Chapter Eighty-Eight: Gaining the Miasma

Half an hour had passed.

No one knew how many times the Earth-Shaking Rhinoceros had unleashed its earth-tremor technique, but the ground had caved in deeply, forming a massive pit almost twenty to thirty meters deep and several hundred meters wide.

The Earth-Shaking Rhinoceros stood within the pit, glaring furiously up at Li Mu in the sky.

“It doesn’t seem tired at all?”

Li Mu was at a loss for words. The beast before him looked no different than it had at the start, as if it possessed boundless strength. He realized he hadn’t thought things through—prolonged battles of attrition with spirit beasts were not wise. Unlike cultivators, who stored spiritual energy in their dantian and meridians, spirit beasts harbored reserves throughout their entire bodies, each part brimming with power, wholly unlike human cultivators.

But now, seeing that the pit was only a dozen or so meters from the pool, an idea sparked in his mind.

“Asura Spike.”

A unique technique of the Asura Sword—after channeling spiritual energy, many sharp, tangible spikes would form along the sword’s light, spinning swiftly and fiercely.

A flash of white light; the sword aura surged like a soaring dragon, plunging into the earth. In an instant, the soil between the pit and the pool was upturned.

Boom!

With a thunderous crash, the water surged and began to pour madly into the pit, rushing in like a torrent.

Amidst the wild current, Li Mu actually saw several green-scaled savage crocodiles swept along, carried straight into the pit.

What luck—those crocodiles, which had been chasing Li Mu as prey, were now being lured into the trap he’d set for them.

The pit filled rapidly.

Within the swirling waters, the Earth-Shaking Rhinoceros bellowed with rage, struggling to break free. Yet how could the crocodiles allow it to escape? They lunged at it, their power in water even greater than on land.

Li Mu ascended higher, watching the turmoil below with a faint smile. This pit, so precisely as he’d hoped, was the rhinoceros’s own doing.

After the time it takes to burn an incense stick, the pit gradually settled, but its surface was stained crimson, as if filled with blood, glowing vividly red.

The crocodiles floated lifelessly, their bodies shriveled like thin paper. It was clear they’d been trampled to death hundreds of times by the rhinoceros; their scales and innards were scattered about—a pitiful sight.

But it was certain that the Earth-Shaking Rhinoceros could not have fared much better.

After a while, a great snowy-white horn emerged from the pit, followed by a pair of enormous eyes, still wide open, though the light within them had faded.

“Asura Spike!”

Li Mu could not let up now.

The Asura Sword shot forth once more, spinning rapidly as it drove straight into the beast’s eye.

In an instant, blood gushed forth like a spring. The Earth-Shaking Rhinoceros let out a final, regretful roar, then perished.

Li Mu retrieved his treasured weapon and gazed at the pit below, finally calm. He sighed long—it was over at last.

After cleaning off the blood, he collected the crocodile hides. The eyes were gone, but the scales were perfectly intact, tough as ever. This only made him look forward even more to forging his second-grade Green-Edge Armor.

With a gentle motion of his hands, Li Mu removed the snowy-white horn from the rhinoceros—an exceedingly rare treasure, invaluable for refining both pills and magical artifacts.

But beneath the horn was the beast’s core—a third-grade beast core. Though not as potent as a Spirit Spring Ganoderma, it could significantly boost one’s cultivation, far surpassing many first-grade beast cores.

He stored the entire Earth-Shaking Rhinoceros inside his Spirit Tower. It was said that food made from third-grade spirit beasts was far superior to ordinary fare, and its blood was the finest material for making earth-element talisman ink—a resource not to be wasted.

Talisman ink was one of the four essential ingredients for crafting talisman paper.

“A third-grade spirit beast—truly, every part is precious. It was well worth the effort.” Li Mu was content, then continued searching the valley.

Yet after a thorough sweep, he found no other remarkable spirit beasts; clearly, the rhinoceros and the crocodiles were the rulers of these two mountains.

Still, he did not neglect the lesser beasts.

Li Mu remained in the twin mountains for two days, slaying hundreds of creatures, though he obtained only a few dozen beast cores.

That would suffice for the group; he would return another time.

Li Mu left the pool behind and headed for the mountain pass.

The air was thick with miasma, its pungent odor stinging his senses, when a strange thought struck him.

“Could this miasma be used as a refining material?”

The Spirit Tower’s power could not be increased at present, but perhaps there were other uses he had not considered. Remembering this, he decided to try.

Swallowing a third-grade Heavenly Spirit Pill to ward off the poison, he plunged his hand into the miasma.

The toxic mist was swiftly drawn into the Spirit Tower, and a familiar chime sounded, making Li Mu so delighted he nearly leaped for joy.

“Second-grade material detected: Toxic Miasma.”

It was indeed a material—how wonderful!

He gathered as much of the miasma into the Spirit Tower as he could, watching as the haze ahead grew thinner, almost disappearing.

Many blood leeches on the ground began to shrivel and die; without the miasma to sustain them, survival was impossible.

“Refine, refine!”

The Spirit Tower shone brilliantly as the endless toxic miasma condensed into many dense pink pearls. Their surface was lustrous but opaque, with swirling clouds trapped within.

After some experimentation, Li Mu discovered their use: these were Supreme Miasma Pearls, top-tier second-grade materials. He would soon unlock their full potential...

When crushed, a miasma pearl would instantly flood the area with thick poisonous fog. Even standing dozens of meters away, Li Mu found himself dizzy, nearly fainting. Had he been less cautious, standing closer to the pearl when it broke, the consequences would have been unimaginable.

If several of these pearls shattered at once, even cultivators in the Qi Refinement stage would find themselves hard-pressed to defend against them.

Such a treasure—extremely dangerous.

But surely there were better ways to use them.

Looking at the remnants of the miasma, Li Mu cried out, “Take it all—collect every last bit!”

Three days later, when he looked back at the twin mountains, they were clear as day; every trace of miasma had been stored away inside the Spirit Tower, transformed into miasma pearls.

Transmuting earth into stone, condensing mist into pearls—the Spirit Tower and his own spirit truly were a match made in heaven.

With a satisfied smile, Li Mu departed. The harvest this time had been immense.

When he reached another mountain, Li Mu decided not to remove the miasma there, as it served as a natural barrier. With this in mind, he skirted the area, tossing out several dozen miasma pearls. The already thick fog instantly became impenetrable.

Crossing the miasma and the marsh, just as he approached the lowlands, Li Mu suddenly stopped.

Several hundred meters ahead, on the path leading out of the lowlands, a human silhouette swayed faintly.

Clearly, this was not one of his companions, but a stranger.

Could it be a demon cultivator? Li Mu’s expression shifted as he cautiously extended his spiritual sense to investigate.