Chapter 175: Plague Demon Gu

Subsequently, a deafening bell toll suddenly rang out across the entire clan, throwing everyone into chaos; all scrambled out in their clothes, fleeing in panic and looking around in terror.

This bell toll only sounded when the clan faced a matter of life and death; it had been countless years since this bell last rang.

Upon hearing this bell toll, everyone's expression changed instantly, their eyes filled with tension.

Soon, figure after figure darted about chaotically, and aura after mighty aura converged upon the Council Hall; faintly, one could even detect the presence of a Gu King.

Seeing these figures, every Long Clan Gu Cultivator was shaken; what matter could possibly have occurred to disturb even the Ancestor, who meddled in no clan affairs whatsoever?

They understood that something extraordinary must have happened, something even concerning the clan's very survival; this was destined to be a sleepless night.

Some time passed.

"Ancestor, we have already inspected; the problem lies with the water source. Throughout the Black River flowing through Black Stone City, there are everywhere these insects invisible to the naked eye."

"It seems this scheme is not targeted at our Long Clan, but at the entire Black Stone City."

"The Black River is the water source flowing along Black Stone City's edge; every household in the city drinks its water. Tampering with the Black River water suggests this person intends to massacre Black Stone City!"

Long Yuanshan's pupils contracted, and he spoke with a grim expression.

Once these words were uttered, everyone present revealed looks of horror, and a buzz of discussion erupted.

"Who exactly did this, harboring such wolfish ambition, actually daring to plan a massacre of Black Stone City? What audacity! Black Stone City is the Western Land First Sturdy City; since ancient times it has never been breached. Does he think he can manage it alone?"

"Fortunately, fortunately we discovered it early enough. It is already late night, so few clansmen are using water; otherwise, once morning comes and everyone uses water, the consequences would be unimaginable."

"Have all clansmen been notified not to use the water?"

"Notifications have been sent, and the water source has been cut off. We are preparing to contact the Qian Clan Merchant Association to arrange water transport from distant locations."

"Although the few who already used the water have been infected with Gu, thanks to the timely discovery, the issue should not be severe; they have already been carried to the Yao Clan and Dan Clan for treatment."

"Hmph! It was only because our clan discovered it first; otherwise, by tomorrow morning, no matter how superb the medical skills of the Dan Clan and Yao Clan, they would be useless. They would be unable to save even themselves. We have saved those two clans once—no, we have saved the entire city once. Had our clan not discovered this early, Black Stone City would truly have become a fallen city."

The crowd discussed clamorously, all turning their gazes toward an old man leaning on a staff at the center of the gathering.

This was the clan's currently strongest and eldest surviving Ancestor, weary and nearing the end of his Lifespan; he stood at the Gu King Late Stage cultivation realm and served as the spiritual pillar of the Western Earth Long Clan.

In any Cultivation Clan, the person with the greatest strength might not handle daily affairs, but they invariably wield the greatest authority; their words are enough to make the entire clan execute orders without hesitation.

Long Yuan opened his clouded eyes and gazed solemnly toward the Black River.

The Black River was vast and turbulent, flowing through Black Stone City as its sole water source.

Though water seems ordinary, no one can survive without it; once a City loses its water source, it will sooner or later become a dead city.

The inability to use the Black River water was not only fatal for the Long Clan but a life-threatening disaster for the entire city's population.

With millions of inhabitants in Black Stone City, resolving the water shortage for millions of people was an immensely difficult task.

He sighed and turned his gaze upstream along the Black River, finally speaking in an aged voice: "Upstream of the Black River should be Black Moon City, correct?"

Many who knew the inner workings understood the Ancestor's meaning: he implied these insects originated from Black Moon City, meaning Black Moon City had already encountered disaster.

Those unaware of the situation remained utterly confused, unable to comprehend why the Ancestor would suspect the insects came from Black Moon City.

After all, upstream of Black Moon City lay other cities and villages, and further upstream still more cities and villages; if someone tampered with the river, every city downstream would suffer calamity. It was entirely possible that Black Moon City itself was merely a victim affected by upstream actions.

Long Yuanshan shared the Ancestor's view; he knew Black Moon City would inevitably encounter a great catastrophe soon.

He had originally intended to keep his family out of the affair, but apparently things did not go as wished; the turmoil stirred up in Black Moon City had ultimately embroiled his clan. A bitter smile crossed his face.

"Ancestor, you are experienced and knowledgeable; do you know the origin of these insects? Yuanshan's knowledge is shallow; I understand nothing about these insects invisible to the naked eye in the water, nor can I trace their source," Long Yuanshan suddenly asked.

"I have a suspicion in my heart, though I cannot be one hundred percent certain. However, since this concerns a great Crisis of life and death for the entire city, I shall voice my guess."

Long Yuan swept his gaze across the faces of the clansmen before speaking solemnly: "Do you know that in this world, there exist countless species of insects so small they are invisible to the naked eye, and they are everywhere?"

"Even in the air we breathe now, tiny insects are everywhere; when we eat our meals, these small insects from the air fall into our food and are consumed into our stomachs."

"Every single person present here has these invisible-to-the-naked-eye small insects within their bodies, and in considerable numbers."

"However, these countless tiny Insect Species are harmless to the human body, so very few people notice them; even if noticed, there is no need to pay them any heed."

Upon hearing this, everyone present was startled; many timid individuals already covered their mouths and noses, fearing the tiny insects in the air would burrow into their bodies through their mouths and noses. Yet upon hearing the Ancestor say everyone already harbored these insects within them, and in large numbers, their faces turned pale.

The Ancestor's sudden statement shattered their understanding and collapsed everyone's worldview; it was the first time anyone had ever heard such a claim.

That the air was filled everywhere with tiny insects invisible to the naked eye caused everyone to change color at the mere mention.

The Ancestor was highly respected and virtuous; they could not believe he would speak such words as a joke.

Of course, many still did not believe, utterly rejecting such absurd claims.

To them, this matter seemed too incredible, sounding like a tale from the Arabian Nights; they found it extremely difficult to believe.

That the world was filled everywhere with these tiny insects invisible to the naked eye, so numerous there was nowhere to hide, was simply terrifying; no matter what, they dared not believe it.

Hearing this, Long Xuan's gaze became thoughtful; he understood exactly what the Ancestor was describing.

It seemed that in this world, all extremely small organisms were classified as insects; what were called bacteria, fungi, and viruses in his Past Life were likely collectively termed 'insects' in this world.

It appeared microorganisms had not gone undiscovered in this world; rather, they had all been uniformly categorized as insects, yet research into them remained shallow and extremely difficult to conduct.

Noticing the expressions of all the clansmen, Long Yuan sighed slightly: "I know many do not believe, thinking I am an old fool talking nonsense, but what I say is fact."

"In this world, insect species invisible to the naked eye are indeed everywhere, omnipresent, with countless varieties existing within every person's body."

"However, these tiny Insect Species are harmless to the human body, making them extremely difficult to utilize for Gu Refining purposes, even harder to locate, let alone discuss how to capture them."

"Therefore, extremely few people research this aspect of Gu Worms, but they absolutely do exist in this world."

"To date, I know of only one Gu Worm capable of manipulating this power: the renowned Plague Demon Gu from the Age of Gods."

Speaking to this point, Long Yuan's pupils contracted, revealing a hint of terror as he looked toward Black Moon City, then slowly spoke again: "Many probably do not know what the Plague Demon Gu is; it has long vanished into the river of history."

"If not for the unprecedented great Plague that erupted in Black Moon City fifty years ago, I might never have associated this with the terrifying existence known as the Plague Demon Gu."

"Legend says that during the Age of Gods, there existed Ten Great Forbidden Gu; each required materials numbering in the tens of millions, possessing power capable of destroying heaven and earth. Obtaining even one would make one invincible under heaven."

"However, do not be misled by the absurdly vast quantity of materials needed to refine a Forbidden Gu; many materials overlap significantly. For instance, one material in a Forbidden Gu Formula is living humans, and the required quantity numbers in the hundreds of thousands, or even over ten million."

"Therefore, refining a Forbidden Gu requires killing people—killing massive numbers of people. Each refinement of a Forbidden Gu demands sacrificing an entire City; if the Gu Refining fails, one must sacrifice another City, continuously sacrificing Cities until the Gu is successfully formed."

"Can you imagine how many people must die to refine a single Forbidden Gu? How many Cities must be sacrificed? Those are numbers beyond your imagination."

"Even more exaggeratedly, the people killed during Gu Refining are merely the beginning; the Transformation method for all Forbidden Gu is killing people. The more Transformations undergone, the more people are killed."

"Once a Forbidden Gu transforms to its final stage, it requires slaughtering an entire domain's population; who knows how many billions of humans will perish because of this."

"Many people know that during the Age of Gods, a dark period known as the Dark Period of Severed Ten Thousand Laws occurred, during which most lineages were lost, including the majority of Gu arts, and even many historical classics were destroyed on a massive scale, leaving us with very little knowledge of ancient matters."

"I tell you, the reason is precisely the Forbidden Gu."

"In the Age of Gods, there was an Evil Path faction called the Demon Sky Sect, where each of the Ten Great Demon Venerables created a powerful Forbidden Gu."

"They gained immense power by slaughtering people to sacrifice cities; as their power grew day by day, the number of people they killed increased, and they would casually slaughter the living beings of an entire domain to strengthen their Forbidden Gu, ultimately causing a catastrophe that swept across heaven and earth."

"During that catastrophe, blood flowed for a thousand li everywhere, cities stood empty, white bones piled up like mountains, and the populations of many regions were completely exterminated, so naturally, the lineages of those places were severed, vanishing entirely into the long river of history."

"In that brilliant era where ten thousand laws contended, due to their slaughter, Spear Cultivators went extinct, Arrow Cultivators went extinct, and the methods for refining Named Artifacts were lost..."

"Humanity ushered in a Great Extinction Period; that was humanity's Darkest Era, where countless powerful professions met extinction in this event, and countless powerful lineages vanished completely into the long river of history."

"Under the slaughter of the Ten Great Demon Venerables, corpses lay everywhere across the lands, blood flowed like rivers, many places died out completely, vast tracts of land became barren wastelands devoid of life, with only silence and a deathly stillness remaining."

"According to records, over half of the Human Race perished in this event of great human extinction, and over half of the ten thousand laws were lost in this calamity."

"To refine Forbidden Gu, the Demon Sky Sect committed various heinous cases of atrocities that shocked heaven and earth, provoking the wrath of both heaven and man."

"This ultimately triggered universal anger, leading the Divine Court and the Heavenly Court to unite numerous factions to jointly eradicate them; the Ten Great Demon Venerables died in that world-destroying great battle, and the Gu Formulas for the Forbidden Gu were all destroyed."

"However, the Divine Court and the Heavenly Court also paid a heavy price for this; both sides lost more than seventy percent of their strength, were severely crippled, and did not recover their vitality for over ten thousand years."

"Thus, those ten types of Gu Worms researched by the Ten Great Demon Venerables were listed as Forbidden Gu, and from then on, no one was allowed to touch them again; this is the origin of the Ten Great Forbidden Gu."

"After that battle, the Divine Court and the Heavenly Court united to promulgate a decree across heaven and earth, forbidding anyone from refining Forbidden Gu; whoever violates this decree shall be jointly executed by all powerful beings in heaven and earth, and every faction's powerful members bear the unconditional responsibility to participate in demon-slaying."

"This decree has no expiration date; no one may violate it, and those who fear demons or avoid battle shall be executed alongside the demons."

"I now have reason to suspect that Shi Haojun has refined the Plague Demon Gu, which ranks tenth among the Ten Great Forbidden Gu!"

Long Yuan's expression turned fierce, and he said in a chilling tone: "The ability of the Plague Demon Gu not only allows it to create large-scale plagues but also enables it to control all living creatures smaller than itself."

"The Domain of the Plague Demon Gu is a Mutation Domain; within the range of this Domain, all living creatures smaller than the Plague Demon Gu will undergo mutation, transforming from harmless microbes into harmful microbes."

"Once the Mutation Domain opens, all tiny insects invisible to the naked eye in the air will fiercely attack surrounding Gu Cultivators, easily biting through the Spirit Armor on the bodies of High-rank Gu Cultivators."

"It does not even require using the tiny insects in the air; one must know that every Gu Cultivator's body already contains countless tiny insects, and once these insects mutate under the Mutation Domain, changing from harmless to harmful to the human body..."

"... one can imagine the fate awaiting Gu Cultivators within the Mutation Domain: either they are eaten alive by the countless insects rioting inside their bodies, or they must expend more than half their power to forcibly suppress them."

"The human body is fragile and utterly defenseless internally; once countless tiny insects bite chaotically within the five viscera and six bowels, even the most powerful Gu Cultivator will die a miserable death."

"Under such circumstances, merely staying alive is already difficult, so how could one possibly contend with the master of the Plague Demon Gu?"

"Faced with such terrifying power, tactics relying on overwhelming numbers are utterly useless against the owner of the Plague Demon Gu; slaughtering a large city with millions of inhabitants is effortless for him and takes very little time—no matter how many people there are, could they possibly outnumber the insects controlled by the Plague Demon Gu?"

"How vast and wide is the Black River? I fear only this Plague Demon Gu could easily generate such a terrifying quantity of insects sufficient to fill the entire great river."

"Aside from the Plague Demon Gu, I do not believe any other power could accomplish something so terrifying!"

"Now I understand why that Shi Haojun is powerful enough to easily slaughter an entire city; he has refined the Plague Demon Gu!" Long Yuan's eyes blazed with fury as he spoke with absolute certainty.

(End of Chapter)