Ignoring the venomous resentment in He Ya's eyes, Huo Hai knew that as long as he did not leave the Huo Family's territory, He Ya could not do anything to him. If He Ya dared to make a move himself, it was still uncertain who would win and who would lose.
Huo Hai continued catching insects. After observing them for the past few days, he had summarized the types and habits of the insects around him. He had even written them down in a small notebook, occasionally using Chinese characters within its pages.
On one hand, Huo Hai did not want to forget where he came from. He constantly reminded himself that he was from Earth; it was also a kind of obsession. On the other hand, it was for secrecy. The Gu Refining Art had originally been an extremely secretive thing on Earth and was almost never passed down to outsiders. How could Huo Hai possibly let others learn it so easily? Even if they stole his notes, it would be useless.
After understanding their habits, Huo Hai had gained quite a few insights into raising insects and would no longer accidentally kill them. Next came the matter of medicinal herbs. Huo Hai had no idea what the medicinal herbs of this world were like.
With Medical Spirit Masters around, no one paid attention to ordinary medicinal herbs at all. Left with no choice, Huo Hai imitated Shennong tasting a hundred herbs, carefully identifying the properties of various plants so that he could use them.
Of course, Huo Hai was not foolish enough to eat them himself. Instead, he raised a small animal that ate herbs. Only when it was fine after eating something would Huo Hai dare try it himself. As for herbs the little animal refused to eat, that was not up to it. Huo Hai had plenty of ways to stuff the herbs into its belly. Over the past few days, he had killed an unknown number of little rabbits.
Thus, He Ya's campaign of rumors gained even more ammunition. Claims that Huo Hai had become an idiot, that he ate grass instead of meals, that he cruelly slaughtered little rabbits, and similar nonsense often spilled from He Ya's mouth. It made the fire in Huo Hai's heart burn ever hotter.
Huo Hai said nothing. No one knew that beneath his seemingly crazed behavior, he had gained enormous rewards. Gradually, he came to understand many ordinary medicines. Some of their medicinal properties were perfectly suited for Gu Refinement.
In the end, Huo Hai selected three kinds of insects as the foundation for refining Gu. One was the centipede. If Gu Refinement did not even include venomous insects, would that not be a terrible waste? This centipede's venom was extremely potent, making it precisely the insect Huo Hai chose as his foundation. The other two were a kind of beetle and a small flying insect resembling a dragonfly.
Gu Refinement followed certain principles. Insects that devoured one another would inherit some of the other insects' traits. By adding flying insects, the Gu Insects would have a strong chance of gaining the ability to fly in the future. For tiny insects, the ability to fly was extraordinarily important.
As for the beetle, Huo Hai had chosen one with an exceptionally hard shell. He did not expect the Gu Insect refined this time to possess much killing power. It was merely an experiment, and incidentally, something to use in retaliation against He Ya.
The process of raising Gu was extremely complicated, but things were different once spiritual energy was involved. For the first two days, Huo Hai stopped feeding the insects ordinary feed and instead gave them specially concocted medicine as food. After consuming the medicine, the insects grew increasingly violent. Huo Hai knew this was because their blood was boiling.
When blood boiled, the Bloodline would become completely active. If they survived long enough in such a state, the insects themselves might even mutate. And if such insects devoured other insects, the chance of mutation would become even greater.
After feeding them medicinal herbs for two days, Huo Hai stopped feeding them altogether and directly starved the insects. Some, driven to the brink of starvation, screeched without pause and sometimes even gnawed at their grass cages. Anyone present would surely have felt their scalp crawl.
Fortunately, because so many insects were being raised at home during this period, the servants had become unwilling to go anywhere near Huo Hai's courtyard. Thus, the courtyard became Huo Hai's private space, an absolutely quiet and safe place. After starving for several days, the insects were nearly dead. Yet supported by the medicinal power, they not only did not weaken but became even more frenzied.
"Good, the timing is just right." Huo Hai smiled faintly and took out the jar he had prepared long ago. Then he used a needle to prick his index finger and dripped several drops of blood. That blood would be the target the insects fought over.
At the same time, it was an important item for the Gu Insects to recognize their master in the future. Back on Earth, after refining Gu Insects, one had to feed them one's own blood every day for a long time. The spiritual energy within blood was the best nourishment for a Gu Insect's growth.
But things were different here. Huo Hai smiled faintly. "I can finally test feeding them with spiritual energy. Even Grandma never tried this before. I wonder what will happen." As he spoke, Huo Hai began injecting spiritual energy into his blood. Since he cultivated the Spirit Art, his blood already contained a certain amount of spiritual energy.
After Huo Hai poured spiritual energy into it, even an ordinary drop of blood seemed to brim with spiritual energy. Such a small loss meant nothing to Huo Hai, so he did not show the pale complexion that other Gu refiners displayed after refining Gu.
After handling his blood, Huo Hai's hands moved swiftly as he placed all the insects he had prepared into the jar. Then he sealed its mouth. However the insects struggled inside was none of Huo Hai's concern.
Seeing that it was about time, Huo Hai sat down beside it and cultivated the Spirit Art on his own. Cultivating the Spirit Art had nearly become a habit now. The comfortable sensation he felt each time he cultivated it also made it impossible for him to stop.
Over these past few days of cultivation, spiritual energy had been transforming Huo Hai's body faster and faster. His entire body radiated an energy surpassing that of ordinary people. He had gradually advanced from Spirit Body Initiation Stage to the early Spirit Body Realm, nearing its peak. If he continued cultivating like this, he would eventually reach the late Spirit Body Realm. Though the Spirit Body Realm might not differ much in combat power, it was the best period for laying foundations.
At this moment, all kinds of sounds came from within the jar—the sounds of insects killing one another, the sounds of insects devouring one another. No one knew what it looked like inside. Huo Hai wanted to lift the lid and take a look, but after thinking it over, he restrained himself.
It was only insects devouring insects. What was there to see? Huo Hai would never admit that he simply did not want to witness something so disgusting.
And so an entire day passed just like that. The next morning, Huo Hai quietly opened the jar and found that the insects inside had vanished. In their place was a bizarre-looking creature.
It was called an insect, but it actually looked like a large cocoon with a mouth. It resembled a silkworm, yet Huo Hai knew it was absolutely not one. He had not put any silkworms inside, nor had he used any similar catalytic medicine. How could such a thing possibly appear? This phenomenon showed that the Gu Insect had been successfully refined, though it was not yet complete.
Huo Hai knew that what it needed now was feeding. At this point, he did not need to use his own blood. He merely dripped one drop onto the insect's head for it to recognize him as its master, then injected a strand of spiritual energy into it to nourish the insect.
This was an experiment. Huo Hai wanted to test whether the spiritual energy Grandma had spoken of was the same as the spiritual energy in this world.
As spiritual energy entered its body, the insect indeed stopped moving. Once it calmed down, its body rose and fell. Something seemed to be gestating within the large cocoon. While a Gu Insect was forming, it required enormous amounts of energy. As long as it had energy, that was enough.
"Whew, it seems it really works. From now on, I'll use spiritual energy to raise insects. I'd like to see who can still withstand my army of insects." Thinking of the delightful prospect, Huo Hai could not help laughing aloud. On Earth, there had been limits to the number of Gu Insects one could raise. Ultimately, it was because one's blood was insufficient to feed so many Gu Insects, and one's vital essence was insufficient as well.
But Huo Hai was different. He had the Spirit Art and could use spiritual energy. With spiritual energy to support him, what could mere Gu Insects do to him?
After that, Huo Hai returned to a regular life. Every day, he either cultivated the Spirit Art or fed his insects. As for whether He Ya could find him, Huo Hai could not be bothered to care. His entire heart was now focused on his Gu Insect.
With spiritual energy nourishing it, the Gu Insect developed much faster. Originally, it would have taken at least ten days to half a month before it could possibly be refined successfully. But now things were different. Fed with spiritual energy, the insect showed signs of movement after only three days.
That day, Chu Yuntian was performing his routine task of feeding the insect when he suddenly heard a faint sound. Opening the lid, he saw that at some point, a crack had appeared on the large cocoon. "Judging from where this crack is, it should be coming out soon. It looks like there are wings too. This effort was not wasted." Huo Hai muttered to himself.
A slit opened along its back, growing larger and larger until it spread across one-third of the large cocoon. At that moment, a pair of wings suddenly stretched out. That was right, a pair of wings, like dragonfly wings and carrying a faint golden glow.
The wings slowly extended, followed by the insect's body. As its body crawled out segment by segment, Huo Hai finally understood what he had refined. He had not used any ready-made method recorded by others.
Instead, based on his own research into this world, he had attempted to refine it himself. Beneath the wings was a centipede—a Golden Centipede. The tiny wings were utterly disproportionate to the centipede's body, yet with one flutter of those mismatched wings, the centipede floated into midair. It was not merely because of the wings.
"Huh? Such a tiny thing can actually use spiritual energy too. A Gu Insect truly deserves to be called a Gu Insect. I just wonder how strong it is in battle."
The moment he finished speaking, a consciousness appeared in Huo Hai's mind. Its general meaning was affection, along with a declaration that it was very powerful. Huo Hai froze. After being refined into a Gu Insect, had its intelligence actually increased? If this continued, could it reach the level of a human?
Before Huo Hai could react, the Golden Centipede suddenly dropped from the air and landed in the center of the jar. Opening its mouth, it began biting off and eating the large cocoon that had originally wrapped around it. As it ate, the centipede's body slowly grew larger.
Before you continue