Chapter 62: Extreme Religious Fundamentalism and Vicious Gu Arts

Louis watched from the second floor with great interest. Unfortunately, it was too short, and they didn't actually end up fighting, which left it a bit lacking.

No, I need to figure out what happened.

"Emma!"

Louis called out.

Emma, who was staring blankly at the bedroom door and lost in thought, instinctively turned her head and found herself staring into Louis's fiercely curious face.

Her eyelids twitched instantly. Having spent all these years together, how could she not know him?

He was just a bastard who loved watching women fight!

A total drama-loving voyeur!

Yet, Emma gritted her teeth, turned back into the house, and sat down in front of Louis.

"Come on, drink some water and take your time. No rush."

Louis gently poured her a glass of water.

Emma rolled her eyes. No rush? You certainly have the nerve to say that!

As it turned out, Carrie’s mother, Margaret, was an extreme religious fanatic. Prior to this, she had even been expelled and stripped of her nun status because she strongly disagreed with the actions of her local church and openly denounced them.

As for the extent of her extremism...

Emma simply described her as a psycho who seemed to believe that all men and women who engaged in premarital sex bore original sin and deserved to die.

Emma had simply been bored. During her first visit to Carrie's house, finding nothing particularly entertaining, she had just been chatting and watching television. But when she switched the channel to a fashion show, Margaret happened to walk in and catch it, whereupon she cursed Emma as shameless and threw her out without another word.

"Called me shameless? She'll pay for that," Emma said indignantly, then looked at Louis. "You're not going to stop me, are you?"

"Of course not, just don't kill anyone."

Having learned the whole story, Louis found it utterly anticlimactic. He had thought it would be something genuinely entertaining, but it was just this? Boring!

As for stopping Emma, they had made an agreement back then, but this time Emma wasn't the one starting trouble, so naturally, he wouldn't block her revenge.

Emma gave a cold snort and accepted the permission.

Turning her head to look at the neighboring house, Emma narrowed her eyes as various schemes flashed through her brilliant mind.

Extreme religious fanatic, lots of crosses and religious paraphernalia in the house, not particularly well-off, exercising extreme control over Carrie, extremely conservative, dressed from head to toe without an inch of skin exposed...

Within a short moment, the embryonic form of a plan had taken shape in her mind.

And not just one—two! A full two plans!

***

Louis paid Emma no further heed, shooing her out of the room. He sat back down on his bed and continued browsing through the inherited knowledge.

The remaining three mystic arts were the Miao and Dai Gu sorcery chapters, unlocked in advance due to the presence of the regional demon lord's aura.

Witchcraft and Gu sorcery had been symbols of mystery since ancient times.

In the beginning, the settlements practicing Gu techniques were mainly concentrated among the Miao people, whereas witchcraft was more prevalent among the Dai people.

Due to their geographical proximity, the two ethnic groups maintained a close relationship, to the extent that outsiders could hardly tell them apart and assumed both groups practiced both Gu-poisoning and Jiang-sorcery.

In reality, because of their proximity to Southeast Asia, the sorcery of both groups had blended, absorbing local traditions and fusing with one another. By modern times, they had become indistinguishable and could be regarded as a single branch.

1. Harm-Spirit Gu: This best aligns with popular perceptions of Gu sorcery—various venomous insects are placed together in a jar to devour one another, and the sole survivor is designated as the Gu.
Upon poisoning, the victim suffers from mental muddledness, restlessness, a fishy taste in the mouth, and experiences visual and auditory hallucinations. They see ghosts, hear ghostly wails as if facing a formidable enemy, and periodically feel the urge to commit suicide. It can be simply understood as an intensely powerful neurotoxin specifically designed to torture people.
Depending on which venomous creature survives, the final form of the Gu varies slightly. The only constant is that it can only survive by feeding on other venomous insects, and its lifespan is short.
Note: This Gu serves as a prerequisite for the God-Harm Gu—a Gu comparable in power to the legendary Golden Silkworm Gu.

2. Blood Gu: Exceedingly vicious! It brings disaster upon descendants! Never used unless there is a deep, unresolvable hatred!
Originally developed during wartime by local chieftains to counter powerful Han Chinese people—who traditionally placed great emphasis on bloodlines and posterity—it nearly caused a catastrophic disaster later on.
Modern Blood Gu is a clumsy imitation crafted by successors using earthworms, larvae of blood-sucking mosquitoes, leeches, and human placentas (Ziheche). On the day it is successfully refined, a drop of the practitioner's own blood is fed to it. Once the Gu is planted inside the enemy's body, the blood turns into illness, placing the victim's life entirely in the practitioner's hands.
Most importantly, it can be passed down along the bloodline, turning three consecutive generations into the slaves of the sorcerer!
Note 1: Because it is a clumsy imitation lacking powerful witchcraft involvement, it can only be passed down through the direct bloodline and is easily broken by masters of water sorcery (such as Meishan Water Sorcery or Zhu You Ke).
Note 2: The success rate is relatively low.

3. Corpse Gu: During the Ming and Qing dynasties, legends of jiangshis (hopping corpses) were rampant, and Western Hunan even boasted a long-standing tradition of corpse-driving legends. Under these circumstances, a master from the Miao borderlands combined these with Han sorcery techniques to create this Gu.
This Gu can transform a corpse into a Gu-corpse, capable of moving as freely as a jiangshi, fearless of pain and bleeding, with vastly increased strength. Furthermore, in its original conception, this Gu was meant to serve as a preparatory step for refining even more powerful jiangshis by nurturing the corpse.
Therefore, this Gu-corpse can also be utilized to refine orthodox jiangshis.

***

Having finished reading through the three Gu techniques, Louis felt that the popular folk warnings against approaching the Miao borderlands existed for good reason.

The Harm-Spirit Gu was explicitly designed to torture people, the Blood Gu inflicted generational curses and was utterly vicious, and while the Corpse Gu seemed somewhat better on the surface, it still required the desecration of corpses.

Not a single wholesome thing among them.

Yet, for some reason, Louis didn't find this strange at all. Perhaps it was because ever since he had acquired this inheritance, far too many of the mystic arts leaned toward the demonic and evil.

"Good techniques, just a bit difficult to practice."

"Who knows how long it will take me to finish practicing all nine arts? And these are just unorthodox paths; if it were orthodox Buddhism or Taoism, the time and energy required..."

Louis shook his head. No wonder most competent Buddhist monks and Taoist priests were already middle-aged or even elderly, while young monks and priests were treated with utter distrust.

There was a reason for it!

"There are priorities in all things. These techniques must also be sorted into order."

"These Gu sorceries require both materials and cultivation levels, making the conditions rather harsh; I won't consider them for now."

"Let's practice the earlier techniques first."

Pondering the principles and cultivation methods of these arts, Louis let out a yawn. He decided to step up his qigong practice and strive to cultivate internal Qi. Otherwise, as future arts grew increasingly powerful and demanding, he certainly didn't want to rely on burning his own lifespan as consumable fuel at every turn.

There's no time like the present; let's start now.

Louis immediately began practicing the static meditation aspect of his qigong. The entire room fell into absolute silence, save for Coal Ball, who opened its bright eyes and stared intently at its master.

Meanwhile, once he commenced his practice, Emma also picked up her belongings and headed out the door. As for what she was going out to do—it was blindingly obvious.

Aside from conceding to Louis, she had never yielded to anyone, not even that psycho Esther.

Right now, she was going to show off her own capabilities.