Vampire Cultivation Notes

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The group spent a full month traversing the northern lands and clearing the wilderness.

Along the way, five cultivators died, either from attacks by monsters or from poison in the wilderness.

Four of them were from the Yu family, and the remaining one was Old Liu's man, who was his partner when they set up a stall on North Street and also robbed people to earn extra money.

The northern frontier is fraught with danger; even experienced individuals can make mistakes, and a mistake can mean death.

Fortunately, after all these hardships, the group finally arrived at the promised land that the upper sect had designated for them.

The swamp in front of us stretches all the way to the sea to the west, and it is all an undeveloped sacred land.

Old Liu was not saddened by his old buddy's death. On the contrary, facing the endless black swamp in front of him, a genuine smile appeared on his face.

"What the patriarch said is indeed true; there is indeed a sacred place there."

"I used my magical artifact to probe the area, and the spiritual energy concentration is already this high just in the outer perimeter! If I were to find the center, it would definitely be a high-grade first-tier spiritual energy!"

"Good! Great good!"

Huang Chong'er turned her head as she listened to the excited discussion.

Old Liu's joy remained undiminished. He smiled and leaned closer, patting the scales on the yellow worm's back. He looked up and said, "Fellow Daoist Wangyue, the swamp is dangerous. We'll have to trouble you with your mount."

"It's alright. The foundation is right before us, and I will naturally spare no effort."

Li Jieqing smiled, but unlike the others, he didn't try to hide his excitement.

Two late-stage Qi Refining cultivators from the Yu family were discussing their plans with their clansmen, while Jinwu Shangren and Luqiu gazed at the boundless swamp, mesmerized.

"With your own sacred land right in front of you, fellow Daoist, you are able to remain calm."

Old Liu sighed in admiration, but then remembered something and said with a smile, "Fellow Daoist Luqiu asked a lot of questions last time. Please don't take it to heart. He was just remembering the past. Back then, his master who introduced him to cultivation was also famous for his ability to control demonic beasts."

"Oh? Who is it?"

"No one knows his real name, but he had a nickname in the old Taiping Market: the One-Horned Taoist."

"ha……"

A smile appeared on Li Jieqing's lips as he turned his head.

Nearby, in the swamp, Luqiu, carrying a steel gun, turned around and looked over.

One of the reasons he was able to survive in the wilderness was because he had learned a lot about monsters from the old Taoist priest with the unicorn.

Therefore, Luqiu still held his master, who had left that day and never returned, in high regard.

Looking at the demonic beast that Li Jieqing was riding now, although the blood sac on its head from the beast-taming nail had long since disappeared, only a few cracked and unclosed scales remained on its exterior.

But Luqiu still couldn't help but feel something was off, which was the reason he stared at the top of Huangchong's head when they first met.

However, Li Jieqing showed no unusual behavior throughout the journey.

Furthermore, Luqiu also values ​​land reclamation even more. Now that the sacred land is before them, all other thoughts must give way to land reclamation.

"Gentlemen!"

The voice of Venerable Jinwu suddenly rang out.

"Please listen to me, everyone. In a swamp like this, there must be poisonous creatures lingering!"

In fact, many people have already felt the miasma and toxic smoke.

Ordinary people would probably die after just a couple of breaths, and even cultivators, without other means, could only endure it for a little longer.

"Let us first set up camp in a safe place, and then slowly make our way from one corner of the swamp, while also purchasing more antidote pills."

"What the Venerable One said makes sense; these are the words of a wise and experienced ruler."

Many people around agreed, even the two late-stage Qi Refining experts from the Yu family nodded in agreement. Clearing land in this poisonous area and fighting against monsters would be extremely difficult, and it would be best to minimize the number of deaths.

That's too slow...

The thought arose in Li Jieqing's mind, but he immediately fell silent.

Aside from facing two or more first-tier peak demonic beasts at the same time, the entire northern lands posed no real danger to him.

But why rush? Being too arrogant is not a good thing.

The original plan was to simply use the yellow worm as a weapon; there was no need to risk exposing oneself by doing so.

Thinking of this, Li Jieqing even nodded to Lu Qiu, who was occasionally peeking at them.

The newcomer behind the old Taoist priest with the unicorn back then has now become a late-stage Qi Refining cultivator. Even if he is a bit dull-witted, he is still considered a big shot among the rogue cultivators.

"So he ended up in the wilderness. No wonder I couldn't find him after I went back to look for him. What a pity..."

Li Jieqing patted the yellow worm, and the worm's huge, winding body slid into the swamp.

……

"The miasma is poisonous, stretching for four hundred miles across a vast swamp. It was expelled from the back of a toad-skinned snake. Over time, it has turned this swamp into a poisonous land where no vegetation can grow."

"Fortunately, these toad-skin snakes are weak, only about ten feet tall when they grow up. They are considered early-stage first-tier demonic beasts. Only the poisonous mist they spew from their backs is troublesome. We should send people out in teams, equipped with antidote pills, and carefully hunt and kill these snakes in batches."

"Fellow Daoist Wangyue, how about we trouble you to patrol the great swamp and eliminate those large, fully grown toad-skinned snakes?"

With the land reclamation project on track, Li Jieqing, after discussing with several late-stage Qi Refining experts, was assigned a long-term mission.

After considering it for a moment, Li Jieqing did not refuse and nodded in agreement.

The Yu family is numerous and powerful, and has made great contributions. Li Jieqing knows that if he fights alone and cannot do anything practical, he may not be able to get a seat when the sacred land is allocated.

And so, a year passed in the blink of an eye.

In the vast swamp, the yellow worm parted the muddy marshland, exhaling to disperse the gathered miasma.

Li Jieqing sat upright on his head, his gaze sweeping around.

Amidst the hazy miasma, the surrounding swampy area was unusually quiet. After a year of reclamation by six families and the large-scale hunting of monsters, the commotion of toads and snakes writhing around that had occurred occasionally when they first arrived had completely disappeared.

Only the miasma that shrouds the swamp has not yet dissipated.

"This doesn't seem to be miasma, but rather... malevolent energy?"

Li Jieqing fell into deep thought. He was no longer the ignorant rogue cultivator he once was. After robbing Wanbaoge, his knowledge had greatly increased. He was no longer a novice in cultivation. At least he could be considered a scholar of the immortal path.

The evil energy in the world is divided into two categories: Yin and Yang. Each category is further subdivided into three types: Heavenly Evil, Earthly Evil, and Human Evil, totaling seventy-two kinds.

Heavenly evil spirits are the rarest, often fleeting, while earthly evil spirits are the longest-lasting, often emerging from evil burial sites.

The first two are naturally derived from the universe itself, so there's no need to elaborate. The last one, the so-called "human evil," refers to the evil influences of all living things, including demonic evil, monster evil, and so on. It can be said to refer to the evil energy that is gathered together by certain factors after birth.

Li Jieqing had been inspecting the four-hundred-mile-long marsh for a year. Seeing that the toads and snakes in the swamp were almost all killed, and that the miasma in the air had not yet dissipated, he realized that there must be a malevolent aura at work in the dark.

The malevolent energy is the manifestation of the killing intent of heaven, earth, and humanity, and it can naturally draw upon the power of heaven and earth.

The lingering miasma in this four-hundred-mile-long swamp must be caused by malevolent energy, as if heaven and earth have cast a continuously cast spell here.

There was a malevolent aura that perfectly matched this situation.

"It should be the Yin-type snake miasma. The toad-skin snakes in the four-hundred-mile swamp spray poisonous mist day and night, shrouding the swamp in darkness. Over time, this has given rise to a snake miasma, which in turn makes the miasma even stronger."

Li Jieqing surveyed the Swamp of Wandering Snakes for a year, and by comparing the terrain of the swamp, he estimated the source of the miasma.

However, the venomous snakes hid in the swamp, seemingly avoiding the spiritual light of cultivators, and never showed themselves.

If the evil energy is not removed, the miasma will not dissipate.

Li Jieqing searched for a long time but could only determine the general location for the time being.

Fortunately, he has already made some progress on how to find the true form of the evil aura.