Chapter 102: Devil Mushroom
Chapter 102: Devil Mushroom
“I feel like you’re telling a ghost story!”
Li Si was startled by the Phantom Bride’s strange tone.
As they say, once the mushroom bites you once, you’ll fear devil mushrooms ten years. He had just gone through the Seven Emotions Tribulation. Although he really wanted to restart his important work quickly, he truly didn’t want to be ruled again by the terror of countless cursed emotions violently washing through him.
“Stupid, I am a ghost.”
Li Si: …
“Alright, let’s put it another way. Did you know? In the Mortal Realm, I had a nickname. They called me the Mushroom Prince.”
“And then you faced the Seven Emotions Tribulation?”
“That’s not the point. Back in the Mortal Realm, I was an expert at hunting little mushrooms.”
“I know. And then you faced the Seven Emotions Tribulation!”
“Ugh! Can we just have a normal conversation?”
“Alright. Go ahead.”
“In the Mortal Realm, like right now, those little mushrooms see me like I’m a ghost.”
“You are seeing a ghost right now.”
“Not that kind of ghost!”
“There’s another ghost? I don’t believe it.”
“No! I mean, in the Mortal Realm, I hunted them so much that little mushrooms became a rare protected species.”
“So, therefore, you faced the Seven Emotions Tribulation?”
Li Si: …
Phantom Bride: …
“So, are you trying to say you actually didn’t face the Seven Emotions Tribulation?”
“Fine. I did face it.”
“Then why did you say I was telling a ghost story? Isn’t the Seven Emotions Tribulation scary? I think it’s scarier than a ghost. I’m gentler than the Seven Emotions Tribulation! You should call it a Devil Mushroom story. Then I would understand you.”
Li Si: …
Phantom Bride: …
“Okay, let’s put it another way. I faced the Seven Emotions Tribulation in the Mortal Realm.”
“And then?”
“And because of it, I gained the Bedrock Dao Heart. So now, I’m not afraid of little mushrooms anymore.”
“But are you afraid of the Seven Emotions Tribulation?”
Li Si: …
“Sister, can we please not mention the Seven Emotions Tribulation?”
“Am I that big?”
“Alright, ‘Lovely Sister’ then?”
“Am I that small?”
Li Si: …
Phantom Bride: …
Li Si: Tears streamed down his face. What sin did I commit to deserve this?
“Let’s go to work. You go eat Peach Blossom Demons. I’ll go pick up Wishing Stones.”
“Aren’t you returning to the Mortal Realm? Didn’t you have urgent business there?”
“I changed my mind.” Li Si took a deep breath. From now on, anyone who mentions little mushrooms is a dog!
“Suit yourself.”
The Phantom Bride slowly turned around. Her blood-red glow illuminated the darkness. Then she started humming a song. She sang as she walked, seeming in a good mood.
Li Si held his Divine Idol, which wasn’t even nine inches tall. His feelings complicated, he followed behind her. He was thinking. He now had two anchor points for crossing over within the Illusory Realm. One was near his Idol of Fortune, where he met the Phantom Bride.
The other was at the Hundred-League Law Seal. There, he had glimpsed some part of the Old Madam’s true form. That place had a lot of monsters. It also had a huge number of little mushrooms, especially the big, colorful ones.
That place looked really dangerous…
So instead of hunting little mushrooms in the Mortal Realm, why not hunt them here in the Illusory Realm? Especially with this nitpicking phantom along. Bonus points.
But first, he needed to figure things out. What was the Seven Emotions Medicine Field? What was the Seven Emotions Great Medicine? And why did the little mushrooms escape from the Seven Emotions Medicine Field? Besides the little mushrooms of the seven emotions, were there also seven emotions little cabbages? Seven emotions little leeks? Seven emotions radishes? Seven emotions wood-ear fungus?
But to find out any of this, he had to ask the nitpicker walking ahead…
Li Si shot a look of disgust at the Phantom Bride. Favorability -1, Hmph!
Friendly reminder: Current favorability level remains at 99,999,999 points.
“So, you want to hunt devil mushrooms here?” The Phantom Bride asked actively once she stopped humming. See? It wasn’t stupid. Just deliberately picking arguments! Annoying nitpicker! Favorability -1!
“Yeah, got the idea. Just floating it for now though. Any bright suggestions?”
“You can’t beat me.”
“Huh?”
“Give it up. The waters here run deep. You couldn’t even beat me, yet you dream of hunting devil mushrooms? Where does this courage come from?”
“In the Mortal Realm, I killed a ton of little mushrooms! I’m a professional. Professional! Got it?”
“You can’t beat me.”
“This has nothing to do with fighting! Different skills for different things! I have secret methods.”
The Phantom Bride finally stopped nitpicking. It halted. Turned around. Stretched out a pale arm and patted Li Si’s head pityingly.
“Li Si, it’s time for your medicine.”
Li Si: …
“Don’t sulk. The devil mushrooms here are anything but little. I saw one once from a distance. It practically stretched between heaven and earth. Taller than the highest mountain. Wider than the broadest sea. Billions upon billions of tentacles reaching who knows where. Your Mortal Realm? Definitely has tentacles snaking into it. So the mushrooms you hunted… maybe they were just the devil mushroom’s reflection.”
Li Si understood this time. But it made him confused again. What about the mushrooms he saw from his other anchor point?
“I saw mushrooms like the ones in the Mortal Realm, little ones, in another part of the Illusory Realm. I think I can hunt them.”
“So where do you think we are right now?”
“Not… in the Illusory Realm?” Li Si suddenly had a bad feeling.
“It is, yet it isn’t. To be precise, this area belongs to the Seven Emotions Medicine Field. But it’s also considered part of the Illusory Realm. However… it likely has a fundamental difference from that specific Illusory Realm you mentioned.” The Phantom Bride spoke slowly. Li Si felt like it was telling a ghost story again.
“Is the Seven Emotions Medicine Field big?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who created the Seven Emotions Medicine Field? Is anyone tending to it now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then what do you know?”
“You can’t kill the devil mushroom. Maybe someday you’ll have the chance. But right now? No. You cannot kill it.”
Li Si went quiet. He thought for a while. Couldn’t resist asking again.
“That big mountain you go to every day? And the ruins? What are they about? Besides me, have you seen any other deities from the Mortal Realm?”
“That mountain is called Peach Hill. It formed from a single peach pit. And that pit, it originally came from another Seven Emotions Great Medicine grown in the Seven Emotions Medicine Field. Now… it calls itself the Peach Blossom Ancestor. It commands one hundred and eight Peach Blossom Immortals. One of those immortals has a grudge against you. Even your Master, at their peak strength, was no match for the Peach Blossom Ancestor.”
“As for those ruins? They’re called the Palace Ruins. Not ‘palace’ like a building, but ‘gong’ like the note in traditional music. You know? The five-note scale. Nobody knows where the Palace Ruins came from. Since I arrived, it was a place where deities from the Mortal Realm tried to build their divine kingdoms. But clearly, those deities and your companions weren’t the original owners here. Choosing that spot to build kingdoms or halls? Only because, wherever the Palace Ruins stand, the Seven Emotions are forced to detour.”
“But recently… for some unknown reason, maybe something changed in the Seven Emotions Medicine Field, or maybe it’s them (Peach Blossom Ancestor) causing trouble… that hall built by your companions collapsed. That’s why I wouldn’t recommend you build your Temple there either.”
The Phantom Bride’s explanation shocked Li Si thoroughly. It felt like his worldview was rewritten. The most devastating bit? Those little mushrooms he’d effortlessly beaten? Their original source was likely an enormous devil mushroom that bridged heaven and earth.
“And… what about the Evil God? Know anything?” Li Si asked again.
“Evil deities? Or something else?”
“The one affecting the Mortal Realm, stirring things up into chaos. That Evil God.”
“Oh! That is that Devil Mushroom! The one I mentioned earlier. No mistake. You calling it an Evil God? Fits. It’s pretty evil alright.”
The Phantom Bride’s words made Li Si uncomfortable once more. If he remembered right, it said earlier it had seen the Devil Mushroom’s true form, the Evil God’s original body, from afar.
“Can you defeat the Peach Blossom Ancestor?”
“Of course not. I told you, I’m just a lonely ghost woman. Barely scraping by here.”
Li Si wasn’t entirely convinced. But recalling their first meeting – how cautious the Phantom Bride was, even when hunting the weakest Peach Blossom Demons – he decided to tentatively believe it now.
The man and the phantom slowly approached Peach Hill. The Phantom Bride stopped talking. It returned to its watchful, cautious self again. It walked a short distance, then stopped and waited. The red glow faded to its dimmest, weakest state. Like a tiny mole.
“Don’t be afraid. As long as it’s not a Peach Blossom Immortal, I can deal with it!”
The Phantom Bride paused mid-step. Didn’t make a sound. In the next instant, it lunged forward. It snatched a peach tree root from the darkness. Inside the root was a humanoid shape. Before it could even scream, the Phantom Bride bit its head off clean. Ferocious like a cat… Li Si’s only job? Rush forward to seize the Wishing Stone.
They worked together smoothly. Perfectly in sync.
After eating the Peach Blossom Demon, the Phantom Bride glanced back at Li Si. It raised one pale finger, hidden beneath its red veil. A clear gesture: Quiet. Li Si got the message instantly.
Yes. This was the Peach Blossom Ancestor’s turf. Stealth was key. He had to admit a newfound respect, too. The Phantom Bride wasn’t a coward. Risking it day after day, year after year, sneaking over here to ambush Peach Blossom Demons? That took guts and persistence. Even if it seemed pointless…
Only after Li Si and the Phantom Bride had moved far away, disappearing into the dark…
A peach branch trembled violently. It rose from the dirt. Three sickly-looking, pale gray blossoms clung to it. Then, it darted away as if fleeing for its life. Following it? Countless more peach branches. Like startled loaches, they slithered silently into the distance…
Farther away, atop a thick peach tree trunk, a blurred figure watched cautiously for a moment… then slowly turned its head away…
They hunted two dozen or so Peach Blossom Demons. This tense, thrilling spree finally came to an end. Li Si followed the Phantom Bride away from Peach Hill and into the massive ruins. A pity the Phantom Bride’s blood-red glow barely stretched a hundred meters, so he couldn’t get a good look at the entire ruin complex.
But this place truly seemed safer than the outside world. The Phantom Bride started humming and searching the rubble again. It was hard to tell what it was looking for exactly. It just hauled back enormous piles daily.
Li Si, burning with curiosity, wasn’t dumb enough to interrupt while it was singing. Plus, hearing it repeatedly… the melody sort of grew catchy.
Assuming your Soul Corruption level doesn’t explode.
“Here. This is the outer entrance to the Palace Ruins. Want to go inside and look?”
The Phantom Bride suddenly spoke with its back to Li Si. Ahead of it stood a colossal building. Yet a third of it was missing. Cut cleanly away.