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Chapter 350 Ever-changing
Xu Yuan watched helplessly as the con artist hid to the side and deliberately caused trouble for the three men.

It feels like... an ant hiding and sticking out its leg, trying to trip an elephant.

The leader was on par with Qiu Ningtai.

Qiu Ningtai was able to compete with the gangrene crow in terms of "symptoms".

The subordinate who kept sniffing the air was a seventh-rate alchemist.

He burned the con artist to ashes with a single burst of fire, finding it quite amusing: "Hey, there's a con artist hiding here. This is the first time I've encountered such an evil spirit."

Xu Yuan was helpless. This con artist... he really deserved to die.

The three burned the con artist to death, then followed the scent to continue searching for the Ghost Beard Wood, before slowly walking away.

Xu Yuan hesitated, wondering whether he should follow the three.

The official asked, "Why hasn't Deng Linyue arrived yet?"

"I have already arranged for someone to deliver the news about Gui Xumu to him at the right time. He should have arrived by now."

“He was the bait I laid out for Guixumu. If he doesn’t come, we’ll have to find another bait. When Guixumu has eaten a powerful cultivator and is about to grow his fourteenth eye, that true seed will be at its most mature.”

Another subordinate then said, "Shall we arrest Qiu Ningtai?"

"No, that guy may be a hypocrite, but his family is too powerful, and he'll cause trouble in the future."

This man had narrow eyes, high cheekbones, an oval face, and a sinister and ruthless appearance.

What's striking is the purplish-black tattoo on his left cheek.

Xu Yuan was quite far away, and his view was constantly obstructed in the forest, so he could only make out that the pattern looked like a ghost or an evil beast.

It opened its mouth wide, as if it was devouring something.

The subordinate said, "But there are no other living people in these mountains, let alone cultivators."

"Hey!" the adult chuckled strangely, "How could there not be? Those mountain runners in the village, I think they'd be perfect for it!"

"Massacre the village?" The subordinate hesitated. "These villages in the mountains are all a bit strange. If those villagers fight us to the death, it won't be easy to deal with them."

The official glared at him, feigning anger: "Nonsense! We are legitimate officials of the Ming Dynasty. Do you think we are those bandits from the demon-slaying army? Slaughtering villages at the drop of a hat? I have my own ways of finding those mountain runners."

They like to roam freely in the mountains and spend relatively little time in the village; catching those who wander off into the mountains is sufficient.

"Hehehe." The two subordinates chuckled and bowed, apologizing, "We were wrong."

Xu Yuan had already secretly followed, and he frowned as he listened.

Dan Xiu's nose was noticeably several times larger than normal, thick and coarse; upon closer inspection, it resembled a tiger's nose.

He kept sniffing the air.

After searching for a while, he suddenly started trembling all over and couldn't stand up.

Another person helped him up, and he forcefully ripped his nose off.

A large piece of living flesh was torn off his nose.

Not only did the skin refuse to detach, but large patches of blood and flesh began to spread, each strand trying to burrow into his face.

After tearing it off with all his might, Dan Xiu clenched his fist, and a ball of fire rose in his palm, transforming the flesh back into a strange pill.

His nose was covered in blood.

He quickly treated her with a medicinal pill.

"The yin energy in this mountain is too heavy," Dan Xiu said. "The time required to use the Ghost Pill is reduced by almost half compared to outside the mountain."

If it wasn't removed soon, the strange pill would completely go out of control, piercing through his skin and flesh and drilling into his brain.

The adult looked around and said helplessly, "We won't find the Ghostwood this way. Let's catch a mountain runner first."

He then led the two out of the forest and left. No one knew what methods he had that allowed him to find the mountain runners in the vast mountains.

Xu Yuan quietly followed them again.

After they left, a small blade of grass suddenly swayed a few dozen feet away from the spot where the con artist had been burned to ashes.

Then, the yin energy surged out like a fountain. The grass grew rapidly.

In the blink of an eye, it transformed into a large tree.

The tree is ancient, with rough and cracked bark.

Within those cracks, strange, dark yellow eyes gleamed.

These eyes are different from human eyes and animal eyes.

The irises are dark yellow, and the pupils are blood red, but they are extremely small, only the size of a pinhead.

Each eye has three pupils.

Most of the thirteen eyes were on the tree trunk, while the rest hung from the treetops, vigilantly watching all the movements around them.

The soil around it quickly turned grayish-black.

The roots below kept wriggling, and the ground undulated like waves.

The "ever-changing" nature of the ghost beard tree is not just about its changing shape.

Rather, it is a plant that truly "becomes another kind of plant".

Even the smell has become something else entirely.

Therefore, Danxiu sensed that the scent of Ghost Beard Wood was nearby.

However, after limiting the area, it was impossible to find exactly where it was.

Gui Xumu was terrified and furious.

The fact that the con artist, who was supposed to be its informant, wasn't watching the riverbank suggests that the river was no longer safe.

Those three people kept tracking him, and despite changing his appearance multiple times, he was unable to shake them off completely.

There are at least two groups of people in these mountains who are watching me!

Gui Xumu was torn between fleeing the mountains immediately or taking one last risk tonight and going to Pig Cry Rock.

Somewhere on its trunk, a strange burl has grown.

It looked like... a malignant sore on a person's body!
Having a malignant sore is definitely not a good thing for a person.

But for evil spirits, this is a good thing.

For Ghostbeard to grow its fourteenth eye, it also needs some external assistance.

It inadvertently stumbled upon the raven and the human cultivator battling it out.

Those diseases not only helped it grow a fourteenth eye, but also gave it the ability to possess the disease itself.

If successful, it will cause anyone who enters the forest to fall ill as soon as it is there.

The fourteenth eye is still a little short of being perfect.

Adding a few more "symptoms" tonight should be enough.

It hesitated greatly, and the burl began to wriggle, as if something inside was influencing Ghostbeard's decision.

Suddenly, a large white bird flew in from a distance.

This bird is quite plump, so its flight posture is not very graceful or free.

It flew unsteadily for dozens of feet, and was about to crash into a tree branch. It flapped its wings a few times, barely managed to rise a little, and then awkwardly dodged a few branches before gliding and crashing headfirst into the Ghost Beard Tree.

Boom!
Gui Xumu was taken aback. What was this thing?
The large white bird's two claws gripped the tree trunk, but it couldn't hold on tightly and slipped down a bit.

A branch of the ghost beard tree drooped down, with an eyeball hanging from it.

It realized that it couldn't hold on because it wasn't claws at all, but two webbed feet.

This thing isn't a big white bird, but a goose.

It clung tightly to the tree trunk, struggled to climb a little higher, and then aimed at the burl, chiseling away with its flat beak like a woodpecker!
(End of this chapter)