will that happen? I can't wait that long..."

"Roar!"

Suddenly, the roar of the cavemen came from underground, and the sound of mud collapsing, along with the screams of the cultists, rushed to the surface!

The twelve corpses, clad in rotting sacrificial robes, were thrown by the cavemen beside the spring, their chest wounds still oozing pus and blood.

"My lord!" the pheasant roared, "Deep within this swamp are corrupted cultists."

The spore-shaped face instantly twisted into a vine-like form: "Despicable insect!"

Suddenly, the membrane around the spring rolled back, and a scarlet root covered in flesh and blood pierced towards Wang Bufu's throat. "You dare to lie to me!"

Emerald wind blades cleaved through the miasma, and Tina's wings unfurled above Wang Bufu's head to form a barrier. The wind blades of three hundred harpies shattered the spore-like face, and the lie of the corrupted spiritual spring instantly collapsed.

"Hmph! I knew it. Those fern people have no guts to corrupt a natural wonder. It really is the work of cultists. The cavemen are digging tunnels, let's go down!"

Wang Bufu shouted, and the cavemen immediately set to work, quickly digging a passage leading to the underground flesh-and-blood cavern. Wei Yi and the cavemen entered first, followed closely by Wang Bufu and the main force.

The flesh-and-blood cave beneath the Bone Mound echoed with the sound of sticky water. Wang Bufu crushed a fluorescent spore sac with the tip of his boot, and the emerald-colored liquid refracted strange patterns under the blind cat's magical illumination.

This cavern of flesh and blood is very tall, easily over ten meters high, tall enough for a harpy to fly through. The cavern is surrounded by flesh and blood; walking through it feels like stepping into the stomach of some gigantic creature.

The caveman used his palms to chisel away at the fleshy membranes that grew on the rock wall. With each piece of decaying tissue he peeled off, the surrounding fleshy walls would convulse.

"My lord, there's an altar ahead!" Mountain Cannon's exclamation came from deep within the side passage. Wang Bufu hurried through the stalactite formations dripping with pus and flesh, and suddenly a natural cave a hundred meters wide appeared before him.

Hundreds of human corpses, clad in rotting sacrificial robes, lay sprawled on the ground in a radial pattern, their withered fingers pointing in unison to the central altar of flesh and blood, dark purple vines still protruding from their withered throats.

[The Corpse of the Priest of the Golden Cult] *342
“This is a Level 3 Transcendent Priest of the Goldless Cult. A type of cultist. They love to oppose the Church of Wealth.” Wang Bufu used a wooden stick to peel back the corpse's hood, revealing a face covered in fern roots. “The time of death is at least three years.”

Wang Bufu noticed many parchment scrolls on the edge of the altar. He had Wei Yi use her sword sheath to pry open the scrolls, revealing faded blood-red characters inside.

Under the illumination of magical light, these blood-red words gradually became visible.

"The Root Nest has been connected to the Spirit Spring. Once the gold coin sacrifice is completed, we will witness the birth of a new era..."

"Something went wrong. The Spirit Spring did not completely collapse as expected. The power of natural wonders is stronger than we imagined."

"If it weren't for this spiritual spring, the desolate wetlands would have been swallowed up by our chaos long ago..."

"The source of the Spirit Spring's power is likely the intelligent creatures of the desolate wetlands. We have a new plan: first corrupt them, then use them to corrupt the Spirit Spring..."

Wei Yi turned the pages of the parchment, but unfortunately, apart from the information on it, the remaining writing was mostly illegible. At the tattered signature, the broken coin emblem of the Wujin Sect was bleeding.

“These cultists deserve to die,” Wang Bufu shook his head. The three great duchies had all searched the Deadly Wetlands but hadn't found the spiritual spring, yet they had.

That's true; monsters won't attack them unless provoked, and they have a significant advantage in the chaotic zone.

Just as Wang Bufu was deep in thought, a hurried voice suddenly rang out.

"Lord! Something is moving underground!" The serrated totem on the shell suddenly exploded into a huge red mark on the ground.

The blind cat's magic struck the marked point with a resounding crash. The earth suddenly trembled and cracked, and twenty-three scarlet roots burst forth from the soil, rushing straight towards Wang Bufu. Accompanying the tentacles appeared a large group of already dead cultist parasites.

"Fire with deadly poison! Protect the lord!" The shouts of the mountain cannon overlapped with the spitting sounds of the three hundred cavemen. The second-tier transcendent cultist parasite, which had just emerged from its roots, was hit head-on by a large poison bullet and collapsed to the ground, lifeless.

"Wind Blade Array, strangle!" Hera's emerald feathers sliced ​​through the poisonous miasma, and the air blades formed by the harpies' swooping descent precisely cut into the root joints.

With a muffled groan, the blind cat raised its staff. The parasite that had crawled into the cave didn't even have time to roar before it was pinned to the rock wall by a barrage of ice spikes.

Wang Bufu's military boots stepped on a still twitching root, and the murmurs of the corrupting root nest traveled through his nerve bundles into his mind: "Give me two hundred thousand gold coins... to purify..."

He sneered as he plunged the torch into the cut surface of the root, causing it to tremble from the heat: "Still playing tricks?"

(End of this chapter)