The First Immortal of Destiny-Chapter 460: Southern Poison Zone_1
"Fellow Daoist Shen, another five hundred li ahead is the burial site of the powerful entities," said the lead elder from the Five Poisons Cult, reducing the speed of his escaping light and transmitting his Divine Sense to Shen Mo. "However, from this point onwards, without any means to avoid poison, one must not proceed any further!"
As he spoke, a multicolored spirit light flickered on his body, and a fishy-sweet Demonic Qi emanated from within him, enveloping his body before he continued to fly forward.
As a Spirit Sea Realm powerhouse of the Five Poisons Cult, he had cultivated toxic arts since childhood, making his resistance to the Southern Poison Zone extremely strong. Yet, he dared not be careless and employed magical techniques to resist the myriad poisons’ corrosion!
Shen Mo raised his eyes and saw that everything within his sight was filled with an interspersed mixture of dazzling, colorful fog, stretching to the horizon and seemingly endless.
This was not an ordinary mountain mist, but the external manifestation of the Southern Poison Zone.
The flowers, grasses, and trees on the ground grew in all their glorious and vibrant beauty. However, Shen Mo noticed that every single weed, flower, and tree here carried intense toxins, constantly releasing them into the atmosphere and merging with the poisonous fog.
Even the small creatures flying and hopping around—bugs, snakes, frogs—were all toxic. Some were so deadly that even one insect could poison hundreds or thousands of people if brought to an ordinary city!
Moreover, Shen Mo’s sense detected that within the colorful fog, there were countless tiny Gu insects as small as mustard seeds. Their numbers were in the trillions, each one different from the other. In such a small area alone, Shen Mo could identify a million different varieties of tiny Gu insects.
What a remarkable Southern Poison Zone; it really lives up to its reputation! Shen Mo silently exclaimed.
Everything here—toxic flowers and exotic plants, bushes, vines, Vermilion Scaled Feathered Beings, mustard seed-sized Gu insects, and so on—had evolved into various forms of poisons over many years to adapt to the endlessly persisting poisonous miasma. They, in turn, released various toxins that pervaded heaven and earth. The original toxins further entangled, evolved, and integrated to form billions of new types of poisonous miasma, thus becoming what they are today!
It could be said that if one took just a breath of the nature’s spiritual energy of the Southern Area, one part was pure Primal Spirit, one part was all kinds of Turbid Qi, and the remaining eight parts were all fatally poisonous miasma.
Even Spirit Sea Realm and above practitioners, living and cultivating in this environment for a long time, would suffer irreversible damage to their organs, Dantian, chakras, and Daoist body and mind. Not only would progress in cultivation become difficult, but their Lifespan would also be reduced, leading to a much shorter life expectancy compared to cultivators of the same rank!
The disciples of the Five Poisons Cult cultivated potent toxic arts, granting them considerable strength. However, even they suffered from constant exposure to the poisonous miasma. Consequently, their Daoist bodies and minds were inferior to those of ordinary cultivators of the same rank, and their Lifespans were generally shorter by about 30 percent.
Although this immortal sect had quite a few Spirit Sea Realm cultivators, no one had ever reached the Golden Core Realm in several hundred years of cumulative cultivation. This clearly had a strong correlation with practicing toxic arts!
Excluding special cases, normal Qi Gathering Realm cultivators live for two hundred years, Spirit Sea Realm experts for five hundred, and Golden Core Realm elders for a thousand. But the disciples of the Five Poisons Cult, even those who cultivated to the Spirit Sea Realm, typically only live a little over three hundred years. Since their Daoist bodies and minds are constantly eroded by poison, the probability of them forming a Golden Core is extremely small!
After gathering his wandering thoughts, Shen Mo came to a sudden stop in his escaping light.
The disciples of the Riverside Sect behind him, those at Spirit Sea Realm, dispersed their escaping light, and the Qi Gathering Realm practitioners halted their artifact controlling. To look after the Gas Gathering Disciples, Elders like Clam Girl Ming Yu, alien minister Wu Gong, Guo Bai Ge, and several others at Spirit Sea Realm were flying swiftly around the periphery of the group. Meanwhile, Zhao Lingyin and about thirty other Qi Gathering Realm disciples were controlling their magic artifacts, guarded in the center of the formation.
Seeing Shen Mo stop his escaping light, Ming Yu, who was at the rear of the group, flew forward and asked, "Brother, what happened?"
"Don’t worry. Nothing major!" Shen Mo responded with a smile. Immediately, he announced loudly to everyone, "All Sect Disciples, take a Poison Avoiding Pill immediately. If you feel any discomfort later, report to me at once!"
To enter the Southern Poison Zone and assist the Ghost Corpse School in breaking into the Heavenly Monarch’s tomb, everyone had received the Poison Avoiding Elixir distributed by the Riverside Sect.
As everyone swallowed their Elixirs, Shen Mo began to chant and consecutively cast dozens of Constellations Palms.
BUZZ!
BUZZ BUZZ!
Streaks of spirit light flared, and a moment later, every disciple from the Riverside Sect was enveloped by the phantom of an Earth Bat.
In legends, the Earth Bat is an auspicious beast that drives away evil.
The Fairy Palm is one of the seven types of Palms from the Seven Constellations of the Northern Black Tortoise. It has the miraculous effect of avoiding poison, driving away miasma, and exterminating plagues. With both the Poison Avoiding Pill and the Palm for protection, penetrating five hundred li into the Poison Zone should pose no problems!
Concerning Shen Mo himself, blessed with the "Flawless" Skill, he could reject most of the Poisonous Demonic Qi from entering his body. Still, even with such protection, he swallowed a Poison Avoiding Elixir and cast an Earth Bat Palm on himself. After all, the Poison Zone contained numerous types of intense poisons, some of which could invade one’s spirit and body through mere skin contact, poisoning a cultivator to death, body and soul!
It’s better to be safe; it doesn’t take much effort anyway.
Of course, whether it was the Poison Avoiding Pill, magic, or Skills, all had their limits.
Merely stepping five hundred li into the colorful poisonous fog of the Poison Zone would naturally be foolproof. But if one were to venture deeper, even Shen Mo, with his "Flawless" Skill, might not withstand the increasingly intense poison and Gu insect miasma. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺
According to the Riverside Sect’s Manuals, in the deepest parts of the Southern Area, even poisonous flowers, exotic grasses, or tiny Gu insects could not survive. There, ninety-nine percent of nature’s spiritual energy was poisonous Demonic Qi; the negligible breath of Primal Spirit could be ignored. In such conditions, even the soil or rocks deep underground, if casually dug up, could poison a fairly strong cultivator to death—truly terrifying.
However, such places also tended to give birth to various Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures, including poisoned earth fire, and mineral deposits containing the ultimate essence of poison.
Someday, if I successfully form my Golden Core, a trip deep into the Poison Zone will surely yield huge rewards!
After applying a Palm to every disciple of the Riverside Sect, Shen Mo reignited his escaping light and flew towards the Five Poisons Cult elder ahead.
After flying into the poisonous, colorful mist, the Earth Bat phantom enveloping his Dao Body made a continuous ZZZZ sound under the erosion of the poison and burst out tiny, multicolored specks of light.
Fortunately, Shen Mo’s Constellation Great Hand Seal had already reached the "Transcendence" realm and was not far from Extremely Perfection. Thus, even a simple Fairy Palm could withstand this level of poisonous miasma erosion, its spirit light remaining undiminished and its complex runes flowing normally.
Two Shichen later, the group finally reached the area where the Heavenly Monarch’s tomb was located. The Heaven Sword Sect had arrived a few days prior, but the Profound Moon School and the Seven Stars Altar had not yet arrived.
At the foot of a relatively flat mountain, the Ghost Corpse School had already built a temporary camp and set up a Formation to dispel the poisonous miasma.
Soon after Shen Mo led the Riverside Sect disciples to settle in the camp, several Elders from the Ghost Corpse School, along with more than ten elite disciples including Li Chen, came to visit.
