Liu Xiange

Three days later, Fang Huai traded in his full bottle of Killing Intent for Contribution Points, then exchanged them for some Antidote Pills. At last, he had cleared most of the spider venom from his body.

Over the next few days, whenever Fang Huai entered Miasma Valley to gather Killing Intent, he kept an eye out for Pei Family disciples following him.

But he saw no Pei Family disciples. Instead, he noticed two unfamiliar women and a man who were always trailing behind him.

They seemed to have figured out that Fang Huai knew how to locate the Sha Source, and kept some distance behind him. After he finished gathering, they would collect the leftover Killing Intent.

They were a little bothersome, but they were only picking up his scraps and keeping a respectful distance, so Fang Huai let them be.

Three days later, after filling a bottle with Killing Intent, he was about to return to Servant Valley when the three waved to him.

"Stop!"

Fang Huai pulled the Stone Blade from his robes, took a guarded stance, and shouted at them.

"Senior Brother, there's no need to be nervous." One of the women spoke up. "I'm Liu Xiange, and these are Zhang Zhu and Shen Yuan. The three of us have been in the Corpse Sha Sect for over a month."

The woman's voice was clear and bright. She had a graceful figure and pretty features, and an ornate stone hairpin tucked into her bun. Her eyes and brows held a lively spark.

By comparison, the man and woman behind her seemed utterly ordinary.

"Say what you came to say, or get out of my way."

After what had happened with Jin Xiaoxiao, Fang Huai was especially wary of pretty women in the demonic sect. He had no desire to deal with them.

Liu Xiange blinked and said, "Senior Brother's complexion is dark, and your chest seems heavy with pent-up discomfort. It looks like you still have some lingering poison in your system."

[Liu Xiange]

[Mortal]

[Poison Resistance (Gray)][Venom Gu Body (Black)]

[Poison Resistance: Poison Resistance]

[Venom Gu Body: Innate Affinity for Venom Gu]

"Explain!" Fang Huai was intrigued. This woman seemed to know a thing or two.

Liu Xiange gave her head a little shake. A foot-long Red-Headed Centipede crawled out from her bun, slipped along her skin and beneath her clothes, then poked its head out of her sleeve a moment later, eyeing Fang Huai curiously.

[Blood Gu Centipede]

[Gu Worms]

[Docile (Gray)][Immune to All Poisons (Red)]

[Docile: Docile only toward its master]

[Immune to All Poisons: Can withstand a hundred kinds of poison, but may not withstand the hundred-and-first]

"This is Little Red. It's good at detoxifying and can clear the lingering poison from Senior Brother's body."

Without waiting to see whether Fang Huai agreed, she took his hand and brought it close to the centipede.

The centipede raised its fangs and bit down.

Fang Huai was horrified and started to yank his hand away, but Liu Xiange held his wrist fast. "It's fine. It's very well-behaved. It won't hurt you."

As the centipede sucked, Fang Huai did feel his body grow a little lighter, and only then did he relax.

Still, as he stared at the centipede before him, an inexplicable hunger kept rising inside him.

Half a quarter of an hour later, the centipede let go and crawled back into Liu Xiange's sleeve.

"Well? I didn't lie to you, did I?" She narrowed her eyes and spoke playfully.

"You don't get something for nothing. What do you want from me?"

Having accepted their kindness out of the blue, Fang Huai couldn't very well keep telling the three of them to leave.

"To be honest, although the three of us have been in the sect for some time, we know next to nothing about finding the Sha Source."

After Liu Xiange spoke, Zhang Zhu picked up where she left off.

"Last month, we barely managed to gather five bottles of Killing Intent. After turning them in for the mission, we didn't have enough Contribution Points left to buy even a single Miasma-Clearing Pill.

"If it weren't for Junior Sister Liu's Little Red driving out the miasma poison, the three of us would already be buried here."

As Zhang Zhu spoke, Shen Yuan's eyes reddened. "We thought we'd make something of ourselves when we came here. We didn't expect that before we could even cultivate, we'd be dying instead.

"We've been following Senior Brother these past few days, and now we understand you're an expert. You know where the Killing Intent is thickest, so we swallowed our pride and came to ask if we could team up with you to gather it."

So they wanted to throw in their lot with Fang Huai.

Gathering Killing Intent alone wasted a great deal of resources. And after the Black Death Spider incident, Fang Huai also wanted someone to help keep an eye on the Pei Family.

The three of them could dispel poison, so they'd certainly be useful to have around. But he wasn't about to let them freeload.

"I'm willing to team up with you, but I have a few conditions."

"No problem!" The three answered in unison without a moment's thought.

"Don't rush to agree. You'll have to swear on your Dao Hearts that you'll honor these conditions.

"First, no matter how much Killing Intent we gather each month, each of you must give me one bottle."

"This..."

Zhang Zhu started to say something, but Liu Xiange stopped him and gestured for Fang Huai to continue.

"Second, the four of us will take me as our leader and follow my orders. If I'm in danger, you must not abandon me."

As he spoke, Fang Huai watched their expressions. If the three of them had agreed without the slightest hesitation, they would surely have been trying to trick him.

In that case, he would simply have turned on his heel and left.

But seeing them hesitate, he was more inclined to believe they were genuinely interested in working together. He continued:

"Third, you must not tell others our secrets or reveal where we're going. As for anything else, we can discuss it later."

Fang Huai finished speaking and didn't press them for an answer. He simply watched them in silence.

When nobody spoke, he turned and said, "It's getting dark. Since you have no real intention of working together, let's part ways here."

"Senior Brother, I agree!"

After he had taken a few steps, Liu Xiange called out to stop him. "I swear on my Dao Heart that unless Senior Brother betrays the three of us, we will follow you wherever you go."

With Liu Xiange leading the way, Zhang Zhu and Shen Yuan agreed as well.

"Tomorrow, at the hour of the Dragon. Meet me at the entrance."

After bidding farewell to Liu Xiange and the others, Fang Huai hurried back to Servant Valley. Along the way, he picked some wild greens and millet to make dinner.

For some reason, during that time he had also, almost as if in a daze, picked several Poisonous Grasses.

The pot of wild greens and millet simmered together, giving off a fresh, sharp aroma that would normally have made his mouth water.

But today, Fang Huai had no appetite at all.

"How strange. I can usually eat a whole ox. Why does this pot of delicious food make me feel sick just looking at it?"

His chest felt unbearably tight, as if countless ants were scratching at his heart. Irritated beyond measure, he glanced at the Poisonous Grasses beside the stove.

He grabbed them and tossed them into the pot. The irritation in his chest seemed to ease a little.

He lifted a bowl of green soup, feeling uneasy. "It's only mildly poisonous. It should be fine, right?"

"They say you fight poison with poison. I just got rid of the spider venom, and that Red-Headed Centipede bit me for ages. Eating some Poisonous Grass to fight poison with poison should make sense..."

He drained the bowl.

Delicious!

The prickling in his chest eased, too.

He sat quietly for a quarter of an hour. When he felt no ill effects, Fang Huai ladled himself another bowl.

After finishing the whole pot of wild greens soup, Fang Huai's belly was round with food. For no apparent reason, he thought of Pei Hu, who had been stuffed to death, and broke out in a cold sweat.

"Have I become addicted to poisonous things?"

Fang Huai paced back and forth. "Why does drinking poisonous vegetable soup make me feel better?"

He couldn't figure it out, so he could only chalk it up to the Body Forging Technique. He figured that with the Red-Headed Centipede sucking out the poison, there shouldn't be much of a problem.

It was just that his Body Forging Technique hadn't improved in ages.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

As he was thinking, someone pounded urgently on the door. A woman's sobbing came from outside. "Senior Brother, open the door! Help me!"

Sigh!

What could he do? He had a kind heart.

Fang Huai supported his round belly and shuffled over to the door. The moment he opened it, a tearful woman threw herself into his arms.

"Thank you for saving me, Senior Brother..."

[Body Tempering Art: Beginner: 67/100]