Chapter 43: Chapter 43: Demon Insect Eggs

The next day, Yang Jing was on duty near the County Yamen when he suddenly heard a cheer.

A group of strong young men carried over a Demon Bear that was a full two zhang tall. The Demon Bear’s fur was black and glossy, and its body was covered in scars and traces left by various kinds of Magic. The fatal wound was a small hole that had pierced its right eye and scrambled its brain.

After the young men moved the Demon into Huashan County, they stared eagerly at the Cultivator who had slain the Demon Bear.

The Cultivator begrudgingly took out a Purity Talisman and dispelled the Demon Qi from their bodies. Recently, these mortals had somehow learned that prolonged contact with Demons would cause the scourge of Demon Qi to invade their bodies.

Unless a Cultivator was willing to offer a Purity Talisman, they were unwilling to take on the manual labor of carrying Demon Beasts back to the county seat, no matter how many strings of copper coins they were offered.

The Chen Kingdom had its own laws forbidding Cultivators from casually killing or coercing mortals, so the Cultivators of San Yuanli could only pinch their noses and produce the Purity Talisman.

The corrosive power of Demon Qi was extremely strong.

Even for Cultivators, prolonged exposure to Demon Qi carried the risk of contaminating their Magical Power. If they were unwilling to buy Elixirs for purification, they would have to put in painstaking effort in their cultivation to dispel it.

“I don’t know who the busybody was that told these mortals about the harm of Demon Qi entering the body. Now I’ve wasted a Purity Talisman for nothing.”

A Purity Talisman might be cheap, but it still had to be bought with Spirit Crystals. It was a real waste to use one on these mortals. However, the Demon Bear’s corpse was simply too massive to fit into a Storage Bag, so he had no choice but to have the mortals carry it back.

Even though it meant using up a Purity Talisman, it was still worth it compared to abandoning part of the Demon’s corpse.

After learning that the Wu Family’s heritage included the Inconstant Illusionary Form Technique, Yang Jing began to secretly observe the Cultivators within the county, making sure they hadn’t had their identities replaced by the Wu Family’s Demon Cultivators.

’Cultivators who practiced this Magic were truly insidious, excelling at infiltration and espionage.’

He had come this time to try and use his Bright Qi Talent to check if any of the Cultivators leaving the city had been secretly replaced. After mastering the Inconstant Illusionary Form Technique to a certain Realm, Yang Jing was confident he could spot something amiss with anyone using the illusion.

After confirming the Cultivators were themselves, Yang Jing didn’t leave. Instead, he frowned, his gaze fixed on the dead Demon Bear.

The Demon Bear’s corpse looked completely normal. Even when he inspected it with his Bright Qi Talent, it was completely devoid of Life Force, with only a mass of Demon Qi stagnant inside its body.

But Yang Jing still felt something was wrong. Although he didn’t come to see the commotion every time a Demon was hunted, he knew the types of several of the Demons that had been killed.

The Demons that had been killed were all too large; it often took more than ten strong young men just to lift them.

In the Nine Heavens World, he had also participated in the Autumn Defense before. However, back then he hadn’t been forcibly conscripted by the Chen Kingdom but had volunteered in order to get a Foundation Establishment Pill. Thus, he didn’t have a deep understanding of the Autumn Defense situation under the State Mansion’s jurisdiction.

During the Autumn Defense, all sorts of strange Demons flooded into the Chen Kingdom’s territory, but the vast majority were still small. Among Tier One Demons, only a minority could change their body size. A body that was too large would find it difficult to evade the scouts between the Six Passes Defense Line.

But the demons appearing in Huashan County were consistently large, and this Demon Bear was no exception. This abnormality made Yang Jing suspicious.

Yang Jing walked up to the group of young men. They were all locals and would surely have a clear understanding of the Demons from previous years.

“In past Autumn Defenses, were the captured Demons this large?”

The young man recognized Yang Jing’s status as an Immortal Master and said, a little reservedly:

“We never had Demons this big in past years. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be many people left in our village. This Demon broke into our stockade yesterday and started eating people on sight. It ate a dozen people from our village and only went back to the mountains after it was stuffed. If you Immortal Masters hadn’t arrived quickly, the whole village would have been devoured by this Demon.”

Recalling the horrific scene from that day, the young men still shuddered with fear.

Yang Jing’s eyes narrowed. He walked up to the Independent Cultivator who had hunted the Demon.

“Fellow Daoist Zhang, cut me a piece of bear meat.”

Yang Jing said, taking out a Spirit Stone.

“I’ve run out of the Spirit Rice I brought, so I’ll have to make do with some Demon Beast Flesh to change things up.”

Because he had been selling Elixirs at a low price at the small gatherings in San Yuanli, his reputation among the other Cultivators was quite good. The Cultivator who killed the Demon Bear was pleased and immediately used his dagger to cut off a few choice pieces of meat and handed them to Yang Jing.

After paying with the Spirit Stone, Yang Jing carried the Demon Bear meat back to his courtyard. He pushed his Bright Qi Talent to its limit, his eyes gleaming, but he could still only see the residual Demon Qi on the chunks of meat.

“Iron Head, do you see anything wrong with this Demon Beast Flesh?”

Iron Head stared droolingly at the choice meat on the table. Ever since the Autumn Defense began, it had been eating nothing but dried fish; it had been a long time since it had eaten fresh Demon Beast Flesh.

Seeing its reaction, Yang Jing knew he couldn’t count on Iron Head.

After a moment of deep thought, he took out a dagger and began slicing the Demon Beast Flesh into paper-thin pieces, spreading them out on the table. He also cut a few mahjong-tile-sized cubes and carefully observed the cross-sections with his Bright Qi Talent.

Only then did he notice something was wrong. On almost every slice of meat, there were tiny dots where the concentration of Demon Qi was much higher, like little specks of starlight.

If he wasn’t mistaken, these had to be the eggs of some kind of Demon Insect.

Yang Jing took a deep breath. ’There really is something strange about this Demon Beast Flesh.’ The Demon Qi-infused eggs were hidden within the flesh, concealed by the residual Demon Qi. Even his Bright Qi Talent, which could distinguish various kinds of Spiritual Qi and Demon Qi, had been deceived.

He found a thin needle and carefully picked the eggs out of the meat slice, placing them in a porcelain bowl. From that single slice of meat, he picked out three eggs.

These eggs were about the size of a needlepoint. Hidden within the Demon Beast Flesh, they were completely invisible to the naked eye.

Over this period, quite a few giant Demon Beasts had been transported into Huashan County. The thought that countless eggs might have been brought into Huashan County made Yang Jing’s scalp tingle.

’These massive Demons, with their corpses full of rich qi and blood, are the perfect incubators for Demon Insects.’

’They were all deliberately driven to Huashan County by someone with an agenda.’

Yang Jing stared at the eggs floating in the bowl of water, a headache coming on. To the naked eye, these tiny specks were indistinguishable from normal Demon Beast Flesh. He picked one out and pricked it with the needle, but saw no change.

’It’s far harder to touch someone’s interests than to touch their soul.’ If he tried to get the Independent Cultivators to dispose of the Demon corpses on the grounds that they contained insect eggs, he would probably become a public enemy overnight.

Afterwards, Yang Jing tested the eggs with fire, boiling water, various types of Magic, and his Celestial True Yang.

He discovered that while the eggs were extremely well-hidden, their Life Force was quite fragile. A lick of ordinary flame caused them to wither, though boiling water had little effect. The flames produced by burning Silver Silk Charcoal and various types of Magic could kill them outright.

But the most effective method was still Celestial True Yang. As soon as he channeled his True Yang, the eggs parasitizing the flesh all withered and died, completely unable to resist.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep