"Gods, am I going to die?" Huai Shi opened his eyes from the severe pain, gasping violently. He felt an indescribable thirst and agony, as if his Stigma would shatter, his Source Substance depleted, and his vision grew dark. Then, a semi-transparent shadow drifted by his side.

It was like a shadow condensed from ashes, a pair of dimly glowing eyes staring silently at him, expressionless, nearly causing Huai Shi to jump up from the ground in fright. If only he could have jumped.

Soon, the gray shadow dissipated, morphing into the stiff face of Red Gloves, which made Huai Shi gasp for a while before he started choking violently.

"How did you turn into that ghostly appearance?"

"What appearance?" Red Gloves looked at him, puzzled. "I haven't changed at all."

"Bullshit, you obviously..."

Huai Shi hadn't finished his sentence when the image of Red Gloves before him changed again. This time, he finally realized that it wasn't just Red Gloves changing, but also himself. After that mysterious Bronze Mirror merged into his Soul, his eyes seemed to have undergone some transformation, allowing him to easily see through the surface of things when he focused.

Reflecting the essence. However, the little Source Substance he had barely recovered was drained by those two glances.

And with just that brief glimpse, he saw his own bones showing cracks, as well as countless tiny, worm-like things squirming in his blood like parasitic worms.

He looked down and saw the dreadful state of his body. His left leg, grazed by that putrid giant hand, had shattered into several pieces. His body was covered in countless wounds; he had almost perished on the spot. The most severe injuries were where the maggots had bitten him, with grayish poison entwining the wounds, a poison even his own resistance couldn't neutralize.

Through his semi-transparent flesh, he could see dense parasites sprouting in the wounds... and his own dimly operating Stigma. No matter how he looked at it, he seemed on the verge of death.

If Red Gloves hadn't sensed his danger and rushed over in time, taking over from the injured White Horse and performing emergency treatment, he might have succumbed to shock...

"Inhale."

Red Gloves opened the basket it carried and stuffed a handful of leaves into Huai Shi's hand.

Unlike Huai Shi, who had been severely injured by a mere graze from the Sun Shaman Embryo and nearly died for nothing, Red Gloves seemed to have reaped a bountiful harvest. Its basket was stuffed full of various plants Huai Shi didn't recognize, many brimming with such abundant life force that he was pleasantly surprised. These included about forty kinds of precious Abyss plants rich in life force. The rest were types Huai Shi had never seen before, all plucked branches and fruits. Huai Shi wasn't choosy; he grabbed a handful, sucked them dry in one breath, and only caught his breath after consuming nearly half the basket.

Meanwhile, Red Gloves was boiling something in a crucible it had found from who-knows-where.

"What is that?" Huai Shi asked.

"Butterfly Incense from India," replied Red Gloves, its hands never pausing as it poured the thick gel from the small crucible into a crude sieve. "I found some tobacco leaves and spices there and I'm trying to make some." Eventually, the residue in the sieve quickly turned into a gray powder.

The powder was mixed with dried, chopped tobacco leaves and stirred evenly. This mixture was then combined with juice extracted from Border plants and crudely shaped by hand into a conical form.

An incense cone was made.

This was a category of botanical applications in Alchemy, outside Huai Shi's area of expertise in Metallography. But he could tell that the tools were too rudimentary, and the technique wasn't particularly skillful. Much material had been wasted, so the concoction's potency probably wasn't great.

But it was enough. Metal repaired the body, and incense healed the Soul.

The Silver Blood Potion could heal wounds, and such incense produced by Alchemy was often used to recover Source Substance—unfortunately, except for a small amount of Thousand-Year Incense, most incense couldn't generate Source Substance out of thin air but could only stimulate the Soul to forcibly produce it. Like using adrenaline to fight off sleepiness, using it too much was harmful, not beneficial. But it was a critical situation, and compromises had to be made.

Pale Alchemy Fire emerged from Huai Shi's fingertips, touching the top of the incense cone and igniting it instantly. The white flame burned furiously, consuming the entire incense cone and reducing it to useless dust.

In its place, a wisp of refined, sky-blue smoke entered Huai Shi's nostrils. His complexion visibly regained its healthy hue. An abundance of Source Substance surged from the emptiness within his Soul, dispelling his drowsiness. He quickly estimated that he had replenished more than half of his 'blue bar,' though its upper limit had been slightly reduced.

However, Huai Shi's Source Substance was already more than three times greater than others of his rank. Given the urgency, a small loss wasn't a major issue. He could simply meditate more upon his return and recuperate for a while to recover it.

Finally climbing back from the edge of sudden death, Huai Shi took a deep breath and wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. "The parasites must be removed," he declared. That was the real critical issue.

He thought for a moment, drew out the Sacrificial Knife and the Sword of Virtue, and handed them to Red Gloves. "I'll direct; you perform the surgery. Small hammer for prying, big hammer to finish the job. Any problems?"

Red Gloves silently took the knife and sword, awaiting his command.

Sometimes, Huai Shi would doubt whether Red Gloves was still alive. After being endowed with memories, the transformation of the Legion's Yin Soul was stark, as lively as if the dead had been resurrected. But death is death; resurrection is impossible. What stood before him was merely a Stigma that bore the records of the deceased—at best, nothing more than a movable gravestone.

This was merely the result of the most basic record fragments fused with a Stigma. If the Heavenly Kingdom of old still existed, the effects produced by fusing with a higher-tier Stigma... probably wouldn't be much different from bringing the dead back to life, would they?

It was precisely because of this that he increasingly understood why the Heavenly Kingdom had fallen, and it wasn't without reason. Who would want to become someone else's puppet after death? This was even more detestable than necromancers playing with corpses. The sins committed by the deranged Creators of Utopia were probably not limited to this; the seeds for future division and collective ossification had likely been sown long ago.

Thinking of this, Huai Shi couldn't help but sigh as he heard thunder rumble from the cloudy Sky Dome. Gods battling. But no matter who won or lost between Dongxia Genealogy and Yingzhou Phylogeny, this was no longer related to someone as insignificant as himself... Although, having said that, Yingzhou Phylogeny would probably be the one to suffer the most losses, right?

Putting aside the size of the genealogies, the level of internal unity made the outcome clear.

Until now, he still didn't understand to what extent Yingzhou Phylogeny was incompetent to be fighting so viciously amongst themselves. Even if the Wu Family and the Dukes had a tradition of infighting and overthrowing each other for thousands of years, couldn't they manage to set aside differences and unite against such a formidable external threat? Now, even a Fifth Stage Saint Mark could be plucked by Dongxia Genealogy...

What a joke, that's a Fifth Stage Saint Mark we're talking about!

Unlike low-tier Stigmas that can be mass-produced with Alchemy and bought with money, it's a miracle truly reigning above the Fourth Stage—a walking nuclear weapon! Its presence in Current Circumstances needed to be announced. Merely approaching a national border would attract the attention of the Astronomical Society, as it was a humanoid destruction-seeding machine.

The demigods among humans!

How many Fifth Stage powerhouses does Yingzhou have? One? Two?

Even if they're all fools, there's no need to be such imbeciles, right?

What are they really thinking?

But what did any of this have to do with a 'Second Fifth' like him in the Astronomical Society?

While his mind wandered, Huai Shi, with the help of his newly acquired X-ray vision, had already pointed out a few parasites that had begun to nibble at his Stigma.

Red Gloves drew its sword and sliced down. The Sword of Virtue precisely made an incision, and then the damaged Sword Blade flicked, pulling out a parasite. The parasite, resembling an earthworm, screamed wildly once extracted. But the Sacrificial Knife immediately descended, consuming its vital energy and withering it to ash.

Even for those tangled around bones and irremovable, once the Sword Blade made an incision, the Sacrificial Knife plunged straight in. It drew out Huai Shi's vital essence along with the parasite, sucking it dry. At the moment of losing its life, it was digested by the Mountain Ghost's Stigma.

With the aid of the surgery, the struggling Stigma instantly began to operate smoothly. Immediately, countless threads of Source Substance from within started to strangle the foreign elements. After consecutive transformations, the Source Substance was endowed with the traits of the Parasitic Vine, beginning a reverse parasitism on the parasites, to the point where Huai Shi couldn't even tell which was more vicious or malicious—his power or the parasites.

Red Gloves worked quickly. Within minutes, the old wounds were all treated. Numbness gradually subsided, replaced by waves of tearing pain from his flesh.

That, however, was a minor issue.

First, he realigned the bones, then applied the Silver Blood Potion to seal the wounds. Finally, invoking the Mountain Ghost to embrace a tree and voraciously absorb energy completed the procedure. His depleted 'health bar' was visibly replenishing.

As for the toxins entwined within his body, Huai Shi thought for a moment, then simply pulled out the Spear of Compassion and stabbed it a couple of times into the poison-infested areas. The Green Crown Dragon's decay-inducing poison broke down most of the toxins, forcing them to expire. The remainder fell within Huai Shi's ability to handle. As for the Green Crown Dragon's poison, he had Raven's Antidote, so it wasn't a problem.

After one round of fighting poison with poison, Huai Shi had essentially recovered from his weakened state.

That was the good thing about the Mountain Ghost: it was extremely tenacious. As long as one didn't die on the spot, recovery was always possible.

Once he had recovered a bit, Huai Shi's death-courting tendencies began to stir again. After a moment of hesitation, he thought for a moment and said to Red Gloves, "Stab me."

Without a word, Red Gloves raised the Sacrificial Knife and aimed a stab at Huai Shi's chest. Its movements were swift, its attack fierce, almost infuriatingly precise.

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