Chapter 89 – Florida Man Pays His Employee's Wage with Cooked Wasps
50 kilometers north of the mysterious pyramid, five portals brought 50 cultivators to the same world as Leo. Yan Xiang led nine imperial bodyguards with him and formed one team. Tang Xuan brought nine people from the Tang Clan while his son, Tang Ting, led the elders and disciples from the Sixth Element Sect. As for the other two teams, they belonged to the first prince and the second prince, who came with their close aides.
Yan Xiang looked at everybody. When he noticed that the portals of the Tang Clan and the Sixth Element Sect were nearby, he let out a long sigh of relief.
"I'm glad you're here with me, Chancellor."
Tang Xuan was slightly taken aback as he had expected to be separated from the imperial family. Unfortunately, he got stuck with the emperor again.
"I guess this is fate," Tang Xuan humbly bowed.
"Well, the bigger the crowd, the better," Yan Xiang laughed and looked at the juniors of the Tang Clan and the disciples of the Sixth Element Sect. He ignored the subordinates of his two sons as he didn't think highly of them.
The emperor swept his eyes through the golden core and foundation establishment cultivators for a moment before his gaze stopped at a certain disciple of Tang Tian. He looked at the master.
Despite being 800 years old, Tang Tian looked like he was in his early 20s. His pale delicate skin was spotless and smooth as if he was a young maiden. His beautiful face and silky long hair could make any adult man gay as he was too attractive to be a man. Had anybody looked at Tang Tian from behind, they would have always mistaken him for a lady.
Fortunately, Tang Tian was not a member of the LGBT. He was a man through and thorough, but his face and appearance came from the exceptional genes of Tang Xuan and Tang Tian's personal Dao. For the sake of making himself more masculine, he tied his hair into a ponytail and wore green dragon plate armor. His wooden fox mask also covered his face, and nobody could see his true appearance.
Yan Xiang had keen eyes. He saw through the mask, but he immediately disabled his x-ray vision ability when he saw Tang Tian. He coughed to hide his embarrassment.
"Ahem. Tang Tian, I see that you have found exceptional talented disciples yet again."
Tang Tian saluted, "We were just lucky to have your support. Without the imperial family, our sect and our clan wouldn't have been this prosperous. More good men join us because of your prestige, your majesty."
"Stop with the flattery. Anyway…" Yan Xiang got to the point as he had an eye on somebody among the Sixth Element Sect's disciples. He pointed his finger at one of the young men.
It was Jin Yong, whose cultivation base was the highest among the disciple group. In addition, his poison element Qi was the thickest among the disciples.
"What's his name?"
"Oh, him?" Tang Tian narrowed his eyes as he didn't want to let the emperor poach his trophy. "He's Jin Yong, my core disciple."
"Ohoh? Core disciple?"
Yan Xiang sneered as he had already predicted it. Still, he was amused, "Are you sure he's not an illegitimate child of the Tang Clan? How come his poison element Qi is so thick? I think he must have already attained poison element essence."
"You jest, your majesty. If a golden core cultivator managed to condense any element essence, he would have been heaven's chosen child. That type of genius can only exist in 10,000 years."
Yan Xiang scoffed as he had already seen through why Tang Tian avoided praising the disciple. As a quasi-immortal, he could see things that regular mortals couldn't see. Moreover, he also believed that a soul transformation cultivator like Tang Tian should have already noticed Jin Yong's talent.
Floating behind Jin Yong was a Dao Spirit, aka an incomplete dao avatar. Normally, only nascent soul cultivators or soul formation cultivators had them as they were related to Dao, yet Jin Yong got one when he was only a golden core cultivator.
This was proof of Jin Yong's talent. Yan Xiang couldn't help but want this young man to work for him.
"Ah, shame. Indeed. What a shame."
Yan Xiang lamented. He wished that he could find Jin Yong earlier than Tang Tian. That man would have been a fine asset to his imperial assassination squad or agent.
After a brief chat, Yan Xiang didn't continue bothering the Tang Clan and their people. He took flight and scanned the realm. The nine bodyguards also followed the emperor. As for the two princes, they detached from the group, heading west and east respectively.
Yan Xiang looked around him for a long time before he made his decision. He pointed at the pyramid in the south and ordered his bodyguards.
"We'll explore that structure and search for treasures. Cultivation and Qi gathering can be done later. We must secure whatever treasures in that thing before the others take them!"
After delivering his order, his unit rushed south.
Meanwhile, the Tang Clan and the Sixth Element Sect's people remained at the starting place. They scanned the area to secure their exit portals. Then, they began setting up their camps and barricades to ward off beasts.
Weak disciples could do nothing to contribute. They sat on the ground and started cultivating wood Qi and earth Qi in the air. Even Jin Yong got stuck there as the dense Qi of this world suppressed his movements.
The elders of the Tang Clan and the sect were the only ones moving. As they had numbers, they erected tents and cut down strange trees in a flash. An hour later, their camp and tents were operational.
Tang Tian and Tang Xuan's subordinates took their time. They began collecting plants, fruits, tree leaves, and herbs from the jungle. Then, they offered them to Tang Tian to appraise them.
Tang Tian inspected the palm leaves, aloe, moss, and raw coconuts. Then, he started marking them if they were usable. As for Tang Xuan, he explored the camp and made sure that they were secured enough. When he was certain that their defensive arrays were firm and active, he vanished from the camp.
WHOOSH
Tang Xuan traveled 500 meters south. He directly appeared in front of a cockatrice horde.
In front of Tang Xuan, 20 cockatrices minded their businesses, pecking and eating a dead caiman. Strangely, small yellowish mushrooms pierced out from its scales, and the dead monster seemed to bloat.
Tang Xuan narrowed his eyes. He had a feeling that he had seen the mushrooms somewhere before, but he couldn't remember. As he came here to remove the monsters, he stopped thinking and got to work.
A green dao spirit emerged from the ground. It had the appearance of his younger self, but it had green skin. In addition, poisonous green gas emanated from its body.
"SQUAK?"
"POKOK?"
The cockatrices looked at the green spirits in confusion. Because of their reflex, their eyes shone as they tried to petrify the floating humanoid mist.
POOF
The dao spirit exploded, but the green mist expanded. The cockatrices inhaled them, but none of them reacted.
Meanwhile, Tang Xuan took several steps back and hid under a bush. Even though he was a quasi-immortal, he didn't let his guard down around a pack of 7th-stage monsters.
These guys had the same strength as him! Fighting them in the open was suicide.
The cockatrices ignored the gas and returned their attention to their prey. They continued enjoying their little buffet.
An hour later, they finished eating. The caiman was left with nothing but white bones. Even its monster core was eaten.
Tang Xuan continued to observe the chickens. As he noticed that the group had just finished eating a 9th-stage monster's carcass and its monster core, he let out a sigh of pity.
'What a waste. That's a precious 9th-rank monster core. I could have used that to make longevity pills. Well, it doesn't matter. One of them swallowed it whole. I can just cut open its stomach and get my hands on it.'
After coming up with a solution, Tang Xuan waited for his poison to work.
Five hours later, the chickens started flapping their wings while their heads twitched. Some of them had a seizure while a few rammed their heads against trees.
Tang Xuan frowned. He remembered that his poison dao spirit could only disable one's blood from reaching the brain. However, it didn't have this effect.
"POKOK!"
"SQUAK!!"
The next moment, they started fighting each other. One of them bit the neck of their comrade and tore the latter's flesh.
"Hmm!?"
Something wasn't right with these cockatrices. This symptom reminded him of a nightmarish incident of the ancient past 500 years ago.
Tang Xuan sensed a chill running down his spine as the old memory finally resurfaced. The flashback events when he and Situ Nantian fended off hordes of cultivator zombies and humanoid monsters came back to haunt him.
'The mushroom… SWEET DREAM MUSHROOM?!'
Tang Xuan finally remembered that the cockatrices ate the mushrooms on the caiman's mutated corpse. He connected the dots, and he was horrified.
"SHIT!!"
The chancellor kicked the ground and returned to the campsite. As soon as he returned, he ordered everybody.
"RETREAT! THIS REALM HAS SWEET DREAM MUSHROOMS! WE MUSTN'T LINGER OUR STAY!!"
.
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The Tang Clan's group was lucky as their portal was opened outside of the mushroom's influence. On the other hand, some sects didn't have that luxury.
Situ Nantian and his Situ Clan controlled two portals. Aside from Situ Nantian, 20 people from their city and clan entered the green realm. However, their portals didn't appear near each other.
Their clan's portal was located on top of a straight mountain, 2,000 meters above sea level. As for the other, it was opened directly on top of the pyramid building.
The cultivators from the pyramid portal were stunned when they found their portals floating high in the sky. They brought out their flying swords to stand on and save their internal Qi.
Everybody looked down. Then, they noticed that the pyramid was covered by yellowish mushrooms. At the foot of the pyramid, all trees were replaced by tall mushrooms of various sizes, and they didn't belong in this Amazon-like jungle and this climate.
Nobody noticed the militated and compressed objects that had fallen on the ground in front of the pyramid entrance. Among them, a distorted and broken spatial ring of a former mountain bandit became one with the mushrooms while its ejected content was hidden under the sea of fungi.
The Situ's clansmen and elders were under 500 years old, and they had never seen the mushrooms. They soon descended to inspect the new specimen. It only took them less than five minutes - they inhaled THEM.
.
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While some people had a mushroom party, Leo carried 20 mutated corpses of giant wasps back to his base. He calmly dropped them on a cleared plain in front of the camp.
Wu Buyi sweated profusely when he noticed the monsters. As they hadn't been butchered yet, he managed to evaluate their strength by injecting his Qi into their monster cores.
Leo ordered Wu Buyi, "Do me a favor. Throw these guys into the portal for me. I'm gonna eat them later."
"…Are you gonna eat those?!"
Wu Buyi couldn't believe his ears, but his face remained expressionless. He started to get used to Leo's weirdness.
Leo didn't hang around or respond to Wu Buyi. He vanished into the forest. A few seconds later, he returned with more giant wasps.
"…"
Wu Buyi silently stared at the pile of wasps. Those were 7th-stage monsters, and their strength was comparable to a quasi-immortal. However, Leo took care of them without leaving a wound.
As Wu Buyi couldn't think straight, he let his body act on its own. Like a robot, he collected all corpses into his spatial ring and pointed the ring at the portal. Then, he commanded the ring to eject the wasps.
He was efficient. The wasps crossed the portal to the other side.
Unfortunately, Wu Buyi's hard work was underappreciated. When he finished sending 40 wasps to the other side, Leo already piled 40 more on the ground, and the latter didn't stop teleporting.
Wu Buyi turned around and scratched his head. He had a feeling that Leo pranked him.
"Can't he just use his spatial ring to collect everything? This is harassment!"
Again, Wu Buyi collected the wasps and threw them into the portal. However, this time, he kept one in his ring. Secretly, he used his Qi to cut a piece of their leg and brought it out.
Inspired by the Florida Man, Wu Buyi put the small piece into his mouth and chewed it.
It was disgusting. It tasted worse than anything that Wu Buyi had eaten. However, he sensed something from the insect's leg – It had a similar energy as immortal grass!
"Isn't this… life force?!"
