Ghoul Soldiers

The two had traveled together, yet one had ended up with his fine head rolling to the ground while the other's bones had been scattered all over.

Xu Qing was kindhearted and couldn't bear to see someone dismembered into two places, so he fitted the head back onto the headless, brainless Li Shuangxi, then roughly stitched it together with a large needle used for sewing sacks. That counted as done.

After all, he was still counting on the Duren Sutra to see him through the days ahead. How could he perform a rite of transcendence on someone with neither head nor neck?

Once the corpse had been dealt with, the familiar scripture rang out once more—

"Human Way is vague and distant; Immortal Way is vast and boundless.

Ghost Way delights; it is the gate of human life.

Immortal Way Values Life; Ghost Way Values Endings.

Immortal Way is Often Auspicious; Ghost Way is Often Ill-Omened."

When the recitation reached this point, it began repeating endlessly. Seeing this, Xu Qing's brows furrowed, and as if triggered by a reflex, he immediately leaned backward.

He remembered clearly that the first time he had encountered a reanimated corpse, this very scripture had echoed through his mind.

Now that he was hearing it again, how could he fail to take precautions?

He put on his knuckle dusters and fixed his gaze tightly on Li Shuangxi.

Sure enough, when the Duren Sutra began stuttering and repeating the line "Ghost Way is Often Ill-Omened," the corpse whose head had just been stitched back on suddenly drew a deep breath in the courtyard and sat bolt upright, its chest swelling like a fish's air bladder.

Fortunately, Xu Qing was a zombie. If an ordinary living person who breathed had been in his place, that single inhalation would probably have drained away all their vital essence, turning them completely into a shriveled, cold corpse!

Looking at the Resentful Corpse that had turned its head and was sucking in air fiercely toward him, Xu Qing wore a face full of disdain. He wasn't afraid in the slightest!

It hadn't been good for anything while alive, had died at his hands, and now that it was thoroughly dead, it still wanted to fight him for this last breath?

Where did it get that confidence?

The night mist was thick. Xu Qing swung the Vajra Knuckle Dusters gleaming with cold light and once again taught a ghost how to be a dead person.

"Immortal Way is Often Auspicious; Ghost Way is Often Ill-Omened. The Pure Spirit of the High and Lofty, sorrowful songs resound through the vast sky."

He put away his iron fist. The stuttering recitation returned to normal, and the Duren Sutra began turning its pages.

There had been nothing remarkable about Li Shuangxi's life. His greatest flash of brilliance had probably been that moment when he reanimated just now. Unfortunately, before it could fully shine, Xu Qing had snuffed it out with one squeeze.

The Duren Sutra also seemed to find it embarrassing, giving him a Human-grade Mid-quality evaluation. It rewarded him with a packet of Deodorizing Powder commonly used by Corpse Drivers, as well as two Forgetfulness Pills.

Applied externally, the Deodorizing Powder could remove any odor, including the corpse stench that Corpse Drivers picked up from prolonged contact with the dead.

Taken internally, it could temporarily block the sense of taste according to the dosage, leaving a person unable to distinguish sour, sweet, bitter, or salty.

After learning its uses, Xu Qing found it rather pointless. Who would have nothing better to do than block their sense of taste? Only its odor-removing effect might come in handy.

What he hadn't expected was that something even more pointless would come later.

Forgetfulness Pill—a pill that, when taken, could make one forget one's previous life and present life and become a new person. Its effects lasted three days.

A three-day idiot Chunsheng experience pass?

Xu Qing felt that these two things could be put into storage together with the Wine Bug and Cooling Powder he had obtained earlier.

After completing Li Shuangxi's transcendence, he casually searched his body as well.

He found several silver banknotes, one Dao Soldier Corpse Talisman, and a wanted notice from Shu Land.

Xu Qing took one glance. It depicted two people—Shi Jiulu and Qiu Ping were both listed—but Li Shuangxi's portrait was conspicuously absent.

Your presence is low enough. Even the wanted notice thinks you look too shabby!

After thinking it over briefly, Xu Qing more or less guessed why Li Shuangxi had kept this wanted notice.

He had probably intended to use it if his tracks were exposed one day and he was captured by soldiers, producing the notice to clear himself of suspicion.

After all, it only had Shi Jiulu and Qiu Ping's portraits and names. It didn't have Li Shuangxi's!

After completing the transcendence of Li Shuangxi, whose presence was exceedingly low, Xu Qing went to Qiu Ping, whose bones had been scattered.

The Duren Sutra turned its pages slowly. Fortunately, the background recitation didn't stutter this time. Once the transcendence was smoothly completed, the Duren Sutra rewarded him with a Corpse Guiding Lantern, a small and exquisitely crafted Snuff Bottle, and a Corpse Training Scripture for training Dog-headed Corpses and Cat-faced Corpses.

The Snuff Bottle and the Corpse Training Scripture were meant to be used together.

The Snuff Bottle's effect was simple. As long as one opened its little lid and brought it close to a corpse, that corpse would be like a little puppy catching the scent of steamed buns. Wherever one went, it would follow—obedient to an almost ridiculous degree.

"Train the dead into cats and dogs to guard the house?" The image of Constable Zhao Zhonghe sticking out his tongue and wagging his tail at Xu Qing inexplicably surfaced in his mind.

This thing is great!

As it happened, he still had a Dog Beating Staff in his hands. Wasn't this exactly what it was for?

The transcendence of the two corpses was complete, but the matter wasn't over yet. After all, the Corpse Soldiers those two had refined were still hidden inside the house!

In the dimly candlelit house, a pot of wine was warming on the stove. Xu Qing entered the inner room and lifted the white cloth covering the corner. Two corpses stood there stiffly, eyes closed and without breath, finally revealing their true forms.

The two corpses before him had not been ordinary people when alive. They had been special troops trained by the Nantang Yin Family.

They had merely died on the battlefield and been left exposed in the wilderness, where Li Shuangxi and the others had found and refined them into Corpse Soldiers.

Xu Qing had known very little about Dao Soldiers before this. If he hadn't completed the transcendence of these soldiers who had returned from the frontier battlefield tonight, he might not even have known what Dao Soldiers were.

When he raised his hand and completed the transcendence of the two Corpse Soldiers, all kinds of sights and experiences from the southern frontier appeared before Xu Qing's eyes, despite him being far away in Linhe.

The Great Yong Dynasty appeared peaceful on the surface, but in truth it was already a dike eaten through by ants, one step away from falling into eternal ruin.

The calamity in the southern frontier was especially severe. Ever since the Nancuo Army had invaded, everything south of Hejing had already fallen into a place where Imperial Power was not respected and Aristocratic Clans wielded power.

At a time like this, only military might and Divine Strength could restrain forces within and without. As for how much military power still remained in Emperor Longping's hands, no one could say.

After all, the old emperor was already over eighty. Whether he could even lift the Emperor's Sword in his hand was a question, let alone count on him to restore military authority and pacify the realm inside and out.

After witnessing the chaos among the various prefectures of the southern border, Xu Qing knew that the Great Yong Dynasty was gravely ill. Without someone capable of turning the tide, there was no cure.

After reading through their lives, he looked at the rewards.

Both Dao Soldiers had seen and experienced much and were veteran soldiers of a hundred battles. Both received Human-grade High-quality evaluations.

The Duren Sutra rewarded him with the method of raising Ghoul Soldiers, a Ghoul Banner for commanding Ghoul Generals, a Blade Aversion Talisman, two Plague Expelling Talismans, and the archery technique Hundred Paces Through the Willow.

The method of raising Ghoul Soldiers was similar to the method of raising Corpse Soldiers. However, instead of refining corpses, it gathered Killing Intent to refine ghouls, borrowing the deathly Killing Intent of soldiers who had died on battlefields. Refining the killing intent of one hundred corpses produced one Ghost Soldier, while refining that of one thousand corpses produced one Ghoul General.

Xu Qing took out the Ghoul Banner, red as blood, and a thought stirred in his heart.

The haunted house he had just bought happened to be an excellent place for gathering Killing Intent.

According to the method of raising Ghoul Soldiers, if he buried one hundred ordinary corpses beneath the house and then took advantage of the haunted house's ability to generate and gather Killing Intent, wouldn't he be able to refine a Ghost Soldier?

If the Killing Intent was dense enough, it might not even be impossible for every hundred corpses to condense into a Ghoul General!

Hiss. At this thought, Xu Qing suddenly had a bold idea.

Zombies had limitless lifespans. If he buried corpses for ten years, a hundred years, or even a thousand years, wouldn't he be able to accumulate and refine a Ghoul Army of Ghost Soldiers numbering a thousand—or even ten thousand?