Elsewhere
Ever since the seal above the Snake Abyss had opened, Su Qingqiu had felt a powerful presence emanating from it, intimidating all the Spiritual Serpents and Evil Remains and keeping them from approaching.
Its strength was enough to make even him feel faintly threatened. Through the Eyes of the Spiritual Snake, he could see magic power soaring from the entrance, layered with killing intent and danger at every turn.
Such a powerful being... might be able to break one of his scales?
His defenses really weren't thick enough!
Under the powerful Spiritual Light, every move made by Lingli and her companions, every word they spoke, was seen and heard by Su Qingqiu.
Though he was deep within the Dragon Bone, surrounded by layer upon layer of Evil Qi, it was as if he were right there beside Lingli and the others.
He had naturally heard their so-called secret language, too.
What was secret language?
It was actually a set of principles that Dragon-Raising Temple had secretly pieced together to improve the odds of successfully communicating with Spiritual Serpents. That was secret language.
For example, some Spiritual Serpents liked being praised for their size, strength, and bright, beautiful coloring. But in reality, they might be only five and a half feet long, weak, and dull in color.
If you spoke according to what a Spiritual Serpent liked, that was secret language. It was just like how a matchmaker described a prospective spouse in the mortal world.
Six feet tall—five and a half, tops.
Mature—old-looking.
Good at managing a household—stingy.
Full of potential—no money, no house.
Secret language often involved deception, lies, and even temptation. It was vague and evasive, and something Buddhists disdained. After all, monks did not tell lies.
So secret-language tactics were generally unacceptable.
Especially since once a Spiritual Serpent learned that you had deceived it, your use of secret language would bring severe backlash.
Trust had to go both ways. Anyone who gained trust through deception from the very beginning couldn't survive in Dragon-Raising Temple.
Ling Rat Secret Language was one such tactic. It exploited Spiritual Serpents' fondness for mice to tempt them into doing what you wanted.
Seeing this, Lingfa sighed and said, "I knew Senior Sister wouldn't agree. Never mind. If we throw these mice away, they'll only ruin the common folk's grain. Let them stay here and serve as food for the Spiritual Serpents. At least that way, they'll be of some use."
With that, he casually untied the cloth sack and tossed it onto the ground. Seven or eight mice squeaked and scattered in all directions.
"This..." Lingli furrowed her brow, then finally sighed and began reciting the Buddha's name again and again. "Amitabha. May Buddha show mercy and forgive us for the sin of taking life."
Spiritual Serpents ate mice by nature. Though she didn't approve of catching mice specifically to feed them to the Spiritual Serpents, she didn't object, either.
After all, Dragon-Raising Temple was a Buddhist holy ground, but its members weren't dogmatic fools. It was said that some eminent monks even exchanged goods with Yanfeng Nation specifically to obtain Ling Rats for feeding Spiritual Serpents. Such things happened often enough.
"That eminent monk from Dragon-Raising Temple has something wrong with him—and so do the mice he let loose!"
"He seems to be Yuanming's disciple... Could he have been corrupted and fallen to the Hundred-Eyed Devil, too?"
Through the Eyes of the Spiritual Snake, Su Qingqiu clearly saw a bloody glow above Lingfa's head, tinged with black Evil Qi. It meant the man had already met a violent death.
And it was connected to evil demons.
But if Lingfa was dead, who was the person standing before them?
Most importantly, even the eminent monks of Dragon-Raising Temple hadn't noticed anything amiss about Lingfa. If Su Qingqiu hadn't possessed the Eyes of the Spiritual Snake, perhaps this evil thing would have fooled him, too.
"It looks like his Essence, Qi, and Spirit have already been completely devoured, yet he's still moving freely like an ordinary person without anyone noticing. What a powerful demonic technique... How did it manage that?"
Lingfa was nothing but an empty shell!
There had to be an evil demon controlling him from the shadows.
Su Qingqiu shifted his gaze to the mice.
Sure enough, the mice had only scattered in different directions as a pretense. Once they were far from Lingli and the others, they quickly gathered together and rushed toward some Small Spiritual Snakes.
As the mice neared the Spiritual Snakes, their eyes glowed red. In an instant, they turned into balls of black mist and merged directly into the snakes' bodies.
It didn't take long for Su Qingqiu to see through the Eyes of the Spiritual Snake that the Essence, Qi, and Spirit of those dozens of Small Spiritual Snakes had been completely devoured.
The mice didn't reappear. Instead, after wriggling awkwardly for a while, the dozens of Spiritual Snakes seemed to grow used to their new bodies, then headed toward the Dragon Bone.
Su Qingqiu had been preparing to strike, but stopped. He wanted to see what this evil demon was up to.
He watched as the Spiritual Snakes devoured every Small Spiritual Snake they came across. By the time they reached the outer edge of the Dragon Bone, there were already thirty-four of them.
The next moment,
the Spiritual Snakes began devouring one another. Evil Qi roiled, and moments later, a Spiritual Python seven or eight meters long emerged from their midst.
"What an astonishing rate of evolution!"
"What are these mice, exactly? They can devour one another and turn into something stronger in the blink of an eye."
Su Qingqiu was startled.
The evil python blended right in with the Spiritual Pythons and made its way through them. It even passed San Sha, who was still staring blankly, and imprinted its dim, hazy Spiritual Light onto the Dragon Bone.
"Spiritual Light imprinted on the Dragon Bone?"
"What is it trying to do?"
"Wait... If its Spiritual Light is imprinted on the Dragon Bone, then once Lingli and the others cultivate Spiritual Light, they'll be able to sense this evil python's Spiritual Light. And then..."
Su Qingqiu furrowed his brow, his heart turning cold.
This evil demon was secretly corroding Dragon-Raising Temple's very foundations. Who could have guessed that the Spiritual Snake whose Spiritual Light they cultivated was actually an evil demon?
One day, when this evil demon suddenly erupted, what would happen to the cultivators who had cultivated its Spiritual Light...?
To take it a step further, if the evil demon controlled the cultivators who cultivated its Spiritual Light and accelerated their progress, they would leave their peers far behind.
As long as it didn't make things too obvious, power within Dragon-Raising Temple would inevitably fall into the hands of these evil demons.
Without anyone noticing, they would have already pulled off a change of heaven and earth!
"Clever. No wonder it's an evil demon. Truly insidious!"
Su Qingqiu took a deep breath.
There was still one thing he couldn't figure out. How would this evil python get past Yuanhui of Dragon-Raising Temple?
Based on the information he'd gathered earlier, the Dragon-Snake Hall of Dragon-Raising Temple enshrined a seven-inch scale. Once a Spiritual Python imprinted its Spiritual Light on the Dragon Bone, a mark would appear on that seven-inch scale.
So every Spiritual Python was carefully recorded.
Even if this evil python imprinted its Spiritual Light on the Dragon Bone, it wasn't a true Spiritual Snake. Its mark would never appear on the seven-inch scale.
Just like the Serpent Seed of Si from back then. Otherwise, Yuanhui would have known long ago that a demonic snake had been born in the Snake Abyss.
If Lingli and the others attuned themselves to its Spiritual Light, it would be exposed the moment anyone compared the records.
"Is it only trying to kill Lingli and the others? Surely it wouldn't go to such lengths just for these rookies?"
As he pondered,
suddenly,
the temperature around the Dragon Bone plunged. Layer upon layer of frost formed in an instant.
At that moment, Su Qingqiu understood the evil demon's plan.
"No wonder I couldn't figure it out. It was hiding right under the lamp. So it plans to take my place."
Su Qingqiu sighed. He had just advanced and no one knew what he looked like. Wasn't he the perfect disguise?
As long as the evil python devoured and merged with him, getting past Yuanhui would be no problem.
But as the saying went, good advice couldn't save someone bent on dying, and even great compassion couldn't save someone who refused to be saved. That was more or less the situation here.
That stupid bug, the Hundred-Eyed Devil, had set its sights on him again.
It really never learned its lesson.
Before you continue