I was forced to cultivate immortality when I just wanted to lie down

Chapter 179 The Three Transformations of the Corpse
"This commotion surpasses even that of the golden-armored zombie from Xiangyin a thousand years ago. This is a strategically important area near the capital, and also where the dragon energy of the imperial mausoleum gathers. What kind of evil spirit dares to do such a thing?"

Thunderclouds gathered on Zhaoshi Mountain, and outsiders could not see through the dark clouds, so they could only make subjective inferences.

"Indeed, Yang lightning is effective against evil spirits, but it's already a matter of life and death. This is divine lightning from heaven, so there's absolutely no chance of this evil spirit surviving. Naturally, it has no scruples. If it were me, I would go to the Heavenly Master's Mansion, let alone the imperial mausoleum!"

Southeast of the imperial mausoleum, white mist rises from the vast river stretching for miles. In the swirling clouds and mist, a pair of golden eyes, as bright as torches and as deep as abyss, pierce through the clouds and look toward Zhaoshi Mountain.

The ancient, obscure symbols in the golden eyes kept arranging and combining, and when a certain balance was reached, the secrets of heaven would be revealed.

However, just as the enormous creature on the river was about to glimpse the secrets of heaven, a bolt of lightning descending from Zhaoshi Mountain in the distance suddenly split off and struck it directly!
"???"

The enormous creature's eyes widened, and after a moment of astonishment, a bone-chilling horror swept over its entire body.

Before the divine thunder even arrived, it could already feel electric current coursing through its body!
No, I'm just watching the show. What does this lightning disaster have to do with me? Why are you striking me for no reason?!

A bolt of lightning, spanning hundreds of miles, struck the vast, misty river, staining its surface with a dark yellow blood, while dozens of cyan-gold scales reflected a dazzling light.

The enormous creature let out a mournful roar, then plunged into the unfathomable river and vanished without a trace.

April 25th is auspicious for bathing and cleaning; other activities should be avoided. Transactions and divination are also inauspicious.

Outside the capital city, inside the Celestial Master's Hall.

As Jiang Jingchen, one of the Seven Sons of Xuanji, was listening to the teachings of her master, Master Lu, she suddenly heard thunder coming from outside the hall.

Master Lu took out a spare mirror, made a sword-finger gesture with his left hand, and wrote a talisman from a distance of about an inch from the mirror.

As soon as the talisman disappeared into the mirror, the scene of Shaoshi Mountain, more than a hundred miles away, appeared on the mirror.

The Celestial Master frowned, about to raise his hand to perform divination, when Jiang Jingchen suddenly spoke up: "Master, the divine lightning of Zhaoshi Mountain is strange. Moreover, today is not a good day for divination. Why not wait until after the tribulation, and then I will go and investigate before making a decision?"

Jiang Jingchen had her own little scheme. Everyone knew that divine lightning was unavoidable, and if she went to investigate the scene after the lightning disaster, she might be able to find some good treasures.

Master Lu glanced at Jiang Jingchen and said calmly, "Worldly taboos are nothing but shackles for mortals; how can they bind us?"

Master Lu did not particularly like the disciple in front of him.

As for why he didn't like her, it was because half a year ago, when Jiang Jingchen was traveling in Tianjin, he encountered a temple with extremely prosperous incense offerings.

If it were a deserted temple with few worshippers, he would turn a blind eye and treat it as a sparrow looking for food; nobody would care about a few grains of rice.

But if you eat meat and fish every day, then you're out of your mind.

After all, you are just a small rural temple. Without imperial decree or official endorsement, where do you get the ambition and courage to compete with a tiger for food?

Jiang Jingchen felt his eyes burn and his heart ache when he looked at the temple. Even though he burned the temple down, he still felt uneasy.

Sure enough, the first thing Jiang Jingchen did upon returning to the Celestial Master's Mansion was to tattle to Celestial Master Lü, telling him how the Xuan Nu Temple was illegally possessing incense offerings.

As the saying goes, "Birds of a feather flock together," and Master Lu was not exactly a magnanimous person.

He doesn't care about disputes among fellow practitioners, and he can tolerate bald monks stealing incense offerings, but do you think I can't handle a small temple like yours?
So, on that very day, Master Lu was struck by lightning.

After this incident, Master Lu went into seclusion for half a year.

"Once or twice, but how many times?"

Hearing Jiang Jingchen's advice, Master Lu became even more determined to consult the oracle.

Can't a heretic who is about to be punished by Heaven be divined by a legitimate and upright Heavenly Master?
With a flick of his fingers, he conjured up astrological and astrological insights. However, in the next instant, a bolt of divine lightning suddenly traversed a hundred miles, pierced through the Celestial Master's Hall, and struck straight down on Celestial Master Lu's forehead!

Amidst the rubble and dust, the Tianshi Hall, which had only recently been repaired, developed another large hole. In a short while, the dust-covered Tianshi Lu had already sported a trendy perm hairstyle.

On this very day, the Seven Sons of Xuanji became the Six Sons of Xuanji.

The thunderclouds over Zhaoshi Mountain were visible for miles around. Apart from the Celestial Master's Mansion, there were many other talented individuals who knew divination by yarrow stalks and tortoise shells, or prophetic writings by spirit writing, and they couldn't resist making their own calculations.

Outside the capital, a lame fox fled in a sorry state.

The fat monk at Cizhao Temple, who managed to dodge the first day of the lunar month, ultimately couldn't dodge the fifteenth.

In April and May, summer thunder rumbles.

Today is destined to be an overtime day for the gods of thunder.

The imperial mausoleum of the Dayong Emperor had a skylight, and by the time the people from the Exorcism Bureau and the Imperial Observatory arrived, the demons were long gone.

The Vice Minister of the Imperial Clan Court, who was in charge of the affairs of the imperial clan, personally led a team to inspect the mausoleum. After half a day of investigation, apart from the missing coffin of an empress from the reign of Emperor Wengeng, there were no other abnormalities.

When the news reached the capital, the entire city was in an uproar.

The current dynasty is already turbulent, and now this incident has occurred. Some people are privately discussing whether the Great Yong Dynasty is about to perish, otherwise how could their ancestral graves have been struck by lightning?

Perhaps this is God giving us a hint.
What kind of implication is this? It's clearly telling you outright that the Great Yong Dynasty is doomed!

Spies from the Southern Kingdom, rebels from the Northern Border, and spies from Yaozhou took the opportunity to spread various rumors.

Suddenly, the entire capital was filled with turbulent and unpredictable events.

Emperor Jingxing was furious and immediately ordered an investigation into all those who spread rumors. Anyone caught would have their tongue cut out, be paraded through the streets as a warning, and be executed in the autumn!
At the same time, the Imperial Clan Court was ordered to repair the imperial mausoleum immediately and to select an auspicious day to hold a grand ceremony at the Altar of Heaven in order to ensure the stability of the nation.

Meanwhile, in the Baisha River basin, Xu Qing, who had shaved off the corpse's hair, had already boarded a light boat and was heading towards Tianjin.

The imperial mausoleum is adjacent to the capital. This tribulation was a grand affair, which would inevitably attract many people to spy on it. Therefore, Xu Qing decisively left Zhaoshi Mountain as soon as the lightning disaster ended.

Standing at the bow of the ship, Xu Qing was in better spirits than ever before. The sunlight shining on her skin even gave it a warm, jade-like glow.

Compared to his previous pale and bloodless appearance, if he were to say that he was a dead man now, probably no one would believe him.

The three types of wandering corpses are ultimately just ordinary corpses. Now, he has been in seclusion in the imperial mausoleum for more than a hundred days, and while he has become a golden-armored corpse, he has also chosen the path of evolving into a hidden corpse in advance.

Zombies are born close to the earth. For example, iron-armored, silver-armored, and gold-armored zombies do not need to choose a path, and naturally possess the weight of the earth and the chilling power of the metal.

Only the mountains, forests, and barren lands corresponding to the Hairy Jiang, Black Jiang, and Fire Jiang need to be chosen and practiced independently.

All zombies that undergo transformation become corpses.

Xu Qing secluded himself for several months, experiencing changes every day. From the moment he was born, he was both a golden corpse and a crouching corpse.

The Corpse-Lying Transformation has three stages, each stage leading to the attainment of general knowledge. Xu Qing had already activated his visual perception earlier. If he were an ordinary Corpse-Lying, he might already be able to choose to nurture his body and bones, aiming for the Undying Bone Realm.

The Undying Bone is the result of refining a portion of the bones. This portion of the bones is the source of the zombie's immortality. As long as the Undying Bone exists, even if the flesh and bones are scattered, as long as the remaining bone is still there, the zombie can be reborn.

When Xu Qing was reading about corpses, there was a rumor that said that ten thousand years ago, a cultivator's partner's lifespan had run out, so the cultivator raised his partner into a zombie and nurtured her right hand bone into an incorruptible bone.

Later, the monk's misdeeds came to light, attracting criticism from his fellow practitioners.

Strangely enough, although the zombie had lost its original memories, it was extremely obedient to the cultivator's words.

The monk also stated that he had never condoned or used zombies to harm people; the zombies were like his shadow, following him wherever he went, nothing more.

But back then, raising zombies was the original sin. No matter how obedient your zombie was, even if it had great merit and could carry an old lady across the river, it was still considered evil!

Demons have only one fate: to be slain!
Knowing he couldn't escape the attacks of the crowd, the cultivator removed a piece of his zombie wife's hand bone just before she was about to be killed. That bone was the Undying Bone.

Seeing that the alien had been killed, the crowd stopped making things difficult for the cultivator.

Since then, the monk found a secluded place and brewed a soup of animal bones every day to soak his wife's hand bones.

Over time, skin, flesh, and fascia gradually grew from the bones in his wife's hands, followed by her arms, head, and torso.

The story of the corpse-raising wife turning into a zombie ends here, and Xu Qing has no idea what the final outcome will be for this couple who crossed the line between life and death.

However, this story also illustrates two things: the importance of uncorrupted bones to zombies, and the prejudices of the human heart.

Not to mention people, even God's prejudices are a mountain.

Xu Qing still remembered the Heavenly Thunder that wanted to strike him. If it weren't for those merits that blocked it, he would probably be a pile of ashes floating on Zhaoshi Mountain by now.

"I don't know why that cultivator chose to refine his wife's hand bones. Shi said he didn't give an explanation, otherwise I could have taken a look."

Xu Qing definitely planned to refine all the bones in his body, but he hadn't decided which bones to refine first.

It wasn't until the boat docked and stopped that Xu Qing saw the boatman's hands as he cooked fish soup and realized what had happened.

"That's right. Human hands are the most dexterous. Even if a zombie dies, as long as a piece of its hand is still there, it can walk freely and even hunt to nourish its body. But if it were other bones, it wouldn't be so convenient."

After Xu Qing activated the third transformation, his tongue, nose, and ear senses were fully developed.

If we add the visual perception that he spontaneously activated when he first obtained the Heavenly Eye and Yin Eye, then he is a corpse that has already activated all four kinds of perception.

Humans possess nine kinds of general knowledge, but a person may not be able to unlock even one of them in their entire life.

Now that Xu Qing's four senses have been awakened, what he hears and sees is very different from what he used to do.

The ear is the means of hearing, able to hear ghostly tales and divine sounds. Some with strong spirituality can even decipher external sounds and communicate with birds, beasts, and insects.

Xu Qing already understood the language of birds and beasts. After opening his hearing, he reached the standard of being rich in spirituality without any cultivation.

The nose is the source of much hearing and knowledge, capable of discerning the strength and subtlety of energies, remembering even the smallest details. Regardless of direction, whether in divine or ghostly realms, whether incense offerings or the divine or the wicked, it perceives the scents of the yin and yang as if they were right before its eyes.

Xu Qing believed that even a dog's nose couldn't be as accurate as his. If he were to remember someone's scent at this moment, he could track them down within a thousand miles.

The tongue is responsible for the perception of the five flavors. It can distinguish the taste of all kinds of things, from the rare and delicious to the poisonous and evil, and know them all clearly.

The corpse is the dividing line for zombies. They can eat anything, and now that they have the ability to sense food, they no longer have to chew on those candles all day long.

The boatman brought fresh fish from the fish hold, and soon stewed a pot of delicacies.

It's called a delicacy, but it's really just freshly killed fish and some ginger and salt.

Although the cooking method is simple, it best brings out the fresh and delicious flavor of the river fish.

Xu Qing's nostrils flared, and his lips, mouth, and tongue were almost dripping with bodily fluids!
"This fish is extremely delicious, it's just a pity that Xuan Yu isn't here."

Xu Qing didn't mind that it was scalding hot. He swallowed the fish meat and soup clean, and then took out some money to ask the boatman to make another pot.

"Unfortunately, sir, I only caught one fresh fish today. If you are not in a hurry, please allow me to go and catch another one, but I am afraid that it will delay the time."

Upon hearing this, Xu Qing casually replied, "I have some knowledge of fishing and hunting; may I borrow your fishing rod, sir?"

With his fishing rod in hand, Xu Qing walked along the riverbank until he was out of sight of the boatman. Then he put away his fishing rod and jumped into the river.

When he first entered the water, Xu Qing tried to use water manipulation techniques to control the water, but when the river water enveloped his body, he found that he no longer needed water manipulation techniques to control the water.

At this moment, he felt even more at ease in the water than on the shore.

Black zombies love water, and rivers, lakes, and seas are their home ground. In the water, Xu Qing's magic power is inexhaustible. If he were to fight with someone, the water would undoubtedly be an excellent place.

Xu Qing roamed freely in the vast Baisha River, like a swimming fish.

Only then did he truly understand the feeling of "fish leaping freely in the vast sea".

Once his enthusiasm subsided, Xu Qing subtly moved his mind, and without using any water control techniques, the waters within a ten-mile radius were under his control.

Xu Qing casually hunted several spirit fish. After they surfaced, he took out his storage box and put most of the fish inside, leaving only two for cooking. He gave the rest to Xuan Yu to take back.

After putting away the miniature garden, Xu Qing turned around and was about to return to shore when he suddenly smelled a strong scent of blood coming from afar.

"Hmm? What kind of blood is this? It smells so sweet?"

Zombies crave blood, especially human blood. Xu Qing knows the smell of human blood, but the aroma he's smelling right now is definitely not human blood.

Besides the strange scent of blood, he could also distinguish the fishy smell of more than a dozen other types of blood in the air.

Xu Qing followed the scent and, after about twenty miles, saw several large fish fighting each other in the middle of the river.

Just as a fish demon swallowed a large, bowl-sized, bluish-gold scale, a group of other large fish attacked it, tearing it into pieces and swallowing them as well.

Xu Qing carefully discerned the difference in the density of the blood-like energy in the air and discovered that the strange fragrance was emanating from the bluish-gold scales of the fish vying for food.

By controlling the water flow to attract the scales, Xu Qing then stored them in the Landscape Painting once they fell into his hand.

Some fish demons with rudimentary cultivation skills tried to approach and compete, but were cut into pieces of fish meat by Xu Qing's foot-long sharp claws.

In the time it takes to drink a cup of tea to search, Xu Qing had already collected five or six strange scales.

When he could no longer smell a similar odor in the river, Xu Qing turned back to the shore.

The old man waited for a long time, and when he saw the spirit fish, he was clearly taken aback.

“Young master is quite lucky. If I’m not mistaken, this should be a very rare spirit fish. If it were sold at the fish market in the port, it could fetch at least a hundred taels of silver.”

"Does the young master truly intend to eat this fish?"

Xu Qing laughed and said, "Eat!"

"This," the boatman hesitated, "I only have some ginger and salt on this boat, no other seasonings. I'm afraid it will ruin your precious fish."

"It doesn't matter. This is the freshness I want. If other flavors overpower it, it won't taste good."

After the fishmonger finished cooking the fish, Xu Qing shared a bowl with him and then began to enjoy the delicious food in front of him.

Xu Qing shuddered as soon as the fish entered his mouth.

It's so delicious it makes even the dead tremble!

Xu Qing, who hadn't eaten a proper meal in nearly two years, experienced for the first time a feeling that only a living person could understand.

"If life is like this, what more could one ask for?"

(End of this chapter)