Zhong Shenxiu came to his senses.
Under his palm, the Five Poison Sect Disciple had turned into a dried-up corpse, unrecognizable even if Yan Wushuang were to arrive.
He looked at his own hands and suddenly fell into silence.
"I feel much better now, the hunger inside me has also been eased... and more importantly... my martial arts have greatly improved..."
By absorbing others’ Five Elements energy, his own inner strength had advanced further and seemed about to begin the Five Elements Unification, and the breakthrough of changing his blood.
To some extent, this Five Poison Sect disciple was a better ingredient of ’Spiritual Medicine’ than ordinary people!
And by reversing the Five Elements Thief Palm, Zhong Shenxiu understood a lot more, "The tough part of changing blood, it’s not just about changing fresh blood... Martial Artists change their own blood once, and that’s it, there would be no significant improvement in abilities... Hence, what is being changed is something more essential, perhaps vitality?"
After the blood change, Martial Artists would differ significantly from ordinary Jianghu masters in terms of physical endurance, able to go days without food yet still remain spirited, and they could consume a cow a day, eating voraciously... Only a change in vitality could explain this situation.
"Is changing blood a slight change in vitality, and what about refining marrow? Is it a change and sublimation of the essence of life? Would that still be human?"
Zhong Shenxiu suddenly felt a great fear.
"Rumors of haunted creatures abound in remote places of this Jianghu, allegedly devouring living beings and being utterly ferocious. Now it seems, though there are no demons... perhaps, they are Martial Artists who have gone into demonic cultivation..."
"Before, I also heard from Wei Baizhu that, though the Fei E Sword of the Lingnan Song family is acclaimed as the number one swordsmanship in the world, it is easy to undergo a drastic change in temperament during cultivation, and there are even rumors about a preference for raw meat and tree sap... I always thought these were baseless rumors, but now it seems, where there is smoke, there might be fire... Perhaps, did they all turn into... monsters?"
"Is this a horror world dressed up as Jianghu? No wonder it was located by the aura of an Evil God..."
Zhong Shenxiu had originally found it odd why the aura left by Black Lotus Venerable would pinpoint an ancient traditional martial arts world.
Now he finally understood—this was not a traditional martial arts world at all!
But one filled with bizarre and terrifying martial arts in a mysterious Jianghu!
"But knowing all this, there’s not much I can do, I’m not here to save the world..."
Zhong Shenxiu gathered his scattered thoughts and began to ponder his own issues.
"The Five Elements Thief Palm, I still need to continue practicing it, break through the blood-changing phase. After all, it’s not my body, turning into a monster doesn’t matter... And so many of the Heavenly List Martial Artists still look human, perhaps I’m just overthinking it."
"This palm technique, or perhaps the martial arts of this world, are a bit evil, easily leading to demonic cultivation, something one must be cautious of."
"Earlier, after I stole the Five Elements energy from the Five Poison Sect disciple, my impulsiveness weakened a lot, sensorial mutations also became controllable. It seems that after a period of time, consuming a bit can mitigate these negative effects? It’s not such a big deal; I could just find a few extremely evil individuals and slay them every now and then..."
The mansion was very secluded, with seemingly no one around.
Considering the commotion, it was surprising no one came to watch.
This made things a bit easier for Zhong Shenxiu. He first searched the body and regretfully found no martial arts scriptures on the Five Poison Sect disciple.
However, there were plenty of bottles and pots full of poison, including some corpse-dissolving water, specifically used to destroy bodies without leaving a trace, with excellent effects.
Zhong Shenxiu didn’t want to attract official attention, so he placed Chen Jiu and the dried-up corpse together, dissolving them with the corpse-dissolving water.
Only after seeing both bodies dissolve into pus did he burn their remaining clothes and casually left.
Not to mention ancient officials, even in modern times, without a corpse, death cannot be conclusively determined, significantly reducing the resources invested in further searches.
After all that, Zhong Shenxiu vaulted over the wall, picked a random alley, and strutted down the street, buying a few oil cakes to snack on. He returned to Shanyao Hall.
Wei Hongyao looked at Zhong Shenxiu and suddenly relaxed, "Just now, you seemed so odd, I almost thought you were sick."
"Haha, I am strong as an ox, how could I possibly be sick?"
Zhong Shenxiu made a little joke. Seeing that Shanyao Hall was already running smoothly, he didn’t want to cause further chaos and headed to the backyard.
Dressed in a silk robe, Wei Baizhu was fiddling with a couple of walnuts. Upon seeing Zhong Shenxiu, he coughed, "Liu Yi, there’s something I need to discuss with you..."
Zhong Shenxiu was somewhat surprised.
With the threat from the Five Poison Sect temporarily resolved and having good relations with both the Nine Elements Sect and the authorities, Shanyao Hall should be thriving.
"This issue is neither big nor small. Our Shanyao Hall has established its reputation, and now there are a few families who want to send their young boys to apprentice here."
Half-grown boys who were eating their fathers out of house and home. If a family wasn’t wealthy, these adolescents had to look elsewhere for a living.
Apprenticing at the medicine hall, learning a craft, was naturally an excellent way out.
Even if they couldn’t master the craft, as long as they were fed, they could be beaten and scolded at will, and their parents certainly wouldn’t object.
As for wages? What are those?
But Shanyao Hall was different after all; it was half a Martial Arts sect, with its own internal martial arts inheritance.
Taking on apprentices was, in fact, taking on disciples.
Of course, it couldn’t be said at the moment, hence the guise of apprenticeship.
Wei Baizhu intended to discuss this very matter; otherwise, a few odd-jobbers could be easily recruited without needing to discuss it with Zhong Shenxiu, the top martial artist.
"Did the Uncle-Master review their talents?"
Zhong Shenxiu asked casually.
"Hehe... there are two promising youngsters, one named Shi Yu and the other Lu Yang. Their muscles and bones have just developed nicely, good for training..."
Wei Baizhu played with the walnuts, "I’m free lately and could take a disciple, how about you take one as well?"
’Is he trying to tighten our master-disciple bond again?’
Zhong Shenxiu saw through the old man’s intentions right away and muttered internally: ’In a while, he’ll probably try to betroth Wei Hongyao to me...’
But it was not a big deal after all. He answered promptly, "Sure, Uncle-Master, you pick first. I’ll take whichever one is left."
Casually teaching an apprentice wasn’t much trouble; anyway, at first, he would definitely use the Medicine Sand Palm to lay the foundation, and only if they passed the test of spirit in the future, would he teach the Five Elements Thief Palm.
Of course, he would teach at most four parts of it, as once the skill combined all five elements, it became rather sinister, not something ordinary people could handle.
If he ended up creating a homicidal maniac, Zhong Shenxiu would lose face.
This thought suddenly sparked a notion: ’The Divine Capture Sect should know about these things, right? But such secrets won’t be shared... Yan Wushuang thinks my Five Elements are incomplete; he wouldn’t specifically warn me...’