Filthy Cultivation: I Pierced the Heavens with the Merit System

night.

The moon is dark and the wind is high.

Not a single star could be seen in the deep night sky.

In a remote, secluded mountain village, a small, thin figure slowly opened his eyes in the darkness, startling several crows that were about to peck at their prey.

Upon closer inspection, the figure turned out to be a dirty little girl.

[Merit system successfully bound!]

[Begin transmitting basic information!]

[May the host, under the guidance of this system, actively punish evil and promote good, diligently accumulate merit, and restore a bright and just world to its former glory.]

A cold, electronic voice echoed in her mind. As Li Fuyao absorbed the original owner's memories, she looked around with a mixture of disgust and curiosity.

At that moment, it seemed as if a rain of corpses was falling in front of her.

There were dismembered limbs, excrement, bones, flesh, and brain matter all around, but no living people.

A hundred or so bodies were piled up in an uneven pit, and the blood flowing out had turned the soil into a dark red swamp.

Mixed with the stench of decay, the scene was nothing short of hell.

"Ugh, if I've time-traveled, could I at least pick a better location? What have I been thrown into?"

Li Fuyao, who had died suddenly from a heart attack, pinched her nose and retched. While absorbing the original owner's memories, she pulled her feet out of the dark red mud.

"Ugh~ Killing someone and not burying them, what a lack of manners! May the murderer have diarrhea every day!"

"The stench is one thing, but what kind of decent crow would drink a stream of blood teeming with fly larvae as if it were popping boba milk tea?!"

Li Fuyao muttered dejectedly, rummaging through the remains of someone's head, her face contorted with frustration as she picked through the scattered limbs and broken pieces on the ground.

"I still have quite a few exposed wounds on my body. If I stay in such a dirty place for a long time, I'm afraid I'll inevitably get infected, inflamed, and have a high fever."

"Even if you've gotten used to this kind of stuff in the apocalypse, you'll never get used to this smell! Damn it, I'd rather stick my head in a septic tank than this!"

He kept complaining, but his hands moved with surprising speed.

She used someone else's thigh bone as a walking stick and quickly crawled out of the pit of corpses, stepping on a pile of indescribable debris.

[Ding! Congratulations on taking your first step on the Spirit Cultivation Continent!]

[Your first task is now available]

[Mission Name: Survive]

[Remaining time for the mission: three hours]

[Task Rewards and Penalties: Upon completion of the task, the host's exclusive system panel will be unlocked, and the host will be rewarded with one attribute point lottery draw. Failure of the task will result in the host's immediate elimination.]

[Mission Details: Survive the pursuit of the filthy beasts for three hours, and ensure that your consciousness does not succumb to corruption before the mission is completed.]

[Note: Since He has chosen you, this system will definitely not let you die at the start of the game.]

To increase your chances of survival, a newbie gift pack has been sent to your space. Please check it. Hope you survive! Go for it!

What is a filthy beast?

How can you survive its pursuit for another six hours?

Is this some kind of man-eating monster?!

Upon hearing this, Li Fuyao felt a sudden sense of unease.

She stiffened and suddenly turned around.

Not far behind, wisps of black mist were rising from the pit of corpses, rapidly gathering towards the sky as if they were alive.

The black mist was like smoke, and Li Fuyao, who was not far from the mass grave, suddenly felt a violent and bloodthirsty desire surge in her heart. Even her cat-like eyes were faintly stained with blood vessels.

No, this isn't right!

She was startled and quickly bit her tongue, barely regaining some clarity through the sharp pain.

"Holy crap, this thing looks really weird!"

Remembering the part in the mission details about ensuring one's consciousness doesn't fall into defilement, Li Fuyao didn't hesitate and turned to run.

The black mist was condensing much faster than she had estimated.

Before Li Fuyao had run very far, a narrow, spindle-shaped crack appeared in the sky.

The fissure was more than five meters long, looking just like a giant pot of boiling water filled with Cthulhu.

Massive amounts of black, foggy sewage gushed out from the cracks, spreading wildly in all directions.

Wherever the black mist passed, vegetation withered and living creatures fled.

Several birds that couldn't escape in time were stained by the mist and instantly became deformed and swollen.

They frantically tore off the heads of their own kind, then swallowed them with shrill cries.

Amidst the billowing fog of the rift in the sky, countless ferocious and ugly deformed monsters roared as they poked their heads out, widening the narrow, vertically shaped rift. Soon, a filthy beast landed on the ground.

Unlike the zombies and mutated beasts that Li Fuyao had seen in her previous life, the filthy beasts in this world were covered in thick black mist.

The mist's texture seemed neither solid nor ethereal, but rather more like a swamp of particles distorted by magnetic force, appearing both heavy and elusive.

The body, pieced together from human and spider parts, is secondary; what's most horrifying are its two heads covered in eyes.

The agonizing screams of pain were connected at the center, where the connection was like cheese melted by high temperature, sticky and stringy, even the blood-red eyes on it were twisted into a blurry mess, disgusting and indescribably terrifying.

Several dark red, worm-like tentacles emerged from the gaping maw of the abdomen, each twist accompanied by a sticky, squelching sound and a stench that shot straight to the top of one's head.

The other filthy beasts that landed each had their own ugly ways, but in the next instant, all of them seemed to have received some kind of command.

The densely packed eyeballs simultaneously stopped their disorderly twitching, and all the filthy beasts instantly locked their gazes on Li Fuyao.

"Target...eat, eat them! Kill..."

Indistinct roars emanated from the filthy beasts, and as their desire to devour rose, the black mist surrounding them expanded.

The frantic screams drew ever closer from behind.

Li Fuyao darted even faster.

She now wishes she could have extra legs like those monsters.

Perhaps because her current body is only nine years old, her personality has been greatly affected.

Compared to her personality in her previous life, she now acts like a naughty, talkative child.

"Go to hell!"

"You're a merit system! Shouldn't a righteous character like this, whose name alone suggests high moral character, be kind and soft-hearted?"

"What's wrong with you?!"

As Li Fuyao sped away, panting heavily, she cursed under her breath without restraint:

"Isn't it a bit out of character to make the failure penalty this severe? I just said I wouldn't die at the start, and you just wipe me out instantly!"

"You bastard, are you playing two roles with my life on your shoulders?!"

Hearing the sound of the wind rushing behind her, Li Fuyao suddenly lowered her head!

The tentacles covered in poisonous stings swung past, smashing the farmhouse on the right into ruins.

She lifted her head, which had nearly detached from her body, and felt a surge of novelty as she broke out in a cold sweat on her back.

Although she became the revered Night Raven Queen in her previous life by relying on her intelligence and family power, she always had many experts around her for safety.

Because I always have someone protecting me, I have never experienced the thrill of being on the verge of death.

Feeling her heart pounding wildly in her chest, Li Fuyao couldn't help but smile.

It's so good to have a healthy body!

It feels so good to not have to suppress my emotions!

She was determined to live for these feelings she had never experienced before!

The beasts were not very intelligent, and Li Fuyao relied on the route in his memory to turn left and right in the village. Although the places he passed through were all turned into ruins by the beasts, he was not caught up for a while.

Once again, Li Fuyao, exhausted, dodged the sharp claws that swung beneath her feet, her face ashen.

She couldn't possibly run for three hours straight, and hiding like this wasn't a solution either.

Since the newbie gift pack is meant to improve your survival rate, it must contain something that can be useful right now.

For some reason, the way she used the system was so familiar to her that it felt almost instinctive.

With a thought, she saw five things suddenly appear in the space, which she felt was connected to her soul and was about ten cubic meters in size.

They are a rusty, stemmed, nine-petaled lotus flower; a thick, antique-style book with a classic royal blue cover; a small card shimmering with purple light; and two small porcelain bottles, one red and one blue.

Based on her years of experience with adolescent delusions, Li Fuyao didn't need to look closely; she could tell what each one represented at a glance:

"The variety is quite complete. Not only are there cultivation techniques and weapons, but also initial skills and red and blue potions."

With her life hanging by a thread, this frail body, which had just been revived, was already running out of energy after desperately running.

Li Fuyao made a quick decision, swiftly pouring out a pill from the small red porcelain bottle and popping it into her mouth like a candy bean.

As the pill entered her stomach, she felt a warm current travel from her abdomen throughout her body.

Where the warm current passed, injuries healed rapidly, like withered trees sprouting new life. The pressure on the legs and lungs, which had been overburdened by strenuous exercise, was instantly relieved.

Amidst the itching and pain of the healing wound, I even felt subtly stronger than before.

As expected of a system product, this Rejuvenation Pill is of impeccable quality!

A hint of satisfaction flashed in Li Fuyao's eyes, and then she took out the lotus-headed hammer, which was over a meter long:

【Name: Tetanus Hammer】

Quality: Good

[Attribute: Attack +3]

[Skill: After being hit, the enemy gains the weakness effect "Tetanus": It stuns the enemy for three seconds. After this effect is triggered, the skill goes on a ten-second cooldown.]

[Note: The effect of tetanus is reduced when the strength difference between the enemy and ourselves is too great.]

Li Fuyao's steps slowed down due to the weight of the hammer. If she hadn't taken a step and used a house in the village to block the blow, she would have been torn apart and eaten by the three bloodthirsty mouths behind her.

She swiftly tossed the hammer back into her spatial storage, a slight look of unease appearing on her face:

"This weapon is a good piece of equipment, but it's a bit too heavy for me."

[Host, don't worry. After you retrieve the system fragments, you will unlock the full system functions, including the attribute point lottery.]

Once your cultivation level improves or you participate in the attribute point lottery, using this equipment will be a breeze for you.

As if hearing Li Fuyao's thoughts, the system explained.

"This pie in the sky is so perfectly round..."

Li Fuyao silently complained, then pressed a Rejuvenation Pill under her tongue just in case.

Thinking that having more capabilities would provide more security, she took out that thick, ancient-style book with a royal blue cover.