Chapter 66 Are you really gay? Don't argue, I have my own plans.
At the border between the celestial realm and the demon realm, there is always a dim, yellowish scene, with deep clouds containing a fiery red glow, and the underworld spring gushing outwards from below.
Between the gloomy, dark sky and the water, there were only two tiny figures, one standing and one sitting.
Fu Ming was washing his knife. He immersed the blood-stained longsword in water and wiped it repeatedly with a towel until his old friend was as shiny as new.
He had just killed several drowned ghosts that had been wandering the Netherworld Spring for years. These creatures had lived in the human world for a long time and had tricked some living people into the water, thus developing slippery, fish-like bodies. The blood splattered from the drowned ghosts was sticky and foul-smelling, requiring careful washing to remove.
"Has it been performed for the deceased?" Fu Ming asked casually to the person beside him.
The talisman paper held between Xiao Huaiyuan's two fingers burned completely, and the ashes drifted away, dispelling all the restless souls.
"Um."
Mingquan was formerly known as Huangquan. According to the people of Quanzhuang, it is the place of reincarnation in the underworld and does not appear in the mortal world. However, during a protracted earthquake a thousand years ago, the River Styx collapsed, and the demon realm appeared out of nowhere. Part of the underworld also overlapped with the mortal world, which created the strange sight of wandering ghosts and spirits appearing here.
The people of Quanzhuang had done him a favor, so even if the system hadn't issued a task, he would still have helped them with this small favor.
Amidst the swirling ashes, Xiao Huaiyuan suddenly called out to him, "Senior Brother."
Fu Ming looked up and asked, "What?"
What followed was an incredibly passionate kiss. Xiao Huaiyuan pinched Fu Ming's chin from top to bottom, pressing his fingertips against the bright red demonic markings on the side of his neck, rubbing them repeatedly.
The demonic runes were a sensitive area for demonic cultivators. Fu Ming felt somewhat uncomfortable, his Adam's apple bobbing, but he never managed to break free.
To Xiao Huaiyuan, Fu Ming seemed like a completely different person.
The senior brother who used to kick him off the bed when he was sulking and add Suoyang powder to his medicine when he was uncomfortable has become much quieter and more obedient. His behavior is also quite reminiscent of the upright and virtuous senior brother from a hundred years ago.
Even though they were very close, he still couldn't figure out Fu Ming's heart.
After a long, passionate encounter, Fu Ming's eyes turned red. Once his junior brother moved away, he took a deep breath and said, "Are you trying to suffocate me, Xiao Huaiyuan?"
Those pale amber eyes seemed to be filled with honey; though they were scolding, there was no real anger in them.
That's what they say, but Fu Ming is two minor realms higher than Xiao Huaiyuan. If he really wanted to push him away, it would be a piece of cake. He was just deliberately indulging his junior brother.
Within his consciousness, the system, forced to watch the kissing scene countless times, finally couldn't find an excuse for Fu Ming.
"Host, you...you...you're really gay?"
Fu Ming pressed the system button: "Don't make a fuss, I have my own plans."
As the old saying goes, when a child is quiet, he's definitely up to no good.
Since learning that he not only has the potential to ascend but is also a promising candidate with great destiny, Fu Ming's mind has become active again.
He wanted to break through the boundary during his tribulation and ascension to seize the opportunity to return to modern Earth.
But this process is fraught with peril. If they fail, they will perish in the turbulent currents; if they succeed, they may never be able to return to this realm.
Treating his junior brother, whom he had deceived, well now is a way to make up for the mistake of pretending to deceive him before.
"Senior brother..."
From childhood to adulthood, Xiao Huaiyuan had never been good at arguing with Fu Ming, and this time was no exception. He only managed to get the first word out before Fu Ming stuffed a pill into his mouth, silencing him.
Fu Ming's specially made, improved version of the elixir is sweet and sour and melts in your mouth.
Although several key medicinal herbs had not yet been obtained, once Fu Ming, the local tyrant of the demon realm, issued an order, Fang Zhengxing immediately sourced the remaining spiritual herbs from the ghost market for him.
Don't think he doesn't know; Fang Zhengxing has also made a lot of money from the Ghost Market, and is probably much richer than him, the Demon Lord.
As a top-tier swordsman, a first-rate swordsman, a second-rate array master, and a third-rate medicine master, Fu Ming possesses many essential skills for both daily life and travel, including alchemy.
As the saying goes, good medicine tastes bitter. Xiao Huaiyuan had never tasted such sweet medicine before. He gently sipped the pill, and the sweet taste, like flowers and fruits, lingered for a long time.
"This medicine does contain..."
Fu Ming drew his sword, stood up, and walked towards the manor surrounded by the Styx River not far away: "Let me think, there's nothing else, it's just that I added more hawthorn powder and sugar, since you like sour things."
"What does Senior Brother like to eat?"
"That's a lot."
Like ordinary fellow disciples, Xiao Huaiyuan and Fu Ming walked side by side ashore, stepping on the stones by the water.
The people of Quanzhuang were waiting on the shore. They were dressed in hemp clothing, and standing at the front was a hunchbacked old woman holding a snake-wood cane, her eyes covered with a black cloth. Fu Ming knew that her eye sockets were empty beneath the veil; this was the price that those who divined the secrets of heaven had to pay.
Fu Ming first briefed the old man on the progress of the mission: "The drowning ghost is dead and will not be reborn within a hundred years, so you can rest assured from now on."
She bowed deeply and said, "Thank you, Your Excellency. The Soul-Gathering Mushroom is about to ripen. May I go and check it first?"
Of course he would go. But he didn't want to put on airs in front of his saviors; that would be too petty: "No need to be so reserved. If you hadn't pulled me out of the water, I wouldn't be alive today."
The old woman walked with an unusually fast pace, and the sound of her serpent staff striking the river stones was crisp and rhythmic: "Your Majesty's fate is extraordinary, and you are also favored by fortune. How could you easily die in a place like this?"
Does fate favor one side?
At that time, he truly believed that he was going to die.
Fu Ming had never touched water colder than the River of Oblivion or the River Styx. He couldn't swim, and was only fighting desperately with the little spiritual power he had left. In the surging waves, he was like an unmoored boat, swaying alone.
He made the right bet after all; the underground river did not connect to the unfathomable Wuxiang Sea, but rather to the rivers of the outside world.
Unfortunately, the area around the River Styx was desolate and deserted, and there were no fish or shrimp in the river. He didn't see a single living creature as he floated downstream, let alone any fishermen who could pull him ashore.
The sound of the waves was monotonous, so he stopped struggling and just kept gazing at the clouds drifting and rolling across the sky.
Fortunately, Xiao Huaiyuan was sent away in time after he activated the boundary marker.
Fu Ming always felt that he had a strange connection with the Grand Competition Secret Realm, otherwise how could he suddenly be able to connect with the boundary marker?
If the Calabash Daoist knew that he was leading Xiao Huaiyuan to their deaths, he would surely break out of his seclusion and give him a good beating. His junior brother was different from him, a country bumpkin. If he died, no one would care, but if his junior brother died, the entire Tianyan Sect would probably be shaken.
well!
He didn't know why, but he always felt that Xiao Huaiyuan was a threat to him, even the previous champions had never made him so wary.
As he grew older, Xiao Huaiyuan's dark eyes became more and more like those of a wolf, a wolf that would lick his palm but was inherently fierce.
Junior brother, how should I treat you?
His jumbled thoughts were washed away by the flowing water, and the undercurrent pushed Fu Ming toward the bank, where a grove of thick reeds caught him. Then a surprised cry rang out.
"Look! There's someone here."
...
A translucent spirit passed through Fu Ming's chest. This was a ghost that had died before its lifespan was over, called an idle ghost. It did not harm people, but it would manipulate people's emotions and devour them.
Fu Ming was in a daze for a while until Xiao Huaiyuan held his left hand. The cool and broad palm calmed Fu Ming down.
"What did you see?" he asked Xiao Huaiyuan quietly.
Xiao Huaiyuan said, "I saw it; it was about when I came to Mingquan to pick you up."
Actually, it should have been even earlier.
Xiao Huaiyuan's score during the competition was not low, but it was far from reaching the second place on the overall list. It was Fu Ming who put that thing into his palm when he pushed him out.
"Junior brother, you go first, I'll cover your rear, I'll be right there." Fu Ming's back was already covered in bright red blood, but he still smiled as brightly as the sun. He always liked to smile when he did bad things, and no one knew what his mentality was.
Xiao Huaiyuan returned to Tianyan Sect by falling from a great height, his head throbbing and the world spinning. Only then did he realize that the return passage had never been officially opened.
His senior brother did not return shortly afterward.
Three days, half a month, a month.
It took him a full hundred days to find Fu Ming's inscription on a stone in the Styx River by chance: a simple, round fox drawn with a crooked character for "talisman".
At the end, Fu Ming, blindfolded and much thinner, still smiled and said to him, "Junior brother, you've come. I knew you could find this place. You're always very good at finding people."
These words are truly hateful.
But Xiao Huaiyuan didn't say anything, he just hugged him tightly.
Therefore, Fu Ming did not see his junior brother's anger, and he still did not see it now. He only felt that his junior brother's hand was pinching him even deeper.
Fu Ming was already used to Xiao Huaiyuan's sudden pressure: "Oh, did you melt that gold fragment into your magic seal? The points it's worth in the secret realm are so high, I wonder what it is."
"No, the fragment is missing." Xiao Huaiyuan was unwilling to elaborate.
Not only did the hard-earned treasure go unused, but it also mysteriously disappeared. Anyone would be incredibly unlucky in this situation.
Just like when they were young, Fu Ming patted his junior brother's head affectionately.
I tiptoed slightly.
Unlike the Ganoderma lucidum that usually grows on steep cliffs, the Soul-Gathering Ganoderma lucidum grows under spring water and can only grow slowly by absorbing the scattered souls of the underworld.
After killing the several mutated drowning ghosts, Fu Ming poured a bottle of air onto the Soul Gathering Mushroom. The Soul Gathering Mushroom, about the size of a human face, turned from green to red, a sign that it was about to mature.
"Beware, there are often symbiotic evil spirits around the Soul-Gathering Mushroom. When these spirits are not discovered, they are colorless, formless, and shapeless, and their bodies are covered in poison."
The old woman gently shook her snake-shaped staff to stir the spring water, trying to detect anything unusual in the flow.
With a whoosh, Fu Ming drew his sword like lightning, slicing the ghost hand down.
The texture was strange, like chopping up a huge, soft jellyfish.
"Ha, I never expected that there would be such a person in this degenerate age."
Before seeing the ghost, one hears its voice. Following the usual tropes of male-oriented online novels, the vengeful ghost will now have to fight Fu Ming for another eight hundred rounds.
Unexpectedly, his next sentence was...
"I surrender!"
Fu Ming, however, had no intention of letting him off the hook: "Wait, what do you mean by the end of the Dharma? Explain it in detail."
Xiao Huaiyuan's Immortal Binding Rope was finally used for good, and the group sat on the rocks to slowly interrogate the vengeful ghost.
In fact, this so-called end times is not much different from the tribulations mentioned by the remnant souls of true immortals. It is nothing more than the depletion of spiritual power, the scarcity of cultivators, the turmoil in the mortal world, and the death of many people.
"The underworld is finished."
The vengeful ghost was heartbroken. Some ghosts with some knowledge knew that the cycle of reincarnation had been broken, and fewer and fewer ghosts could be successfully reborn.
"But the ghost messenger once told me that within a hundred years, a savior will appear out of nowhere and may be able to save us from our dire situation."
"You two look quite alike, I'm not going to fight you, hehe."
As Fu Ming listened, he washed the Soul-Gathering Mushroom with water. The ripples cut the reflected sunset into pieces, and he, with his sharp eyes, immediately noticed the strangeness in the sky.
He nudged Xiao Huaiyuan with his elbow: "Junior brother, have you seen it? There's a palace in the clouds."
Is it a mirage, or...?
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