Chapter 106 — Taking Life with Poison

' The herbs I've gathered have no other use than to make the scent and the poison of earth-root grass a hundred times stronger. " He walked on quickly, releasing primordial qi as he went, lifting the herbs with his qi, using qi as a furnace to refine them in the air.

His other hand burst into flame, baking and drying the medicinal properties, while he added black-tortoise primordial qi to keep the herbs moist and prevent them from scorching. Before he had crossed the hollow, Shen Mu had already distilled the potency of the herbs, thrown away the dregs, and pressed his palms together, leaving in his open hand a few drops of oil-like liquid. Shen Mu looked around and saw a clear spring in a nearby hollow, so he went over and rinsed his hands, then sprinted away at full strength.

Before long, a red cloud came flying across the sky, blotting out the heavens—it was Uncle Qiao's crimson corpse beetles. These beetles had been following Shen Mu's trail and were about to overtake him when, suddenly, the swarm lost control and rushed downward, diving at the clear spring in the hollow.

Uncle Qiao, controlling the swarm from behind, felt a jolt of alarm and flew over at top speed.

When he reached the hollow, his heart went cold: red insect corpses lay over the mountainside as far as the eye could see. The corpse beetles he had so painstakingly raised were dead to the last one!

To poison all his beetles at a stroke—that was a skill to make anyone shudder. "And, most importantly," said Shen Mu, far away now, to the little fox hiding in his pack, with a smile, "a corpse beetle is itself a poison, and a great poison, and the crimson corpse beetle is the fiercest poison of all. The poison oil I just refined has no effect on humans, but if a crimson corpse beetle drinks it, it blends with the beetle's own venom into a poison even more frightful.

Touch it, and your flesh immediately rots, your body goes numb, and you can move nothing—you can only watch yourself melt away.

" Snow Fox jumped with fright.

"Young Master, can that master of the Corpse Immortal Sect be poisoned to death as well? I judge his cultivation is very high! " Shen Mu said coolly, "That depends on whether he touches those beetles. " He looked up at the sky and said softly, "This poison will dissolve on its own. In sunlight, its potency breaks down and grows weaker and weaker. After half an hour of blazing sun, the poison vanishes.

But in that half hour, whoever touches it dies! " In the hollow, Uncle Qiao's body was trembling.

He suddenly gave a cold laugh.

"At least I still have many more beetles—and above all the mother beetle is still. . .

" At that moment, the beetles on his body crawled out madly and flew toward the poisoned spring, and the mother beetle came out too. Uncle Qiao cried out and snatched at her, but she flew very fast, reached the edge of the spring, and began to drink.

Uncle Qiao seized the mother beetle from behind with one hand and had just begun to relax when his body turned stiff. The skin of his palm rotted at speed; the rot crept up his arm, his muscles started sloughing off the bone, falling to the ground, swiftly becoming pus. He could see his arm rotting, yet he felt no pain at all.

He wanted to chop off the arm, but his body seemed split away from his consciousness; he could no longer control it. Gritting his teeth, Uncle Qiao strained to lift his other arm, but suddenly he lost his balance, pitched forward, and landed face-down, and beneath his face lay over a dozen dead corpse beetles. "Grandpa Alchemist told me: if you can't win, poison. Grandpa Alchemist was exactly right.

" In the distance, the cowherd boy of Hidden Remnant Village said with emotion.