179: Soul Eater

Chapter 178: Spirit-Devouring Insect

Zheng Yi became interested. He had not expected that within the vast harem, there was still someone hiding a Spiritual Root.

Thinking about it, about four or five years ago when he first selected consorts, he had chosen over five hundred beautiful women to enter the palace.

In these past few years, he had favored most of the women, leaving only about fifty or so little girls who had been only thirteen or fourteen years old at the time untouched.

After all, no matter how eager he was, he could not bring himself to act against such young girls, nor could he send them back home.

So Zheng Yi gathered these young girls together and had them raised in the palace for so long, just like Dongyun Jie and Dongyun Yu.

Could it be that the Spiritual Root bearer mentioned by Consort Yu was one of these young girls?

Calculating the time, those little girls who had been only thirteen or fourteen then had now grown into young women of seventeen or eighteen.

Dongyun Jie and Dongyun Yu were also about sixteen and could now be made consorts.

"Is it a woman from Youwei Palace?"

Youwei Palace was the palace where Zheng Yi raised these young girls.

He vaguely remembered there were about fifty-two of them.

A large number of eunuchs and maids were assigned to take care of them.

At the same time, several Shadow Guards were secretly hidden among them, watching over the many women and subtly changing their views of Zheng Yi.

"It is not them," Consort Yu said. "It is Princess Lingyin, who has newly entered the palace."

"Princess Lingyin... So it is her!"

Princess Lingyin, princess of the Nanzhao Kingdom, had already taken Xu Xuanwu as her husband, fantasizing about using Xu Xuanwu's power to carve out the Yun and Yue prefectures of Great Yu.

Unfortunately, who would have thought that Xu Mujun would shatter that plan single-handedly.

The entire Nanzhao Kingdom was trampled under Xu Mujun's feet.

Even she herself was forced by Xu Mujun under the banner of national righteousness, forcing the Nanzhao King to offer her to the Great Yu Emperor, that is, Zheng Yi.

Zheng Yi had originally only intended to regard her as a pawn and hostage, never expecting that this woman actually bore a Spiritual Root!

"By the way, what attribute Spiritual Root does this Princess Lingyin have?"

"Your Majesty, this woman has a three-attribute Medium Grade Spiritual Root, with the fire attribute accounting for the most, about fifty percent. The remaining Spiritual Root attributes are metal and earth."

"Fire attribute!"

Zheng Yi's eyes suddenly flashed.

His Five Elements Spiritual Root was complete with metal, wood, water, and earth, lacking only the fire attribute Spiritual Root.

Unexpectedly, he obtained it so quickly?

"You have come into contact with this woman. What do you think of her disposition?"

Consort Yu hesitated: "Princess Lingyin... is a person of passion. If Your Majesty wishes to bring her into the harem, it will take some effort."

"A person of passion?"

Zheng Yi became interested: "I like that. When I return to the palace, I will properly meet this Princess Lingyin."

"Your Majesty~ Your consort has found some things here; I believe Your Majesty will be very interested."

Suddenly Yuechan shouted from a distance. Zheng Yi and the others looked up.

At that moment, she was standing before a row of wooden shelves, holding a wooden box in her hands.

As they walked over and looked, they found that there were actually ten huge bookshelves placed here, each shelf holding rows of wooden boxes of similar shapes.

"What are these things?"

Zheng Yi also picked up a wooden box at random and tried to open it.

Yuechan said: "Your Majesty, these are spirit insects~"

"Oh? Spirit insects!"

Zheng Yi's eyes flickered, and he quickly looked over.

Sure enough, in the wooden box in his hand was indeed a black insect with special patterns on its back, shaped like a cricket.

"This is..."

According to the record on the piece of "Record of Strange Insects" left by the founding emperor, this should be a spirit insect called the "Heart-Boring Insect."

This insect loves the hearts of living creatures. It can reside at the heart and breathe along with the heartbeat.

If threatened, this insect can release toxins to affect the heart of a living creature, causing severe pain in the heart.

It is the best spirit insect for killing people, or rather, for controlling subordinates!

Unfortunately... this Heart-Boring Insect was dead.

Zheng Yi touched it; the corpse was already dried up.

"It's a pity it's dead."

Yuechan also opened her wooden box toward Zheng Yi: "Your Majesty, the 'Hidden-Wing Insect' in your consort's hand is also dead."

"It is said that once the Hidden-Wing Insect reaches maximum flying speed, it can even reach a state of invisibility, and even ordinary Cultivators' Divine Thoughts cannot detect it. It is the most suitable spirit insect for sneak attacks!"

"Could it be that all these wooden boxes contain spirit insects..."

Zheng Yi nodded and began browsing other wooden boxes again.

As expected, these rows of wooden boxes all contained various kinds of spirit insects.

"Golden Light Insect."

"Silk-Drawing Spider."

"Chaos Flying Mosquito."

"Six-Winged Frost Centipede..."

As he looked through row after row, Zheng Yi could not help but feel some heartache.

If only these spirit insects were all alive, how wonderful that would be!

Cui Xiabing asked curiously: "Why are there so many spirit insect corpses here?"

Zheng Yi explained: "This continent was previously the sphere of influence of the Fu You Sect and the Yellow Springs Sect. The Fu You Sect was a Sect that controlled insects. Since the ancestors of the Zheng family were able to replace them, there would surely be a large number of spirit insects in the clan treasury."

"But unfortunately, over three hundred years, these spirit insects all starved to death!"

Zheng Yi's mind stirred, and he suddenly said: "I remember it is recorded in the 'Record of Strange Insects' that several spirit insects have a lifespan of more than a hundred years. Hurry, look for any living spirit insects or insect eggs!"

"Yes!"

The few people quickly split up to search among these bookshelves.

Soon Yuechan shouted: "Your Majesty, over here!"

"I found... a really big insect!"

Zheng Yi and the others hurried over and saw a peculiar spirit insect that was as large as an adult's head.

Beside it were piled corpses of various spirit insects.

Some had been swallowed whole, while others had some broken limbs and remains left around.

Even stranger, beneath it there was actually spread a huge animal hide.

On the animal hide were densely packed insect eggs the size of sesame seeds.

"These are... spirit insect eggs!"

This insect corpse was much larger than all the insects they had seen before.

But the eggs it had laid were no different from ordinary spirit insect eggs.

"What kind of spirit insect corpse is this?"

Yuechan leaned in and looked up and down.

"It looks a bit like a Devouring-Gold Insect?"

"Black Fire Ant?"

"Ghost-Face Bee?"

"And why are there so many other spirit insect corpses here?"

"I speculate that the spirit insects that could appear here were all carefully selected by the founding emperor, put to sleep using the secret methods of the Yellow Springs Sect, so as to survive for a thousand years. But some insects woke up early for unknown reasons."

Zheng Yi guessed: "With no food, they could only kill and devour each other, treating the other as food."

"Until the last kind, or rather the last insect, remained and laid so many eggs."

"This spirit insect should be the Spirit-Devouring Insect."

"Spirit-Devouring Insect?"

"Mm."

Zheng Yi nodded: "A kind of insect that lives by devouring the Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi. It is ferocious and fierce, its body as hard as iron, impervious to swords, spears, fire, and water, very troublesome to deal with."

"As long as an object contains Spiritual Qi, it can devour it."

"Moreover, depending on the different Spiritual Qi it devours, it will gradually transform into a Devouring-Gold Insect with special abilities, possessing ever-changing forms."

"According to the 'Record of Strange Insects,' this kind of insect is already extinct. Unexpectedly, there is one here."

"What a pity it's already dead..."

"It hasn't completely died!"

Yuechan suddenly said: "Among those insect eggs, your consort can sense that many still have life aura. Perhaps they can be hatched!"

"Oh? The insect eggs have life aura? My Beloved Consort, are you sure you aren't mistaken?"

"That's right. We often hatch Gu insects back in the clan. This one, this one, and these few all have life aura. If placed in a warm place, they might be able to hatch Spirit-Devouring Insects."

"Unfortunately, the life aura of these insect eggs is too weak. I don't know if they can hatch at all."

Zheng Yi immediately put away these insect eggs and checked to see that there were still twenty-seven eggs surviving.

So what if the life aura was weak?

As long as he was willing to use his blood essence for a blood sacrifice, he would eventually be able to hatch them!

Then he examined the surrounding things, most of which were ordinary Cultivator Materials and tools.

Unfortunately, most of them looked greatly depleted of Spiritual Qi, with only a portion usable.

Even so, the three women were very excited, strolling through the treasury like shopping, occasionally picking out things they wanted.

In the end, they still arrived at the innermost part of the treasury, at a platform where several obviously important wooden boxes were placed.

Zheng Yi said: "Seven wooden boxes and five jade bottles should be the most precious items in the founding emperor's treasury."

"I wonder what could be inside?"

"How about this: the five of us will each pick one blindly and see what's inside these blind boxes."

"Blind boxes?"

Consort Cui asked strangely: "Your Majesty, what does 'blind box' mean?"

"It means these boxes. We don't know what's inside. Each person picks one blindly and sees what it is."

"Wow! How fun! Let me go first!"

Yuechan clapped her hands excitedly and was the first to come to the platform, looking at the wooden boxes and jade bottles of various sizes and shapes, hesitating over which to pick.

Zheng Yi laughed from the side: "Just grab one. The things are still here; they can't run away."

"Alright."

Yuechan glanced again at the things on the platform, and finally picked the largest wooden box, pulling it over to herself.

This wooden box was overall black-red in color, and its size was actually more than a person's height, a whole head taller than Yuechan.

Her petite body leaped up, and she directly sat on this wooden box, swinging her two little legs: "I've chosen mine, your turn."

"Beloved Consort, Elder Chen, please."

"Thank you, Your Majesty!"

Consort Cui and Consort Yu also came to the platform to carefully make their selections.

But Chen Liancang hesitated: "Your Majesty, this old servant need not participate."

"There's no need to be polite, Elder Chen. Between you and me, there is no need for such formalities."

Zheng Yi said: "When we have achieved success in cultivation, I will still need to rely greatly on you in the future."

Chen Liancang said gratefully: "Thank you, Your Majesty! This old servant will spare no effort to be loyal to Your Majesty!"

As he spoke, he casually took a jade bottle from the platform, the one closest to him, not knowing what was inside.

Soon, all five had made their selections.

Even Zheng Yi had picked up a palm-sized wooden box and looked at the others with interest.

"Alright, all the blind boxes have been selected. Let's see what's inside."

Zheng Yi said: "Who goes first?"

"Me, me, me!"

Yuechan was still the first to raise her hand: "Your consort's wooden box is the largest, so the thing inside is definitely the most precious!"