Devouring Essence to Prolong Life
In one corner of the cave, there were more than a dozen women lying unconscious.
These women were all in their early twenties, with their bellies protruding high, indicating that their babies were almost full-term and not far from being born.
The Su Clan cultivator placed the skeleton, along with the Yellow Essence Fungus attached to it, onto one of the women.
The mycelium clinging to the skeleton seemed to come alive, resembling long worms, and began to wriggle, detaching from the weathered bones and slowly crawling towards the woman below.
The hyphae landed on the woman's skin, then slowly penetrated the flesh and extended into her body.
The woman cried out in pain and immediately woke up, her eyes snapping open.
Fright, panic, fear...
She wanted to scream, she wanted to struggle desperately.
But the Su Clan cultivator standing by wouldn't just stand by and watch; he cast a Method Formula.
The woman was immediately rendered speechless and unable to move.
Only her trembling body silently spoke of the endless fear and pain in her heart.
As the mycelium transferred entirely to her body, the bones pressing down on her suddenly shattered, turning into countless tiny bone fragments.
Without the support of the skeleton, the Yellow Essence Fungus suddenly fell and landed right in her left eye socket.
At that moment, the woman's eyes widened as if they were about to pop out, her terror reaching its peak.
Many new hyphae rapidly grew from the roots of the Yellow Essence Fungus. The hyphae pierced the eyeball and entered the woman's brain.
The woman gradually lost her breath amidst endless pain and fear.
The Su Clan cultivator did not stop what he was doing and continued to cast Method Formula towards the woman's corpse.
He was using his spiritual power to preserve the corpse, slowing down its natural decay; otherwise, the body would have decomposed into nothing but bones in less than a month.
Seeing the entire cultivation process of Yellow Essence Fungus made Song Wen, a corpse exorcist from the Corpse Demon Sect, feel a little uncomfortable.
The Su Clan actually used a living person, a pregnant woman, to cultivate the spirit medicine. The woman was parasitized and died by the mycelium of the Yellow Essence Fungus.
Its cruelty surpasses even that of demonic forces.
At the same time, Song Wen also had some doubts.
According to Rong Jingyun 'Alchemy Jade Slip, the Yellow Essence Fungus of the Beast Taming Sect was cultivated using the corpses of Demon Beast.
The spiritual power contained in the corpse of Demon Beast is far stronger than that of the mortal pregnant woman used by the Su Clan. Logically speaking, the corpse of Demon Beast should be more conducive to the growth of the Yellow Essence Fungus.
Why would the Su Clan use a living, ordinary pregnant woman as a guinea pig for medicine?
Aside from having a bit more vitality than Demon Beast corpse, Song Wen couldn't think of anything else special about the living pregnant woman.
Inside the cave, six members of the Su Lineage were methodically dealing with Yellow Essence Fungus.
After they transplanted the Yellow Essence Fungus onto all the dozen or so women, they took out a large amount of Spirit Stone powder and sprinkled it on the corpses for the mycelium to absorb.
Sudden.
One of them collapsed without warning. A lump the size of an egg appeared under the skin of his chest, moving rapidly inside his body. His body began to collapse downwards at a visible speed.
The sudden change instantly caught the attention of the other five people, and before they could make a move, they followed in the footsteps of the previous person.
After about twenty breaths, the six Sacred Beetle Gu devoured the bodies of the six cultivators, leaving only six sets of clothing behind.
A Sacred Beetle Gu crawled out from under the clothes, gently flapped its wings, and in an instant arrived at one of the cave entrances.
It picked up a blue ring from the ground and went back into the cave.
The other five Sacred Beetle Gu flew around the cave, plucking one Yellow Essence Fungus after another and bringing them to the ring.
With a flash of blue light, the ring absorbed the individual plants of Yellow Essence Fungus.
In just a few dozen breaths, all of the more than a thousand Yellow Essence Fungus in the entire cave, except for a few dozen that were less than ten years old, were harvested by the Sacred Beetle Gu.
They put the clothes left behind by the six people into their storage rings. One of the Sacred Beetle Gu grabbed the storage ring, while the other five Sacred Beetle Gu grabbed the six Storage Bag and sped away out of the cave.
After confirming that no one else was around, Song Wen emerged from the pool, put away his storage ring and the Sacred Beetle Gu, and headed towards his residence.
While the six people in the cave were ventilating the cave, Song Wen sent five Sacred Beetle Gu carrying a storage ring slowly into the cave.
Then, they launched a surprise attack and killed all six people.
After a cultivator reaches the Foundation Establishment, they can remotely control a storage ring within the range of their Divine Sense.
Half an hour after Song Wen left, a male cultivator from the Su Clan with thick eyebrows and a square face arrived at the cave entrance on his sword.
Every day at midnight, the Su Lineage members would activate the cave formation to change the stale air in the cave and take care of the Yellow Essence Fungus, which usually took about fifteen minutes.
Today, six members of his tribe have been in the cave for a quarter of an hour and a half, and they have not yet returned, which made him somewhat suspicious, so he decided to come and check it out himself.
Upon reaching the edge of the cliff, the square-faced cultivator saw that more than a dozen cave entrances were still open, and there was no sign of any living person inside. A bad premonition immediately rose in his heart.
They slipped into the cave and found it in complete disarray. Almost all the Yellow Essence Fungus were nowhere to be found, as were the six clansmen.
The square-faced cultivator's expression turned extremely ugly. He hurriedly flashed outside the cave, took out a Jade Slip, and crushed it.
A white light shone above the spirit field, illuminating the entire field as if it were daytime.
The sudden appearance of the strange phenomenon attracted the attention of all the Su Clan cultivators in the spirit field, and even the Su Lineage members on Clearpeace Mountain noticed the light.
A few breaths later, more than a dozen figures appeared beside the square-faced cultivator.
"Su Yuan, what happened that warranted you activating the Lineage's emergency communication talisman?"
A tall, middle-aged cultivator with thick eyebrows and large eyes asked.
This man was none other than Su Anping, the head of the Su Clan.
The square-faced cultivator, known as Su Yuan, looked at the family head Su Anping and, disregarding etiquette, replied directly.
"The Yellow Essence Fungus has been stolen!"
He then briefly explained the whole story in just a few words.
Su Anping's face turned ashen, as if he were burning with barely suppressed rage, his voice low and filled with murderous intent.
"Find her for me! Use every resource the Su Clan can muster, even if it means turning the entire area within a hundred miles upside down, find Yellow Essence Fungus."
Instantly, the dozen or so Su Clan cultivators around them took the order and mobilized the entire Su Clan's strength to begin searching the surrounding area.
An old man, frail and with dark skin, thin and emaciated, who looked rather sinister, did not leave.
He stared coldly at Su Anping, clearly extremely dissatisfied with him.
Su Anping glanced at the sinister old man and said coldly, "What! Does the Grand Elder have any objections to my orders?"
Elder Su Wenshi snorted coldly.
"Su Anping, the Yellow Essence Fungus is crucial to our ancestor Essence-Devouring Longevity. Now that it is lost, you, as the head of the Su Clan, cannot shirk your responsibility. If this matter delays our ancestor's longevity, I'd like to see how you explain yourself to our ancestor and our Su Clan ancestors."
After saying this, Su Wenshi turned and left.