Chapter 126: The Heavenly-Grade Corpse

The Infant-Locking Pagoda was filled with filthy and foul things used to seal its doors and windows, such as the amniotic fluid from women in labor, the menstrual blood collected monthly by the nuns in the temple, and blood-tainted items like fetal placentas.

These things were not only feared like tigers by immortal deities, but even righteous cultivators avoided them at all costs.

Because these filthy items could not only pollute immortal techniques but also a portion of Daoist arts and methods. Once contaminated by such filth, many spells would lose their efficacy, and even high-and-mighty deities would be covered in bad luck.

Therefore, when practitioners encountered such things, unless necessary, most would not choose to "test the law with their own bodies."

Only a fool would know a mountain is full of excrement and still insist on walking into that mountain of excrement.

Xu Qing had the intention to deal with this place that harbored filth and dirt, so he inevitably had to play the fool for once; after all, some things always need someone to do them.

Although he could not be counted as a living person, since the Cat Immortal Hall had accepted the business here, it had to have a beginning and an end, and bring this matter to a close.

Controlling his substitute puppet, he arrived beneath the Infant-Locking Pagoda. The steel-boned puppet was like a human bulldozer; one person was worth an entire demolition squad.

However, when Xu Qing saw the jars of filthy blood falling with a rustle from the Infant-Locking Pagoda, as well as those jars containing foul-smelling dead fetuses resembling kittens and puppies, he immediately felt that this puppet could no longer be kept.

Bricks and tiles crumbled, and the three-zhang-tall Infant-Locking Pagoda was pushed over at the roots by the puppet. The moment before the pagoda collapsed, countless infant wraiths and grievances surged out from within. Xu Qing's Qi-Observing Technique swept over them roughly; there were at least a hundred infants trapped inside.

Xu Qing ignored the infant ghost shadows that were crashing around and wailing everywhere; he ordered the puppet to move all the earthen jars containing the dead fetuses in front of him.

Inside those jars that had shattered due to the pagoda's collapse, there were many corpses mixed with flowing blood.

The puppet spread its hands, carefully cupping those tiny, misshapen corpses, and placed them in front of the ruins.

Not far away, the old nun who had stumbled over was crying and cursing. The black crow circling high in the sky could not stand her clamor and swooped down, constantly pecking at her skull.

Her monk's hat was knocked off, and the old nun, in pain, covered her bald head and rolled on the ground, screaming.

Xu Qing ignored the noisy and chaotic movements around him. Amidst the wailing of the infants, he walked slowly toward the ruins.

In those ruins, an exceptionally shrill infant cry resounded through the dark night.

As Xu Qing walked toward the ruins, the puppet, which shared his mind, had already pried open the broken rubble and pulled out an infant with purple-blue skin.

Seeing the puppet, the infant suddenly stopped crying, and then it grinned, revealing a cunning smile at the puppet before it.

At the edge of the ruins, Xu Qing saw the infant stretch out two cold little hands and place them on the puppet's neck.

Seeing that it had succeeded, the infant giggled with delight.

Xu Qing, however, had a strange expression; this infant didn't seem very bright. You just pinched a lump of iron—what is there to be happy about?

The puppet remained unmoved, but where the infant's little hands touched the puppet, a depression a finger deep appeared, and spiderweb-like frost condensed, spreading bit by bit to the puppet's cheeks.

Here, Xu Qing frowned slightly, and the next moment, the puppet in the field suddenly raised a steel arm and slapped the infant it was holding in its arms!

This slap landed solidly.

The infant was stunned for a moment, then glared with rage. Its dark purple corners of the mouth split open, and sharp, jagged teeth suddenly bit into the puppet's arm.

Sparks flew; the puppet's steel-cast arm gained a tooth mark, while the corpse-infant in its arms lost a few sharp teeth because of it.

Xu Qing felt a fire in his heart, so he controlled the puppet again to slap the infant's face left and right.

In the distance, the old nun, whose head was pecked bloody by the black crow, let out a scream.

"My child! Don't you dare hit my child!"

Pitiful people must have hateful aspects. Xu Qing glanced sideways; the old nun, who hated him to the bone in the distance, was now kneeling on the ground, kowtowing to him frantically and begging for mercy.

Xu Qing remained unmoved. He looked back at the ruins, letting the puppet educate the child for the old nun.

After about a dozen breaths, the corpse-infant's aura grew weaker and weaker. It was at this moment that an iron coffin suddenly broke through the ground beneath the ruins of the Infant-Locking Pagoda and flew out from the rubble.

Xu Qing was amused at the sight. He had been beating the child for so long—wasn't it just to lure out its dead-ghost father!

The moment the iron coffin was unearthed, dust swirled in the ruins, and a crack appeared in the heavy coffin lid. A white ball of light flew out from within, darting straight toward the corpse-infant.

Xu Qing reacted quickly. The instant the white ball of light flew over, he controlled the puppet to toss the corpse-infant over.

The ball of light followed closely behind, but when it saw Xu Qing, it suddenly stopped its momentum, then turned back the way it came and submerged into the coffin.

From within the iron coffin, a man's voice emerged.

"Blocking someone's path is like killing their parents. Fellow Daoist, you and I are both people of cultivation; why bother making things difficult for each other?"

"Today's matter might as well end here. I can let the matter of the pagoda being pushed over slide, but Fellow Daoist needs to return that infant to me."

Xu Qing looked at the upright iron coffin and realized with a start: "So this corpse-infant is your vessel for soul-borrowing and resurrection. You used these people to induce labor and kill infants just to let this corpse-infant grow, so you could seize the body and cultivate again."

The voice in the iron coffin was silent for a moment, then said: "Since Fellow Daoist already knows this, you should understand how important this infant is to me. If Fellow Daoist insists on being an enemy..."

Xu Qing chuckled, and without waiting for the other party to finish speaking, he pinched a spark of Yin-Burning Fire right in front of the iron coffin.

Yin-evil things are the favorite fuel for Yin-Burning Fire; the heavier the Yin energy of an object, the fiercer it usually burns when ignited.

The iron coffin felt the threat and immediately shouted to stop in a panic.

"Wait! Fellow Daoist, do not act! If there are conditions, we can discuss them properly!"

Xu Qing suddenly put away the Yin-Burning Fire spark, but it was not because of what the other party said, but because he felt the fluctuation of the *Scripture of Salvation*.

He had almost forgotten that the corpse-infant in his hand was also a corpse.

Putting away the Yin-Burning Fire, Xu Qing instead took out the Sinan Sword and, in front of the iron coffin, pressed the sword tip against the corpse-infant's heart.

"What exactly does Fellow Daoist want me to do to stop?"

Xu Qing suddenly raised his head and looked straight at the iron coffin.

"When you instigated the monks and nuns of the Child-Sending Temple to harm those women and infants, did you ever ask them what they had to do for you to stop?"

As he spoke, the Sinan Sword in Xu Qing's hand had already pierced through the corpse-infant's body.

Dark purple infant blood sprayed out. A mournful cry came from afar; the temple keeper, seeing this scene, had already fainted.

At this time, a roar came from the iron coffin, and the heavy iron coffin lid suddenly popped out, smashing toward Xu Qing, who was killing the infant.

The iron coffin lid weighed over a thousand catties. If it were an ordinary person, they would likely be grazed and injured or hit and killed; who would dare to take it head-on?

But was Xu Qing an ordinary person? Seeing the coffin lid flying over, Xu Qing did not dodge or evade; he raised his foot and gave it a kick.

A loud "Clang!" comparable to a bell ringing echoed, and an iron pit four fingers deep appeared in the middle of the coffin lid.

Then the iron coffin lid, like a tattered sack, shot toward the pitch-black iron coffin with a momentum even more rapid than when it came.

From within the iron coffin, a corpse dressed in divine robes and a divine hat, looking like a shaman, walked out.

The corpse kept its eyes closed, and although the exposed skin on its face was shriveled, it shone with a metallic luster, as if it were a piece of copper that had just been polished.

The instant the iron coffin lid flew over, the dried corpse quickly dodged to the side, and then it kicked the ground with both feet, like an iron pellet out of a chamber, instantly appearing in front of Xu Qing.

The dried corpse's fist, shriveled to the point where clear bone joints and veins could be seen, smashed down at him fiercely. Xu Qing saw this and remained unhurried; he lowered his body, raised his fist, which was fitted with diamond finger knuckles, and met it.

A crisp "Crack!" sounded.

The dried corpse's fist, comparable to copper and iron, actually cracked with several patterns like porcelain.

Xu Qing felt the numbing vibration coming from his fist and was also somewhat surprised in his heart.

This was the first time he had encountered an opponent with such a tough physical body.

Just this physical strength was at least comparable to the level of an Iron-Armored Corpse, or even a notch higher.

What kind of corpse was this? A Copper-Armored Corpse?

Xu Qing was puzzled. If you called it a zombie, it didn't have much corpse Qi on it, but rather a strong medicinal fragrance; if you said it wasn't a zombie, it was clearly not a living person either.

The dried corpse was equally shocked. Its physical body was concocted using secret methods; ordinary people, let alone resisting, might not even be able to break its defense even if they picked up a precious sword that could cut iron like mud.

"Are you a Grandmaster-level hard-body martial artist?"

Seeing the finger knuckles Xu Qing was wearing, the dried corpse appeared quite wary.

Xu Qing's peripheral vision caught sight of the black cat that had appeared behind the dried corpse at some point. His expression softened, and he actually started chatting with the dried corpse.

"I am no crude martial artist; I am just a corpse-driver. I am not good at fighting people, I am only good at dealing with corpses."

"Collecting corpses, digging up corpses, burying corpses—that's my old trade."

"Oh, right, I almost forgot to tell you, I am also the part-time Sect Leader of the Cat Immortal Hall. This trip was specifically to eradicate this illicit temple and cult, so that the prestige of my Meow Meow Sect can spread throughout Jinmen."

Xu Qing's words left the dried corpse's head in a daze. It could not connect the young man in the bright red wedding dress before it with a corpse-driver or the Cat Immortal Hall; these things didn't fit together at all!

"Corpse-driver, Meow Meow Sect..."

During the dried corpse's silence, the black crow in the sky was not idle either. It nervously watched Xuanyu, who was sneaking toward the dried corpse like a cat, and kept making "caw-caw" noises, trying to cover the other party's senses.

At a certain moment, black light suddenly erupted from the ruins. Xuanyu, who was a zhang away behind the dried corpse, suddenly pounced out. The cat-claw phantom that slashed through the air broke the stalemate. The shriveled zombie tried to turn its head and block with its arm, but the black light had already stuck to its body a step ahead.

Black mist carried demonic Qi. The dried corpse could not dodge in time, and several wounds two fingers deep immediately appeared on its neck.

It was only because it was not a living person; if it were an ordinary person, this single strike would have meant certain death.

By the time the dried corpse came to its senses, the black cat that had launched the sneak attack had already retreated ten steps away.

At the same time, a sound of breaking air came from the side of the dried corpse.

It was Xu Qing, who had quickly stuck close while Xuanyu attracted the dried corpse's attention.

Earlier, when the dried corpse flew out of the coffin, it had punched him; now, the roles of attacker and defender had reversed.

The power erupted by the Silver-Armored Corpse was exceptionally fierce. The moment Xu Qing's fist edge touched the dried corpse's head, half of the other party's head was shattered into fragments.

"You cannot kill me! I have long been a dead person! As long as my soul remains, I will not die!"

"Dead person? You say you are a dead person?"

Xu Qing arrived close to the dried corpse, staring at the other party with great interest.

"If you want to put it that way, then I won't be polite."

A white, untouchable light detached from the dried corpse's body. Xu Qing's eyes were sharp and his hands fast; he reached out and pressed against the dried corpse's body.

The *Scripture of Salvation* flipped rapidly, and scriptural verses appeared in the minds of the dried corpse and Xu Qing.

The white light that had just prepared to detach from the dried corpse seemed to be subjected to some irresistible force and flowed back rapidly, shrinking back into the dried corpse's body in just a moment.

"You..."

The dried corpse's tightly closed eyes suddenly opened; the eyeballs, in a half-wet, half-dry state, were exceptionally terrifying.

However, it only said that one word before it completely lost all movement.

Just like a living person suddenly turning into a clay sculpture, its life was frozen at this moment.

The *Scripture of Salvation* flipped rapidly, and Xu Qing looked at the dried corpse's "revolving lantern" of memories.

This corpse was not ordinary; its life alone could be traced back more than four hundred years.

The corpse was originally a shaman from Mount Taodou in the Shu region, having cultivated for over three hundred years, and its own Daoist practice had already reached the bottleneck of five hundred years.

To resist the disasters on the path of cultivation, the Great Shaman began to prepare for avoiding the disasters.

Why avoid instead of resist? Because this Great Shaman knew its own supernatural powers were insufficient, and it had created too many grievances previously; without Yin-virtue to protect it, once the heavenly thunder descended, it would surely face ten deaths and no life.

To deceive the heavens, the Great Shaman came to Jinmen, found the Yin Corpse Sect, and exchanged a great price for the method of raising and refining medicinal corpses.

A medicinal corpse is a corpse made by having a person take various decoctions and elixirs concocted with secret methods while they are still alive.

During this period, the person taking the medicine must not eat or drink a single drop of water or grain; the longer they survive, the higher the grade of the medicinal corpse.

Some corpses that do not rot for a thousand years are medicinal corpses raised by this method, but most of these corpses only lasted until the primary medicinal stage—that is, they only survived for forty-nine days while in the state of taking medicine.

And this medicinal corpse that Xu Qing was saving had actually survived for a full five years before dying!

But this was not the Great Shaman's limit; the reason it took the initiative to stop breathing and die after five years was because the heavenly tribulation was approaching, and it had no choice but to end its own life prematurely.

Living people say that when a person dies, the debt is cleared; the heavenly tribulation is the same.

After the Great Shaman's body died, the disaster naturally dissipated.

However, this Great Shaman had kept a trick up its sleeve, which was that its own soul had not dissipated.

From that time on, the Great Shaman possessed the medicinal corpse and began searching for a way to "reincarnate and be reborn."

Although the medicinal corpse did not rot or decay, its body structure had been completely destroyed by the medicine; the Great Shaman's soul could not use the physical body to continue cultivating and strengthening itself. If this continued, it would only have one outcome: death and the Dao dissipating.

To obtain a body that was perfectly compatible with itself, the Great Shaman claimed to be a deity descended to earth, deceiving and bewitching the young nuns of the Hongxing Nunnery to have intercourse with it and bear children.

Intercourse between ghosts and humans can produce ghost infants. The Great Shaman's physical body had been damaged by medicine; if it wanted to find a body perfectly compatible with its own soul, it could only use its divine soul to have intercourse with the nun.

Solitary Yang does not grow; solitary Yin does not flourish.

The divine soul is a Yin-attribute object, and the nun is a body of Yin-essence; neither had a trace of Yang energy to generate, so how could the infant grow?

After giving birth to the ghost infant, the shaman began to bewitch the nun. It first made the nun report the promiscuity of the Hongxing Nunnery in the noble mansions; when the government investigated, it made the other party act as a good person and bring the nuns from the nunnery to Xijing Mountain, using the Child-Sending Temple to cover their identities.

After that, the "Saving Infant Mother" appeared, wanting to use living infants to resurrect its own child.

But the old nun of the Child-Sending Temple did not know that the shaman was not doing this to resurrect their child, but to create a container suitable for its divine soul to transplant into—that was all.

The revolving lantern reached the end, and the *Scripture of Salvation* gave a reward.

A Heavenly-grade low-tier "Heaven-Deceiving Technique," a Earth-grade high-tier "Yin-Eye Method," and a Human-grade high-tier "Medicinal Corpse Method."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 127 =====