Mutation Organ: Meridians

Shadow looked at Feng Buzhi with a complicated expression. He said nothing—or rather, he did not know what to say to this devil.

Only after quite a while did Shadow seem to remember something. "There's some news I need to tell you, though I doubt you'll care much.

"After all, you won't care who achieves [Promotion] first, much less about the reward for being the first to achieve [Promotion].

"Qian Zheng from Zhao Gang's team should achieve [Promotion] tomorrow. Though he is somewhat weaker than Zhao Gang, he has also completed the Mutation Stage. Passing the [Promotion] trial should not be difficult for him.

"They have probably set the time for noon tomorrow, and they'll be giving a speech as well. I don't know whether anything will change. It seems they want as many people as possible to witness that moment of [Promotion].

"If Qian Zheng succeeds in achieving [Promotion], Zhao Gang will lead the other people in town to the Abyss Altar in the Mist. They want everyone to leave this place."

After leaving behind this message, Shadow's figure quickly dissipated.

Night had already fallen, and Shadow could no longer remain.

Feng Buzhi stared at the place where Shadow had vanished, then suddenly turned to look in the direction of the town.

"Seems to be somewhere underground northeast of the town. It's just that my body has yet to truly merge with the Weird, so I can't sense his exact location."

Feng Buzhi murmured softly.

Though Invisible always liked to nag, Feng Buzhi still held some goodwill toward him.

If the opportunity arose, he decided that he would rescue this Shadow and grant him freedom.

"In theory, by borrowing some Goblin or human corpses, he should have a certain chance of possessing one. I just don't know why he has always refused to try. Whenever I mention the idea, he becomes extremely agitated."

Without giving it much more thought, Feng Buzhi took a walnut-sized yellowish-brown chunk of weird flesh from one of the jars on the nearby ground. He then slit open his left arm with his axe and implanted the wriggling brown chunk of flesh inside.

This yellowish-brown chunk was not the kind of Aberrant Source he had obtained from killing Ryan ten days ago. It was something stranger and more complex, containing far more violent weird power.

Even for him, before he activated the title "Mortal Gazing into the Abyss," it had been difficult to suppress and guide it.

Very soon, his left arm began to change after the brown flesh was implanted.

Centered around the implanted yellowish-brown flesh, the nearby blood and flesh were quickly contaminated, turning yellowish-brown as well. They soon swelled, forming brown blood vessels that spread outward.

Feng Buzhi sensed his left arm as he used his spirit and will to resist and guide the weird power.

Under his guidance, the brown blood vessels gradually stopped spreading upward, while their downward spread accelerated. As these yellowish-brown blood vessels extended to his fingertips, a painful itching sensation emerged.

The nails on his left hand began to fall away, replaced by five sharp, razor-edged claws. Under his control, these claws could retract into his body at any time.

"Although I've already tried more than twenty times, fully controlling and guiding this weirdness is still very difficult for me. I've only grasped a few tricks."

Not long afterward, when he discovered that the weirdness in his arm had begun invading his soul, Feng Buzhi picked up his axe and chopped off his left arm.

Though severed from his body, the left arm seemed to remain alive, twitching endlessly on the ground. Several full minutes passed before it finally went still.

Feng Buzhi removed the implanted brown chunk of flesh from the arm. By then, it had shrunk by a full circle, occasionally giving tiny tremors.

"Its Vitality has dropped drastically. It's no longer useful to me. Perhaps..."

Feng Buzhi looked at Pei Chao, who was practicing chopping not far away, but ultimately shook his head.

This low-Vitality chunk of weird flesh was still far too dangerous for Pei Chao.

After all, this weirdness was not like those whispers. It was something almost tangible. Once it invaded the soul, regardless of whether the outcome was good or bad, it could not be reversed.

With that thought, Feng Buzhi clenched his right hand and crushed the flesh in his palm.

Over the past few days, he had conducted more than twenty experiments of implanting weird flesh and then severing the limb. Most had been performed on both arms, with only two using his legs.

Because his Goblin-killing efficiency was high enough, his Abyss Points had already overflowed at this stage. Even after spending a great deal, he still had 17,000 Abyss Points left, enough to freely use the [Repair] function.

As for the source of this brown weird flesh—

After obtaining the Red Name Curse, bizarrely shaped monsters would occasionally emerge from the nighttime Mist to attack him. These monsters could wield certain supernatural powers—or rather, weird powers.

For example, their arms or hair would suddenly lengthen, or they would unleash green flames and purple currents of electricity at him.

These special monsters appeared nearly every night. Most of the time there was only one, occasionally two, and on one day there had even been three.

After he killed these monsters, he could remove these endlessly wriggling chunks of weird flesh from their bodies.

They were somewhat similar to the flesh chunks of an Aberrant Source, but far more violent and chaotic.

The yellowish-brown chunk he had just used had been taken from the corpse of a half-meter-long toad two nights ago.

This was also one of the reasons he had not removed the Red Name Curse.

If he removed the Red Name Curse, these special monsters would no longer come attack him, and he would no longer be able to obtain these strange chunks of flesh.

Even after ten days, he still had not gone to the Abyss Altar Shadow wanted him to touch in order to receive the weird power bestowed by the Abyss.

It was not because his body had failed to reach its limit. Five days ago, his body had already reached the limit he had calculated, arriving at its peak.

He had made virtually no progress these past few days.

His strength had reached 30. After breaking the shackles within his body, it could reach 50, and the state of breaking those shackles could last one to two hours. The burden on his body had greatly decreased, turning it into a routine ability.

The reason he had not touched the Abyss Altar was that over these past days, he had formed a new idea—an idea concerning Mutation Organs.

—He wanted to turn the meridians within his body into a Mutation Organ.

Feng Buzhi had not given up cultivating the Muscle-Tendon Transformation Classic. Since powers such as internal force and true qi did not exist in this world, could he make weird power circulate through his meridians instead?

According to Shadow, weird powers came in every strange and grotesque variety, and the organs they mutated were equally varied.

Though Shadow's account suggested that this world did not have Mutation Organs such as meridians and channels, Feng Buzhi believed it was feasible.

After more than twenty tests, Feng Buzhi had confirmed the possibility. By now, he could already sense the meridians in both arms.

Though meridians seemed to have no physical form, they truly existed.

Most of the meridians in the human body were blocked, but weird power could easily force them open.

When he guided weird power through his meridians, its circulation became smoother and its restless sensation weakened. Moreover, after repeated circulation, it also produced a tempering effect.

If he continued following the same method, he could also map the meridians in both legs. He only needed to implant weird flesh into his legs a few more times, then repeatedly sever them and use [Repair].

The current difficulty mainly lay in the meridians of his torso and head.

Letting weirdness flow into his limbs was manageable, since he could keep making mistakes and trying again. But if it entered his torso and head, he would be unable to repeatedly start over by severing them...