My experience of grinding in another world

Chapter 416 Tracking
One hundred and thirty li north of the Gan River.

A streak of emerald light flashed across the azure sky like lightning.

Mo Wuzhou was shrouded in mist, like a thin white cloud, locking onto the emerald bird's movements from afar.

Fifteen minutes later, the bird flew into a dense forest, and when it reappeared, the small bamboo tube tied to its leg had disappeared.

Above the clouds, Mo Wuzhou frowned deeply: "Ganhe Lower Temple has only just been established. Which Taoist sect has such good information?"

"Or are you casting a wide net to catch as many fish as possible, simply launching a large-scale reconnaissance operation?"

"I'd like to see who this person really is."

For half a month, he hid in the clouds, wandering around the dense forest. But no matter how long he waited, no contact person appeared.

"Be very careful!" Mo Wuzhou's expression turned solemn.

……

"That guy is too cautious!" On the Gan River, at the bow of a covered boat, Tantai Zong sighed through gritted teeth.

“He followed the messenger bird to the place, but he just hid in the sky and watched.”

Lin Su chuckled: "I told you before, the bait is too small, this person won't show up on their own."

Tantai Zong looked troubled: "Are we really going to lure him here? Then, young master..."

Lin Su tapped her fingers lightly on the table: "You can't catch a wolf without risking your cub."

"Without someone like me who looks like a key member, why would he show up?"

"Go and make the arrangements. Make sure the information passes through several hands and is delivered to me as discreetly and truthfully as possible."

Tantai Zong solemnly clasped his hands in a fist and bowed: "Yes!"

……

That afternoon, in an unnamed grove of trees.

A golden-haired monkey wandered in, took fifteen small bamboo tubes from the bird's nest, and stuffed them into its mouth. It left behind a fiery red pill, then stretched out its arms and vanished quickly through the woods like a swing.

"Relying on inconspicuous strange beasts to transmit information link by link?" Mo Wuzhou wondered inwardly.

He became increasingly curious about the identities of these people.

We immediately followed the golden ape back to the troop.

Half a month passed quickly, and Mo Wuzhou watched the bamboo tube move among the various animal groups in the Dongling Mountains.

Finally, when he followed a giant tortoise to a section of the Gan River, he saw a small, covered boat.

A middle-aged man wearing half-body black leather armor appeared at the stern of the ship. He took a bamboo tube from the turtle's mouth, fed the turtle a golden pill, and then placed the bamboo tube in front of the gray-clad man sitting at the bow of the ship.

Seeing that the other party unfolded, examined, and burned the items one by one, Mo Wuzhou knew that he had found the right person.

But he still did not show himself, and instead followed the awning boat closely once again.

For five consecutive days, after discovering that the other party was constantly receiving small bamboo tubes through various animals, Mo Wuzhou finally realized that even if this person was not the mastermind, he must be a high-ranking person who knew the details.

"Two mortals, where do they get the audacity to target someone who cultivates immortality and practices Qi?!" After observing them for many days, he had already discovered that these two people had no magical power and were not cultivators at all.

Thinking this, Mo Wuzhou descended from the sky and suddenly appeared at the bow of the ship.

Upon seeing who it was, Lin Su was taken aback.

Tantai Zong couldn't help but laugh out loud: "You, surnamed Chen, are quite cautious. You've been following me for over a month, and now you've finally decided to show yourself?!"

Mo Wuzhou, who had just gained a foothold, was immediately stunned.

Someone surnamed Chen?
Chen Mu?!
These people aren't investigating the shipyard in the mountainside; they're trying to lure and capture Chen Mu.

So, I've become a landmine?!
"Stop laughing!" Lin Su kicked the smug Tantai Zong, making him stumble, and said helplessly, "He is Mo Wuzhou!"

Tantai Zong couldn't help but widen his eyes.

and so……

Did I end up hiring the wrong person after a month of hard work?

Wasn't all this work for nothing?!

Lin Su looked at Mo Wuzhou's gloomy face, shook her head, and smiled bitterly: "I don't know if he wants to use someone else to do his dirty work or if he simply wants you to test the waters."

"But one thing is certain: we have all underestimated the cunning and shrewdness of that young man, Chen."

Mo Wuzhou: "..."

At this moment, he couldn't help but think of Chen Mu's worried face a month ago.

"You're a really damn good actor!"

Inside the jade seed, Tu, who had witnessed everything, couldn't help but burst into laughter: "You humans are truly too insidious! Hahaha..."

……

A sneeze!

On the wooden house corridor.

The cunning, treacherous, and ruthless man shuddered and suddenly sneezed, waking up from his sleep.

He got up from the rocking chair and rubbed his nose with a puzzled look on his face.

"Yuanbao, did you insult me?"

The giant toad squatted quietly on the ground, not even blinking, completely ignoring the person's erratic behavior.

Chen Mu stretched, leaned against the pillar, and reached out to poke the toad's chin.

"You must have insulted me!"

The giant toad looked helpless, then a surge of magical power erupted from it, and its form slowly became transparent.

Chen Mu raised an eyebrow immediately.

Want to run?

He suddenly pointed at the ground.

boom!
With a muffled thud, the giant toad reappeared. Its large eyes were glazed over, clearly indicating that it had been badly injured in the previous impact.

Chen Mu couldn't help but laugh.

"You have the art of burrowing underground, but we have the art of turning the earth into steel!"

"Trying to use your earth-遁法 (earth-遁法, a technique to burrow underground) to come and go as you please in my little courtyard? No way! Hahaha..."

Chen Mu looked at one of the columns on the gray wall with a smile.

Ground-based steelmaking: 70/10000/Third Rank;

Unbeknownst to many, this earth-based secret technique has entered a completely new stage.

He discovered that the new "Steel-like Ground-Touching Technique" could temporarily suppress the ability to burrow underground.

Although this effect will disappear once the magic power dissipates, it's enough for him to tease the giant toad, haha!
“Caw…” Yuanbao looked helpless.

"Were you about to catch fish for me?"

"Alright then." Chen Mu smacked his lips, regretfully dispersing the steel-forming power he had been using to point to the ground.

"We'll have to play again next time..."

Yuanbao: "..." They're really bored!
"I wonder where Mo Wuzhou went. Is he hiding somewhere leisurely drinking tea?" Chen Mu couldn't help but feel angry: "Such an important place, and he just left me here to guard the gate. How can he be so careless?!" "Sigh, what can I do? I'm just a nobody."

"You'd better just stay here and guard the door."

"A life of toil."

Chen Mu reluctantly lay down in the rocking chair, yawned softly, and drifted back to sleep.

……

On the Gan River, a black-awning boat.

Lin Su stood up, bowed slightly, and pointed to the futon opposite the small square table: "Please sit down."

Mo Wuzhou, however, did not want to waste time, his gaze cold: "What is your purpose?"

Lin Su shook her head and sighed: "The arrogance of a Qi cultivator, huh? Tsk..."

"What?" Mo Wuzhou was baffled by this nonsensical answer.

"In your heart, we are nothing more than weak mortals, so you can't be bothered with pretense, right?" Lin Su sat down on her own and asked indifferently.

Mo Wuzhou frowned slightly. Was this person a little too calm?

He carefully surveyed his surroundings but found nothing suspicious.

"Looking for what?" Lin Su asked with a strange smile. "Are you checking if there are any ambushes around here?"

Mo Wuzhou's brows furrowed deeply.

There's something wrong with this guy!

Lin Su's lips curled up: "Didn't you ever think that the so-called ambush was right in front of you?"

Two mortals?

“You will talk.” Mo Wuzhou was not going to delay any longer. He planned to take the two of them away directly. The Inspection Bureau had plenty of ways to investigate.

"Are you planning to arrest us and search our souls?" Lin Su chuckled and shook her head. "Do you think we're insects that you can crush at will?"

"You seem to have forgotten that you too started as an ordinary person and gradually rose to where you are today..."

"Run! This is the Yellow Springs Crossing! He's stalling for time!" Before he could finish speaking, the black smoke monster Tu, hiding inside the jade seed, suddenly shouted.

Mo Wuzhou's body suddenly surged with spiritual light, and he instinctively activated the rainbow light from the ground, launching himself into the air in the blink of an eye.

Just as he was about to ask Tu why he had given the warning, his expression suddenly changed.

He suddenly realized that, without him noticing, the once turbulent Gan River had become a calm surface of water that showed no sign of movement.

The muddy Yellow River water became clear, and the distant shore seemed to be shrouded in a black and gray filter, becoming blurry and dark.

He glanced at the clear river water unintentionally and immediately couldn't help but shudder.

At the bottom of the river, countless wisps of black smoke, resembling human figures with snake tails, appeared out of nowhere. They silently piled up together and slowly crawled forward.

He only glanced at the swarms of humanoid black smoke, and for no apparent reason, he felt a chill.

At this moment, the awning boat, which should have been easily scattered by the spiritual light, remained intact and drifted in the middle of the river.

The man in black armor stood silently at the bow of the ship, while the man in gray robes remained calmly seated at the table. He waved slightly to Mo Wuzhou with a hint of regret on his face, as if saying goodbye.

The next moment, the entire awning boat was like a portrait, quickly erased from the stern.

The scenery on both sides of the river is clear and bright.

The clear river water turned murky and yellow.

The dark shadows at the bottom of the river vanished without a trace, as if they were an illusion.

“That’s the Yellow Springs Crossing, a common method used by the Yin-Yang Clan to break through boundaries and teleport,” Tu said in a complicated manner.

"What would have happened if I hadn't left the awning boat?" Mo Wuzhou asked, still shaken.

"You will fall into the underworld, forget yourself, forget your past. You will live in a daze, and it will be difficult for you to come back to this world." Tu's voice was full of inexplicable heaviness.

Mo Wuzhou felt a chill run down his spine.

……

Deep in the Dongling Mountains, at the foot of a desolate mountain.

The withered, yellow leaves were crushed by a heavy foot.

A figure darted through the dense forest like lightning.

It eventually stopped beside a stream.

Then he plunged into the mountain stream and gulped down the icy water.

After a while, Shang Huan, who was as thin as a stick and almost emaciated, finally raised his face, ignored the muddy banks of the stream, and lay down on his back by the water.

He took a few deep breaths to calm his rapid breathing before asking in a dry, hoarse voice, as if he had swallowed burning coals, "How far is it from here to Ganhe Lower Temple?"

The next moment, another deep voice came from the deserted forest: "Almost there. Traveling day and night, it will only take a day at most."

"Don't lie to me, you said the same thing last time." Shang Huan stared blankly at the sky.

He ran, ran, ran, constantly on the run for a month, his mind barely able to process any other information.

"You asked me that just two hours ago," the deep voice said calmly.

"Guess what? As a Qi cultivator who yearns for immortality, I've actually started to wish time would pass faster. Hehe... cough cough cough!" Shang Huan's laughter was full of dejection.

"You should be glad, after all, you're still alive to lament the passage of time." The deep voice remained calm.

"Brother Mu, can you really let us live? Or should we just surrender?" Shang Huan's lazy voice was filled with despair: "This feeling of being chased to the point of having nowhere to run is too painful."

"Ha! You know what? More than living, I actually want that horned monster to suffer." A hint of morbidity crept into his deep voice.

"If we find Chen Mu and transform him into a ghost soldier, we can exist in another form, a form that the bull-horned monster would never want to see."

"After a month of hard work, he suddenly discovered his plan had failed. Can you imagine the look on his face? Hehe...hahaha..."

"Damn it!" Shang Huan suddenly opened his bloodshot eyes.

"It's just a body full of fat, I can afford to lose it!"

He pulled open his shirt, revealing a human face growing on his chest.

The next moment, the face suddenly jerked outwards, and countless black threads burst forth from Shang Huan's chest.

The moment it landed, the black lines began to wriggle and weave rapidly, instantly transforming into a handsome young man dressed in black.

Shang Huan was panting heavily, and he had visibly lost even more weight, with his eye sockets becoming even more sunken.

"Lu Ku, this time you have to lure them far away. I've already reduced my flesh to the limit. If I create another Seven Kill Puppet, we'll both be doomed!"

At this moment, Lu Ku's face reappeared on Shang Huan's chest.

The face chuckled and said, "Don't worry, when things really come to a standstill, I'll kill you first, and then take my own life."

“We won’t survive, but I guarantee that the bull-horned monster’s plans against us will also fall apart.”

"You're a fucking lunatic! I don't want to die!"

"Then let's stop talking nonsense and run for our lives."

"grass!"

(End of this chapter)