Humanity’s Great Sage

wing up. 

 

Lu Ye did not have to dig long.
He retracted his arm moments later with a grotesquely misshapen mass of flesh and blood vessels barely the size of his fist still beating in his grasp. 

 

One look at it and anyone knew what the thing was: the heart of the insectoid nexus was still full of life.

 

“So it’s true.”

 

Lu Ye murmured to himself.
This was what was absorbing the sustenance whenever an insectoid consumed something—the very instrument of the colony’s continuity—the heart that would pump more life into the nest to reproduce more hatchlings.
This was why the Praetorian insectoids stood guard here so that they could protect the heart and keep it safe from all harm. 

 

In his hands, Lu Ye held the amalgamation of life and energy, which, in the real world of Jiu Zhou, was known as the Nucleus of Life.
But the rich vitality and energy stored inside this thing were of no use to Lu Ye—or any other Cultivator for that matter.
The sole purpose of this biological instrument was the continuity of an insectoid colony and nothing else.

 

An insectoid nexus like this usually had more than one Nucleus of Life.
Lu Ye could count more than a handful of them when he was digging through the fleshy fold of the nexus’s insides.
He would need to slice open the whole thing if he wanted to know exactly how many Nuclei were inside. 

 

And doing that would fully extinguish all life and energy inside the nexus.
Without the sustenance from it, the nest would wither and die, and the battle would finally be over.

But Lu Ye wasn’t going to do that.
Lacking proper ways to farm Contribution Points, the members of the Crimson Blood Sect—its acolytes, initiates, and associates—could use this chance to earn as much as they could while the chance was still presenting itself.
With all seven hundred Cultivators camping here in the nest cavern, all they needed to do was to just slay any insectoids that the nest produced, and they could easily gain points.

 

Therefore, Lu Ye only gave the Nucleus another brief look before he stuffed it back inside the nexus. 

 

As soon as he retracted his arm, the incision he made immediately healed with noticeable speed, portending to the nexus’s incredible vitality and energy. 

 

That was what they did next: everyone just loitered around the nest cavern and once the nest reproduced another hatchling, the Cultivators would be upon it before it ever saw the light of day, sending it straight on its way to its maker.

There was nothing else for Lu Ye to do.
He divided the squads, assigning them to every egg sac hanging from the meat ceiling of the nest so that they could farm all the Contribution Points they wanted before he left them to it…

 

He went back to check on Hua Ci and made sure that she was fine.
Only then was he relieved.

 

Although reminiscing how she looked earlier really was funny and gratifying at the same time. 

 

[Well, I suppose as a woman, it’s understandable for her to have some form of vulnerability,] Lu Ye mused.

 

“Lu Ye! Lu Ye!” Yi Yi was calling him all of a sudden.

 

“Hmm?”

“There’s a tunnel there that leads to somewhere else.”

 

“What do you mean ‘somewhere else’?”

 

“Like what I said: a tunnel.
Just come and you’ll find out what I mean,” Yi Yi pulled at his arm to get him to come with her.

 

Now that the situation in the nest cavern was fully under control, Yi Yi had taken the time for a leisurely walk around where she discovered a tunnel that no one had explored before.

 

Yi Yi led Lu Ye to the tunnel in question.
He stood there and tried to remember all the underground routes that everyone had mapped.
That was when he realized that this particular tunnel was the one tunnel that no one had noticed.
A dark underground passageway which was not one of the nine tunnels that they had discovered, and no one knew where it would lead.

 

Lu Ye scoured around, and he bent down, finding a patch of viscous liquid that was still slick and wet. 

 

The same type of secretion that insectoid hatchlings were born with the moment they broke out of their egg sacs.

 

That meant that some of the insectoids had left the nest and come this way.
That the patch was still wet indicated that the insectoids did not leave too long ago—a day at most.

 

That reminded Lu Ye of a possible scenario that Li Baxian had warned him about.
A sense of foreboding hung over him. 

“Go in and have a look?” Yi Yi suggested.

 

“I’m heading in.”

 

“I’m coming along,” Yi Yi added briskly. 

 

“All right.

 

“Take Amber with us.”

 

“Right.”

Yi Yi pranced off and went to fetch Amber.

 

Meanwhile, Lu Ye called Chen Yu to him before leaving Chen Yu instructions to watch over the others in his absence and to raise him over anything urgent.

 

Riding on Amber, Lu Ye and Yi Yi explored the unknown tunnel, plunging deeper into the darkness. 

 

He had Inviolable drawn in case of any surprises while he held aloft its scabbard with Glyph: Radiance activated like a flaming torch.
Yi Yi sat in front of him, and Amber bounded forward as quickly as it could.

 

That brought back some form of nostalgia like how all three of them used to travel together in the past, carefree and happy.
Yi Yi loved those days and being reminded of that left her in such a jovial mood that she began humming a tune. 

Lu Ye propped his chin on her head and the strands of her hair flailed in the passing wind, pricking his face gently enough to feel itchy. 

 

“Your head’s so heavy!” Yi Yi protested.

 

Lu Ye deliberately applied more force.

 

“I’m telling Sister Hua Ci about this!” wailed Yi Yi angrily, “I’ll have her deal with you!”

 

“Hua Ci, eh?” Lu Ye smirked.
He might be concerned with her before, but now that he knew her weakness and with the tiny spider golem still in his possession, the tables had been turned!

 

“You’ve grown bold enough to not fear Sister Hua Ci anymore, eh, Lu Ye?”

 

“And you seem to have forgotten whose surname you now carry,” Lu Ye clenched his fist and noogied her head with it.

“WAA! I’m a Lu! All right!” Yi Yi tried to push him away to no avail, “I’m Lu Yi Yi, all right, all right!”

 

The banter went on as the trio pressed forward through the tunnel. 

 

It took almost an hour before they finally reached somewhere they could sense the pulsing discharge of Spiritual Power up ahead, notwithstanding a loud, continuous buzzing.

 

Lu Ye quickly shut down Glyph: Radiance and fell quiet immediately, so did Yi Yi as well as Amber who padded forward quietly to maintain stealth.

 

Lu Ye patted the tiger’s back to motion for it to stop.
Next, he and Yi Yi clambered off its back and they sneaked forward themselves.
They reached a corner and peeked.
An incredible sight filled their visions.