Modern Chemical Knowledge

The four of them didn't have time to adjust their breathing, immediately sprinting toward the Bone-Rotting Forest.

The ground of the Blackwater Marsh was slick and muddy. Every step felt like a tug-of-war with the swamp, and even worse, those seemingly solid mossy patches could turn into a devouring mire at any moment.

"Watch your step!" Li Nanzhu suddenly grabbed Jiang Yifan's sleeve. "That's a disguised bog!"

Jiang Yifan broke into a cold sweat—the spot he had nearly stepped on was covered in emerald moss, but it was actually a hidden death trap. In the moment he dithered, a slender black shadow suddenly shot out from the mud!

Snap!

Feng Weilan's blade flashed, slicing the ambushing bone-rotting leech in two. The severed body parts continued to writhe frantically, spraying a highly corrosive black liquid from the wounds.

"Damn it!" Jiang Yifan's vambrace was splashed, and blue smoke immediately began to rise. "It's a bone-rotting leech!"

Li Nanzhu quickly cast a karmic fire lotus to incinerate the affected area.

This venomous insect was unique to the Blackwater Marsh; its body fluids could corrode magic tools. A regular cultivator would have their flesh separated from their bone if they were touched by even a drop.

"We can't stop!" Feng Qingping urged. "The mother nest's tentacles can travel underground!"

As if to prove her point, the ground a hundred meters behind them suddenly exploded, and a tentacle as thick as a water barrel burst forth!

Even more terrifying, the tentacle's surface was actually covered in the slime of bone-rotting leeches, having clearly adapted to the environment of the Blackwater Marsh!

"Good grief!" Jiang Yifan cursed. "It's evolving too fast!"

"What on earth did those evil cultivators create?" Feng Qingping's face was grim. She never expected the mother nest to be this difficult to handle; judging by a cultivator's strength, each tentacle was currently at least at the Golden Core stage!

The four of them fled for their lives, but the swamp terrain severely hampered their speed.

Seeing the tentacles closing in, Feng Weilan suddenly turned. "To the Bone-Rotting Forest! The toxicity there can stall it!"

The bone-rotting tree was one of the most dangerous plants in the Blackwater Marsh. If one wasn't careful, the resin secreted by the trunk could kill even a Nascent Soul cultivator. But right now, it was their only hope.

The moment they rushed into the woods, Li Nanzhu was made dizzy by the pungent stench of decay.

The twisted trunks were covered in honeycomb-like holes, and each hole housed fist-sized poison bees. Their intrusion immediately alerted these guardians, and a black cloud of a swarm took to the sky!

"Get down!" Feng Qingping threw out a talisman, which transformed into a cyan light shield to protect the four of them.

The poison bees slammed into the shield, making a tooth-grinding sizzling sound.

Their stingers could actually corrode spiritual energy! The light shield grew thinner at a visible rate.

"It won't last long!" Feng Qingping gritted her teeth. "Find cover!"

"Head that way!" Jiang Yifan pointed to an exceptionally thick bone-rotting tree deep in the forest. "The older the tree, the stronger the toxicity!"

The four of them pushed forward with difficulty under the assault of the poison bees.

Li Nanzhu's karmic fire lotus rotated around her, incinerating any bees that got close, but the swarm was simply too massive. Her spiritual energy was being consumed at an alarming rate.

Feng Weilan suddenly stopped. "Wait!" He pointed to the ground. "These marks..."

A few shriveled poison bee corpses were scattered on the ground, with obvious drag marks around them. Li Nanzhu followed the marks and found they all led in the same direction—toward a massive bone-rotting tree with a natural crack in its trunk.

"Something is preying on the poison bees..." Li Nanzhu's eyes lit up. "It might be a predator-prey relationship!"

Jiang Yifan immediately understood her meaning. "Lead them to attack each other!"

The four of them changed direction and dashed toward the cracked bone-rotting tree.

The tentacles behind them had already entered the forest, toppling the bone-rotting trees as they passed and inciting more angry attacks from the poison bees.

"A little closer..." Feng Qingping calculated the distance. "Now!"

She suddenly dropped the protective shield, and Li Nanzhu took the chance to throw out three gale talismans!

The violent air currents swept a large number of poison bees toward the cracked bone-rotting tree. Almost simultaneously, a crimson long tongue shot out from the crack like a bolt of lightning, instantly snatching dozens of bees!

"It's a bone-rotting toad!" Jiang Yifan said in pleasant surprise. "It really did build its nest here!"

The provoked swarm immediately redirected their target, madly attacking the tree.

Three toads as large as calves soon jumped out from the crack. Their bodies were covered in lumps that looked like bone-rotting trees, and their backs had holes like poison bee nests.

The two types of venomous creatures instantly began to fight, with poisonous stingers and venom interweaving in the air. The four of them took the opportunity to hide behind a fallen bone-rotting tree, finally getting a moment to breathe.

"Clever," Feng Weilan praised rarely. "But this will only delay them for a while."

It was true. The mother nest's tentacles were already gradually adapting to the toxicity of the bone-rotting trees. Although some tentacles were distracted by the venomous creatures, more of them continued to close in on them.

Li Nanzhu suddenly noticed the scattered resin on the ground. "Fourth Senior Brother, you said this resin could kill a Nascent Soul?"

"That's right, but it's too dangerous. We don't have time to refine it..."

"I don't need to refine it." Li Nanzhu took several empty bottles from her storage bag. "Just collect the raw fluid directly. I have a way."

Though confused, the three of them quickly helped her collect the resin.

Li Nanzhu poured the resin into a specialized jade bottle and then pulled a small cloth bag from her robes—it contained a small amount of star-patterned iron powder.

"What are you doing?" Feng Qingping asked in surprise.

"Making a bomb." Li Nanzhu rapidly mixed the star-patterned iron powder with the resin. her movements carried a precise rhythm completely different from the alchemy of the cultivation world. It was the knowledge from another world coming into play.

"The main components of star-patterned iron are iron oxide and star sand..." she whispered to herself. Flames formed a stable heating zone at the bottom of the bottle. The training Xiao Yan had once given her now served as the foundation for her daring attempt.

"The compounds in the resin will start to decompose at around 120 degrees..."

The other three looked at each other. Although they didn't understand what Li Nanzhu was saying, not one of them spoke to interrupt her.

Li Nanzhu carefully controlled the temperature, her mind rapidly recalling the experimental content she had once studied.

The viscous resin liquid began to separate into layers after being heated. The volatile components in the upper layer reacted violently with the star-patterned iron powder, making a faint hissing sound.

"I need a catalyst..." She bit her finger and dripped several drops of blood into the mixture. "The iron ions in the hemoglobin and the spiritual energy should be able to..."

Before she finished speaking, the liquid in the bottle suddenly churned violently, turning from dark green to an eerie fluorescent green. Li Nanzhu immediately withdrew the flames.

Suisui also suddenly raised its tail, and the ice mist it spat out condensed into hexagonal frost flowers in the air, rapidly cooling the mixture!

"Good job, Suisui!" Her eyes sparkled. "The redox reaction has begun!"

Jiang Yifan leaned over, looking at the constantly changing colors of the liquid in the bottle in shock. "This... this isn't alchemy at all!"

"It's a more efficient way to react." Li Nanzhu carefully swirled the jade bottle to make the reaction more uniform. "In my... hometown, this is called a chemical reaction."

She quickly used talisman paper to fold a simple buffering device and fixed it to the mouth of the bottle. "It's like mixing fire oil and saltpeter, but a hundred times more violent!"

Feng Weilan suddenly pressed down on her wrist. "Are you sure you can control it?"

Li Nanzhu's hand paused for a moment before she answered honestly, "Theoretically, yes. But the actual effect..." she looked at the increasingly bright jade bottle, "at least it's better than being trapped and dying here!"

The tentacles had already closed to within five zhang, with the nearest ones madly whipping the surrounding bone-rotting trees!