Su Jiu and Chu Luohen were both so striking in appearance that they looked utterly out of place here. Their arrival naturally drew the gazes of men and women, young and old alike.
Most of those gazes were curious, as though wondering who they were and why they had come here. Yet despite their curiosity, no one approached to greet them.
There were also a few hostile gazes directed at Su Jiu. Puzzled, she looked toward where she sensed them coming from and saw several pretty girls with rather dark complexions.
Each girl carried a bamboo basket on her back. They had gathered along the way to Poison Valley, chatting in their distinctive dialect. Every so often, one of them would cast an unfriendly glance at Su Jiu.
Su Jiu spread her divine sense over the entire village.
She discovered that most of its residents were mortals without any cultivation. There were occasional cultivators with spiritual qi in their bodies, but they were not Dao cultivators in the conventional sense.
The girls ahead of Su Jiu were just such examples. Although they could be considered cultivators, they certainly had not embarked upon the Immortal Path through qi induction.
As though someone had noticed the confusion on Su Jiu's face,
a cool, pleasant voice suddenly sounded in her sea of consciousness. "They entered the Dao through Gu. They're usually called Gu cultivators."
Understanding dawned on Su Jiu's face. She suddenly recalled an ancient text she had read long ago, which described precisely this kind of cultivator who entered the Dao through Gu. They did not even need a spirit root; as long as they had an aptitude for it, they could accomplish it.
However, cultivation was no easy matter for those who entered the Dao through Gu without anyone to guide