Chapter 53 The Disappearance Incident! (Two Chapters in One)
Gao Yuan stared quietly at this plant, which was eighty-nine times similar to the magic pattern grass marked on the jade slip on the map. In terms of its appearance, it would be more appropriate to describe it as "tuan" or "clump".
Its core part is a fist-sized, pitch-black block that protrudes from the ground. Slender spikes about a foot long and covered with silver stripes grow radially from this block.
From a distance, it looks like a giant sea urchin.
When Gao Yuan was observing this clump of magic grass, he was at the end of the formation, and Shi Jun, who was acting as the observer, quickly noticed its existence.
He immediately issued an order, changed the direction of the team's march and moved closer.
After a while, Shi Jun carefully collected the magic grass with a strange shovel-shaped tool.
Finally, he shoveled some of the surrounding dark soil and carefully covered up the remaining roots of the magic grass.
After doing all this, Shi Jun quickly glanced around, then took out a jade slip and quickly recorded something.
Magicweed is a perennial plant that can be harvested repeatedly, and its growth cycle is shorter than other second-level spiritual materials.
As long as the root system is not damaged during the picking process, new plants will usually grow from the original site in three to five years.
Therefore, after picking it, many demon hunting teams will record its location information and collection time in detail so that they can harvest it again when it matures.
…
Seeing that the succubus was forced back by the beam of light cast by Zhai Youzhi's bronze mirror instrument, Gao Yuan instantly launched the Explosive Flame Curse that had been prepared for use.
Following his movements, a red cloud with a diameter of several meters appeared out of thin air close to the succubus's retreating figure, expanding and instantly covering it.
"boom!"
When the spell exploded, the succubus, whose strength was equivalent to that of the middle stage of the Kaiyuan Realm, was suddenly blown into pieces.
Then, he fell to the ground like a torn sack under the lightning strike from Yan Huaili.
Although he felt a little regretful because he didn't get a kill, Gao Yuan didn't have time to think too much. As soon as he fired the Explosive Flame Curse, he immediately gathered the second one because the battle on the field was not over yet.
According to Shi Jun, the demon hunting team's operation this time was quite smooth. It was only the first day and they encountered two clumps of magic grass.
Just now, in order to facilitate Shi Jun's collection of magic grass, the team blocked the blind spot for nearly three minutes.
However, just three short minutes later, when the blind spot of perception was released again, two succubi appeared.
In addition to the mid-stage succubus that was just killed, there is also a late-stage succubus not far away.
At this time, Shi Junzheng was alone to contain the opponent, but there was a huge gap in strength between the two sides. Although he tried his best to support him, he was retreating steadily under the opponent's attacks.
After his fiery red shield was hit hard one after another, the red light surging on its surface had become very dim.
Shi Jun had no choice but to play out talismans from time to time to help in the battle to share the pressure on the shield.
Even so, the red light on the surface of the shield was shaky and about to collapse.
Seeing this, Zhai Youzhi on the side quickly used the bronze mirror to rush forward, resisting the counterattacks of the succubus as it fluttered.
At this moment, Yan Xueli's thunder and lightning chain here was also taking shape. Seeing that the mid-stage succubus had fallen to the ground under the combo attacks of Fang Huai and Yan Huaili, he directed the direction of the spell to change, towards the succubus.
He was suppressing the late-stage succubus that Shi Jun was fighting and bombarded him away.
Although the lightning chain did not hit because the opponent was too fast, it cooperated with Zhai Youzhi's attack and successfully interfered with the succubus' attack rhythm, helping Shi Jun gain some breathing space.
The latter took advantage of this opportunity, quickly took out a pill, drank it, and then joined the battle group again.
He and Zhai Youzhi cooperated with each other to cover each other, and in the blink of an eye they fought head-on with this late-stage succubus for several rounds.
A moment later, Gao Yuan's condensed second blasting flame spell finally took shape. He waited patiently for a moment, and finally caught the succubus's opportunity to turn around and dodge, and instantly activated the spell to fire it.
The orange-red fireball exploded close to the succubus' body, and the violent energy burst caused the succubus's protective body to churn with black energy.
Gao Yuan seemed not to notice this. He didn't pause at all after the spell was fired, and quickly condensed the third explosive spell.
Finally, taking advantage of the opportunity given by the Yan Huaili brothers to entangle the succubus with lightning chains, they successfully activated the Explosive Flame Curse to take the head of this late-stage succubus.
"Source of Mutation 42..."
Seeing the system prompts flashing before his eyes, Gao Yuan suddenly felt happy.
From the time they set out in the morning to now, including the two in front of them, the demon hunting team has encountered a total of 11 succubi.
10 of them died in his hands, contributing 341 sources of mutation to him!
He quickly opened the panel and glanced at it. Adding in the remaining balance, his reserve of source of mutation was now as high as 573 copies!
The speed of obtaining this source of mutation was much faster than when he hunted the shadow demon alone in the gray desert.
…
After putting away the crystallized magic cores in the two succubus' bodies with ease, Shi Jun looked up at the sky.
It was almost six o'clock in the afternoon.
It gets dark early in the winter, not to mention the endless chaotic demonic energy blocking the gray desert. The visibility has been greatly reduced in the darkness.
Therefore, after a brief observation, Shi Jun led the team to a relatively open area, and then issued the order to camp on the spot.
Since the emergence mechanisms of Succubi and Shadow Demons are different, the tools used when camping on the second level of the Gray Desert are also different from those when setting up the camp on the outside. It is also more troublesome to set up the camp.
Shi Jun first gave the order of "four-corner formation alert", and then quickly took out a long stick-shaped magic weapon about a foot long.
The appearance of these magical instruments is somewhat similar to that of a magic wand, with a fist-sized transparent crystal inlaid at the top.
Under Shi Jun's control, these long stick weapons swelled up in the wind, and in a blink of an eye they became more than ten feet long. Then they flew out one after another and were inserted into the ground more than ten meters away at the same distance from each other.
During this period, Shi Jun had to stop his movements every minute or so to ask his teammates to open blind spots in different directions to see if there were any new succubi lurking nearby.
Fortunately, the operation of opening the blind spot of the field of view is also very simple without moving. It is just a matter of closing and opening the eyes.
As long as a certain team member closes his eyes, then during the time he closes his eyes, the range of his original observation field becomes the team's blind spot. If there is a succubus lurking nearby, it will appear in this area at this time.
body.
The whole process lasted intermittently for nearly ten minutes, and the surrounding environment became darker and darker in the process.
And these twenty-four long-pole magic weapons finally surrounded the team in a ring under Shi Jun's control.
After the long-pole magic weapon was installed, Shi Jun once again ordered the team to check the blind spots of perception. After confirming that no new succubus appeared, he took out a white jade disc about a foot in size and quickly cast the spell to activate it.
After a moment, a flash of light was seen on the surface of the white jade disk, and a burst of invisible fluctuations spread out.
At the same time, the tops of the surrounding long poles suddenly lit up, and dazzling white light radiated from the transparent crystal inlaid on the top.
The white light emitted from these crystals overlaps with each other, illuminating the lights within a radius of tens of meters.
Even if there is a barrier of chaotic demonic energy, the situation dozens of meters away can be clearly seen.
At this point, the work of setting up camp is completed!
According to the scheduled camp arrangement, the team started with Yan Xueli, who had the lowest cultivation level, and took turns to rest for half an hour, one person at a time.
Calculated this way, by 9 a.m. the next day when the mask is sufficient, the team can take exactly three breaks.
Gao Yuan didn't care much about this arrangement. As he practiced for a long time, the power of the master-level magic formula has gradually emerged.
As his spiritual thoughts continued to grow, his energy became more abundant.
Not to mention that he has been out for less than a day now, even if he goes for three days without rest, he will not feel too tired.
Therefore, while Yan Xueli was meditating and resting on the spot, Gao Yuan, like the other three, each guarded a direction, and from time to time would take turns closing his eyes to leave a blind spot to see if there was a succubus hiding.
…
Advance camp on the 1st.
In that row of two-story townhouses in a remote location.
The round-faced old man Feng Longzheng was sitting on the main seat with a pensive look on his face.
There were two people sitting on the chair in front of him. They were both similar in age to the round-faced old man, in their fifties.
One of them was an old man with a pale face. His head was slightly bald and his eyes were a bit baggy. He was facing the round-faced old man and was reporting something in a low voice.
Sitting opposite him was a tall, horse-faced man with a pair of eyebrows and triangular eyes, and two mustaches on his lips, giving him a mean look.
"Boss, I asked someone. He just joined a demon hunting team yesterday and left the city with the team to the southwest early this morning. The captain of this team is named Shi Jun. He just broke into the fourth level of Kaiyuan Realm two years ago.
The first floor was set up by Shopkeeper Yu of Baifu Inn."
After the clear old man finished speaking, the round-faced old man Feng Long nodded noncommittally.
On the other hand, the horse-faced old man sitting opposite him squeezed his mustache and sneered:
"Hey, after all these years, this old ghost Yu hasn't changed at all. He just likes to do this kind of women's work of threading needles and threads."
After saying that, his face straightened, he turned to the round-faced old man and said:
"Boss, it seems that there is no problem with Kong Youdao's information. This Fang Huai is just an ordinary monk who came to the gray desert to earn resources. He has no followers here in the camp, so it is convenient for us to take action."
"In my opinion, when they come back from the gray desert, let Old Tang recruit them in the name of recruiting people for the demon hunting team. With you, a late-stage monk, in charge, I expect that person will definitely kick out the current team and join us.
.After we get him outside the city, we can wait for action. What do you think?"
The round-faced old man Feng Long nodded when he heard this and said:
"The method is feasible. Once the third child delivers the Forbidden God Talisman, we can do it directly."
When the horse-faced man heard this, he said in surprise:
"No, boss, he is just an ordinary monk at the third level of Kaiyuan Realm. I can easily solve it by myself without you having to do anything. Why waste another Forbidden God Talisman on him?"
The old man Qing Kui on the side also interjected after hearing this:
"Yes, boss, the Forbidden Talisman is expensive, but the key is that it's too difficult to get. It's better to save it for the critical time in the future."
Feng Long glanced at the two of them lightly and said unmoved:
"After all, we are in the gray desert, and any accident can happen. Besides, I want to control him to help me earn spiritual stones, but I don't want to kill him. What if you hit him hard and break him?
?Everything is about safety!”
"Just in time for this matter to be understood, we will leave Linyuan City. As for the source of the forbidden talisman, we can wait until we arrive in a new place to consider it."
After hearing what the round-faced old man said, both the man with sullen eyebrows and the old man with clear skin nodded in agreement, so they said no more.
…
"disappeared?"
After hearing Shi Jun's words, Gao Yuan said in surprise.
At this time, the four of them were standing opposite each other in a four-cornered guard formation, each guarding the area they were responsible for.
After a day of getting along, although they rarely had any non-combat-related verbal exchanges with each other because they were in the desert, after all, they had experienced many battles together with full cooperation.
In this process, the sense of estrangement between them has quickly and subtly collapsed.
More importantly, through the battles during the day, especially the two battles against the late-stage Succubi, the rest of the team had already become very convinced of Gao Yuan's strength.
As the captain, Shi Jun has already made up his mind to develop him into a stable member.
Therefore, in a safer camping environment than when traveling during the day, Shi Jun took the initiative to share various experiences and insights with Gao Yuan, who lacked desert experience.
What he was talking about at this time was about several mysterious disappearances of Kaiyuan Realm monks that had occurred in the past two years.
Faced with Gao Yuan's question, Shi Jun did not answer immediately.
At this time, it was his turn to close his eyes to check the situation. He paused for a few seconds, opened his eyes to make sure there was nothing abnormal, and then continued:
"Yeah, actually I only found out about this last month. The reason was that a newly recruited member of our team disappeared. That member just moved to Linyuan City from Luoyu City in the north. Although his strength is not as good as
Compared with you, fellow Daoist Fang, he is still above average among ordinary casual cultivators.
Originally, he and I agreed to set off for the depths of the gray desert two days later, but he did not come on the day of departure. At that time, I thought he had misremembered the time. It happened that he was staying at Baifu Inn like us.
We went to find Shopkeeper Yu who introduced us to him, but we couldn’t find anyone after searching for him.”
Having said this, Shi Jun paused and said to Yan Huaili:
"Old Yan, check it out."
The latter closed his eyes as instructed, paused for a few seconds, then opened them again, observed carefully before saying relaxedly:
"There are no unusual circumstances."
Shi Jun responded when he heard the words, and then continued the topic just now:
"One day later, I went to contact Shopkeeper Yu on my behalf, but that person never showed up again. Even the deposit of five intermediate spirit stones he placed on the inn cabinet was not taken away. It was as if he had disappeared."
"It was also this time that I heard Shopkeeper Yu mention that this situation has happened seven or eight times in the past two years, and the strange thing is that these missing monks have basically just arrived at Camp No. 1.
God, and people who don’t know much about Hui Mo. But for some unknown reason, these people have disappeared inexplicably.”
Having said this, Shi Jun paused for a moment before continuing:
"Fellow Daoist Fang, the reason why Shi said this is to remind fellow Taoist that there are a lot of strange things in this gray desert, and it is not absolutely safe even in the city. If fellow Taoist intends to live here permanently, he usually
Remember to be careful when doing things and never be careless!"
Gao Yuan was quite curious when he heard this. This was the first time he heard of such a thing.
After all, no matter whether it is the big city outside or various camps in the gray desert, all fighting is strictly prohibited. Is there something weird hidden in this camp?
But Shi Jun said this out of good intentions after all, and he nodded while thanking the other party for the reminder.