Chapter 1040: Chapter 104: Elder Hong Zhu

People can decide to fall into corruption quite quickly; Elder Liao found an excuse for his corruption and was then happy to make his move.

Feng Jun looked at him strangely, “You’re using my name to make money yet you want to earn more than my Spirit Plant Shepherd?”

“That’s different, their cultivation levels are different,” argued Elder Liao, “And if I’m not mistaken, calling upon your Spirit Plant Shepherd also has its price, right?”

The man had guessed right. The reason Feng Jun was putting on an act was to see if he could bluff his way through; indeed, bringing Hua Hua here could solve the problem, but… it was just too inconvenient.

The energy points consumed in crossing dimensions were not that big a deal, but he couldn’t let Hua Hua appear mysteriously time and again. Mount Zhige was now drawing more and more attention from cultivators, and he didn’t want to give the game away.

Moreover, to get Hua Hua to come, he would have to go through Feng Jing, adding another layer of red tape.

However, he wasn’t about to admit that, so he smiled, “Two thousand Spirit Stones are already quite a fair amount for you, right? The Spirit Plant Shepherd is mine; giving it a bit more means the wealth stays within, why should it go to you?”

Elder Liao shamelessly replied, “Mountain Master, I’m one of your people now too.”

“You know very well whether that’s true or not,” Feng Jun couldn’t be bothered with him, “If you want to do it, it’s two thousand Spirit Stones, take it or leave it.”

“Can’t you add five hundred more?” Elder Liao shamelessly bargained, puffing up his chest, “I am in the Qi Refinement Realm, after all.”

Feng Jun glanced at him coldly, “Negotiate further, and it’ll drop to nineteen hundred Spirit Stones!”

“Alright, two thousand Spirit Stones,” Elder Liao quickly agreed, as two thousand wasn’t a small sum for him after all.

Two thousand Spirit Stones could buy an average Magic Artifact; for a Qi Refining Practitioner to receive two thousand for one job was quite good, especially since it wasn’t too dangerous.

Those minor clans only with Qi Refining Practitioners couldn’t afford to hire someone at the Qi Refinement Realm due to not only the danger of the mission but also matters of dignity.

But even if we’re talking about dignity, it’s still tied to the risk. If any trouble came up after Elder Liao’s intervention, the other party wouldn’t find him fighting alone – at the very least Feng Jun was a cultivator of the Qi Refinement Realm.

Seeing that he’d agreed, Feng Jun gave him a look, thinking I knew it’d be like this.

Two thousand Spirit Stones to have Elder Liao make his move wasn’t a loss for him; if it weren’t for his concern over the Earth Realm losing control of its Spirit Stones, he wouldn’t have minded giving two thousand to Hua Hua instead of this “acting.”

Of course, his attitude towards Hua Hua was different; those worthless Spirit Beast Meats, Gu Insects, or Magic Artifacts, didn’t he provide them for free relentlessly?

In his eyes, Hua Hua was one of his own, but Elder Liao wasn’t, not yet anyway.

Their conflict eased through this division of labor. It was no longer about obligatory enslavement; it became a matter of mutual interest, benefiting the development of Mount Zhige.

And since he made this decision, Elder Liao made a tidy sum of Spirit Stones through this business, but that was a story for another time.

On the other side, the Ning Family got their hands on the Giant Millipede Gu and went straight back to the Cultivation World to seek out who made the mystical branding.

They had connections in the Four Sects and Wutai, but unfortunately, such a minor matter could not engage the attention of a Golden Core Ancestor.

There were some Qi Refinement Realm practitioners good at divining fortunes, but naturally, they were not as proficient as the true masters.

After about half a month of searching and even consulting some Gu Cultivators, the Ning Family was able to roughly ascertain that the brand was likely placed by the infamous Golden Core Master Hong Zhu.

Hong Zhu was notorious for being ruthless and was a fifth-layer Qi Refinement practitioner among the Gu Cultivators. His whereabouts were always uncertain due to having made too many enemies.

However, the Ning Family also took on a Tiantong Commission reward task, allowing them to inquire about Gu Cultivators publicly. During this process, they not only got wind of Gu Cultivators who had targeted Liang Zhongyu but also coincidentally heard about the whereabouts of Hong Zhu.

The one who set up the trap for Liang Zhongyu was a Gu Cultivator named Hao Bin, an impoverished man without many resources for cultivation, so he forged a few “Ancient Cave Dwellings” to lure naive, hotblooded youths.

Liang Zhongyu’s Gu Insect was stripped, and Hao Bin had begun to sense it since his Life-bound Gu was the Qingyan Centipede. It wasn’t long before he heard about a bounty issued by Tiantong to capture a Gu Cultivator who branded a Qingyan Centipede.

Hao Bin immediately went into hiding, knowing too many people were aware of his Life-bound Gu, making him an easy suspect.

Yet, he was still betrayed. Three Qi Refinement Practitioners from the Ning Family surrounded him, adopting a stable and strategic approach, methodically squeezing his living space without getting into a life-and-death struggle.

During this, other Gu Cultivators came to ask what was going on, but seeing the bounty task, they turned and left–fooling young cultivators and then seizing their cultivation wasn’t well-regarded among many Gu Cultivators.

Hao Bin finally couldn’t escape anymore and wanted to fight with the Ning Family in a mutual destruction, but the Ning Family had secretly scattered “Absolute Spirit Anesthetic Powder” without anyone’s awareness, so Hao Bin could only use a Fiery Flame Formation Disk to burn himself and the Magic Artifacts he carried with him to ashes.

However, even if he committed suicide, the Ning Family still managed to collect his aura and completed the task at the Tiantong Commercial Alliance.

Up to this point, the Ning Family didn’t actually spend much money on healing Ning Jianlin, and they even reaped some merits. However, the direct lineage bled a little more, after all, the cost of treatment was borne by them, while the gains from killing Hao Bin entered the public coffers.

Although the Chu Family spent over twenty thousand Spirit Stones, their objective – to glorify the Chu Family – was achieved.

For the Ning Family, the problem arose during the hunt for the Red Spider hermit.

This time, the Ning Family dispatched four transcendents, including one High-Rank and two Intermediate Level, but just as they were about to encircle Red Spider, they were shocked to discover — the opponent had reached the seventh level of transcendence!

If anything, it could only be said that Red Spider was too mysterious. The last time he was seen was fifteen years ago, and at that time, he was at the fifth level of transcendence. Who would have imagined that he had now reached the seventh level?

The Ning Family had indeed speculated that the Red Spider hermit might advance in rank during his disappearance, but at most reaching the sixth level of transcendence. Who knew he could be so fortunate to reach the High-Rank of transcendence?

Red Spider hermit was extremely vigilant. Once he realized he was under attack, he decisively struck out and broke free from the encirclement.

Fortunately, in his haste to escape, he didn’t resort to ruthless measures, but a Middle-Rank transcendent from the Ning Family was still seriously injured.

What was even more infuriating was that after breaking out of the encirclement, Red Spider didn’t rush to leave. Instead, he hung around not far from the Ning Family’s cultivators and loudly questioned — what the hell did I do to provoke you guys?

It’s quite interesting to mention that Red Spider’s Life-bound Gu was a spider; the Giant Millipede Gu was merely an auxiliary Gu he nurtured.

It was precisely for this reason that when the Giant Millipede Gu was stripped from Ning Jianlin’s body, Red Spider didn’t pay much attention to it, unlike Hao Bin who was extremely sensitive. That’s why he almost got trapped by accident.

Otherwise, with Red Spider hermit’s ability to hide, once he decided to go into hiding, basically no one could find him.

Seeing his arrogance and daring to ask questions, the Ning Family couldn’t help but recount the incident with Ning Jianlin — using a scion of the Ning Family to nourish a Gu, do you have any justification for that?

However, Red Spider was far more overbearing than Hao Bin by an unknowable amount. Upon hearing this, he sneered coldly, “Did I force the Ning Family scion to cultivate Gu? Your youngster couldn’t resist temptation, how is that my problem… Since ancient times, Gu Cultivators have advocated survival of the fittest, just say that he was weak!”

The reasoning may be twisted, but it basically aligns with the values of cultivators — without this theory, cultivators fighting in the Blood Gu Battles would have been exterminated long ago.

Moreover, it must be admitted that the Ning Family’s Direct Lineage also had similar schemes — you want to use our scion to nourish a Gu? Wait until Ning Jianlin advances to the transcendence stage, then we’ll see who is nourishing a Gu for whom.

But now, it seems quite unlikely, as Red Spider has reached High-Rank transcendence. To nurture Ning Jianlin to the High-Rank transcendence stage, it’s uncertain what vast amounts of resources the Ning Family would have to expend — whether Ning Jianlin even possesses such aptitude is another question.

Furthermore, Red Spider’s combat strength was extremely formidable; a typical High-Rank transcendent might not be his match. Even if Ning Jianlin did advance in rank, whether he could defeat him was still… forget it, probably not.

In any case, Red Spider didn’t feel he was in the wrong, and he brazenly declared, “This time, I’ll forgive your ignorance, but if you continue to pester me, I’ll make sure the Ning Family has no descendants left!”

A seventh-tier transcendent daring to threaten a Cultivator Family with a dozen transcendent members was truly brazen.

But Red Spider really had the audacity. The means of Gu Cultivators were inherently tricky, and once he was willing to go all out, going for mutual destruction with the Ning Family was no problem.

The problem was that Red Spider dared to fight to the death, as Gu Cultivators who participated in Blood Gu Battles were a bunch of madmen, but the Ning Family dared not.

It’s not that the people of the Ning Family were afraid of death, but rather that the family had a large business with a long inheritance, which truly wasn’t easy to sustain. If they encountered an insurmountable obstacle, they would have fought to the end. However, for such a lunatic, to sacrifice most of the Ning Family’s elite was just not worth it.

Of course, this grievance couldn’t simply be swallowed, so the transcendent members of the Ning Family unanimously decided — to spare no expense in inviting a Golden Core Master to assist!

But Golden Core… where are they so easily convinced to help?

As mentioned before, it’s difficult for Qi Refinement Realm families to invite transcendents to act, just as it is difficult for transcendents’ families to get True Masters to take action, and it’s not just about Spirit Stones.

The Ning Family had three transcendents at High-Rank, with two acting as Guest Elders at the Qinggang Sect and the Wanfu Platform, and their influence was slightly greater.

But both of them stated that although Red Spider was audacious, that perverse reasoning wasn’t entirely without merit, and the Golden Core Masters we know of, probably wouldn’t take action — they wouldn’t want the stigma of bullying the weak.

In truth, based on the Ning Family’s predicament, inviting a Golden Core Master to act wasn’t considered bullying the weak — they might even be rewarded with merit points.

Ultimately, those two were Grand Elders, not insiders of the Four Sects, so naturally their influence wasn’t enough.

When the Ning Family was at a loss, someone suddenly suggested, “We could invite Mountain Master Feng from Mount Zhige to act!”