In the center of Linyang Market Town,
In a dim room, seven or eight babies were crawling around chaotically.
These babies had an abnormal dark blue color, with black mist seeping out of their bodies. Their limbs were tiny, their teeth sharp, and their bulging eyes gave off a fierce look.
They were surprisingly quick and agile, and whenever they bumped into each other, they would viciously bite, letting out shrill cries of pain that made anyone who heard them feel dizzy.
In the corner of the room, two beautiful young girls sat quietly, not saying a word. They wore faint smiles, radiating a maternal glow.
Their bellies were round and swollen, resembling large balls. One of them had a huge tear in her stomach, with a grayish-white eyeball peering out through the slit, as if it could crawl out at any moment.
“Who? Who killed one of my beloved evil babies?”
On a bed made of ice, a cultivator sat up straight, surrounded by thick resentment. Occasionally, a blurry face would emerge from the resentment, silently crying out in pain.
The seven or eight babies that had been playing and biting each other suddenly fell silent, like still cicadas, seemingly terrified of this person.
The two girls in the corner continued to smile, unmoving, as the grayish-white eyeball slowly retreated back inside.
“Now, my chances of refining the Evil Baby Pill have decreased again. This is really infuriating.”
The resentment around the cultivator kept rising, mirroring his anger.
He had been at the peak of the Qi Refining stage for a long time, and his two attempts to break through to the Foundation Establishment stage had ended in failure.
By chance, he had obtained a wicked method for refining the Evil Baby Pill from a secret realm. After taking the pill, it would increase his chances of breaking through to the Foundation Establishment stage by about 10 to 20 percent.
Following the method, he collected over a hundred vengeful souls to form an Evil Baby fetus, then found more than ten young girls to control with secret techniques, implanting the Evil Baby fetus into their bodies.
He would then sell them in various ways, and when cultivators bought them, during their intimate moments, the Evil Baby fetus would silently merge into their bodies.
Since the Evil Baby fetus itself was a wicked treasure, the merging process would enhance the cultivator's inner spiritual energy, creating the illusion of a rapid increase in cultivation, making them more eager for dual cultivation.
Once the Evil Baby fetus fully merged with the cultivator, at the right moment, it would absorb all of the cultivator's spiritual power and essence, transforming into an Evil Baby.
After draining the cultivator dry, it would break free and return to the girl’s body, using her form to hide its malevolent aura and sneak back to its home.
The entire process was extremely secretive. When the Evil Baby fetus merged into the cultivator's body, ordinary evil-dispelling talismans and artifacts would find it hard to detect any abnormalities. Only during the brief moment when it broke free would a slight aura be released.
However, unless someone was paying close attention, this brief anomaly usually went unnoticed.
Despite being so cautious, one Evil Baby had still been killed, making his chances of successfully refining the Evil Baby Pill even slimmer, and breaking through to the Foundation Establishment stage would naturally be harder.
To him, this was like a deep-seated grudge.
“It looks like I need to find a few more young female cultivators to implant the Evil Baby fetus into them and sell them on the black market for cultivators to buy.”
“But if one Evil Baby is discovered, it probably won’t go as smoothly as the first time.”
Thinking of this, his anger boiled, and the resentment around him almost took on a physical form, scaring the seven or eight Evil Babies nearby into stillness.
...
In the courtyard.
With the threat of Wang Shan’s malevolence gone, Lu Xuan felt much more relaxed and focused entirely on cultivating the many spiritual plants in his spiritual field.
After the appearance of the strange malevolence, the Law Enforcement Hall had been very strict in monitoring his area, conducting frequent inspections and being very careful about the entry and exit of cultivators.
However, this didn’t affect Lu Xuan much, as he mostly stayed in the courtyard, tending to the spiritual plants and occasionally playing with the Cloud Stepping Leopard and Red Whiskered Carp.
He paid a bit of attention to the Law Enforcement cultivators who came to inspect; among the more than ten mid-level Qi Refining cultivators, he didn’t see Tan Xiaodong, leading Lu Xuan to suspect that the information he had reported last time had caused Tan to be implicated.
Thinking of this made him feel even better, and he felt a sense of satisfaction while planting in the spiritual field.
In the early morning, the light mist had yet to dissipate.
A three-foot-tall Straw Puppet emerged from the mist, having patrolled the spiritual field all night without rest, its dry gray body slightly dampened by the mist.
“What a good worker I have...”
Lu Xuan sighed contentedly while holding a white jade bottle, then entered the spiritual field, heading to the edge of the spiritual spring.
The plump Red Whiskered Carp, seeing his familiar figure, thought it would get to eat some strange bugs, and with a flick of its tail, swam over.
Six long red whiskers trailed beside it like six red ribbons, rippling in the spiritual spring pool.
Lu Xuan scattered a handful of Spirit Rice and paid it no more mind, filling half the jade bottle with spiritual spring water.
A shadow flashed by.
The Cloud Stepping Leopard cub leaped, its cloud-like paws landing on the water's surface, grabbing one of the Red Whiskered Carp's long whiskers and pulling it out of the water.
The cub skimmed over the surface, leaving the Red Whiskered Carp flipping in the air, and in its wild thrashing, it fell back into the spiritual spring pool, creating ripples.
The other two Red Whiskered Carps, startled, quickly dove to the bottom of the pool, causing quite a commotion and making the water's surface ripple even more.
In the center of the spiritual spring pool, the Pure Snow Lotus swayed gently with the water's impact, its delicate white leaves appearing fragile.
“You little rascal, it’s fine to catch fish, but now my Pure Snow Lotus can’t grow properly. I’ll dock you a piece of dried Pufferfish meat at noon.”
Seeing this, Lu Xuan reached out and patted the cub's pointy ears, threatening it.
“Aw~~”
Hearing that its food was at risk, the cub, which had been maintaining a cool demeanor, couldn’t help but let out a low growl.
It was fine when it was quiet, but once it made a sound, Lu Xuan heard its awkward tone and became even more determined to take away its meat.
Afterward, he took the spiritual spring water to the three Pure Wondrous Tea saplings, using his spiritual power to direct the water into thin streams that flowed into the tea plants.
After watering the Pure Wondrous Tea saplings, he continued to inspect the spiritual field.
He separated twenty Emotionless Herbs that were trying to entangle each other.
As the Blood Jade Ginseng grew rapidly, their inclination to cluster together increased significantly. This time, if Lu Xuan hadn’t intervened, about ten of the Blood Jade Ginseng would have likely tangled into a mess.
It almost led to a large-scale ginseng entanglement.
After separating the Blood Jade Ginseng, he cast two Gengjin Sword Arts on the Sword Grass, allowing it to absorb the sharp sword intent freely.
Under the wooden shed, he adjusted the position of the Dark Marrow Fungus so it could better absorb the decayed spiritual energy from the rotting wood.
He also found the Mirage Smokefruit hidden in the thick white mist; after a few days, the area of mist around it had expanded a bit more.
Finally, he arrived in front of the Red Cloud Pine, which was about to ripen, focusing his mind on its branches and leaves.
“Hey, there’s actually a pine nut that has ripened?”
A thought flashed through his mind, and Lu Xuan exclaimed in surprise.
(End of Chapter)