In the blink of an eye, over a dozen days passed.
Inside the mountain body, the underground stone forest.
Squeak, squeak, squeak!
Dozens of Jade Eye Stone Monkeys flashed their blurry figures in mid-air.
They continuously leaped and bounded, launching fierce attacks toward Fang Yuan.
If it were in the past, Fang Yuan would undoubtedly have retreated. But today, he stood perfectly in place, his expression indifferent, remaining entirely motionless.
The stone monkeys crashed, scratched, and bit onto Fang Yuan's body, emitting crisp clinking sounds, as if what they were besieging was not a human, but a solid jade pillar.
A faintly shining white jade light clung tightly all over Fang Yuan's body. Although this layer of light was much thinner than the Jade Skin Gu's emerald green jade light, its defensive power was more than twice as high.
The Jade Skin Gu's defense could at most withstand the simultaneous attacks of sixteen stone monkeys, but right now Fang Yuan was single-handedly facing over thirty stone monkeys.
"On the arena, I was able to shatter Fang Zheng's Jade Skin Gu defense barehanded, but if Fang Zheng used this White Jade Gu, I'm afraid even if I broke my hand bones, I wouldn't be able to break this defense."
Fang Yuan pondered in his heart while simultaneously separating a portion of his mind to pay attention to his aperture's primeval sea.
In the red iron primeval sea, the White Jade Gu sank to the bottom of the sea, constantly absorbing primeval essence. Its surface also emitted a faintly shining white jade light, just like a light bulb.
Every time a stone monkey attacked Fang Yuan once, the surface of this oval-shaped cobblestone-like White Jade Gu would also flash slightly.
At the same time, Fang Yuan felt the consumption of his primeval essence intensify by an imperceptible trace.
"The defense of the White Jade Gu, just like the Jade Skin Gu, requires continuously pouring primeval essence into it. At the same time, the more attacks it withstands, the more intense the primeval essence consumption becomes." Fang Yuan summarized in his heart.
Simultaneously, he abruptly launched a counterattack.
Punching and kicking, he raised a gust of whistling wind. His moves were simple yet ruthless, his momentum sharp and aggressive.
Although the White Boar Gu had disappeared, the strength it brought to Fang Yuan had been retained within his body.
Stone monkeys were continuously struck by Fang Yuan. Some were kicked flying, crashing against the stone pillars; others were directly beaten to death in mid-air, turning into stones before falling to the ground and smashing to pieces.
At the same time, with flicks of Fang Yuan's hands, moonblades flew out piece after piece, like the scythe of the grim reaper, harvesting the lives of the stone monkeys.
Urged by the red iron primeval essence, every single strike of the Rank One Moonlight Gu dealt the maximum attack effect to the stone monkeys.
Squeak, squeak…
The stone monkeys shrieked in terror, continuously retreating.
In the short moment of Fang Yuan's counterattack, a massive number of stone monkeys perished, leaving only five or six behind.
Fang Yuan killed another one, and the remaining stone monkeys finally collapsed, scurrying around in panic and fleeing deep into the stone forest.
Fang Yuan did not chase after these defeated waifs and strays, but instead continued to advance, venturing deeper toward the center of the stone forest.
These past few days, he had been diligently exploring the next clue of the inheritance. As his continuous exploration expanded, the periphery of the stone forest had all been trodden upon without any discoveries.
Fang Yuan reached a sudden realization, vaguely guessing the Flower Wine Monk's thoughts. He felt that the next clue was highly likely arranged by the Flower Wine Monk directly in the absolute center of this underground stone forest.
The deeper he went into the stone forest, the more massive the stone pillars became, and the more stone monkeys resided within them.
As Fang Yuan walked, he looked into the distance—in the center of the stone forest, there was a single, most gigantic stone pillar. Even if over a dozen adults joined hands to encircle it, they would not be able to encompass it.
This stone pillar was his upcoming destination.
However, the deeper he ventured, the larger the scale of the stone monkey groups became, and the difficulty naturally climbed higher.
Fang Yuan took a crucial step, breach a monkey group's warning line.
Squeak, squeak, squeak!
From individual black holes on the stone pillars, angry Jade Eye Stone Monkeys instantly drilled out, numbering no less than a full hundred, and pounced toward Fang Yuan.
Fang Yuan turned around and ran.
Facing the attacks of so many stone monkeys simultaneously, even with the White Jade Gu, he could not parry them.
The stone monkey group pursued Fang Yuan for a while, and one after another, monkeys gave up the chase and turned back. Gradually, only thirty or so stone monkeys remained hanging behind Fang Yuan.
Seeing the time was ripe, Fang Yuan turned around and fought.
After a bout of killing, only a few stone monkeys were left fleeing in panic, not even daring to return to their original stone holes.
Taking turns doing this several times, Fang Yuan slaughtered over a hundred stone monkeys. Along the way, the shattered stone fragments of the monkeys after death could be seen everywhere.
"Primeval essence is insufficient." Fang Yuan checked his primeval sea and sighed, forced to stop his advancing footsteps.
If it were in the past, he would have long used primeval stones to conduct rapid recovery. But now, ever since he fusion-refined the White Jade Gu, his primeval stones were severely insufficient; it could be said that his economy had thoroughly collapsed.
Fang Yuan picked up all the jade stone eyeballs scattered on the ground one by one, storing them in a pouch.
"It should be right beneath that central stone pillar, but for me to reach there, I must forcefully open up a path." This feeling grew stronger and stronger. Fang Yuan cast one last look back, opened the stone door, and returned to the second secret room.
In the corner of the secret room, some miscellaneous items were piled up.
A small gunny sack contained several hundred eyeball jade beads. Fang Yuan opened it and poured the jade beads harvested today inside.
The jade beads collided against each other, emitting a series of crisp sounds.
There was another gunny sack containing wild boar tusks. But right now, Fang Yuan no longer needed to slaughter wild boars.
He had successfully fusion-refined the White Jade Gu using the White Boar Gu and Jade Skin Gu. The disappearance of the White Boar Gu caused his demand for boar meat to drop to zero.
The newly born White Jade Gu leaned more towards the Jade Skin Gu; its food was equally jade stones.
The Jade Skin Gu needed to consume two taels of jade stones every ten days, whereas the White Jade Gu required feeding eight taels of jade stones every twenty days.
Generally speaking, the higher the rank of the Gu worm, the longer the intervals between food intake. For Rank Two Gu worms, the vast majority exceeded half a month. Rank Three Gu worms would exceed a month.
Of course, the higher the rank of the Gu worm, the more its food intake increased. Calculating on average, the feeding cost of the White Jade Gu was even more than the Jade Skin Gu and the White Boar Gu combined.
But for Fang Yuan, with this underground stone forest, he fundamentally did not lack jade stones. At the same time, no longer needing boar meat meant he didn't need to slaughter wild boars, which saved him a lot of trouble and a lot of time.
Tying up the mouth of the gunny sack, Fang Yuan picked up a cowhide water skin beside it.
The water skin was bulging, filled to the brim with Golden Bee honey wine. As early as a few days ago, Fang Yuan had relied on the Jade Skin Gu to withstand the Golden Bees' attacks and collected an ample amount of honey wine from the beehives.
"The primeval stones currently on my body are only two and a half pieces. It is time to go to the Internal Affairs Hall and hand in the family property mission."
Fang Yuan kept the cowhide water skin in his chest, retreated through the underground tunnel, squeezed out of the rock crack, and returned to the outside world.
At this time, it was only dusk.
The dusk of winter days had fine weather and didn't feel cold. The setting sun displayed a warm and cozy orange-red, and the delicate sunlight filtered through the canopies of the pine trees, shining onto the mountainous land.
He walked alone all the way, heading towards the mountain village.
However, Fang Yuan did not proceed directly forward, but instead deliberately took a few detours to hopefully reduce the probability of the secret rock crack cave being discovered.
The winter wind brushed against his face; this was all the taste of freedom.
Previously in the academy, he could only come over stealthily at night. Now that Fang Yuan had advanced to Rank Two, moving freely in and out during the daytime would not arouse suspicion.
Of course, the more crucial point was the death of the Sick Snake's group of four, leaving Fang Yuan alone and reducing a layer of bindings.
The only obstacle was that Fang Yuan was now just one person without the support of group members by his side; moving forward, completing the clan's mandatory missions of at least once per month would inevitably be much more difficult.
Now, after the small beast tide, the reorganization of the various groups had already been completed, and Fang Yuan had already missed this opportunity.
Furthermore, because of his reputation, Fang Yuan was also faintly ostracized by other Gu Masters. Wanting to join another group would not be easy.
"So be it if I'm ostracized. The more I drift on the outside, the fewer gazes pay attention to me, which is more beneficial to me. As for the clan's monthly missions, they are all mandatory, so I naturally must accept them. However…"
Thinking of this, a chilling light seeped out of Fang Yuan's eyes; he had long held plans regarding this.
The clan side mandatorily required a Gu Master to accept at least one mission every month, but did not strictly mandate that this mission had to be completed.
If the mission could not be completed, the evaluation would drop. This was something almost all Gu Masters were unwilling to see, thus they exhausted all their efforts without exception to complete them.
But to Fang Yuan, the so-called evaluation was lower than a fart!
Walking into the mountain village, the blue flagstone-paved streets had an endless stream of pedestrians.
Usually, around this time was the peak period for human traffic.
Many Gu Masters, having completed their missions, returned to the mountain village bearing injuries and wretched appearances. Farmers who had toiled for a day walked forward silently with muddy bare feet, dragging their exhausted bodies.
In this world, people's lives were not easy; everyone had bitterness and pain.
The setting sun gradually dipped to the mountaintops, broadcasting the last bit of mild light. Then this light was clipped and broken up by the uneven, crisscrossing bare tree branches, turning into a puddle of time fragments scattered onto the green bamboo building walls.
"Aiya, my toy." A young girl yelled, chasing after a spinning top amongst the crowd.
The spinning top happened to roll under Fang Yuan's feet, and the young girl also bumped into Fang Yuan's leg and fell to the ground.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry! We crashed into Lord Gu Master, I beg your forgiveness!" The young girl's father hurriedly arrived. Seeing Fang Yuan's attire, his face turned as pale as paper. Pulling the young girl along, he kneeled on the spot, kowtowing to Fang Yuan endlessly.
The young girl cried out of terror, teardrops rustling down her fair, tender, and pink little face.
The mortals by the roadside seeing this scene all took detours without exception, retreating left and right.
Some Gu Masters cast indifferent glances, then immediately shifted their eyes away.
"Stop crying, you troublemaker!" The father was shocked, angry, and terrified. Throwing a slap with his hand, his wrist was instead grabbed by Fang Yuan, unable to move a single inch.
"It is only a small matter, no need to take it to heart." Fang Yuan smiled faintly, reached out to pat the young girl's little head, and comforted her softly, "No need to be afraid, everything is fine."
The young girl stopped her crying, looking up at Fang Yuan with watery eyes, feeling that this big brother before her was truly gentle.
"Thank you for your magnanimity, Lord, thank you for your magnanimity, Lord!" The young girl's father wept tears of joy, kowtowing to Fang Yuan endlessly.
Fang Yuan continued walking forward.
The house he rented was not far away.
And beneath that bamboo building, Uncle Gu Yue Dong Tu stood, looking at Fang Yuan from a distance, evidently waiting for him.