Chapter 34: Have You Met My Senior Brother

Before long, the four of them stopped in front of an inconspicuous calligraphy and painting shop. The door was left ajar, obscuring the view of the interior. Chu Yang glanced at Yang Mao and transmitted his voice through his consciousness: "Are you certain this is the place?"

The other man responded in the same fashion, "It is almost certainly it."

The burly man nodded and pushed the door open. The first thing that caught their eyes was a bizarre painting. It consisted only of large, chaotic blobs of ink. At first glance, it was incomprehensible, but upon closer inspection, the group was startled. The ink blobs were actually composed of countless tiny black insects. The artist’s skill was so profound that this detail could only be perceived by those with a spiritual sense at the Embryonic Breathing realm or higher.

"May I help you?" A hoarse voice suddenly rang out from behind them.

The group turned around to see a hunched, withered old man with sunken eye sockets, his gaze radiating a cold, sinister light. Gu Xian and the others were slightly taken aback; when had this person approached them without a sound?

Chu Yang narrowed his eyes. "Are you the owner of this shop?"

The man nodded indifferently and moved behind the counter. "Indeed, I am."

The man in the green shirt took out the centipede. "Does the shopkeeper recognize what this is?"

The old man’s pupils contracted, but he soon relaxed, a hint of a smile appearing on his withered face. "So, you are the ones who killed that little wolf demon." Perhaps because he rarely smiled, his expression appeared exceptionally chilling to Gu Xian and his companions.

Chu Yang asked coldly, "So it really was you?"

In an instant, four powerful auras erupted within the modest shop. The old man behind the counter acted as if he didn't notice, calmly organizing the scrolls behind him. Only after he finished did he turn around leisurely to look at the four young men.

"Tsk, tsk. It is good to be young."

Yang Mao couldn't help but ask, "Why did you do it?"

The old man glanced at him as if he were an idiot. "Does a Gu master need any other reason to refine Gu?"

Yang Mao was struck speechless; indeed, they did not.

For the vast majority of Gu masters in this world, their ultimate goal in life was not even to seek immortality. As long as they could refine a Gu insect that satisfied them, they were willing to pay any price.

Chu Yang’s voice grew colder. "So you treat human life as child's play?" The man shouted sternly, "What about the young boys and girls you abducted?"

A flicker of madness appeared on the old man’s face. "Them? They were truly top-tier supplements. I haven't returned to my hometown for many years, and finding such ample nourishment upon my return was a wonderful surprise."

Gu Xian frowned. "Are you a native of Tongyang Prefecture?"

The old man nodded gently. "I left at sixteen and returned at three hundred, but everything has long since changed."

Chu Yang’s breathing grew heavy, his aura reaching its peak. He roared, "You old cur, pay with your life!"

He lunged forward, a long spear appearing in his hand as he brought it crashing down toward the old man’s head. The old man raised a hand slightly, dark energy surging in his palm to condense into a shield above him. When the spear struck, a dull thud echoed, and the old man sank several inches into the floor. He suddenly gathered his strength and thrust the shield upward, deflecting the blood-imbued spear.

The old man marveled, "A formidable Military cultivator. I did not expect such a talent to exist in the Great Feng Dynasty."

Chu Yang sneered, "There is much you haven't expected."

He flashed forward and lunged again, the tip of his spear flashing with cold light as he aimed straight for the old man’s chest. The old man’s expression remained unchanged as he flicked his large sleeve, releasing a tiny, ink-black snake. In mid-air, it suddenly swelled to three or four feet in length, flicking its scarlet tongue as it darted toward Chu Yang’s face.

The black snake was incredibly fast, reaching Chu Yang in a breath; it was too late for him to retract his defense. Just then, a flash of sword light, quick as lightning, sliced across the snake’s body. It fell to the ground, severed in two by the sharp sword qi, and was immediately reduced to ash by a talisman that transformed into a fire serpent. It was Gu Xian who had acted.

Chu Yang nodded at the man in the green shirt and charged at the old man behind the counter once more. The old man’s expression shifted, and he hurriedly flung out several more venomous insects.

Chu Yang flicked his wrist rapidly, changing the direction of his spear tip. Multiple shadows of the spear appeared, knocking all the incoming insects to the ground. He thrust his spear straight toward the old man's chest.

The old man felt his hair stand on end. As a Gu master, his strength relied entirely on the Gu he cultivated, but unfortunately, his most ferocious insect was currently elsewhere absorbing essence and blood. With his power severely crippled, he could not truly manifest the strength of an early-stage Foundation Establishment cultivator, a truly frustrating situation.

In an instant, the spear reached his chest, piercing through and drawing blood. The old man stared in horror. "How can you be this fast?" He prepared to discard his cultivation entirely, intending to use a forbidden technique to drag these young men to the grave with him.

But just then, he felt a piercing pain in the center of his brow. A flying sword had somehow pierced his forehead, its sharp sword qi sealing his cultivation and preventing him from unleashing any power.

The next moment, eighteen talismans, brimming with divine intent, drifted from the sleeves of the young man in the green shirt and circled him. Suddenly, they formed a strictly ordered cage, flickering with golden arcs of lightning.

The old man gasped as if he had seen a ghost. He stared fixedly at Gu Xian and shouted, "Who exactly are you?"

Over a hundred years ago, when the old man traveled the world, he had encountered a burly man on the northern border of the Great Xi Dynasty who could manifest a pool of lightning in his palm. At that time, he had been invited by a renowned senior of the Demon Sect to help sacrifice the population of a small border town to refine a magical artifact. The senior had promised him a secretly obtained manual on Gu cultivation.

He never expected that a dozen or so elite Demon Sect practitioners would nearly all fall at the hands of that taciturn man with heaven-defying lightning arts. Had he not sacrificed most of his cultivation to escape using a secret technique, he would have perished on the Xi border.

After the Great Master of the Three Purities Mountain purged the demons sixty years ago, the Demon Sect had been severely weakened. Though they occasionally attempted massacres, they were always thwarted by righteous cultivators, preventing such deeds from spreading. The lightning arts that man used were so majestic that with every casual movement, several high-ranking demonic masters were reduced to spirits and ashes. He would never forget that scene for the rest of his life.

The golden lightning arcs on this cage were clearly of the same origin as that taciturn cultivator's arts.

Gu Xian felt a stir in his heart. "You have met my senior brother?"