Chapter 56

The sixth of the third month, five days until the prefectural examination for students.

Xu Qing ignored everything outside his windows, wielding an iron shovel and hoe, digging holes in the courtyard incessantly.

If a zombie relies solely on swallowing moonlight and yin qi to cultivate, the speed of transformation is very slow. Therefore, zombies often consume raw flesh and blood, killing living beings to improve their cultivation by seizing the vitality of the living.

Xu Qing had no great interest in finding human flesh, because that was too easy to cause trouble, and it was also immoral.

After all, who could guarantee that while foraging, one wouldn't encounter a master who subdues demons and defends the Dao?

After thinking it over, only by following the vegetarian methods in the Corpse-Raising Classic and finding various materials to speed up the cultivation progress was the safest path.

This is no different from practitioners collecting precious materials and refining elixirs to increase their cultivation.

Among the key yin items needed to raise and refine a Silver-Armored Wandering Corpse, Xu Qing had already found the highest quality Yin Spirit Jade, as well as the Old Cat Sha refined through special methods—this was something he had extracted from the Cat-Faced Zombie. The only missing yin item now was the three-foot Ghost-Face Soil from a grave mound.

The so-called Ghost-Face Soil is the layer of soil that looks like a ghost's face when digging three feet down from a grave mound; that layer of yin soil is the required Ghost-Face Soil.

Such yin items are often spawned in places where yin sha qi is dense, most commonly in mass graves and mausoleums.

Xu Qing was unwilling to search in such places. If he met a fellow zombie, it would be fine; he might even be able to chat in zombie language.

But if he met other underworld things, it wouldn't be so fun.

A gentleman does not stand under a dangerous wall; Xu Qing considered that his strength had not yet reached the point of roaming freely outside the novice village.

Based on the principle of doing it yourself to have plenty of food and clothing, since there was no Ghost-Face Soil, he would cultivate it himself!

Although there were no grave mounds in Xu Qing's residence, beneath the flat ground lay the corpses of people from all walks of life, quietly lying there absorbing the yin sha of the haunted house.

Xu Qing dug them up one by one to inspect them, and if he encountered bones that hadn't spawned Ghost-Face Soil, he would bury them again.

When the sky was bright, Xu Qing, who had almost plowed the land in the courtyard, finally stopped.

At this time, the ash bag he used to hold dust already contained a bag and a half of Ghost-Face Soil.

Xu Qing put away his farm tools and looked at the brand-new land, feeling incredibly fulfilled.

Days like this, collecting corpses, planting corpses, and tilling the fields, were the life he yearned for.

For the next few days, besides tending the shop at the mortuary and waiting for business during the day, Xu Qing would return to his residence at night to "pad the nest" and prepare for all matters concerning the evolution of the Silver-Armored Wandering Corpse.

Whether it is bears, wolves, dogs, cats, mice, or rabbits, when they are about to give birth, they will go out to find various dry grasses and velvet grasses to carry into their dens. Animals like rabbits will even use their mouths to bite off tufts of their own fur to pad the nest and keep their upcoming young warm.

Xu Qing would naturally not be like these wild beasts, pulling out his own zombie hair to pad his nest; he didn't produce young.

The reason he had to make these preparations was that last time he evolved into an Iron-Armored Corpse, he spent seven days and nights in the coffin before coming out.

Now that he was raising and refining into a Silver-Armored Corpse, who knew how many days it would take to successfully form a cocoon?

Therefore, padding the nest in advance and making defensive preparations before seclusion became his most pressing concern.

The traps in the feng shui treasure house were doubled, and under the bed in the bedroom, Xu Qing dug a coffin pit; that was where he would seclude himself for cultivation.

Above the bed, he also had a puppet he had simply refined as a decoy.

The only thing missing now was the right timing.

After these days in Linhe, Xu Qing was no longer the wild zombie who was unfamiliar with the place. If he disappeared for no reason, not to mention the neighbors on the funeral street, even Wang Ling, who worked in the government office, would be worried sick looking for him.

Old Wang was still waiting for his junior fellow apprentice to provide for his old age and bury him. To Wang Ling, even if the current Emperor had dementia one day and got lost, unable to find his way back to the palace, it wouldn't compare to a single hair of his junior fellow apprentice going missing!

"So troublesome. It seems I can only wait until the prefectural examination is over, then make up an excuse about going out to study, and secretly return halfway to seclude myself and break through..."

After making up his mind, Xu Qing resumed his usual routine, locked the gate of his residence, and returned to the shop to continue managing the funeral business.

Three days before the prefectural examination, the government office, which had cut off supply for half a month, finally resumed business relations with the mortuary shop.

This time, they sent two unclaimed male corpses.

However, what surprised Xu Qing was that among the people who sent the corpses, there was actually the figure of Senior Fellow Apprentice Wang.

Avoiding the government office runners, Wang Ling pulled Xu Qing to the counter and lowered his voice: "Junior fellow apprentice, Secretary Tang is offering one hundred silver taels for these two corpses..."

"One hundred taels? Why doesn't he go rob someone?"

Wang Ling shushed him: "Junior fellow apprentice, don't be anxious. It's not that he wants money from you, but that the Secretary is giving you silver. But the premise is that you can handle these two corpses. If you cannot, I will naturally take them away and let the Secretary hire someone else."

Xu Qing heard the subtext and frowned: "Is there a problem with these two corpses?"

Wang Ling nodded and explained: "Two months ago, the government office received a corpse. That corpse was a painter in his lifetime. When the mortuary worker was guarding the corpse, he accidentally discovered that every night, this corpse would rise to seek ink and paper to paint. Matters like this are generally handled by the Demon-Hunting Division, but the painter had some fame in his lifetime, and the things he painted could all be sold for high prices..."

"Could it be that the Secretary wants to earn money from the dead, didn't report it to the Demon-Hunting Division, and instead let this corpse paint for him for profit?"

Hearing this, Xu Qing immediately had a guess.

"That's how it is." Wang Ling sighed: "Secretary Tang is just too greedy. In order to let the corpse paint and sell for money, he colluded with the mortuary worker in private and kept the painter in the morgue."

"A free painter who doesn't need to eat or be paid—isn't that a good thing for the Secretary? Why spend money to handle this corpse?"

"How is it a good thing? If it were really that cheap, I wouldn't have come to Linhe!" Wang Ling said helplessly: "On the third day after Secretary Tang kept the painter, the mortuary worker died in the morgue. Guess how he died?"

Xu Qing's eyes were dim; his senior fellow apprentice was good at everything, but he couldn't break the habit of leaving people in suspense.

He didn't know if it was because he went to teahouses too often and was corrupted by those storytellers.

"How could I guess that? Senior fellow apprentice, just continue."

Wang Ling stroked his beard and smiled. In the past, his junior fellow apprentice could guess everything, but now he had managed to turn the tables.

"That mortuary worker was skinned alive, and a painting of a steed was drawn on his skin!"

"If it weren't for this incident, I wouldn't have been recruited to be a mortuary worker."

Xu Qing looked at the two corpses tied up like zongzi on the table, pointed to the other one, and asked: "What about him? What's the story with this corpse?"

"This one I brought along the way; no charge. I'll just send it to you together."

Hearing this, Xu Qing beamed. They say it's easy to get things done when you have people in the government office; now he was finally enjoying this convenience!

However, before he could be happy for long, he heard Wang Ling continue:

"This person was a porter in his lifetime. He died after being hit in the back of the head by a heavy object while carrying goods. No one knows where he is from; perhaps he was a refugee who flooded into the square a few days ago.

This person doesn't have much of a problem, except that he occasionally rises at night and carries the corpses in the morgue outside."

"It's fortunate that I followed Master Liu for a while and have seen more, otherwise I would have been scared sick!"

After hearing Wang Ling's words, Xu Qing didn't feel it was tricky. Corpse-drivers often encounter such things as corpses rising or faking death, and these types of corpses are the easiest materials to refine into walking corpses.

(End of chapter)