Chen Zhou looked beyond the altar, a thought flickering in his mind.
"Plague Rat."
"Squeak!"
A dark shadow darted out from the corner. Plague Rat revealed himself and gave a sloppy, casual bow. "Lord, what are your orders?"
"Pack up. You're coming with me on a long journey."
"A long journey? Where to?" Plague Rat perked up instantly.
"The southern region of Gloomlight Province, Ten Thousand Miasma Valley."
"Ten Thousand Miasma Valley?!"
Plague Rat's eyes widened, and he rubbed his paws together in excitement. "What a wonderful place! That's a holy land for poison production! My lord, you truly understand this rat!"
Chen Zhou nodded slightly.
The little rat could refine poison into essence. The poison-shrouded lands of the southern Gloomlight Province would be like water to a fish for him—it was essentially a professional match.
"Piao, Plague Rat, the two of you will be my overt attendants," Chen Zhou commanded.
"As you command!"
"Jian Huaishuang." Chen Zhou turned his gaze toward Jian Huaishuang.
"Your subordinate is here."
"You will provide support from the shadows. I do not want any 'surprises' occurring at the banquet."
"Understood." Jian Huaishuang's figure faded away once more.
If it truly came down to a brawl, with the Lie Sword Domain available, there was nothing to fear.
Chen Zhou pondered for a moment, feeling as though something was still missing.
"Right. Since we are attending a formal gathering, we need some prestige."
"Just two ghost attendants won't do. I should have a few maids as well, shouldn't I?"
It was the Great Demon Assembly, after all. He had to give them some face. If he didn't have any actual monsters in his retinue, wouldn't it make the foundations of the City of the Wrongfully Dead look weak?
The little black snakes still had fields to plow, and Nie Chaoxi was a spirit beast. That left only the three little flower demons who were growing remarkably well under the spiritual nourishment of the Gathering Fortune Pavilion.
They had been working on greening projects with Lu Cheng, busy every day. They were no longer the frail creatures below the first-stage they once were; they had now reached the third-stage of cultivation.
"Send word. Have those three flower demons report for duty."
Chen Zhou took one last look toward the City of the Wrongfully Dead, his heart filled with a sense of stability.
With the unaging pine guarding the home, he felt at ease.
The old fellow's combat strength was incredibly high. It had even been able to lock onto Lady Zhi while she was in the dream interlayer and kill her with a single strike. There was nothing to worry about.
Before long, the three flower demons timidly walked in from outside the altar.
However, they did not look like the colorful, lush, and beautiful beings they were when he first saw them.
The three flower demons had all become quite bare.
All the extra leaves and petals on their bodies had fallen away, leaving only smooth stalks. On their heads, the vibrant floral crowns had vanished, replaced by blood-red flowers the size of garlic cloves.
The flowers were small, with petals curling outward, a color so hauntingly red it looked like fresh blood.
"Hurry, hurry! The Bone God is waiting for us!"
"Oh my, my petals... oh, wait, I don't have petals anymore, hahaha!"
"Look at my flower. Isn't it the reddest one here?"
The three flower demons held their heads high and chests out, looking immensely satisfied with their new appearance.
Upon seeing Chen Zhou, the flower demons' faces—which had not yet fully transformed into human form—immediately flushed with excitement.
With a 'thump,' they knelt in a neat row, kowtowing repeatedly with fanaticism and joy.
"We pay our respects to the Bone God!"
"Thanks to your grace for saving our lives and allowing us to stay in the City of the Wrongfully Dead, we were able to bask in your divine favor and become this beautiful!"
"To serve by your side and work for you is the greatest honor of our lives!"
In their eyes, being able to transform into a form that matched the aesthetic of the City of the Wrongfully Dead was a supreme blessing bestowed by their god.
Chen Zhou: "..."
Chen Zhou didn't know if they had changed their form because he had obscured the heavenly secrets and the nature of all things, or because of his divine power.
Or perhaps, after being around Lu Cheng for so long, they had simply been influenced by his environment and their aesthetics had been assimilated.
It was a headache.
Chen Zhou didn't think they were ugly. It was fine, really. Blood-red garlic flowers, where the flowers and leaves never met—it did have a certain charm suited for the Underworld.
"Rise," Chen Zhou spoke indifferently. "You shall accompany me on this trip."
"As you command!!"
Chen Zhou was in no hurry to set out immediately.
As the protagonist of this treacherous banquet, arriving late was the only way to maintain his status.
He delayed for half a month, patiently waiting for the cooldown of [Offerings] to reset, ensuring he held the ultimate trump card in his hand.
With everything prepared, Chen Zhou stepped down from the Nine-Skull Throne, the Eternal Calamity Karma-Fire shimmering beneath his black robe.
"Well then..."
"Thousand-Eyed Toad Saint, I hope the ingredients you've prepared for this banquet are sufficient."
Southern region of Gloomlight Province, the Ten Thousand Mountains.
This was a wild, desolate land shrouded in lethal poison and miasma.
The deeper one went, the dimmer the daylight became, with toxic mists everywhere.
This time, Chen Zhou did not choose to possess any vessel.
The distance between Thousand Isles County and the southern region of Gloomlight Province was vast. Hong Ling and Shitou were not evil spirits; accidents could easily happen to them.
Furthermore, to fit his persona as the master of the Bone Temple, Chen Zhou used an old method.
Communion.
He targeted a ghost servant for communion.
"As expected, a skeletal frame is more fitting for the occasion."
Chen Zhou moved his brand-new bone body.
He wore the black robe of the Eternal Calamity Karma-Fire. Beneath the robe were grim, white bones. His aura was restrained, yet an innate majesty emanated from him.
Plague Rat and Piao followed closely behind him like loyal guards, one on each side.
The three flower demons followed quietly at the back, but their cultivation was low after all. After inhaling too much toxic miasma, they inevitably became dizzy.
Plague Rat glanced at them and casually pulled three mist masks from his robe, throwing them over roughly.
"Useless things. You can't even handle this little bit of poison? How embarrassing. Put these on; they can block the toxins."
"Lord Rat is warning you: while we are out, do not dare tarnish our master's prestige, or you can crawl back on your own."
The flower demons treated the masks like priceless treasures and were immensely grateful to Plague Rat.
Plague Rat snorted, folded his arms, and stopped paying them any mind, trotting along beside Chen Zhou.
Chen Zhou walked calmly through the toxic mist.
A bone body was immune to all such things.
Even the corpse poison in the secret realm could do nothing to a skeleton, let alone mere miasma.
Piao was even less of a concern; she herself was a convergence of copper poison and famine. To her, this miasma was no different from air.
The group moved swiftly, soon penetrating deep into the heart of the southern region.
Half a day later, a towering, majestic city appeared at the end of the toxic mist.
Chaiwang City.
The foremost demon city of the southern Gloomlight Province and the mandatory passage to the Ten Thousand Miasma Valley.
The style of this city was entirely different from those of the human race; it was crude and primitive.
The city walls were built from black mud mixed with the carapaces of giant poisonous insects, forced into a structure a hundred zhang high. The walls were covered in dark green fungi that twitched slightly.
At the city gate, two massive stone toad statues continuously spat out five-colored toxic mists as city defenses.
The demon soldiers guarding the gate were dozens of burly, bipedal scorpions.
They wore crude furs and held venom-dipped bone spears, lazily leaning against the walls while shouting and inspecting the passing demons.
"Stop! Where are you from?"
"Snake demons from the Black Marsh. Here is our invitation."
"Hmm, go in. Next!"
"Hiss... we are subordinates of the Mist Forest, the Poison Spider clan, here for the assembly..."
"Go in!"
As Chen Zhou's group approached, a scorpion extended its pincer to block them.
"Halt!"
"What is your business? Do you have an invitation from the four demon kings?"
Chen Zhou stopped walking. He did not speak, nor did he move; he simply turned his hollow eye sockets toward Piao at his side.
A single look.
Piao understood immediately.
She stepped forward, a cruel smile appearing on her exquisite face.
"An invitation?"
"Right here."
Under the startled gazes of the two scorpion demons, Piao's human face instantly transformed into an insectoid one, her mandibles hideous.
Her body then began to break apart, turning into a cloud of copper-colored flying locusts that blotted out the sun.
"Enemy attack—!"
The scorpion demons were terrified and jerked their venomous stingers upright.
But it was too late.
The storm of locusts gave them no chance, drowning them instantly.
"Ah... help...!"
The scream only made it halfway before being cut short.
Crunch... crunch...
The sound of chewing followed.
In just two breaths, the storm swirled back and reformed into Piao's tall, slender figure.
She extended the tip of her tongue and licked the corner of her mouth, countless fragmented images flashing through her heterochromatic pupils.
Dead silence fell over the gate of Chaiwang City.
All the demons waiting in line to enter froze where they stood, looking in horror at the beautiful woman who was slowly retracting her insectoid state.
Burp.
Piao let out a small burp.
She expressionlessly turned around and retreated behind Chen Zhou, as if she had just performed a trivial task.
Chen Zhou took a step forward, and the group walked into Chaiwang City with great fanfare.
Not one of the hundreds of demons at the gate dared to make a sound. Instead, they instinctively backed away to both sides, clearing a wide path and watching as this group of fiends entered the city.
As she walked, Piao digested the information she had just consumed.
Her golden-slit pupils flickered slightly, and soon she approached Chen Zhou to report in a low voice:
"My lord."
"As you suspected, this city is called Chaiwang City, a territory directly under the Thousand-Eyed Toad Saint.
"This Great Demon Assembly was jointly invited by the four demon kings, and almost all poisonous demon clans in the southern region of Gloomlight Province have responded.
"The assembly is set for tomorrow at the Black Bone Hall in the center of the Ten Thousand Miasma Valley.
"On the surface, the assembly is to discuss how to handle the power vacuum in Thousand Isles County after the fall of Sukhavati, but in reality..."
Piao paused, refining the memories of those scorpions.
"...In reality, it is a test for you by the Thousand-Eyed Toad Saint."
"It wants to know if its new neighbor is a friend or a foe, a fat prize or a lean threat."
Chen Zhou listened calmly, his skeleton frame moving forward under the black robe.
"What is the situation in the city?"
"It is very lively," Piao replied. "The demon clans under the four demon kings, as well as various lesser demons, have all gathered here.
"The demonic aura is thick, and the order is chaotic."
Chen Zhou nodded slightly. As he walked, he surveyed the demon city.
The sides of the streets were indeed like a massive market for poisonous things.
There were spider spirits wearing clothes woven from giant spider silk, snake demons selling various venoms, and mushroom people with mushroom caps hawking lethal spores.
Demonic aura, fishy smells, and miasma—all sorts of nauseating scents mixed together.
Suddenly, Chen Zhou stopped.
His gaze fell upon a stall by the street.
It was a stall built from massive beast bones. Behind the stall was a bloated frog demon merchant.
And on its stall sat cages of all sizes.
The cages were filled with various living creatures.
There were common livestock like pigs, cows, and sheep.
But next to these animals were over a dozen larger iron cages.
Inside those cages were dozens of humans, their expressions numb and their clothes tattered.
There were both men and women.
"Human-livestock for sale! Human-livestock for sale!"
The frog demon merchant shouted vigorously. It picked up a spiked whip and lashed a man across the back, leaving a bloody welt.
"Snap out of it, all of you!"
"Take a look! Witness the finest blood-food!"
"Just brought back from the human pens raised by Lord Chaiwang! Absolutely fresh, with a firm texture!"
A sludge-like demon walked over and pointed with interest at a bound young girl. "How much for this one?"
"Hehe, you have a good eye, customer," the frog demon laughed. "This one is of high quality and still a virgin. As you know, such human-livestock tastes the best."
"As for the price, hehe, just one fourth-stage poisonous item or two portions of third-stage flesh."
The sludge demon looked like it had seen a ghost. "Two portions? Why don't you just go out and rob someone?"
Chen Zhou stood silently before the stall.
Seeing this, Plague Rat immediately understood. He stepped forward and shouted arrogantly:
"Hey, you frog."
"Our master is buying everything at this stall."
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