Ren Qing carried Killing-Life Child's consciousness back to the Mud Pellet Palace of his main body.
Killing-Life Child's consciousness was fundamentally composed entirely of memories, making it extremely insubstantial. While inside the Mud Pellet Palace, it seemed as though it could dissipate at any moment.
Ren Qing was somewhat curious about Killing-Life Child and carefully observed him.
The flesh tumor's function was to grant consciousness independent intelligence, yet even after leaving the false world, Killing-Life Child still retained his intelligence.
From this, it was evident that Killing-Life Child truly had the ability to ascend to the Upper Realm in the truest sense.
After Killing-Life Child left the false world, although the disasters he had caused disappeared along with him, the world itself became half-real and half-illusory.
The houses and landscapes seemed veiled in mist, making their full appearance impossible to discern.
A fierce wind swept across the land. Golden rice ears grew from the fields, only to wither into dead weeds in the next instant. The rules governing the world had already collapsed.
The other Beast Pen people seemed to have had their intelligence stripped away, leaving only the most basic instincts as they wandered endlessly through the false world.
Ren Qing suddenly realized that this was probably what people in his previous life referred to as dimensionality reduction.
Because Killing-Life Child played a decisive role in the composition of the false world, many things even depended upon his consciousness to continue existing.
Once Killing-Life Child departed, the false world immediately fell into stagnation.
Ren Qing looked toward the Heavenly Demon Nest Heavenly Demon Nest. The flesh tumor on its surface had already shrunk by nearly half. Hidden among the blood-and-flesh wall stretching for dozens of miles, it was completely inconspicuous.
If the Beast Pen people wished to restore the authenticity of the false world, either the number of conscious minds would need to increase by dozens of times, or another Killing-Life Child would have to emerge.
Neither possibility was very likely, so the false world would be difficult to restore in the short term.
After sealing off all paths leading to the Heavenly Demon Nest Heavenly Demon Nest, Ren Qing strictly forbade any further excavation in that direction.
He then returned to his cave dwelling.
For the time being, he set aside matters concerning his techniques and prepared to awaken Song Zongwu's consciousness as quickly as possible.
He always felt that Nameless Ascetic's arrangements could not possibly be so simple.
Why had Nameless Ascetic been so certain that Ren Qing could restore Song Zongwu's consciousness? Even Earth Immortals might not necessarily be capable of such a feat.
Perhaps he had already prepared a backup plan beforehand but never had the chance to implement it?
Ren Qing was deeply puzzled by this.
Where exactly had the stripped-away Arhat Fruition gone? Could it be related to Sitting-Deer Arhat's Lingshan Temple?
He could not help but shake his head.
The answers could only come after Song Zongwu awakened and explained things himself. Only the person involved truly understood all the twists and turns.
Ren Qing took out a portion of the Forbidden Corpse's brain and attempted to use the Cancer Disease Tree disease strain to refine a flesh tumor, recklessly mutating the brain in every possible manner.
The flesh tumor had been formed by a coincidence within the Heavenly Demon Nest Heavenly Demon Nest and possessed a certain element of chance.
He had anticipated that reproducing it would be difficult, but only after beginning did he realize just how troublesome it was, especially when it came to replicating the intricate structure of the brain.
Ren Qing suffered failure after failure, wasting an unknown amount of time.
Fortunately, he did not need to work in isolation.
Stomach World contained hundreds of artifact refiners. Even through endless trial and error, they could eventually find the correct path.
Moreover, Xiao San'er's artifact-refining skills had already reached a level comparable to Ren Qing without Ghost Shadow's assistance.
In the end, Ren Qing simply became a hands-off manager.
He only needed a bacterial soul to control the disease strain and modify the brain according to the artifact refiners' ideas.
Since he needed to constantly monitor the progress of the mutated brain, he could not fully immerse himself in cultivation. As a result, he began observing Killing-Life Child's consciousness within the Mud Pellet Palace.
Suddenly, Ren Qing felt that Killing-Life Child was rather tasteless to keep yet a pity to discard.
Originally, he had believed Killing-Life Child to be extraordinary and intended to raise him within Stomach World.
However, the reality was that Killing-Life Child possessed absolutely no cultivation potential.
Although Killing-Life Child's intelligence was independent, he did not even qualify as a soul. It seemed that becoming a zombie cultivator was his only path.
Yet if that happened, the limitations of being a zombie would quickly cause Killing-Life Child to fade into mediocrity.
Ren Qing stared at the instinct-driven Killing-Life Child.
Upon noticing that his consciousness was still filled with the desire to ascend to the Upper Realm, inspiration suddenly struck him.
"Perhaps this Killing-Life Child..."
He did not immediately deal with Killing-Life Child.
Instead, he first used The World Is Like a Dream to alter his memories, completely erasing all memories related to Ren Qing.
Then, Ren Qing transferred Killing-Life Child's consciousness into the Southern Mountain Small World.
Under his influence, the Southern Mountain Small World gradually transformed to resemble the scenery of the false world.
Towns and farmland appeared, and even the populace became identical.
Not only would Killing-Life Child be unable to distinguish between the two worlds, but even Ren Qing himself would have difficulty telling them apart.
A smile appeared at the corner of Ren Qing's mouth.
After arriving in the Southern Mountain Small World, Killing-Life Child became utterly confused and completely lost.
Only after wandering through the town in a daze for several days did he finally travel to Purple Household Mountain, where he had always cultivated in seclusion, and begin practicing his self-created Soul Flight Immortal Method.
The Soul Flight Immortal Method was not truly a technique. It was more akin to a form of self-hypnosis.
Killing-Life Child used hypnosis to separate consciousness and memories from himself, even allowing his consciousness to break free from the flesh tumor's restraints.
Ren Qing waited quietly.
Sure enough, Killing-Life Child's consciousness split into two streams, and the secondary consciousness gradually began moving toward the outside world.
Naturally, Ren Qing intercepted it and sealed it beneath the disease tree within the Mud Pellet Palace.
After repeatedly confirming that Killing-Life Child's primary consciousness would not be harmed, Ren Qing assigned a bacterial soul to permanently guard the entrance to the Southern Mountain Small World.
The sole purpose of that bacterial soul was to continuously harvest Killing-Life Child.
Without wasting any time, Ren Qing began refining zombie bodies.
Creating empty shells was not difficult. He only needed flesh, blood, and bones to piece them together. At most, it consumed some resources.
His primary goal was to verify the idea in his heart, so he first completed two hundred zombie bodies.
Moreover, they were all Purple Zombies, the lowest cultivation level.
By this point, roughly forty to fifty strands of Killing-Life Child's consciousness had already been harvested.
Ren Qing infused those consciousnesses into the Purple Zombies' bodies.
The compatibility between body and consciousness was extremely poor, indicating that cultivation efficiency would be heavily affected.
Ren Qing did not care.
He even painstakingly helped Killing-Life Child's consciousnesses fuse with the bodies, spending more than half a month before finally completing the process.
Several dozen zombies gradually developed souls, though their intelligence left much to be desired.
Even while residing in the White Bone Land saturated with Yin qi, their absorption rate of Yin qi was inferior to that of ordinary corpses.
In Corpse Ghost's eyes, such zombies deserved nothing more than permanent confinement within coffins.
Yet Ren Qing found them quite interesting.
He then used Corpse Fengdu to manipulate Yin qi, helping the zombies master the Corpse Brain Method, which had been split off from the Dead Man's Sutra.
**Corpse Brain Method**
Created by Ren Qing.
To cultivate it, corpse fluid must be poured into the eyes, ears, nose, and mouth until the skull is completely filled. The seven facial openings are then sealed shut. Only by surviving thirty-six days can the technique be successfully cultivated.
The zombification of the Corpse Brain Method resides in the brain, causing Yin qi to concentrate within the Mud Pellet Palace.
Although it damages intelligence, the Corpse Brain Method possesses extremely powerful control over Yin qi, whereas the Corpse Refinement Method and Skeletal Corpse Method focus primarily on the physical body.
Ren Qing planted Yin qi within the Mud Pellet Palaces of the zombies.
Then, imitating the methods of the Beast Pen people, he connected them together with umbilical cords.
Yin qi flowed through the cords, forming a Grand Zhou Cycle among the dozens of bodies.
As a result, all Yin qi cultivated through the Corpse Brain Method originated from the same source.
Because of Killing-Life Child, their consciousnesses were also closely interconnected.
The several dozen zombifications functioned as a single whole.
Not only did this compensate for the inefficiency of their Yin qi growth, but the Yin qi itself could gather together or disperse at any time.
Ren Qing narrowed his eyes.
The total amount of Yin qi possessed by the Corpse Brain Method zombies had already reached the Half-Corpse Realm.
And this was with only a few dozen of them.
As long as their numbers continued accumulating, even if each individual zombie's cultivation could no longer progress, quantitative change would eventually lead to qualitative change.
Ren Qing nodded in satisfaction.
As containers for storing Yin qi, Killing-Life Child could ensure that he always had a reserve from which to replenish his Yin qi.
Unfortunately, Yang God Realm was already their limit, as the method was simply too much of a shortcut.
Their souls possessed a mysterious connection to one another and had unexpectedly regained part of their intelligence.
They quickly pieced together the entire sequence of events.
"Many thanks... Immortal Senior... for granting us this immortal opportunity..."
The zombies knelt in perfect unison.
Although their intelligence was somewhat stiff, they had generally inherited Killing-Life Child's memories.
"Killing-Life Child, cultivate the Corpse Brain Method that I've passed down to you properly."
Ren Qing was not worried about Killing-Life Child rebelling.
On one hand, he had already tampered with his memories.
On the other hand, as the Fengdu Corpse Emperor, he held absolute authority over the life and death of all zombies.
Even Corpse Immortal would possess no ability to resist once Ren Qing advanced to Earth Immortal.
Ren Qing brought Killing-Life Child into the outside world and handed him over to Corpse Ghost for arrangement.
Coincidentally, maintaining the resources throughout the cave dwellings required a great deal of manpower.
Corpse Ghost was greatly astonished by Killing-Life Child's existence.
Why were there multiple bodies sharing a single consciousness?
The phenomenon was profoundly bizarre.
At present, Corpse Vein genuinely lacked high-level combat strength.
Killing-Life Child would likely not need long before reaching a level comparable to Yin Difference Realm or even Yang God Realm.
Of course, Killing-Life Child's flaws were equally obvious.
As a zombie cultivator, his bodies were weaknesses and could easily be targeted and assassinated.
Ren Qing assigned Corpse Ghost the responsibility of refining Killing-Life Child's bodies.
Harvesting consciousnesses, on the other hand, was simple.
He preferred to leave matters concerning Corpse Vein to the zombies themselves.
He did not wish to divide his attention and affect his work on organizing the Ascension Methods of the various techniques.
Ren Qing focused most of his energy on Ghost Shadow's primary and secondary techniques.
Among the five techniques belonging to Ghost Shadow, their connections to one another were the weakest.
The slightest mistake could affect his comprehension of their Ascension Method, so complete preparation was essential.
This further demonstrated that having more techniques was not necessarily better.
Compatibility was what truly mattered.
Ren Qing immersed himself in researching Ascension Methods and completely lost track of time.
By the time he came back to his senses, he discovered that the Heavenly Dao Crack had already shortened considerably.
The imitation flesh-tumor artifact had also been successfully refined by Xiao San'er.
He named it the Soul Brain.
Its function differed somewhat from the original flesh tumor.
The flesh tumor granted memories autonomous consciousness.
The Soul Brain, however, allowed remnant souls to regain awareness.
As for its exact effectiveness, that remained unknown.
Ren Qing examined the Soul Brain and could not wait to bring it before Song Zongwu.
At first, he had intended to refine Song Zongwu's brain directly into a Soul Brain.
However, for safety's sake, he instead implanted the Soul Brain at the base of Song Zongwu's neck.
Song Zongwu's body immediately ended up with two heads, one large and one small.
Ren Qing then connected the blood vessels and nerves to the Soul Brain.
Sure enough, Song Zongwu's remnant soul became active.
Even his fingers trembled slightly.
Song Zongwu's soul still required a long period of nourishment before it could fully awaken.
Nevertheless, at least there was now a visible possibility of restoring it.
The alchemists worked urgently to develop pills capable of nourishing souls and invested a large amount of manpower into the project.
Just as Longevous Tortoise's divination had predicted, the Beast Pen truly was a land of great fortune for Restraint Officers' Hall.
Everything was developing in a positive direction.
As Ren Qing's secondary techniques of the Disaster-Dispelling Method successively advanced to Yang God Realm, the area covered by Wu Deceit continued expanding.
Who would have imagined that beneath the Beast Pen, where the Supreme Heavenly Demon resided, tens of thousands of cultivators were secretly hidden underground?
Ren Qing did not stop advancing.
Very quickly, all of his techniques reached Yang God Realm.
Only the later breakthrough to No-Birth Immortal remained, after which he could begin preparing to challenge the Ascension Ladder.