After binding with a genius, I became an immortal by exploiting loopholes.

Chapter 142 Soul-Devouring King Insect

The valley entrance had been cleared by humans, with tire tracks remaining among the rubble, and the soil mixed with remnants of spiritual plants and dried dark bloodstains.

The further you go, the denser the traces of the Soul-Devouring Vine become. The mountain walls, the crevices between rocks, and the dead tree trunks are covered with the remains of withered black vines.

At the end of the canyon is a stone wall covered by vines.

Elder Han raised his hand to signal the group to stop. The bronze mirror was suspended in the air, and its dark golden light swept across the stone wall, revealing several figures behind the vines.

"There's someone there."

Elder Han said coldly.

Before he finished speaking, several dark beams of light suddenly shot out from behind the stone wall, heading straight for the disciple at the front of the group.

Elder Zheng flicked a blue spiritual light from his sleeve, blocking all the dark light.

The dark light struck the light barrier, dispersing into wisps of black smoke, instantly filling the air with a putrid stench.

"Hold the valley entrance and don't let a single one escape."

Elder Han flashed and rushed behind the stone wall.

Inside the cave, seven or eight cultivators were frantically destroying the jade slips and letters in their hands.

These people were not highly cultivated; most were at the Qi Refining stage, with only the leader possessing an aura at the early Foundation Establishment stage.

Elder Han turned the bronze mirror, and wherever the dark golden light swept across, the jade slips in the hands of several Qi Refining cultivators shattered, scattering fragments all over the ground.

The Foundation Establishment cultivator at the head reacted the fastest, putting the jade slip in his hand into his storage bag the instant the mirror light swept over him. He let out a sharp shout, and a cloud of gray mist surged from his body.

The fog was so thick it was almost liquid, carrying a pungent, putrid odor, and the water droplets that condensed on the stone walls were stained dark gray wherever it passed.

This gray mist is not a simple illusion, but contains a kind of corrosive power. Once an ordinary spiritual energy shield is touched by it, it will be corroded and penetrated layer by layer from the outside in.

Elder Han snorted coldly, neither dodging nor avoiding, and walked into the mist with his hands behind his back.

His steps were slow, and with each step he took, the ground beneath his feet shimmered with a dark golden light.

The faint light spread outward from him, and the gray mist surged violently the moment it touched the light.

The power of decay clashes with the power of erosion; one strips away, the other penetrates.

The gray fog tried desperately to penetrate the dark golden halo, but with each step it took closer, the fog's own structure was stripped away, making it thinner and thinner.

Elder Zheng on the other side was also busy.

He made a hand seal, and a string of extremely fine blue light flew out from his fingertips, drifting into the depths of the gray mist.

The light spots themselves are not aggressive, but each one that falls on the gray mist begins to take root—using the spiritual energy in the mist as nourishment, it takes root, sprouts, and branches.

Countless fine blue veins emerged from the gray mist, crisscrossing like leaf veins, locking the spiritual energy structure of the mist from the inside.

When the gray fog dissipated, the Foundation Establishment cultivator had been forced into a corner of the cave.

He leaned against the stone wall, his chest heaving violently, and a faint layer of gray mist still surrounded him, but it was so thin that it was almost invisible.

Elder Han's withering power continued to weaken the activity of his protective spiritual power, while Elder Zheng's vitality power planted several "seeds" in his meridians.

With just a thought from Elder Zheng, those seeds could take root in his body and completely disintegrate his spiritual power.

"Who are you? What are you doing here?" Elder Han put away the bronze mirror and asked in a cold voice.

The Foundation Establishment cultivator grinned, and more and more black blood gushed from between his teeth.

"It's too late."

Before he finished speaking, the remaining gray mist in his body suddenly contracted and flowed back to his dantian along his meridians.

Wherever the gray mist passed, meridians ruptured inch by inch, and flesh was devoured from within by its own corrosive power.

His body withered away at a visible rate, and countless fine gray spots appeared on his skin.

Elder Han stepped forward and placed a palm on his shoulder, channeling the power of the decaying metal into his body in an attempt to strip away the self-destructive corrosive force.

But the gray mist had already merged with his dantian, and removing the gray mist would only hasten his death.

In the blink of an eye, the Foundation Establishment cultivator was reduced to a withered corpse under Elder Han's palm, his spiritual energy completely dissipated.

He died from the backlash of the spiritual path he cultivated. He sacrificed his own life force to detonate the power of the spiritual path within his body, leaving no chance for his enemies to search his soul.

Elder Zheng squatted down and examined the remaining people; they had all committed suicide by poison, leaving no survivors.

Inside the cave lay seven or eight corpses, each with the same black blood dripping from the corner of its mouth, and the air was thick with the stench of decay and poison.

Elder Han straightened up, his face ashen.

He walked to the edge of the huge stone pool in the center of the cave, where half of the pool remained, filled with black, viscous liquid, with steam still slowly rising from the surface.

泡。

Dozens of earthenware jars were scattered around the pond, containing seeds of different kinds of spiritual plants—jade rice, red-veined ginseng, green primordial grass, purple-leaf sunflower. Almost all the varieties that Qingxuan Sect cultivated could be found here.

Most of the seeds have been parasitized by the eggs of the parasitic insect, and the seed coat is covered with a layer of grayish-white mycelium.

There was a row of shelves around the cave, filled with cultivation logs and experimental records.

Elder Zheng casually opened a book, quickly flipped through a few pages, and his expression grew increasingly grim.

"They are here testing the resistance of different spiritual plants to the spirit-devouring insects."

Elder Zheng handed the log to Elder Han, saying, "We've tried all the varieties that the sects are planting: Jade Spirit Rice, Crimson Ginseng, and Azure Spirit Grass. Their goal isn't to ruin the harvest of one or two farms; they're selecting the best."

"What are we screening?"

"A universal insect egg that can infect all spiritual plants simultaneously has been selected."

Elder Zheng pointed to a passage in the logbook, "It says here: Crimson-veined ginseng has the strongest resistance and requires five generations of breeding; Jade Spirit Rice is the weakest and only needs one generation. Judging from the time, they started three months before the outbreak of the Corrosive Spirit Disease."

Elder Han took the journal and turned to the first few pages.

The paper was yellowed and curled at the edges, and it was covered with dense records of the breeding data for each generation of insect eggs.

The first generation of insect eggs could only infect Jade Spirit Rice. By the third generation, they could infect Red-striped Ginseng. By the fifth generation, the log entry became a cold, impersonal line: "Fifth generation insect eggs: applicable to all seven villages, germination rate 93%, mortality rate 70%."

"Seventy percent." Elder Han closed the journal, his face so cold it could freeze. "If the Spirit-Eating Disease hadn't been controlled in time, at least seventy percent of the harvest from the seven estates of Qingxuan Sect would have rotted."

At the deepest part of the cave, Elder Han also discovered a wooden box that was sealed with a restriction.

The core of the restriction contains a Soul-Devouring Insect egg. If someone forcibly breaks the restriction, the egg will explode, corroding everything inside.

Elder Han activated the bronze mirror, and the withering power of the Sujin Spiritual Path peeled away the life force of the insect eggs inch by inch. The insect eggs let out a weak hiss and then turned into a pool of grayish-white powder.

The ban was lifted immediately.

The wooden box contained a stack of letters and several jade slips.

The letter was signed by an organization called "Xuanyin Sect" and was written in dark red ink that had a faint fishy smell.

The letter mentions a place called "Grey Raven Ridge," located in a desolate mountain area hundreds of miles outside Baicaoji, which is one of the outer strongholds of the Xuan Yin Sect.

More importantly, one of the letters explicitly mentioned the "Soul-Eating Mother Worm".

The letter stated: "The mother insect has reached the fifth generation of breeding, and its devouring efficiency is three times higher than that of the first generation. Once the king insect is successfully bred, it can be released into the spiritual fields of the seven major sects at the same time. At that time, Qingxuan Sect will be just the beginning, and the spiritual fields of the entire Southern Region will become our testing ground."

"King Insect?" Elder Han frowned.

Elder Zheng took out the jade slips from the wooden box and examined them one by one, pressing them against his forehead.

One of the records specifically details the cultivation method of the Soul-Devouring Mother Worm. This mother worm is created by forcibly fusing the devouring characteristics of various spirit worms through an evil technique called "Soul-Devouring Feedback".

The cultivation process requires the essence and blood of cultivators as a catalyst, and the birth of each generation of mother insects is accompanied by the exhaustion of a cultivator's essence.

The jade slip concluded: "The fifth generation of the mother insect requires three cultivators who have reached the Qi Refining Perfection stage, while the king insect requires two Foundation Establishment cultivators who have comprehended one of the three spiritual paths: Abyss Silence, Pure Gold, or Netherworld Bamboo."

Elder Zheng removed the jade slip from his forehead, his face as solemn as iron.

"This is no longer an ordinary disease affecting spiritual plants."

His voice was deep and resonant. "They are using evil magic to cultivate spirit insects, and their purpose is definitely not aimed at our Qingxuan Sect—they are using the Qingxuan Sect's spirit fields as an experimental ground. This matter must be reported!"