He had originally been a Golden Core disciple in a top sect of the Middle Immortal Realm, but blinded by folly, he committed some errors. His elders crippled his cultivation and expelled him, reducing him to a mortal.
He couldn’t accept it—how could he?!
But his old enemies came knocking, intent on wiping him out. Desperate, he accidentally entered Xiaoze State as a mortal.
Xiaoze State was a mundane world, and so he became a mortal who could never cultivate again.
He lived in a daze, in utter agony.
Even though he used tricks and a Disguise Pill to usurp the Mu Family young master’s identity, gaining wives and concubines, children, boundless wealth, he still gazed at the white hairs at his temples with unwillingness.
Until one day, Spiritual Energy Revival occurred in Xiaoze State.
Not only could he cultivate again, but in the place richest in spiritual energy, he discovered an abandoned infant with a Myriad Absorption Spiritual Root.
He was overjoyed.
He wanted to raise the infant and then seize its body, but body seizure wasn’t simple. For success, for soul fusion, they needed prolonged contact, aura mingling, and ideally emotional bonds.
So he strangled his own newborn grandson and secretly swapped in this Myriad Absorption Spiritual Root infant.
He treated the infant very well, doting on it excessively and proclaiming it the Mu Family’s sole heir.
That way, after successful seizure, he could rightfully claim everything.
But he failed.
He hadn’t expected this Myriad Absorption Spiritual Root genius to be so hard to seize. He nearly lost his life and was discovered by his son and daughter-in-law.
He had no choice but to kill his son and daughter-in-law, stage a ploy, openly cripple Mu Cheng, and settle for extracting his Spiritual Root.
“Heaven’s will.”
Mu Kunrong threw back his drink.
“Fortunately, I didn’t succeed in the seizure. Otherwise, the one nailed to the tree now, hailed as a Saint, forced to offer blood and flesh for all of Xiaoze State, would be me.”
Mu Kunrong stared at Mu Cheng and sneered.
“Do you know that the Lian Family, Fang Family, and Chen Family jointly announced your existence, calling you the Savior, Heavenly Dao’s gift to Xiaoze State? They demand that everyone who drinks your blood water be sincerely grateful to you, this Saint?
“Tomorrow, you’ll parade through the streets, bestowing your blood and flesh on the spot, inciting the masses to revel in madness, kowtow and worship—you’re to become a saint!”
Mu Cheng vomited.
Aside from Fasting Pills, he hadn’t eaten anything, so he only retched up a puddle of filthy blood.
His pupils turned red, his body trembled. His stomach suddenly twisted in hunger pains. He saw black mist coiling around Mu Kunrong—his Spiritual Root, his blood and flesh, all his things!
He convulsed and fainted.
Mu Kunrong’s mood finally eased.
He laughed heartily, smashed the wine jar, and staggered away.
His wine jar happened to shatter beside the plant. The Spiritual Brew seeped into the soil, and the plant got drunk.
The plant got drunk.
It forgot to hide itself, stretching its body wildly, flailing in the moonlight to capture spiritual energy.
So when Mu Cheng woke, the first sight he saw was the little servant who usually drew his blood plucking the Spirit Capturing Grass and feeding it to the Demon Beast by his side.
“Strange,” the little servant muttered to himself. “How did I never notice such a large stalk of Spirit Capturing Grass before? Little Darling, eat slower—it’s just Spirit Capturing Grass…”
The little servant suddenly felt a chill down his spine.
He turned and saw a pair of blood-red eyes and a madly distorted face.
.
The plant hadn’t died completely.
When it opened its eyes again, it saw endless flames underground and Mu Cheng’s now unfamiliar, crimson pupils.
The owner of those pupils stared fixedly at it, as if not understanding what it was.
The plant looked down and saw itself being plucked from a flower pot by Mu Cheng.
Mu Cheng held the pot, which was exquisitely made, lined at the bottom with countless Spirit Stones and other treasures. The spiritual soil held many of its withered branches and leaves—everything except the surviving “itself” had dried up.
On top of that, the pot reeked of lingering Demon Beast blood, as if these “limbs” had been carved from a Demon Beast’s body.
But that wasn’t important. The fire was.
Endless flames spread underground, to unseen distances, burning everything.
Terrified, the plant wrapped its roots tightly around Mu Cheng’s fingertip.
Mu Cheng’s crimson pupils gradually filled with beastly craving and obsession. He sniffed the plant and opened his mouth, sending the tender-sprout-sized it toward his mouth.
The plant was horrified and, in panic, released its roots from Mu Cheng’s fingertip, plummeting straight into the flames.
It thought it would burn to death.
But the moment its body touched the fire, a layer of water vapor emerged from within it, forming a thin membrane that enveloped it tightly, shielding it as it passed through the flames and burrowed into the ground.
As it curled every tendril in the scorching underground, the plant suddenly understood what that water vapor was.
—It was the tear of the youth Mu Cheng.
.
The flames burned for a full seven years.
The plant didn’t know how it survived, but it did. Not only did it survive, it underwent a slight mutation. It became more fragrant, more robust, full of vigor. It even grew a mighty vine, with which it could slowly move through the soil—from very hot soil to less hot soil.
It looked even more like the King of Spirit Capturing Grass.
The plant poked its head out from the soil when the inferno finally burned everything away and extinguished.
The first sight it saw upon emerging was that of the Immortals joining forces in the sky to besiege him, as Mu Cheng plummeted to the ground like a broken crane.
Ahhh.
The plant did not know what came over it. As if its mind had broken, it desperately burrowed through the soil and shifted to Mu Cheng’s side.
