A Great Haul

Liangshui Town... Lixi Inn?

Lu Li took the purse, and his palm sank slightly. He found it filled with gleaming silver, and at a glance, the amount was considerable.

He naturally slipped it into his pocket.

Money made the world go round. Food, drink, and everything else along the way would cost money. Lu Li relaxed inwardly. Going to the Southern Wasteland would be much easier now.

Seeing that he had accepted it, Shuang Qiuyue said nothing more. She turned and struck the corpse on the ground with her palm. Astral energy surged forth, and in an instant, the body shattered into chunks of flesh, its features utterly ruined.

Give it to me instead!

Standing nearby, Lu Li watched with aching regret. His Erosion Essence Scripture could increase his cultivation through blood absorption.

That corpse belonged to an Astral Condensation Realm martial artist!

"Forget it. Severed limbs and chunks will do."

Lu Li looked silently at the ground, which was strewn with severed limbs and mangled flesh. The blood had pooled into something like a small stream and had yet to fully seep into the earth.

"She only has a slight fever. It is nothing serious. She will be fine after resting for a while."

Before leaving, Shuang Qiuyue touched Liu Yueling's forehead. After sending a thread of inner energy into her, she gave a few more instructions. Then she picked up Gao Fengxing's head, pushed off the ground, and vanished from sight.

"She is finally gone."

Lu Li waited where he was for a while. After confirming that she had truly gone far away, he immediately stepped forward and picked up the shattered limbs.

After learning Poison Blood Hand and the Erosion Essence Scripture through the panel, he had naturally mastered the complete techniques and the pathways for circulating inner energy.

Lu Li activated Poison Blood Hand. Erosion Essence inner energy surged from his dantian, coursed through every limb and bone, and finally gathered at his five fingers.

At the same time, his fingers and palm closed slightly, piercing through the skin. The blood energy within the flesh began rapidly draining away at a visible rate.

After a while, the severed finger shriveled like a dried branch, dull and lifeless.

"Hiss..."

Lu Li let out a comfortable groan. As he absorbed the blood, some of the injuries on his body began to heal.

"So that was how it worked..."

Feeling the changes inside his body, Lu Li realized that the blood was devoured and absorbed into blood energy, then transported into his dantian.

To convert it into cultivation, he needed to train with the Erosion Essence Scripture and refine the blood energy into inner energy. But if it was only for recovery and replenishing blood, there was no need for refinement. He could use it directly, recovering his injuries while fighting.

"This feels way too good..."

Once he started absorbing it, Lu Li simply could not stop. As blood energy flowed through him, his entire body felt pleasantly warm, and it was as if he possessed inexhaustible strength.

After the severed limb had been drained of blood, its skin lost its elasticity and turned grayish white.

"An Astral Condensation martial artist really packs a punch!"

Lu Li immediately tossed it aside. As though he had spotted money, he continued picking up severed limbs from the ground and sucking their blood.

In the end, every severed limb scattered across the ground had been drained, and even the spilled blood had been completely devoured. Lu Li's face glowed red, as though he had taken some powerful tonic.

"I wonder how many levels these blood energies can help me break through after opening my meridians?"

Lu Li closed his eyes slightly. Within his dantian, vast blood energy rose and fell as it gathered. He discovered that his Erosion Essence inner energy was stirring restlessly.

The sky gradually darkened, and the faint roars of wild beasts drifted through the wilderness forest.

Lu Li suppressed his urge to cultivate on the spot. He raised his eyes to check the direction, then continued toward the earthen temple.

The wilderness was unsafe at night. He still needed to find a place to rest temporarily and refine the blood energy within him while he was at it.

Dusky light fell from the sky as a red figure stood atop a great tree, watching Lu Li in the distance.

The figure was Shuang Qiuyue, who had returned after leaving. Her personality was straightforward, but she was also meticulous.

Naturally, she could not fully trust a stranger to care for Liu Yueling, so she had specifically summoned a Hundred-Li Soul-Chasing Worm.

Lu Li had merely happened to be there and had become the current choice by chance.

However, the Hundred-Li Soul-Chasing Worm she had just sent out had flown back.

Shuang Qiuyue's expression shifted slightly. She extended her fair palm, and the brown little insect trembled as it landed in her hand, looking utterly listless.

"This Hundred-Li Soul-Chasing Worm could not possess Lu Li? Could he, like Yueling, possess an Insect-Immunity Constitution?"

Shuang Qiuyue knew that some people in the martial world were born with, or had later swallowed, some heavenly treasure that granted them abilities beyond the scope of martial arts.

Liu Yueling was one of them. With an Insect-Immunity Constitution, she could command countless insects and was a natural talent for cultivating gu arts and poison techniques.

From birth, she had possessed the unusual treasure Emerald Jade, gifted by a Taoist who had come to her door. Once it left her body, Emerald Jade would emit light.

That Taoist had repeatedly warned that if Emerald Jade remained separated from Liu Yueling for too long, her special constitution would dissipate. Even if she later regained Emerald Jade, she would become an ordinary person.

"That brat also has an Insect-Immunity Constitution... If he cultivated gu poison arts, it probably would not take many years before Master had to yield her position. And judging from this, he was born with it. Could it really be such a coincidence?"

Shuang Qiuyue was inwardly astonished and stared at Lu Li for a long time.

The abnormality of the Hundred-Li Soul-Chasing Worm already explained everything. That brat had quite a few strange traits. If he truly was a man who kept his word, she could try bringing him into the Miao Poison Sect.

In the future, another poison grandmaster of the Divine Intent Realm might emerge within the Poison Sect.

With that thought, Shuang Qiuyue suppressed her chaotic thoughts and leaped away.

She had already delayed too long. If she did not return soon, the people at Shangling Cliff would likely grow suspicious of her.

Wild grass grew thick throughout the desolate mountains.

Lu Li held Liu Yueling in one arm, wrapping her with a strap to keep mosquitoes and insects from bothering her. With his other hand, he swung his broken saber, cutting down the weeds along the way.

Clearly, no one had set foot on this path for a very long time. It was difficult to traverse, and weeds grew wildly everywhere.

After Shuang Qiuyue had sent a thread of inner energy into her, Lu Li noticed that Liu Yueling's body temperature had gradually stabilized. That truly relieved him.

He was genuinely afraid that Liu Yueling would die of her fever halfway there. If that happened, he could only pray that Shuang Qiuyue discovered it late, so he could live a few more days.

Although Shuang Qiuyue looked cold and aloof, Lu Li felt that this woman had plenty of schemes. She was not trustworthy.

Soon, the sky darkened completely. Lu Li finally spotted a dilapidated temple. Looking farther behind it, he could faintly make out a babbling stream not far away.

"Phew!"

When he entered the temple, dust had piled up inside, holes had opened in the eaves, and wind blew in from every side. Still, the structure was mostly intact.

Lu Li cut down the weeds within the temple and lit a bonfire. The leaping flames crackled and hissed.

It was easy to catch a chill at night. He himself was fine, but Liu Yueling's body was weak.

"Sigh, I came to another world just to become a nanny."

Lu Li shook his head and placed Liu Yueling to one side. Then he bent his knees and sat cross-legged. The meaning of the Erosion Essence Scripture flowed through his mind as he began cultivating and converting the blood energy.

Martial artists cultivated by sitting in meditation, circulating inner energy through their bodies to strengthen it. Meridian Opening cultivation involved opening the twelve hidden meridians within the human body.

Each of the twelve hidden meridians, once opened, brought a terrifying improvement to a martial artist's attributes.

"I remember that the Taowu Bestiary enhances one talent ability whenever I advance by a major realm."

"Weapon Lord..."