Eldest Senior Brother of Insect Valley

In a single exchange, more than thirty burly men were reduced to corpses strewn across the ground.

Behind the Great Elder, the disciples of the White Sun Sect swarmed forward.

Human skin, eyeballs, vital essence... any "materials" that could be harvested were collected by these disciples.

"Great Elder, we previously discovered traces in this courtyard; it looked like, well, like insects spinning a cocoon..." one injured disciple stepped forward to report.

The two elders present furrowed their brows upon hearing this. It seemed the man was already undergoing his rebirth, though it was unclear how far along he had progressed.

The group entered the main room of the courtyard and saw marks left on the corner of the wall, resembling two pieces of blue-black pleated cloth stuck there.

Everyone, including the Sect Master and the Great Elder, focused their gaze on those two pieces of "rags."

They had never witnessed a Gu Master's rebirth; their only knowledge came from rumors.

"Rumor has it that a Gu Master's rebirth is like an insect breaking out of its cocoon. The traces of a cocoon are here, but the cocoon itself has been moved. We are a step too late. Search the north side of the Outer City immediately."

"Is there any possibility that the thief slipped into the Inner City?"

"The Red Moon Cult monsters drained the entire household of a county magistrate; the authorities throughout Danhe Prefecture have been conducting strict searches lately. At such a juncture, he would never dare enter the Inner City to undergo rebirth."

The White Sun Sect's Great Elder and the Sect Master exchanged a glance, then quickly led their disciples toward the north side of the Outer City.

In the north of the Outer City, inside an abandoned dye house.

The facts were much as the White Sun Sect Master had surmised; that Insect Valley Eldest Senior Brother, Pang Gang, was indeed not undergoing rebirth in the Inner City.

However, for him, the Outer City was more than sufficient.

Inside the dye house courtyard, eight burly men stood or sat, holding various weapons.

These eight were not ordinary Tooth Gang members; the weakest among them had already tempered their Qi into their bones, and five of them had even tempered it into their marrow.

Their strength was no less than that of the soldiers in the Monster-Slaying Battalion; had they been born into better circumstances, they could easily have secured a position within that battalion.

Yet, at this moment, there was a touch of madness in their expressions, their breathing heavy like wild beasts on the verge of losing control.

"Not a single brother who went out has returned. That bunch from the White Sun Sect is almost here."

"According to the Gang Leader, there are two old fogies among them who are Second Realm Daoists."

"We only need to stall them for a little while. The Gang Leader is almost finished."

Even knowing that two Second Realm Daoists were coming, the eight men showed no trace of fear; instead, they seemed somewhat exhilarated.

At this moment, in the room separated from them by a door, a large blue-black cocoon lay horizontally on the ground.

This cocoon was approximately nine feet long and five feet wide.

Through the protrusions on the cocoon's surface, one could vaguely discern a human figure inside, along with a strange creature that resembled both a blade and a large insect.

If Zhu Li and Shen Yushu were here, they would certainly recognize that creature as the Eldest Senior Brother's Soldier Gu, the "Blade Cockroach."

This Insect Valley Eldest Senior Brother, Pang Gang, was actually undergoing rebirth with his Soldier Gu in tow, intending to use this opportunity to elevate his Soldier Gu to the Second Grade.

At this moment, both the Soldier Gu and the human figure within were stretching their limbs.

As the rebirth neared completion, the blue-black color on the cocoon deepened, and a thick, toxic mist seeped out, spreading a blue-black miasma throughout the room.

Just then, outside the room door.

The eight Tooth Gang warriors scanned their surroundings, noticing that the area around the courtyard had become unnervingly silent.

"They are here." The middle-aged man with the broad forehead, the former leader of the Tooth Gang, was the first to rise from the ground.

Almost as he stood up, human skins appeared one after another on the courtyard walls.

Nearly a hundred skins, all with hollow features, slid into the courtyard in an instant.

At the same time, the bolt on the courtyard gate burned into black ash, and the room door was pushed open from the outside.

Two aged figures flickered into the courtyard, and behind them, nearly twenty White Sun Sect disciples filed in.

"Drop your weapons, and this old man will grant you the 'Opening of the Apertures'," the White Sun Sect Master said coldly.

What he called "Opening of the Apertures" was a deep corruption by evil objects, making a person feel as if they were reborn.

This kind of "opening" was naturally familiar to the White Sun Sect disciples, for they had all undergone it, having long since made a clean break with their former selves.

"Gang Leader, we will stall them for you!"

Facing the hundred or so human skins closing in, the broad-foreheaded man let out a wild roar, and the blood-Qi surged throughout the bodies of the eight men.

Just as they were about to fight to the death, a toxic mist seeped out from the room, and more poured from the windows.

Accompanying the mist was a sound like thick cloth being torn.

"Ssh-rip, ssh-rip..." The tearing sound continued.

The moment this sound arose, the expressions of everyone from the White Sun Sect in the courtyard changed.

Among them, the one with the most unsightly expression was the Sect Master; the dozen or so copper balls on his wrist suddenly shook violently, as if something inside were trying to break free.

Even with his composure as a Sect Master, he couldn't help but roar in anger: "No time to capture this man! He is going to trigger an evil object!"

As soon as these words left his mouth, the Great Elder beside him, ignoring the eight warriors, exclaimed in shock: "Triggering an evil object here! The authorities will surely mobilize the army!"

At this moment, the voice of a young man drifted out from the room.

"You lot, come inside."

"As you command, Gang Leader."

The eight people outside the room knew their leader had completed his breakthrough, and unable to hide their ecstatic expressions, they turned and rushed into the room together.

But no sooner had they entered than their Gu poison flared up in unison, and they collapsed amidst the billowing toxic mist.

Immediately following this, the sound like tearing fabric accelerated.

The room door stood wide open, and as the majority of the toxic mist leaked out, the scene inside gradually revealed itself to those outside.

Looking through the slowly thinning mist, eight long, snake-like insect tentacles stretched out, piercing into the necks of the eight martial artists, emitting the sound of "glug-glug" swallowing.

A Blade-Shaped Monster Insect stood up first within the mist; at first glance, its body was only six feet long.

But at the next glance, the monster's muscles surged, its constricted abdomen expanded, transforming into a giant, crescent-shaped blade a zhang long, with a multitude of insect tentacles swaying at the "hilt."

Following close behind the monster, a man broke free from a ruptured insect cocoon, his physique likewise expanding, turning in the blink of an eye into a hulking Spirit Monster.

On his arms, dots of greenish-black flesh granules pulsed, each one suspending a globule of greenish-black venom.

The venom writhed like a living thing, and just like the true energy of a second-realm martial artist leaving the body, it was wielded at will by this hulking figure.

"Retreat, quickly!" As the hulking figure rose, the members of the White Sun Sect streaked toward the outside of the courtyard.

Over a hundred human skins ignited simultaneously with pale Nether Fire, swarming toward the figure in the room.

Inside the room, the man wore a faint smile just as he had in the past, yet he was no longer the Eldest Senior Brother of the Insect Valley.

Following his rebirth, the Exotic Gu within him had shifted from slumber to awakening, emitting shrill cries that reeked of hunger.

"Without Insect Crystals and spiritual herbs to supplement me, essence blood will serve as a substitute. If slaughtering the people of the White Sun Sect is not enough, then..."

He couldn't be bothered to look at the hundred-odd human skins lunging at him; his gaze swept over the fleeing members of the White Sun Sect as if looking at so many supplements.

From the tumor on his chest, a mangled head emitting an eerie black light burrowed out.

The moment this thing appeared, the influence of the evil object spread in the blink of an eye, shrouding the entire West Outer City.

The next moment, a loud "crack" erupted from within the room, and the floor tiles shattered in large patches.

The figure, hulking like a bear spirit of the mountains, sent over a hundred human skins flying with the billowing toxic mist around his body, and dragged the zhang-long Soldier Gu as he streaked out violently.