Wu Sheng looked at Song Wen with his head held high, faint disdain on his face, as though he already had Song Wen at his mercy.
He was now at Qi Refining Third Layer. His family had passed down cultivation knowledge, and his spells and methods were far beyond those of a Rogue Cultivator like Song Wen.
Yet none of that was his greatest advantage.
His greatest advantage was the Iron Corpse behind him. It had been left to him by his father and could wield the strength of a Qi Refining Middle Stage cultivator. Its body was hard as iron and carried intensely poisonous Corpse-Baleful Qi. Even an ordinary cultivator at that stage was no match for it.
Song Wen, meanwhile, felt as though his day had gone straight to hell.
He had never expected to run into bullying from a fellow disciple the moment he entered the Corpse Demon Sect.
Were people in the Cultivation World this brainless too? Making enemies on a whim!
Then again, it made sense. Wu Sheng was only sixteen or seventeen, at an age when youthful arrogance ran high. He was also the strongest of the six who had joined together, so it was hardly surprising that he acted without restraint.
Feeling the dense Corpse-Baleful Qi pouring openly from the Iron Corpse, Song Wen felt a chill run through him.
He had no hope of standing against that Iron Corpse as he was now!
Song Wen made his decision at once. Holding the token in both hands, he bowed and said,
"Senior Brother Wu, it's an honor that my cave dwelling caught your eye. If you want to live there, it's yours."
Wu Sheng nodded smugly, snatched the token from Song Wen's hands, and gave Song Wen the token to his own cave dwelling.
"Junior Brother Extreme Yin, you're not bad. You know which way the wind blows. Stick with me from now on. I do have a few connections in the Corpse Demon Sect."
"Thank you for looking after me, Senior Brother."
"Mm." Wu Sheng gave a curt reply and headed toward Cave Dwelling C-12, playing the part of the boss to perfection.
Song Wen watched Wu Sheng's retreating back and silently put his name on a list of scores to settle.
A gentleman could wait ten years to take revenge.
Once he was strong enough, he would reclaim the dignity he had lost today.
If he never became strong enough... well, fellow disciples ought to help one another.
Song Wen glanced at the token in his hand. C-97.
He looked around and finally found the cave dwelling beside a slope.
Only then did he understand why Wu Sheng had wanted to seize his.
This cave dwelling stood at the outermost edge of the outer disciples' residential area. Its spiritual energy was much thinner than at C-12, so cultivating here would naturally be far slower.
Song Wen's hatred for Wu Sheng deepened.
Token in hand, he entered the cave dwelling with ease.
The cave dwelling was fairly large, covering dozens of square meters, and contained all manner of daily necessities.
At its center was a shaft so deep its bottom could not be seen. Corpse-Baleful Qi streamed steadily from it, making Song Wen uncomfortable all over.
To aid their disciples' cultivation, the Corpse Demon Sect's predecessors had deliberately set up the Corpse Refining Baleful Transformation Array deep inside the mountain. It condensed Corpse-Baleful Qi from the bodies of countless mortals, cultivators, and spirit beasts, then channeled it into the disciples' cave dwellings through the shafts.
Song Wen began checking the contents of his storage bag: outer disciple robes, five low-grade Spirit Stones, and two bottles of pills.
One bottle held three Fasting Pills. Each could let a person go ten days without eating.
The other held three Corpse Blood Pills, which could help a cultivator gather and refine Corpse-Baleful Qi.
Song Wen noticed something odd. Everyone else had received a book containing the Corpse Baleful Art, but his storage bag held no cultivation manual at all. Instead, it contained an extra Jade Slip.
Song Wen was no longer a novice cultivator. He knew this was a Jade Slip used to pass on a technique, a more advanced means of recording information than a book. By pressing it to his brow, he could examine its contents with his mental power.
"Why is my cultivation technique different from everyone else's?"
Unease rose in Song Wen's heart. He recalled the private voice transmission Shi Shou had sent Du Qiu before leaving.
The answer probably lay there.
Certain versions of Safari on iPhone may freeze. This site has been optimized, but if you still encounter the problem, try another browser, such as Google Chrome, or switch back to the default font (yes, the font is the cause). Please contact us as well, and we'll work to improve it!
In other words, Shi Shou had given him this Jade Slip.
Why had Shi Shou singled him out for this technique? Was there something special about his aptitude?
He pressed the Jade Slip to his brow and began examining the technique.
A flood of information instantly poured into Song Wen's mind.
The Corpse King Blood Refinement Art!
That was the name of the technique recorded in the Jade Slip.
It was a body-refining technique rarely seen in the Cultivation World.
The Jade Slip recorded the entire Corpse King Blood Refinement Art, from Qi Refining Level One through Qi Refining Ninth Layer.
From the information he had received, Song Wen learned that cultivating the Corpse King Blood Refinement Art had one prerequisite: the cultivator's Spiritual Root had to contain all five elements.
"Is that why Shi Shou passed this technique on to me?"
According to its general introduction, the Corpse King Blood Refinement Art was a rare body-refining technique. Cultivated to its highest reaches, it could grant the Jiangchen Body of the ancestor of zombies.
Its practitioner could transcend the five elements and exist outside the three realms.
He could become a being who never aged, never died, and could never be destroyed.
Of course, those were only the claims made in the technique's introduction. Song Wen, who had only the Qi Refining Stage portion, could not judge whether they were true.
Song Wen could not tell whether Shi Shou was plotting something, but he had no choice but to cultivate this technique. He certainly could not continue practicing his original Longevity Art, at least not for now.
He was in the Corpse Demon Sect, surrounded by people steeped in corpse qi and sinister ghostly energy.
Stubbornly cultivating the righteous Longevity Art here would be no different from courting death.
Demonic cultivators loved using righteous cultivators' souls to forge magical treasures, their bodies to make Corpse Puppets, and even their blood essence to practice secret arts. In short, to a demonic cultivator, every part of a righteous cultivator was material for increasing their strength.
Song Wen's low cultivation still offered him some cover. If he grew stronger and wandered among demonic cultivators radiating righteous energy, he would be no different from the monk Tang Sanzang strolling through a den of demons.
After gaining a general understanding of the Corpse King Blood Refinement Art, Song Wen set it aside. There was no need to rush into cultivation.
He took out the Corpse Demon Sect's rules. If he wanted to survive here, he had to study them carefully.
Half an hour later, Song Wen closed the book of sect rules.
The book described not only the Corpse Demon Sect's rules but also its general structure, giving Song Wen a basic understanding of the sect.
To his slight relief, although the Corpse Demon Sect was a demonic sect, it did forbid disciples from fighting among themselves. At least that rule offered some measure of safety within the sect.
Why only some measure?
Because the Corpse Demon Sect both forbade private fights between disciples and did not entirely forbid them.
Attack a fellow disciple: a fine of 200 low-grade Spirit Stones.
Kill a servant disciple: a fine of 500 low-grade Spirit Stones.
Kill an outer disciple: a fine of 3,000 low-grade Spirit Stones.
Kill an inner disciple: a fine of 10,000 low-grade Spirit Stones.
Kill a personal disciple: a fine of 100,000 low-grade Spirit Stones.
Kill an elder in the Foundation Establishment Realm: a fine of one million low-grade Spirit Stones.
As long as you could pay the fine, breaking the sect rules brought no other punishment. Kill enough people, and the sect might even praise you for adding to its coffers.
If you could not pay, however, you would face a punishment beyond human cruelty.
Your blood essence would be drained dry. Your soul would then be extracted and refined into a vengeful ghost before being sealed back into your corpse, turning you into a living corpse forced to serve others for all eternity, with no hope of release.
The Corpse Demon Sect's rules were, without question, thoroughly demonic.
If you enjoyed this book, add it to your bookshelf so you can find it again next time.
Before you continue