Chapter 103: Immortal Sect, Insect City, Feathered Immortal
The two siblings were so poor they didn’t even have a stool. Yuan Zhu simply grabbed the little wooden stool belonging to the younger brother and sat down under the other’s angry glare, looking toward the more ‘mature’ and steady older sister.
“As you can see, I have no ill intentions…”
He had just started speaking when the short and young sister nodded in understanding: “Yes, yes, I’ve already sensed the sir’s goodwill.”
“……?”
Interrupted in his train of thought, Yuan Zhu pondered for a moment before continuing: “To show my sincerity, I’ll release you… younger brother? Can you control him and keep him from retaliating? I have some situation I want to understand.”
The little girl nodded repeatedly: “No problem, he’s very obedient. Little brother, when the guest releases you later, squat obediently by the wall for me, don’t move around, don’t cause trouble. Do you hear me?!”
The stubborn boy looked aggrieved, gritted his teeth, and spat out: “Mm!”
The little girl looked at Yuan Zhu expectantly again.
With a slight thought, the shadows wrapping around the boy automatically dissipated. The boy rolled and jumped up, surprised as he moved his hands and feet, then gave Yuan Zhu a deep glance before walking to the corner and squatting down obediently and pitifully.
Considering there was only one wooden stool, Yuan Zhu gave up on returning it. Just let him keep squatting like that.
“Sir, what questions do you have? Please ask. This is our family’s food, and little spicy sticks, please enjoy.”
The little girl first pushed the plate full of insects in front of Yuan Zhu, feeling it wasn’t lavish enough, turned around and hugged out a broken wooden box, reluctantly took out a pile of dried black little spicy sticks, and forced a smile as she placed them in front of him.
Looking at the food emitting a strange smell and laced with strong pollution, Yuan Zhu felt no appetite at all. But out of politeness, he casually asked: “What are all these?”
The little girl enthusiastically introduced: “This is fragrant fart bug, this is mouthful fragrance, this is dung beetle… this is stinky boss.”
“…” Yuan Zhu suddenly regretted his loose tongue, “You usually eat these?”
“Yeah.” The little girl looked puzzled and observed his expression, trying to discern Yuan Zhu’s attitude.
“Do you have vegetables?”
“Vegetables?” The little girl was stunned, trying hard to understand Yuan Zhu’s meaning, then racked her brains before answering: “We also eat moss, mushrooms, purple leaves from the reverse life garden. Tree roots that haven’t been polluted.”
Yuan Zhu knew nothing about the underground world: “What is reverse life garden? What do you mean by tree roots that haven’t been polluted? Aren’t all those tree roots in the underground tunnels polluted?”
Seeing his mild attitude, the little girl boldly asked back: “The guest isn’t a resident of underground paradise, right?”
“Right, so I want to understand the situation of your underground world.”
The little girl didn’t dare ask too much, thought for a moment, then introduced: “The root tendrils you saw in the underground tunnel are all root tendrils left by the Immortal Realm Tree, containing immortal spiritual energy. They are the source of life for all creatures in underground paradise today and also the protective barrier safeguarding the underground world. But the Immortal Realm Tree has been dead for a hundred years, its root tendrils are slowly corrupting and deteriorating, the immortal spiritual energy tainted by rotten pollution, no longer pure.”
“In addition, after the great apocalyptic calamity on the surface, the land became a barren desert with no grass growing, still suffering repeated pollution from demonic calamity. Among them is the highly toxic corrosive [corrosive iron acid rain], which seeps underground and is intercepted and filtered by the immortal roots, protecting underground paradise from erosion. But after the immortal spirit tree roots absorb the corrosive iron acid rain, it further intensifies the pollution, stained with metal deadly poison, accelerating rot and deterioration, breeding and releasing deadly poisonous miasma, even causing the remaining active immortal roots to mutate out of control, turning into forbidden zones.”
“[Reverse life garden] is the active ‘Immortal Realm Tree root tendrils’ reawakened by the Immortal Sect in underground paradise, growing downward again in the underground grotto-heaven in the form of [reverse life tree], opening up a new immortal homeland. However, [immortal homeland] is a blessed land that only the immortal lords are qualified to reside in. The Immortal Sect masters the ‘reverse life tree’, reawakening the vitality of immortal roots, controlling earth veins for hundreds of li, mastering resources like survival, cultivation, food… Thus, numerous city lords choose to attach to the Immortal Sect, each city having numerous ‘reverse life gardens’ as pasture farms.”
The little girl’s introduction was very clear, but Yuan Zhu was stunned. This plot didn’t match what the captain had said at all.
The captain’s intel was that the bubble world had just gone through a world-ending calamity, earth immortals beaten to death, spiritual roots drained dry, the world barren, and the insect system pollution’s native inhabitants fully risen, overwhelming the Kunlun immortals.
But now, [reverse life tree] had grown back, Immortal Sects reestablished, even creating underground grotto-heaven blessed lands. This ‘reverse life garden’ was clearly the small forest split underground within a hundred li radius of the [reverse life tree].
Yuan Zhu: “Underground world, how many cities are there? What are the Immortal Sects called? How large is the reverse life tree’s range?”
These questions clearly stumped the little girl, who shook her head: “The underground paradise is as big as the world. The underground space is full of forbidden zones everywhere, crises lurking, I’ve never left the [Cicada City] range, only heard there are five or six cities nearby attach to [Immortal Bee Dao]. And the entire underground world perhaps has twenty or thirty city pools? Some too remote, some destroyed by demonic calamity, also strong ones opening new bases that gradually expand into new cities.”
“[Reverse life tree] I know of four, but legend has a mysterious fifth one yet to be discovered. Immortal Sects total four, our [Cicada City] is within [Immortal Bee Dao] range, additionally [Earth Escape Sect, Fish Insect Dao, Breath Soil Sect]. Reverse life tree range I’m not clear, but said to be very very large, a hundred li radius or even more…”
There are actually four reverse life trees, four Immortal Sects? This timeline differs quite a bit from the captain’s intel. With immortals rising again, they’re probably cooperating with cultivators to raise insects together?
Yuan Zhu: “Underground world, are Immortal Sects the biggest? Do all you city pools attach to Immortal Sects to exist? Are there other powers?”
“After a hundred years of calamity, spiritual energy declined, Immortal Sects weakened, underground paradise miasma pervasive, immortals all secluded in grotto-heavens not coming out. Only those small cities attach to Immortal Sects to exist, [Cicada City] such large cities have a cooperation relationship with Immortal Sects, able to dialogue equally, trade and exchange mutually. Behind the many [insect cities] is the powerful [Technician Alliance], which once confronted [Immortal Sects] head-on, ultimately leading us insectoid race to overthrow immortal rule, establishing city-states one after another. Now [Technician Alliance] has also split into nine great families.”
Yuan Zhu: “Insectoid race? I see you two are both humans. Could it be you have ‘insectoid race’ bloodline?”
Yuan Zhu carefully observed this little girl and her tall and burly younger brother. Though her eyes were frighteningly large (bulging), she looked human no matter how he saw it, with no insect characteristics (compound eyes); her younger brother even more so with thick eyebrows and big eyes, standard Eastern appearance.
Little girl: “We are of course humans. But humans have different tribal groups, we siblings are [Cicada Tribe], Cicada City also has [Fly Tribe, Locust Tribe]…”
Yuan Zhu now understood the other’s meaning, just simple nomenclature. Like how he was not only Han but could also be moonlight tribe and head-down tribe. But still puzzled: “How are these [Cicada Tribe], [Locust Tribe] divided?”
“Related to qi refining technique, different qi refining techniques divide different races. This is the foundation of our insectoid race’s hundred-year rise, countering immortal path, gaining freedom. Every [insect city] has one supreme [source qi breathing method].”
Yuan Zhu thought to himself, this is the [insect system pollution] the captain mentioned, unexpectedly after a hundred years of brewing and evolution, it has birthed a dedicated ‘cultivation system’.
“Breathing method, qi refining technique… evolved from Immortal Sect secret methods?” Yuan Zhu asked curiously.
He didn’t know much about Kunlun immortal method, only clear there were five types of immortals, and the entry foundation was [seed spiritual root]. Now it seems, are those ‘root tendrils’ pervading underground tunnels inferior spiritual roots? Wonder if they can be used to synthesize ‘Kunlun ghost companion’? Damn, missing the all-purpose goblins again!
Hearing Yuan Zhu conflate [breathing method] with Immortal Sect methods, the younger brother squatting in the corner couldn’t help retorting: “Qi refining technique has nothing to do with immortal methods, it’s our insectoid race’s own created cultivation technique! Martial arts through to godhood, feathered immortal.”
“See! Still say it’s not immortal method? You’ve got feathered immortal. I’ve heard of Kunlun qi refining technique’s great name too.”
The boy saw Yuan Zhu quibbling, got angry huffing and puffing, but didn’t know how to refute, could only squat in the corner sulking.
Fortunately, his young sister stepped forward: “Honored guest misunderstands, our insectoid race’s [source qi breathing method] has little relation to immortal scripture, half obtained from surface heavenly disasters, half from insectoid race dao seed. When breathing method cultivated to high depths, insect cultivator will hear in dreams information related to [feathering], so we call the ultimate pursuit of [breathing method] [feathered immortal].”
Hearing the little girl’s introduction, Yuan Zhu was also stunned. He seemed to have heard of [feathered immortal] somewhere.
The [feathered immortal] in the other’s mouth was clearly like Du Ling’s [sword immortal], [corpse solvation immortal], not proper cultivation style, but those first generation, second generation pollution roots’ disguises.
Little spicy stick suddenly came back to life: “In paradise’s exchange list, there’s a [feathered immortal] category, inside is missing. This system, seems something went wrong?”
Yuan Zhu: “Kid, the power you used to counterattack earlier, that was [qi refining technique]?”
The boy nodded straightforwardly: “Yes, that’s my cicada qi threads.”
Yuan Zhu looked at his sister: “Good, I’m now very interested in your [qi refining technique], tell me about it.”
