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Chapter 487: Zombie Mining
Chapter 487: Zombie Mining
Lu Chengyun's voice was soft, but Mo Hua could still hear it.
Finding people to feed the diagram was not unusual. When they were at the Zombie Village, Zhang Quan had done the same.
However, Lu Chengyun's smile was too sinister, arousing Mo Hua's suspicions.
If it was just a matter of killing someone to feed the diagram, Lu Chengyun should not seem so affected. His expression should be indifferent, not bearing the current ominous look.
Mo Hua rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
Who was Lu Chengyun planning to use to feed the diagram?
"Mineral cultivators? Corpse cultivators?"
"Zhang Quan, and... me?"
Mo Hua was startled by the thought.
Now that he thought about it, it made sense.
Every demonic being that jumped into his sea of consciousness praised their own divine sense as a nourishing delicacy, making them perfect for feeding the contemplation diagram.
Could it be that Lu Chengyun had ill intentions from the very beginning?
Mo Hua pondered this possibility.
Even though it was just his speculation, he couldn't afford to be careless...
After Lu Chengyun's divine sense recovered, he drew the Ling Shu Demon Array again. At the Mao hour, he sealed the bronze coffin and left.
Once Lu Chengyun was gone, Mo Hua waited a little longer, ensuring that he had moved far away and wouldn't return anytime soon, before quietly leaving the altar and approaching the bronze coffin.
The coffin was sealed once more.
Mo Hua circled the coffin, tapping and knocking on it, but he still couldn't figure out how it opened and closed.
He felt a bit disappointed.
When Lu Chengyun arrived, he hadn't paid attention to how he opened the coffin, and when he left, he forgot to observe how he sealed it.
Since he couldn't open the bronze coffin, he wouldn't be able to uncover its secrets.
"I'll figure it out next time..."
Mo Hua muttered to himself and quietly left the Ten Thousand Corpse Altar.
Upon returning to his room, Mo Hua jumped onto the bed, crossed his legs, and entered a meditative state, allowing his consciousness to sink into his sea of consciousness.
Within his sea of consciousness, there was a void of white.
In the midst of this whiteness, there was a golden lock formation, trapping a wisp of blue smoke.
It was the remnant soul of the Iron Corpse Elder, who had been blasted to death.
Mo Hua quickly summoned the Molten Fire Formation, slowly roasting and burning the wisp of smoke, refining it into pure divine sense, and absorbing it into his mouth.
He continued to "roast" and "eat" it.
Until he had devoured every bit of the wisp of smoke, leaving nothing behind.
Greedy, bloodthirsty, and evil thoughts emerged in Mo Hua's mind.
However, Mo Hua was adept at meditation, and his mind remained clear as a mirror, untainted by these intrusive thoughts, which he promptly discarded and eliminated.
With the eradication of the evil thoughts, a pure stream of divine sense flowed into Mo Hua's sea of consciousness.
Mo Hua's divine sense grew stronger, advancing a little further beyond the twelve lines pinnacle, inching closer to the thirteen lines, but still falling short.
Mo Hua opened his eyes and sighed.
Advancing his divine sense was so difficult.
Even after consuming the Foundation Establishment divine sense, he still couldn't increase his divine sense to the thirteen lines.
Could it be that the Foundation Establishment divine sense was too weak? After being refined by him, there was less of it left, so it wasn't enough to satiate him?
Mo Hua blinked.
Could it be that he had to "eat" Zhang Quan's ancestor to reach the thirteen lines in his divine sense?
But how could he eat it?
Mo Hua's eyes shifted, and he began to contemplate mischievous ideas...
Zhang Quan's ancestor diagram was kept close to Lu Chengyun's body, treated as a treasure, and wouldn't be easy for him to get his hands on...
He would have to come up with a plan.
Perhaps Lu Chengyun intended to use him to feed the diagram...
Mo Hua lay on the bed, legs propped up, as he carefully considered his situation...
As he thought, he suddenly realized that it had been a long time since he had communicated with his little junior sister.
There were some matters that he needed to discuss with his little junior sister and junior brother beforehand.
Mo Hua quickly got up, took a piece of paper, and spread it on the table.
Then he began to jot down some key clues.
For example, Lu Chengyun's relationship within the Lu family.
The transaction between Lu Chengyun and the Lu family's ancestor.
The Lu family's ancestor had been refined into a corpse.
Some information about the Ten Thousand Corpse Array... and so on.
...
Mo Hua kept the note safely, and that night, he secretly found Little Tiger and stuffed the note into his mouth, instructing him to crawl outside and deliver the message to his little junior sister.
The next day, Little Tiger returned, carrying another piece of paper in his mouth.
The paper was smooth and delicate, with a faint golden floral pattern, which Mo Hua immediately recognized as the kind often used by his little junior sister.
The fact that a reply had been sent back meant that Little Tiger had successfully delivered his message.
Mo Hua nodded and opened the paper, curious to see what his little junior sister had written.
However, upon opening it, he found only four simple words: "When are you coming back?"
There was also a small face drawn at the bottom, with furrowed brows.
Mo Hua was taken aback.
He suddenly realized that he had unknowingly spent quite a long time in the Corpse Mine.
His little junior sister and junior brother must be worried about him.
As for his master and Master Gui, they probably weren't too concerned.
After all, his master was skilled in divination, and he probably knew what Mo Hua was up to.
He wondered how they were doing in his absence.
Was there anyone making tea for his master? Was anyone roasting pine nuts for Master Gui?
And what about Da Bai? Had his junior brother been feeding him good fodder?
And what about Yan Jiaoxi...
...
As Mo Hua pondered, he suddenly missed his master and the others. He felt that it was about time to start thinking of a way to leave the Corpse Mine sooner rather than later.
Moreover, Lu Chengyun, despite his polite and cultured appearance, had the heart of a wolf and the lungs of a dog. Though he treated Mo Hua courteously, Mo Hua suspected that he had ulterior motives.
It would be better to extricate himself from this situation sooner rather than later and stop playing games with him.
So, Mo Hua wrote a quick reply: "Soon, soon!"
He drew a little tiger's head, looking fierce and cute.
Using his divine sense, Mo Hua instructed Little Tiger to deliver the message.
Then he began to consider what he should do before leaving.
The Ten Thousand Corpse Array, the bronze coffin, the Corpse Mine...
All of these had to be destroyed, or they would surely leave endless troubles.
The corpse cultivators in the Corpse Mine, who killed and refined corpses, also had to be eradicated.
The zombies within had to be dealt with properly as well. It would be best to burn them all to prevent them from consuming flesh and blood, spreading their poisonous influence, and endangering South Yue City...
"But how many zombies are there in this Corpse Mine?"
Mo Hua only knew that there were a lot, but he couldn't give an exact number.
The ones in the stone temple and within the Ten Thousand Corpse Array were probably only a fraction of the total.
The Corpse Mine was larger than the Zombie Village, and the arrays within were more complex. With Lu Chengyun watching him, Mo Hua had limited freedom to explore, leaving many areas untouched.
Even a Foundation Establishment cultivator would undoubtedly perish if they were surrounded by hundreds or thousands of zombies with no means of escape.
Moreover, within the Corpse Mine, there were numerous Iron Corpses.
Even if the Dao Court mobilized their soldiers to suppress the Corpse Mine, without knowledge of the internal situation, their efforts would be challenging to coordinate effectively.
Mo Hua pondered for a moment before deciding to venture out to the mines.
Beyond the stone temple lay the mines, separated by a large gate.
This gate was inscribed with a bloody demonic array, and there was also a key.
Mo Hua had discovered this key later on.
It was made of white bone and kept on the body of a zombie cultivator who guarded the gate.
As for the array, Mo Hua dared not tamper with it for now, lest he alert Lu Chengyun. However, the key could be stolen.
Taking advantage of the guard's undivided attention as he refined a corpse, Mo Hua manipulated Xiao Hu to steal the key, then quietly used it to open the stone temple's gate.
Beyond the gate lay the mines.
They were pitch-black, damp, gloomy, reeking of corpse energy, and yet also incredibly noisy.
Stepping out of the stone temple, Mo Hua followed the mineshaft for a while until he reached a massive pit.
It was as he had guessed, but also somewhat different.
The zombies were indeed mining, but there were far more of them than he had anticipated...
The mining pit was vast, and within it, countless zombies toiled.
They were dressed in tattered clothes, their skin rotten and decayed. Each one held a mining pick, tirelessly digging away!
They were dead, yet they performed the tasks of the living.
Most of them had been miners in life, and in death, they were refined into corpses, continuing their work, perhaps even more diligently and tirelessly than when they had been alive.
Countless zombies toiled in the mine...
The bustling scene seemed to blur the line between the world of the living and the underworld.
The mortal miners, though alive, were driven by their harsh lives to a state of numbness, like walking corpses.
The zombies in the mine, though dead, were enslaved by the Lu family, working ceaselessly like the living.
For a moment, Mo Hua's mind superimposed the images of the mortal miners during the day and the zombies at night, blurring the distinction between reality and illusion.
He couldn't tell what was real anymore.
Mo Hua was stunned and stood there, deep in thought.
In that moment, he felt as though he had gained a profound insight into the cycle of life and death and the true nature of humanity at its core.
At the same time, another troubling fact presented itself to Mo Hua.
There were too many zombies in this Corpse Mine! Just in this one massive pit, there appeared to be tens of thousands of them.
And based on the surrounding arrays, the mine was even larger than he had imagined, suggesting that there were more mining pits within the mountain.
Each of those pits likely held countless zombies as well...
Just the thought of it made Mo Hua's scalp tingle.
If these zombies were to surge out of the Corpse Mine, forming a zombie tide, and if they further spread their poisonous influence through zombie infection, not only would South Yue City be doomed, but the entire Small Desolate Province might be plunged into chaos and suffering.
The Small Desolate Province would become the Small Desolate 'Zombie' Province.
Mo Hua didn't dwell on this thought any longer.
Time was of the essence, and he quietly made his way back.
The entrance to the outside world was a natural boulder, guarded by two second-grade Iron Corpses, surrounded by thick mountain walls.
For the time being, he couldn't escape, so he decided to return and formulate a plan for the long term.
When Mo Hua returned, the zombie cultivator guarding the gate was still in the process of refining a corpse.
Mo Hua once again manipulated Xiao Hu to return the key, then went back to his room, frowning in contemplation.
This Corpse Mine was larger than he had anticipated.
And there were far more zombies than he had expected.
With so many zombies, how many Iron Corpses were there?
In the Ten Thousand Corpse Array, Mo Hua had counted around twenty-four iron coffins, indicating the presence of twenty-four Iron Corpses.
Within the stone temple, there were also some secret chambers that housed the aura of Iron Corpses, and Mo Hua had roughly estimated that there were seven or eight more.
There were also some Iron Corpses in the outer mines.
Adding them all up, there were at least forty or more Iron Corpses in this Corpse Mine?
Among the Iron Corpses, there were both first and second grades. The first-grade ones were slightly weaker, equivalent to the lower levels of Foundation Establishment, while the second-grade ones were significantly stronger and could be considered mid-Foundation Establishment.
Combined, that would mean nearly forty Foundation Establishment cultivators! Mo Hua's heart chilled at the thought.
Forty Foundation Establishment cultivators—not only would they pose a threat to South Yue City, but in the entire Small Desolate Province, such a force would be unparalleled...
With this strength, they could dominate the entire second-grade province.
Mo Hua paused, a hint of confusion crossing his mind.
Where did Lu Chengyun get so many corpses to refine all these Iron Corpses?
Refining an Iron Corpse required at least a peak Qi Refining cultivator's corpse, as well as one from the Foundation Establishment stage.
Considering the success rate of corpse refinement, the number of corpses needed would be even higher.
While a peak Qi Refining corpse might be manageable, where did he get so many Foundation Establishment corpses?
Even if he killed them, there wouldn't be this many, would there?
Where did he get all these Foundation Establishment corpses?
Suddenly, Mo Hua thought of the Lu family's ancestor.
In the Ling Shu sequence of the Ten Thousand Corpse Array, the Lu family's ancestor was the "Zombie King," holding the highest position.
The Zombie King commanded the horde of zombies.
Therefore, the corpse used to refine the Zombie King had to be of a certain status, such as a sect leader, a family head, or a ruler of a nation...
Those who would be subjected to its control would either be sect disciples, family disciples, or the citizens of a nation.
The Lu family's ancestor was the "Zombie King."
According to the principles of corpse refinement, those who would be subservient to it would likely be... Lu family cultivators? It was unlikely to be the miners...
Among the miners, there were hardly any Foundation Establishment cultivators.
Moreover, while the miners resented the Lu family ancestor for exploiting them, their hatred often lingered after death, making it challenging to refine them into obedient zombies that would serve the Lu family ancestor.
It had to be the Lu family...
Were most of these Iron Corpses refined from the corpses of Lu family cultivators, or more specifically, Lu family elders? But Lu Chengyun was the family head, and while he could kill one or two elders, doing so to many would arouse suspicion within the family.
He wouldn't do something so foolish as to cut off his own roots.
So, where did these corpses come from?
The elders' corpses...
Mo Hua's brows furrowed in thought.
Suddenly, a shocking realization struck him:
"Could it be that this Lu Chengyun has dug up the Lu family's ancestral tombs?"
(End of Chapter)
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