Cultivation begins with harvest.

Dongfang Lieming's grip on the shield artifact had just loosened when he quickly tightened it again, noticing the sweat forming on his palms.

I just encountered the Black-bellied Feathered Serpent—

Even under the bright sunlight, the dark ravines at the foot of these mountains are full of hiding places. Dongfang Lieming scanned these places and felt that a black-bellied feathered serpent or some other kind of snake might jump out.

"Ugh."

Chen Guang let out a sigh, and a cloud of purple mist spewed out from the gourd's mouth, enveloping the two of them. Just as they were enveloped, several strange long-snouted and long-legged mosquitoes that reflected golden light in the sunlight flew in from the side and behind. They seemed to be moving slowly, but by the time Dongfang Lieming reacted, they had already crashed into the purple mist, hitting a relatively deep part of it. Dongfang Lieming was so frightened that he activated his spiritual shield even while inside the mist.

"What is this?" Dongfang Lieming asked in a panic. The golden mosquito that suddenly appeared was too strange. After looking at it for a while, she would feel a little dizzy. By the time she came to her senses, it was already close at hand and easily penetrated her defenses to reach the depths of the purple mist. Almost no cultivator had ever been able to do this before, which is why she panicked.

"This is the [Longgu Mosquito], which has the special ability to confuse the eyes. It is metallic in nature and specializes in penetrating. It is somewhat effective against my gourd." Chen Guang stroked his chin and looked at the ravines riddled with holes at the bottom of the slope with a knowing look, but he was not flustered.

The origin of the Longgu Mosquito is even more special than that of the Feathered Serpent. The Feathered Serpent is a serpent with feathers attached, while the Longgu Mosquito is a different kind of fixed group of demon beasts. They share a common origin—from Longgu, and all of them possess the ability of illusion.

A single swarm of swarming mosquitoes poses little threat, but they operate in swarms, and their unpredictable flight and penetrating abilities make them a troublesome threat if encountered.

They are all high-ranking species among the demonic beasts.

"This is the edge of the endless wilderness."

Logically speaking, they shouldn't have encountered these demonic beasts. While manipulating the purple mist to push away the swamp mosquitoes, Chen Guang stared at the slope. Perhaps there was something here that attracted them, otherwise they wouldn't have appeared here for no reason. After all, the half-wabi vine is a rather special spiritual plant, enough to make demonic beasts avoid it.

After trying twice more, the mosquitoes found that they still could not penetrate the defense of the purple jade gourd. One mosquito continued to fly forward, and the others slowly followed.

As soon as these few mosquitoes left, several more rushed in from behind, causing a ruckus before finally leaving. This repeated four or five times until the last few mosquitoes also left, and then it finally quieted down completely.

"We need to change our route and go this way."

Not only the swamp mosquitoes and the black-bellied feathered serpents, but Chen Guang also flicked his fingertips to create bright, firefly-like sparks that floated out. This was a newly mastered detection spell, the complexity of which was beyond his ability to deduce. It could reach as far as 150 feet and remain for more than the time it takes for an incense stick to burn. It would be naturally attracted to living beings and then quickly extinguish itself.

This is also the drawback of this spell, as it carries the potential to attract other living beings. Therefore, the spiritual power contained in each spark is extremely weak, and this situation should be avoided as much as possible.

The investigation confirmed Chen Guang's earlier suspicions: there was indeed something there that attracted these demonic beasts, and he had also detected traces of some cultivators, but he lacked better detection spells to confirm it.

One of the main characteristics of fire-attribute spells is their impressive display when used, which makes them less effective for detection and concealment. However, they do have their advantages, as they can quickly cover the detection area. At this moment, it is not suitable to use other detection spells to see clearly. Chen Guang could only draw a map in his mind to match the area in front of him with the map in his mind, creating an area that he should not easily set foot in. He couldn't help but feel a little headache. To completely avoid this area where demonic beasts and cultivators gathered, he had to stay away from the Great Dao, which was different from his initial plan.

"It's better to avoid trouble. We can return to the main road at Huaquankou and Daoyingxia."

The purple mist grew thicker, and with one hand on the array flag of the armored formation, Dongfang Lieming quickly left the slope in a diagonal direction.

The two moved at a fast pace. With the purple mist surrounding them, Chen Guang could easily pass over tree branches with a quick scan of his clear spiritual eyes. Although this consumed a lot of mana, it was highly efficient. The Star Leaf Powder continuously transformed into new mana to replenish their energy.

In the time it takes to drink a cup of tea, we ran over a small hill in the foothills, finally breathed a sigh of relief, rested briefly, and then entered the dense forest.

The forest was deep and the leaves were dense. As soon as you entered, you felt that the surroundings became darker. This was originally a good place for demonic beasts to ambush. But it was precisely because of this characteristic that this place was given special attention. On the contrary, it was safer because it was so cleaned up. Occasionally, cultivators would come here to catch snakes and insects. Some old spiritual trees had been cut down.

……

Several days later.

Between two green hills lies a flat and wide meadow.

"twitter!"

A white-haired badger let out a piercing scream, its muscles suddenly swelled and then contracted, and after two screams it fell to the ground and never moved again, only then did two lines of fire fly out from the white-haired badger's body.

Chen Guang, however, only approached after piercing its skull with the cotton fire needle, and used the jade-cutting blade to peel off its entire pelt, including its claws. Such a complete pelt was worth more than two hundred silver dollars.

Chen Guang collected them out of interest; the rice cakes were of little use to him, but they were novel and he treated them as a form of collection.

At first, Chen Guang wasn't very familiar with it. Even if he pierced the vital organs or head of a demon beast with a cotton fire needle, it wouldn't kill it immediately. However, the cotton fire needle was too small, and the accompanying burning effect couldn't immediately end the life of a demon beast with strong vitality. There was even a time when a lone wolf demon endured the pain of its heart being pierced and burned, pretending to be dead. If Chen Guang hadn't recently developed the habit of intermittently using his clear spiritual eyes and noticed that the wolf demon's spiritual energy hadn't dissipated, he would have suffered a great loss.

Only demonic beasts equivalent to the upper-grade first rank (late stage of Qi Refining) will have their spiritual energy dissipate at a significantly slower rate after death. Even if left unchecked, it can take up to half a month before their spiritual energy can no longer be completely locked away.

A first-tier low-grade (early stage of Qi Refining) is quite ordinary. Even if it was just slaughtered, most of its spiritual energy would dissipate within the time it takes to brew a cup of tea.

This is the cultivation path of demonic beasts, somewhat similar to body tempering, which involves storing spiritual energy within the physical body to gain the ability to resist damage of the same level and possess powerful self-healing capabilities.

Along the way, Chen Guang killed quite a few demonic beasts, mostly low-grade ones, with few mid-grade ones. Unless he acted immediately, the demonic beast meat would have little spiritual essence left.

"Another flesh-toothed demon beast. Hoof-milk demon beasts are really hard to deal with." Dongfang Lieming sighed as he helped collect the demon beast blood.

"Yes," Chen Guang nodded in agreement.

The terms "flesh teeth" and "hoof milk" are somewhat similar to the classification of carnivores and herbivores in the previous life. However, these are not terms used by cultivators, but rather they originated from demon beasts and spirit beasts and were accepted by human cultivators.

In addition, there are other classifications such as "greedy scales", "five-colored shells", and "roaming arrays", but they are not as deeply ingrained in people's minds as meat teeth and hoof milk. Humans simply used them as they came and did not completely copy them.

After all, humans also have their own theory of the five insects, but some cultivators feel that it is too general and not precise enough, so they pick out some of their favorite theories and mix them together.

Monsters are not intelligent. As they advance to higher levels, they will learn to think, summarize, and learn more logically and clearly. However, wisdom always belongs to the individual. Even humans cannot spread their teachings to everyone. It is even more difficult for these extraordinary monsters to pass on their wisdom to their descendants. Any results that are revealed are the essence, which is why they can spread.

Most demonic beasts are fleshy and bloodthirsty, which is the fastest way to strengthen their bodies. Regardless of the type of demonic beast, their digestive ability is very strong. Cultivators who directly swallow the flesh and blood of demonic beasts have an extremely low utilization rate. Only by combining them with special body-refining techniques and with a certain amount of auxiliary resources can they keep up with the instincts of some demonic beasts with mediocre digestive abilities.

This is a favor bestowed by heaven. Although demon beasts lack intelligence, some of their natural instincts are worth a lifetime of imitation by cultivators. Many skills are derived from the instincts of demon beasts, especially body tempering, which has become inextricably linked with demon beasts.

Of course, whether it's fleshy teeth or hoof milk, at least on the edge of the endless wilderness, they can only eat the parts that are influenced by spiritual energy and are transforming into spiritual creatures but are not yet spiritual creatures. However, hoof milk demon beasts almost never eat meat or gnaw on blood, but only gnaw on spiritual plants and trees. Therefore, hoof milk demon beasts have very little turbid energy, and their skin and flesh are all excellent spiritual creatures. Naturally, they are also first-class in escaping, scouting, and defending, making them a kind of creature that is difficult to capture.

The easiest monsters to capture are actually those with fleshy teeth, greedy scales, snakes, lizards, and fish.

Chen Guang had seen the hoofed milk demon beasts several times, but they would disappear as soon as he saw them, making them difficult to catch. The flesh-toothed demon beasts were aggressive enough that their instincts would make them observe for a longer time, which is why Chen Guang was able to kill them.

"Upon reaching Baishui Creek, the upper path leads to Huaquankou, where many hoof-and-milk monsters roam; the lower path leads to Daoying Gorge, which is much easier to traverse."

Just as Chen Guang was saying this, a black-robed cultivator suddenly leaped up from the grass in the distance, his body soaking wet, and looked over in surprise.