Hunyuan Immortal Sect

Chapter 168 An unexpected gain
Zhong Wenyuan, who was surrounded by the giant snake, saw Wang Huan's head and body separated, and he no longer hesitated. Spiritual power continued to flow into the green talisman. As the talisman glowed, three-foot-long wind blades condensed and slashed towards the giant snake.

More and more wind blades gathered, and from a distance it looked like a tornado.

Dozens of wind blades hit the snake's body, and the sound of metal hitting stone continued to be heard.

Although the demon snake had thick skin and flesh, it could not withstand the continuous attacks of the huge wind blades, and its skin was gradually torn apart by the wind blades.

It screamed in pain and had to give up wrapping around the deformed and twisted golden bell, but the wind blade would not let it go. It continued to spin around its body and cut it into a bloody mess.

As the Fire Phoenix and the Xiaguang Sword Light slashed down, the big snake whimpered and its body slid down from the golden bell outline of the scroll.

After the wind blade dissipated, the big snake was already dying, its body covered in blood and flesh, with red blood all over the ground.

Song Xian took out the black banner, and a blood shadow shot out from the banner and penetrated into the body of the big snake.

At the same time, another desperate and shrill cry was heard. The male snake had broken through the protective shield around Xu Zhen, wrapped its body around him, and bit off Xu Zhen's head in just a moment.

"Brother Zixiang, don't hold back anymore. This beast is extremely powerful. Use the Thunder Talisman quickly." Seeing this situation, Song Xian shouted hurriedly.

The male snake had just swallowed Xu Zhen's head whole when it turned around and saw that the female snake was already a bloody mess. It also let out an angry roar and actually abandoned Lin Zixiang and Lu Yuan and came towards this side.

The talisman in Lin Zixiang's hand shone brightly, condensing into a palm-sized ball of lightning, which shot towards him like thunder.

The thunder ball hit the big snake in the blink of an eye. In an instant, the big snake seemed to be hit hard by a huge hammer, and its huge body fell down obviously.

Immediately afterwards, lightning flashed, and the dazzling silver light enveloped the huge body of the snake. Lightning arcs flashed inside it, and crackling sounds like firecrackers continued to be heard.

The sect only had two second-level attack talismans. One was a second-level low-grade storm talisman that Zhong Wenyuan had just used, and the other was this second-level mid-grade thunder talisman. These two talismans were obtained from Apples that year, and they finally came in handy at this time.

The big snake had been injured by the attacks of Lin Zixiang and Lu Yuan's magic weapons and talismans, and was now hit head-on by the thunder talisman and immediately lay down.

When the silver light faded, the snake was covered in blood. Electric arcs could be seen faintly jumping in its bloody body, and a pungent smell of burning filled the air.

Song Xian took two steps at a time, came up to it with a black banner, drove the blood shadow out, and drilled into the body of the male snake.

After a while, the snake's flesh and blood shriveled up visibly until it was completely sucked dry, and the blood shadow returned to the black banner again.

Everyone gathered around the bodies of Wang Huan and Xu Zhen. Their heads had been swallowed by the giant snake, leaving only headless corpses.

Song Xian was no longer as angry as he was when he saw Wang Huan die. He only felt regret and sadness.

These two people have only been in Hunyuan Sect for a short time, only a year at most. As soon as they joined the sect, they participated in the attack on Lingyun Mountain. They have been doing their job conscientiously over the past year, but they did not expect to die here today.

Everyone was silent and no one spoke.

After a while, Song Xiancai slowly sighed and said to himself, "Junior Brother Wang, Junior Brother Xu, if you are still alive, please don't blame me."

"Master, please take the bodies of these two junior brothers back! Then carve their heads out of fragrant wood and bury them." Zhong Wenyuan said.

"That's all."

Lin Zixiang's face looked pale. With his cultivation level, it was still a bit difficult for him to activate the second-level intermediate-grade thunder talisman, but his eyes seemed to be shining with excitement.

"This group of green spirit snakes are lurking here to guard this spirit pond and cultivate. This male snake is almost at the stage of Qi Refining Great Perfection. Once the three-colored spirit lotus fruit matures and it consumes it, it will have a chance to advance to the Foundation Establishment stage. Fortunately, we arrived not too late. If it had really established its foundation and then intruded here, we would all be dead."

"I don't know if there are other green spirit snakes down there. Let's retreat from here and recover our spiritual strength before continuing forward." Song Xian said.

The location of the spirit pool is not the end of the cave. There is still a wide downward road in front, and the end is as far as the eye can see.

Everyone returned to the cave entrance, sat down cross-legged, took the Qi-recovering pill, and after their spiritual power recovered, they came to the spiritual pool again.

"Brother Zixiang, Brother Wenyuan, please go explore below this spirit pond to see if there are any hidden Green Spirit Snakes. Be sure to eradicate them completely. Be careful too."

The range of a Qi-refining cultivator's spiritual awareness is very limited, otherwise he would not have failed to discover the two giant snakes hiding at the bottom of the spirit pool.

The two men responded, jumped down with their magic weapons in hand, and dived under the spirit pool.

After a while, the two men jumped up from the bottom. Lin Zixiang was holding two white snake eggs between his arms, and Zhong Wenyuan was also holding one.

"There are no green spirit snakes under the spirit pool, but we did find three snake eggs. They should belong to the two big snakes."

"That's good. Let's go! Let's take a look down there." Song Xian put away the snake eggs, and the group continued to move forward.

………………

After walking for several dozen feet, they finally reached the end of the cave. They saw a room standing there. They pushed the door open and entered. The room inside was very simple, with a corpse lying on the bed.

The clothes on his body were still intact, with light flowing around them, and it was obvious that they were high-level robes.

However, the flesh and blood had rotted away completely, and the bones were black, as if they had been poisoned.

There was a high-level storage bag hanging between the belt of his robe, and everyone's eyes lit up. The person who could wear a high-level robe and use such a high-level storage bag must be an extraordinary person.

Song Xian immediately stepped forward and took the high-level storage bag on the waist of his robe. He used his spiritual sense to explore inside and took out the items one by one. The dazzling array of items made people dazzled and stunned.

Among them are seven magic weapons, one top-grade flying magic weapon, two top-grade magic weapons, and four high-grade magic weapons.

There are also more than a dozen bottles of second-level pills, including Qi-recovering pills, detoxification pills, heart-clearing pills, water-avoiding pills, limb-repairing pills, blood-clotting pills, etc., and there are thirty or forty bottles of first-level pills.

There are even more talismans of various types. There are more than a dozen second-level talismans alone, and hundreds of first-level talismans of various types.

In addition, there are several cloth bags of different colors. One of them contains seven fifth-level spirit stones, another contains more than twenty fourth-level spirit stones, and another contains dozens of third-level spirit stones. Second-level spirit stones and first-level spirit stones are all contained in different bags.

There are four other books, one of which is a black book, which is a water-attributed martial arts technique.

There was also a green book titled "The Art of Controlling Spirits" on the art of taming and breeding beasts, and a white book on the art of the five elements.

And a golden book on refining talismans called Jidao Milu.

The more Song Xian watched, the more excited he became. His hands began to tremble unconsciously and his throat kept rolling.

He never imagined that there would be such a distinguished person in such a simple room. This amount of wealth was more than what even the Luoyun Sect's leader carried with him, not to mention the wealth of ordinary sects.

Not only Song Xian, but everyone else also stared with their eyes wide open.

"With so many good things, have we unearthed a treasure?" George Lam was overjoyed, his voice even trembling with joy.

"I know, it's him." Shao Jian touched the robe and said suddenly as if he had suddenly realized something.

"Could it be that Fellow Daoist Shao knows this person?"

"If my guess is correct, this person should be Wang Qingpu."

"Wang Qingpu?" Song Xian asked doubtfully, "Who is this person?"

"He was a well-known independent talisman maker in Xijiang County. His talisman-making skills were the best in Xijiang County. Even Jiang Zhihua, the chief talisman maker of the Beast Taming Sect, said in public that he was not as good as him. I didn't expect that he would die here." Shao Jian said in shock and regret.

"How can you be sure that this is the person, Shao Daoyou?"

"Look, there are three characters on the chest of this robe: 'Wang Xue'e'. This Wang Xue'e was Wang Qingpu's first wife, who later passed away. It's said that Wang Qingpu, in memory of his beloved wife, went to the shop that sold this robe and asked for her name to be engraved on the chest again, as this robe was a gift from his wife."

"Since then, Wang Qingpu has been wearing this robe. Add to that his wealth, which is rare among the independent cultivators in Xijiang County. Furthermore, Wang Qingpu is a playboy, traveling all over the world and never staying in one place for long, so it's almost certain that this is him."

"So that's how it is." Song Xian nodded. He had not been here long and had been staying at the mountain gate for a long time to handle affairs. He knew very little about the various celebrities and anecdotes in Xijiang County. Naturally, he could not compare with Shao Jian, a native cultivator of Bianxi City. He had never even heard of the name Wang Qingpu before.

The other people in Hunyuan Sect were similar to him. Wang Huan and Xu Zhen might have understood, but unfortunately, these two died.

"According to Daoist Shao, this person must be Wang Qingpu. I wonder what his cultivation level is?"

"I've never met this person. I only heard that he was in the middle stage of Foundation Establishment. However, he hasn't appeared in public for many years. It's possible that he has already reached the late stage of Foundation Establishment."

A famous cultivator in the middle and late stages of foundation building actually died here, and the circumstances of his death were extremely strange.

Song Xian's mind was racing.

It is certain that the flesh and blood were not eaten by a demon snake. If it were, the corpse would not be so intact.

Seeing that everything in this room is intact, the demon snake here has been lurking in this cave for so long without disturbing this place. It is very likely that the two green snakes under the spirit pool are the spirit beasts raised by this person. The book of spirit control in his storage bag also indirectly confirms this. This person knows how to control beasts.

Shao Jian just said that this man had a deceased wife and they were very much in love, which makes even more sense.

The two big snakes must be the spirit beasts of this man and his first wife, one male and one female.

The other three green spirit snakes should be born from these two big snakes. If my guess is correct, this place was originally where Wang Qingpu raised spirit beasts. There is a natural spirit pool here, and it is so hidden that it is a good place for spirit beasts to practice.

After Wang Qingpu's death, the two spirit snakes continued to stay in this spirit pool to practice, and gave birth to three little snakes. With the help of this spirit pool, the three little snakes' cultivation became increasingly profound.

The three-colored spiritual lotus in the spiritual pond must have been planted by Wang Qingpu in his early years, in order to feed it to his spiritual beast and help it break through the foundation-building stage.

As for why Wang Qingpu died here in the end, he must have been seriously injured outside and returned here to recuperate, but his injuries became more and more serious, and he was unable to recover, and eventually died on the bed.

All the flesh and blood on his body had disappeared, and his bones had turned black. What could have caused a foundation-building cultivator to become like this?

There must be some secret here, but it is not something Song Xian can figure out, so he shook his head and did not think about it too much.

He put all his belongings into the high-level storage bag and bowed to the corpse.

"Senior, I have no intention of offending you. These personal belongings are no longer of use to you, so I will take them. In return, I will properly bury your body. These things are considered as payment, and I believe you will not object."

After saying this, he bowed three times and took off his robe.

They then dug a pit outside, placed his remains inside, filled it with earth and rocks to make it look like a grave, and then returned to the spirit pond.

"Master, this spirit pond can be put to good use and turned into a training room. I want to stay here to practice." Lin Zixiang's expression was full of excitement. He couldn't wait any longer and had thought of this when he first saw the spirit pond.

With the spiritual power contained in the second-level spirit pool, there is absolutely no problem in using the spirit gathering array to create a first-level top-quality training room. With a first-level training room, he will save a lot of time on his path to foundation building.

"With Junior Brother Lin's talent and his current level of cultivation, if he can use this spiritual pool to cultivate, he can reach the state of great perfection in Qi Refining in ten years at most. If the sect can produce a cultivator who can establish his foundation, the benefits to his future development will be limitless." Zhong Wenyuan echoed from the side.

"Okay, let's do this! Let's go back to the mountain gate and prepare the materials for the Spirit Gathering Array training room."

Song Xian had no objection. Lin Zixiang was the most promising person to build the foundation of the sect. He had a high level of cultivation and good aptitude. Even if he didn't say it, he was planning to do so.

If we can cultivate a foundation-building cultivator, it will certainly be beneficial to the sect and have no harm.

"Master, I won't go back! Someone needs to guard this place. Otherwise, if someone discovers and takes over, it will be terrible. Besides, there is this three-colored spiritual lotus fruit. We have to prevent birds, beasts, or other monsters from coming in and stealing it."

George Lam was in a state of great excitement and did not want to leave for a moment, fearing that something unexpected might happen. He had to stay there in person to feel at ease.

"Alright then! Senior Brother Zixiang, you stay here and guard. We'll go back first and send it over after we buy the Spirit Gathering Array."

When everyone left the cave, it was already dark. Song Xian ordered Zhong Wenyuan to quietly descend from the cliff entrance and observe whether there was anyone around. If a passing monk saw everyone coming out, he would be curious and come to investigate.

After making sure that there was no one around, everyone left the place on their flying magic tools.

After returning to Guzi Peak, Song Xian immediately ordered people to put the bodies of Xu Zhen and Wang Huan into coffins, and asked people to find a skilled craftsman to carve heads out of fragrant wood, connect the two bodies, and prepare funerals for the two according to the highest funeral standards of the sect.

(End of this chapter)