This stretch of jungle was not large, but finding the goblins' lair on his own would still be rather difficult for Jiang Ziliu.
That was because goblins were also prey for other carnivores.
They generally lived in secluded burrows in the jungle, with entrances that were usually very well concealed.
The task of finding the goblins' lair would have to fall to the Azurite Rock Man.
After the fighting, the Azurite Rock Man had consumed a great deal of dark energy.
Fortunately, it had eaten a pile of slime beast cores, and its strength was recovering rapidly as it digested them.
While Jiang Ziliu was dealing with the goblins, it had already been recovering its energy nearby.
By the time Jiang Ziliu finished all his work, his contracted beast, the Azurite Rock Man, had recovered to around eighty percent and could continue moving.
Jiang Ziliu sent the Azurite Rock Man off on its own to help him locate the goblins' lair.
The Azurite Rock Man headed into the jungle to explore, but Jiang Ziliu did not follow.
After gathering and packing the materials, he returned to the tree and continued concealing his presence and traces.
Jiang Ziliu constantly practiced the principle of putting his own safety first.
Too many young people disregarded the paths their predecessors had taken, only to lose their lives to carelessness on the road of beast-taming growth.
After a wait of less than fifteen minutes, the Azurite Rock Man returned from its exploration mission.
It had successfully found the goblin tribe's lair.
However, judging by what the Azurite Rock Man conveyed, Jiang Ziliu determined that around ten goblins still remained in the lair.
The goblin tribe's chief was also inside.
As the goblins' chief, it should have been at Black Iron Grade, just like Jiang Ziliu's contracted beasts.
Given this situation, Jiang Ziliu took cautious measures in this battle.
He approached carefully with his two contracted beasts.
The goblin tribe's lair lay beneath a huge boulder in the center of the jungle. The goblins had hollowed out the soil below it and constructed a long burrow along the underside of the rock.
The lair's placement was carefully chosen. Building it beneath a rock prevented rainwater erosion from collapsing the roof.
Clearly, goblins had an ancestral talent for digging burrow lairs.
This time, Jiang Ziliu decided to send the Azurite Rock Man in again, but rather than have it fight head-on with a blade, he told it to make as much use as possible of Rock and Earth Sneak Stab to secretly assassinate the goblins inside.
After all, he could not see the situation inside. Covert attacks were still the best way to ensure the Azurite Rock Man's safety to the greatest extent possible.
There would be plenty of opportunities to train his contracted beasts' combat skills later.
In less than half an hour, the Azurite Rock Man emerged from the cave, wreathed in a murderous aura, dragging a two-headed goblin that stood a head taller than ordinary goblins.
There was a clear blade wound over the two-headed goblin's heart.
This two-headed goblin was indeed a Black Iron Grade exotic beast and should have been the chief of this goblin tribe, but it was already cold.
The Azurite Rock Man had successfully killed every goblin inside, including the two-headed goblin chief.
The enemies had duly collected their boxed lunches.
Jiang Ziliu then had the Azurite Rock Man carry everything out. After all, with his build, he could not fit inside at all.
If he insisted on entering, he would have to crawl.
Although there was no longer any danger inside, he had no need to take that risk.
What if something happened? Exotic beasts included plenty of highly venomous insects, as well as earth-attribute beasts that could also travel through rock and soil.
Perhaps a single careless moment, and the venomous stinger of a fingernail-sized insect in the grass, would be enough to take a beast tamer's life.
Insect-type exotic beasts might lack strength and size, but their venom had become terrifying through evolution.
Goblins truly deserved their reputation as creatures that loved collecting things. Before long, a pile of items appeared before Jiang Ziliu.
They included large quantities of bones, useless strange stones, broken metal weapons, tattered beast tamer clothing, and more.
Clearly, many beast tamers had carelessly fallen at the hands of these goblins, even becoming their meals.
Wearing a mask to block the foul smell, Jiang Ziliu began searching.
The first things he found were some unusual copper coins, clearly not human currency.
These copper coins were more likely currency belonging to other races in the universe that had ended up here through some accident.
Some of the exotic beast bones were useful as well, so he collected them too. He was still at the stage where he needed to scrimp and save; he should not pass up anything he could carry away and exchange for money.
Clink!
He found nothing else worthwhile after that, but before long, the Azurite Rock Man brought out another pile.
The goblins had many possessions, requiring the Azurite Rock Man to carry them out trip after trip.
Clink!
A black metal plate suddenly rolled out, catching Jiang Ziliu's attention.
It was clearly not a human-made metal object. One glance at the strange symbols and writing on it showed that they belonged to an intelligent nonhuman race.
Who knew how it had ended up in this goblin tribe, then passed into Jiang Ziliu's hands?
Jiang Ziliu picked it up, and after cleaning it a little, made a startling discovery.
A leaf had actually been embedded in the face of this metal plate when it was cast!
Even more inconceivably, this leaf might have undergone the high temperatures of casting, yet it remained deep green and completely undamaged!
The mysterious leaf was clearly of extremely high quality, as though a trace of life still lingered within it.
More mysteriously, the dense patterns on its surface seemed alive.
Had Jiang Ziliu's soul not been so perceptive, he would never have noticed that these patterns were flowing extremely slowly.
This meant that the patterns on this leaf were constantly changing and flowing, never stopping.
This mysterious phenomenon made Jiang Ziliu realize that the mysterious ancient plate was certainly a precious, mysterious object.
As for whether it was a beneficial treasure, he could not yet be certain.
Still, Jiang Ziliu decided to carefully store it away. Perhaps he would discover something about it in the future.
After obtaining this object, he found nothing useful at all in the next few piles the Azurite Rock Man brought out, as though his luck had run dry.
Surprises always came!
When the Azurite Rock Man brought out the final pile, Jiang Ziliu still found something useful to him.
Compared with the mysterious, unknown leaf-bearing metal plate, the shade-dried mushrooms with black markings he now held were the truly good finds.
They were called Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms!
Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms were a special kind of mushroom.
Though only the size of a fingernail, they were anything but ordinary.
They could grow only on heaps piled with skeletal remains, absorbing the special power within to develop.
Although Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms grew in deeply creepy surroundings, they possessed a unique effect that sent people flocking to them like ducks.
They could cleanse some of the impurities from a living being's soul!
For humans, removing impurities from the soul meant improving comprehension and Wisdom, and their soul power would also improve in quality.
Beast tamers with pure souls had somewhat greater growth potential than others of the same rank, along with higher resistance to certain harmful mental effects.
For contracted beasts, Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms could purify their souls and grant them greater spirituality, even directly awakening Wisdom and turning them into Wisdom-type contracted beasts.
Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms were truly treasures that money could not buy!
This time, he had obtained three Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms of around C grade, just enough for himself, the Azurite Rock Man, and the Mutated Lightning Snake.
The value of these three Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms alone surpassed everything else he had gained on this trip.
Jiang Ziliu searched a little more, then asked the Azurite Rock Man whether anything else remained inside. After confirming there was nothing, he left.
He first had the Azurite Rock Man wash the foul smell off its body in the swamp at the jungle's edge before rejoining him.
After all, the goblins' lair had truly stunk.
By the time the Azurite Rock Man returned, Jiang Ziliu had finished considering the matter.
He decided to use all three Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms right here in the instance space!
After all, there was still some detection equipment at the entrance to the instance space.
He worried that someone might discover his Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms outright, bringing unpredictable dangers from powerful beast tamers.
As the saying went, only what was safely in your pocket was truly yours.
Jiang Ziliu first had the Azurite Rock Man eat a Soul-Cleansing Mushroom, then watched the little fellow fall asleep.
It did not wake again until two hours later.
This time, Jiang Ziliu noticed the newfound liveliness in the Azurite Rock Man's eyes.
He understood that the Azurite Rock Man's spirituality had fully awakened, and was quite good at that.
The second to consume a Soul-Cleansing Mushroom was the Mutated Lightning Snake.
It needed only half an hour of sleep to digest the mushroom's medicinal effects and complete its improvement in spirituality.
Not only that, the Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms had also raised their life levels!
The Azurite Rock Man was now a five-star Black Iron Grade contracted beast, while the Mutated Lightning Snake had risen to three-star Black Iron Grade.
After all, the Azurite Rock Man had consumed a large number of beast cores earlier, so its improvement was greater.
Jiang Ziliu had them guard him carefully before consuming the final Soul-Cleansing Mushroom.
Unlike contracted beasts, humans had somewhat stronger souls.
Jiang Ziliu did not fall asleep, but he felt terrifying, agonizing pain, as though something were scraping away at his soul.
Unlike the transformation of contracted beasts, human transformation was more difficult, and the process of removing soul impurities could even cause severe pain.
When it was all over, Jiang Ziliu was drenched in cold sweat. All he wanted was never to experience that again.
It had hurt far too much. He had only endured it by biting through a wooden stick.
Only then did he begin examining the results of his improvement, turning his gaze to his information panel.
Jiang Ziliu: Class: Nine-star Gray Rock Grade beast tamer Lifespan: 16 (139) Life status: Healthy Soul strength: 13.9 Life level: Gray Rock Grade life-form Dark energy level: 9.3 Personal skills: Probability Judgment (Innate skill): Can judge the probability of a specified outcome occurring at any time Feedback skills: Life Aura Concealment (SSS grade) Electromagnetic Manipulation (SSS+) Contracted beasts: Five-star Black Iron Grade Azurite Rock Man, three-star Black Iron Grade Mutated Lightning Snake Contracted beast skills: Azurite Rock Man: Life Aura Concealment (SSS grade), Rock and Earth Evasion (C+ grade), Rock and Earth Concealment (C- grade), Mutated Spirituality (D+), Rock and Earth Sneak Stab (D+), Earth Space Evasion (Unawakened) Mutated Lightning Snake: Electromagnetic Manipulation (SSS+ grade), Electric Current Attack (C- grade), Lightning Divine Speed (D+ grade), Mutated Spirituality (C- grade) Contracted beast ranks: Azurite Rock Man: Five-star Black Iron Mutated Lightning Snake: Three-star Black Iron Contracted beast status: Azurite Rock Man: Healthy, favorability toward beast tamer 85%. Mutated Lightning Snake: Healthy, favorability toward beast tamer 81%.
Both contracted beasts had gained tremendous benefits. The one without Mutated Spirituality had acquired it at D+ grade, while the one that already possessed it had risen straight to C- grade.
Moreover, the improvement in spirituality had also raised their skill grades to some extent.
It seemed that the emergence of spirituality also offered tremendous benefits for mastering and improving skills.
Even Jiang Ziliu himself had received strength feedback from his two contracted beasts' improvements, raising his life level to nine-star Gray Rock Grade!
The Soul-Cleansing Mushroom had also further increased his soul strength, while his lifespan had grown further along with his life level.
A lifespan of 139 years would absolutely have made jaws drop across the world in his previous life.
Jiang Ziliu marveled inwardly. Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms truly deserved their reputation as treasures that were hard to obtain even with money.
The Soul-Cleansing Mushrooms he had obtained were only C grade, yet they had brought such enormous improvements to him and his two contracted beasts!