Chapter 163: Greeting

Squish!

With just one blow, the three Heaven-Man Gu soldiers, along with the centipede, were smashed into a lump by Li Miao.

They were intertwined, bones and flesh mixed, blood and meat blended.

The Vajra Gu soldier caught in the middle already had all its ribs smashed, its entire upper body only a foot wide, with the rest of its parts all smashed into its chest cavity.

No matter how tenacious a Gu soldier's vitality was, it could not survive such injuries. Its head already hung limply on its shoulder, no longer moving.

Within this lump of flesh, the centipede was still twisting its body, hissing, trying to get close to Li Miao.

And the two Gu soldiers Li Miao had swung over also extended their arms in unison to lock onto Li Miao's joints, exerting force and twisting, trying to break Li Miao's arms.

Li Miao remained unmoved, only watching their futile struggle, his hands continuously exerting force.

And so, these few things were squeezed tighter and tighter.

Creak.

Creak.

Creak.

The bones let out a mournful sound.

Snap.

The sound of internal organs rupturing.

Crack.

The spine of the Gu soldier on the right let out a crisp sound; its lower body suddenly stopped moving, leaving only the upper body hanging on Li Miao's arm, still twisting continuously.

Clatter—

The abdominal cavity of the Gu soldier on the left burst open, blood spraying.

Li Miao remained expressionless, continuing to squeeze.

Until the spines of the three Gu soldiers were gripped together by his hands.

The three pale heads all lost movement, hanging limply. As the centipede twisted, they swayed on the shoulders.

Li Miao let go.

The already unrecognizable flesh and blood fell to the ground.

The centipede had originally been clamped by the Gu soldier's ribs; now that Li Miao had let go, those few ribs also scattered, and it finally gained its freedom.

Swish!

Without a moment's pause, the centipede sprang up from the ground, pouncing toward Li Miao's face again.

Slap!

Li Miao slapped the centipede, directly smashing it into a lump of filthy blood on the wall.

"Tsk, good thing I wore gloves in advance."

Li Miao clicked his tongue, wiped his hand twice on the wall to rub off the filth, and only then turned to continue forward.

The firefly Gu insects left by the old man to lead the way had long since been shaken to death by the aftermath of the battle, but fortunately, Li Miao only needed to follow the path the Gu soldiers had come from, no longer needing a guide.

And along this path, the Miao King sent out various Gu beasts, Gu soldiers, and Gu insects one after another to block Li Miao.

But no more Heaven-Man level things appeared. It seemed those few Heaven-Man Gu soldiers were the Miao King's trump card.

In fact, it made sense.

Killing moves are best used at two moments: either the first move upon meeting, or the final move to decide life and death.

Heaven-Man experts had not appeared in the world for a long time; for the Ming Sect and the Miao King to pull out four Heaven-Man Gu soldiers was already quite difficult. And the greatest advantage of this thing was surprise, so the Miao King did not hide her cards, but sent out her trump card in the first wave, attempting to achieve victory in one battle.

It was just that she still underestimated Li Miao.

Killing all the way, walking all the way, Li Miao couldn't even count how many things he had killed.

Often, just as a limb was revealed, Li Miao would strike directly with a Great Nine Heavens Palm, beating it into a puddle of minced meat, leaving no time to see its true form.

By now, the soles of Li Miao's boots were already soaked with blood, leaving a trail of bloody footprints on the ground.

He walked to the end of the passage.

Before him was an ancient stone door, opening on both sides, carved with various patterns, with insects being the most numerous. There were also many figures with narrative significance; Li Miao took a look, and most were content like blood sacrifices.

Li Miao had no intention of being polite and kicked the stone door directly.

Boom!!!

The stone door, a full foot thick, collapsed with a crash, and the ground shook.

Li Miao stepped over the stone door, stood still, and looked around.

This was an extremely spacious hall, a full hundred zhang square. Smooth bluestone slabs were embedded in the stone walls, the gaps between them faintly black, emitting a faint, fishy stench.

In this hall, the center was a circular platform, with four ridges extending in four directions, dividing the hall into four square areas.

The area to the front left was piled with countless bones, both human and animal. Hair matted into felt, skin and flesh rotted into mud and dust. Human tendons were wrapped around human bones, dry and scorched, shining like silver. It was truly a mountain of corpses and a sea of blood, indeed fishy and foul-smelling.

To the front right was a flat area, neatly stacked with hundreds of huge jars. The jars were covered with wooden boards, and a hole was opened on each board, with a skull sticking out.

The black hair had already rotted away with the skin and flesh, piled on the wooden boards.

"Pupa Girl."

Li Miao frowned.

This was one of the processes for making Pupa Girls.

These hundreds of jars each contained the skeleton of a young girl.

They were all Pupa Girl candidates who had failed to endure the torture of the Gu insects and died before entering the Miao King's tomb.

But the reason Li Miao frowned was not just because of these departed girls, but because these jars reminded him of Xiao Si.

When he rescued Xiao Si back then, she was also trapped in such a jar, bitten by the Gu insects inside, exactly the same as these girls. It seemed that the Great Shaman back then, when refining human Gu, had also referred to the methods of refining Pupa Girls.

Li Miao continued to look at the other two areas.

One was a huge pool, from which rustling sounds constantly came; it should be the place where Gu insects were stored.

One was a narrow cage, inside which countless pale arms were extended, waving wildly; they should all be Gu soldiers.

Finally, Li Miao looked at the platform in the center of the hall.

There, a woman was standing, expressionless, looking coldly at Li Miao.

Her face could be called stunningly beautiful, skin as white as congealed fat, nose like an orchid, cheeks like peaches, eyes like autumn water, and a heroic spirit in her cheeks. Unfortunately, the murderous aura in her eyes was too heavy, making this appearance seem somewhat fierce, like a female ghost.

She wore a worn-out Miao man's outfit on her upper body, equipped with silver crowns, silver jewelry, silver necklaces, shawls, necklaces, and hairpins, with a long pleated skirt made of blue homespun cloth on her lower body, covered by twenty-four red-bottomed ribbons embroidered with patterns of flowers, birds, insects, fish, clams, frogs, dragons, and phoenixes.

She wore no shoes, her snow-white feet bare.

Clearly a woman, yet she wore men's clothing and women's ornaments, appearing incongruous.

Most conspicuous were the countless snakes and insects wrapped around and crawling on her body; at this moment, they all lifted their heads, looking at Li Miao together, hissing.

"Miao King?"

Li Miao spoke.

"Lord Li."

The woman said.

"It's good that it's you."

Swish!

Her clothes fluttered, and with a flash, Li Miao had already closed in on the Miao King.

"One Saber"!

Now was not the time to tease Zuo Lishan; Li Miao had no mood to play around with the Miao King.

Li Miao was also feeling a bit tired of these Gu and insects.

He had left the capital to see the Jianghu, but for several months, he had been dealing with bugs. At first, it was a bit fresh, but by now, he was truly a bit weary. It just so happened that the Ming Sect was inextricably entangled with witchcraft, forcing him to deal with this stuff all day long.

The people of the Twelve Sect Branches had been beaten into submission by him; now, the only remaining uncertain factors were the Ming Sect and this Miao King.

If he could end these things here, Li Miao would be more than happy.

The first move upon meeting, he would kill this Miao King!

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 164 =====