Ghostly Calamity

"Old Lu should break through in three to five days, you just need to wait."

"Recently, many ghostly calamities have occurred in Hanshui City. If you have nothing to do these few days, you can go to the vicinity of Hanshui City to catch ghosts and monsters. You can also exchange them for contribution points when you return. I will write a letter of proof for you." Elder Gai said with a smile, showing great care for the three juniors, Lu Yang and his companion.

"Ghostly calamities?" Lu Yang wondered. With the governor in charge of Hanshui City and the Corpse-Driving Sect helping him, what kind of ghostly calamities would dare to show up?

Elder Gai sighed, "Wasn't the previous governor arrested after being reported? A whole host of officials were also arrested along with him, and the entire bureaucracy of the desolate state was reassigned."

"At this time, many ghostly calamities suddenly appeared in Hanshui City, which were difficult to completely suppress even with the rules. It must be that there are Body Integration Realm secretly fighting against them."

"The newly appointed governor hasn't even settled in yet, and this kind of thing has happened. He hasn't handled it properly, and the ghostly calamity hasn't been effectively contained."

"The Nine Nether Sect is most skilled at exorcising ghosts. The governor suspects that the Nine Nether Sect is secretly behind this and is conducting a thorough investigation, but so far, he has not obtained any results."

"As a renowned sect in the Desolate State, our Corpse Driving Sect naturally takes on the responsibility of encouraging its disciples to resolve the ghost plague. The level of the ghost plague is not high; it's enough for you to handle."

"Of course, you can also choose to learn the corpse-driving technique within our sect. It's up to you."

Lu Yang and Meng Jingzhou exchanged a glance, noticing the confusion in each other's eyes.

How could it be the Nine Nether Sect causing trouble? They're doing so well running their barbecue restaurant, they wouldn't have time for this. Are they complaining that their barbecue restaurant isn't making enough money?

Regardless of who caused the ghostly calamity, they, as disciples of the Ask Dao Sect, had to deal with it.

After the group bid farewell to Elder Gai, the Immortal Fairy's voice echoed in Lu Yang's mind.

"The old man from earlier wasn't a living person; he was a zombie. His refining technique was quite sophisticated."

"Who?" Lu Yang thought he had misheard.

"The old man from earlier."

Lu Yang's mind raced, and he instantly thought of the most likely scenario, breaking out in a cold sweat: Elder Gai was dead and no one knew it; someone had refined Elder Gai's corpse to create the illusion that Elder Gai was still alive.

"Brother Zhao, I sense that Elder Gai seems to be acting strangely," Lu Yang asked tentatively.

Zhao Po gave a thumbs up. "Brother Lu, you have a good eye. You could even tell that the person sitting there just now wasn't my master, but a living corpse that my master had created."

"What's going on?" Meng Jingzhou and Man Gu became interested.

Zhao Po explained with a smile, without any hesitation. "We corpse drivers are constantly exposed to the aura of corpses and death, causing an imbalance of yin and yang in our bodies, with yin dominating and yang declining, resulting in weak physical bodies. Not to mention compared to body cultivators like Brother Meng, even the physical bodies of ordinary cultivators are stronger than ours."

"The corpse-driving master's entire cultivation is embodied in the living corpses he creates. For safety reasons, corpse-driving masters who have reached the Spirit Transformation stage no longer show their true faces, but instead have the living corpses they create take their place."

"It's not just my master; all the elders in the sect use living corpses to walk in front of others. Nobody knows where their real bodies are."

"Moreover, most corpse-drivers are unwilling to communicate with living people, are shy, and taciturn, so it's perfect to have living corpses take their place. Why not?"

Corpse transporters deal with corpses year-round and are generally introverted; people like Zhao Po are actually in the minority.

"So that's how it is." Lu Yang suddenly realized that he had been overthinking things.

"Should I go to our school to study next, or should I take on a mission and work with you to solve the ghost plague?"

Lu Yang smiled and said righteously, "Of course we must go and solve the ghost plague. Old Meng has a single Spirit Root, has formed two single Golden Core, and possesses Pure Yang Body. Any ghost will flee at the sight of him!"

"With Old Meng involved, resolving the ghostly calamity will be a piece of cake!"

Although it was a rare instance of Lu Yang praising him, and he was speaking the absolute truth, Meng Jingzhou couldn't feel happy at all.

You are the one with a single Spirit Root, your whole family has single Spirit Root!

Sometimes Meng Jingzhou really wanted to give Lu Yang a set of "single Curse punches," but he didn't dare.

Intuition told me that if I were to unleash a "Single Curse Fist" on Lu Yang, the karmic backlash would be even more severe than it is now, and there would truly be no way to save him.

Lu Yang is nothing but a nobody. I'll teach him a lesson once I become an immortal!

"So, does that mean we Golden Core stage cultivators can just take on any mission?" Zhao Po pondered. With the four of them at the Golden Core stage, they could easily sweep through Golden Core stage ghost-related missions.

Lu Yang waved his hand and said, "Be bold, we can even take on the Nascent Soul Realm."

Zhao Po was startled for a moment, but he quickly figured it out. The four of them working together should have no problem dealing with the Nascent Soul Realm ghost.

"Alright, then I'll go find Nascent Soul Realm mission. Please wait here for a moment."

While Zhao Po went to accept the mission, Lu Yang, having nothing else to do, took out the Nine Nether Token, contacted Vice Master Shi, and typed in a message.

"Our Heavenly King is currently in Hanshui City in the desolate state and has discovered a calamity caused by ghosts. The governor suspects it was you. Was it you?"

After waiting for a while, the Nine Nether Token did not respond. Lu Yang thought that Vice Sect Leader Shi was busy with something and had not looked at the Nine Nether Token. Just as he was about to put it back, he saw that the Nine Nether Token was hot and a long passage of text appeared on its surface.

Lu Yang was speechless. "So it wasn't that Vice Leader Shi didn't see it, he was just writing like crazy."

Vice Leader Shi's reply was as follows:

"This is pure slander. Those bastards in the imperial court are once again pinning the blame on us. Our leader thinks that Young Master Lu's 'shop debate' is very good. Right now, the Nine Nether Sect has too few strong people. We should focus on cultivation and increase the number of people in the Body Integration Realm and even the Tribulation Transcendence Stage. All activities of our Nine Nether Sect are in a semi-stagnant state. Everyone in the sect is busy opening chain stores to make money. This is the decision made by our leader."

At the Nine Netherworld Sect branch, Vice Sect Leader Shi was filled with righteous indignation upon seeing Lu Yang's problem.

"We don't even have enough time to make money right now, where would we find the time to cause any trouble? What benefit would we gain? The imperial court has slandered us more than once or twice. Whenever there's something we don't understand, they blame it on our demonic sect. Our demonic sect doesn't have the time to do these things!"

He replied to Lu Yang while cursing loudly. If the Heavenly Court Sect misunderstood and thought that the Nine Nether Sect was disregarding the overall situation and acting on its own, it would be difficult to deepen cooperation in the future.

After replying, he felt it was necessary to explain something to Lu Yang, only to discover that the Nine Nether Token was unusable.

"It needs to cool down for another five days, what a hassle."

Vice Leader Shi leaned back in his chair, looking at the rooftop, when he suddenly slapped his forehead. "Hey, why should I worry about this? Isn't the leader right here in the desolate state?"

He took out another Nine Nether Token and told the sect leader what Lu Yang had said, to see how the sect leader would handle it.

The cult leader replied quickly, with only one sentence.

"I'm in Hanshui City."