Immortality: Raising an Ant Queen to Cultivate by increasing stat points

Chapter 464: Chapter 456 Eating Worms Boots_1

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Among the loot scavenged from Elder Wu Shanle, besides the jade slip detailing the Insect Formation, there was another extremely formidable item.

It was a pair of boots taken off Elder Wu Shanle’s legs.

Qin Niu had noticed these boots because when Master He Shan’s Golden Centipede crawled inside, it was instantly killed.

Qin Niu initially thought there was a powerful Insect Pet hidden inside the boots that could easily kill the Golden Centipede.

However, no insect carcasses were found inside the boots afterward.

This was very puzzling.

Could it be that these boots could consume insects?

Qin Niu held the boots, examining them, mid-calf in height, to be worn below the knee.

Some long boots can be worn above the knee.

The size of the boots was quite small; they could probably fit a child of seven or eight, which was understandable since Elder Wu Shanle was only as tall as a child of that age.

The material of the boots was indistinguishable, marked with dark patterns, somewhat like leather but not quite.

They were heavy in hand, weighing at least over two pounds.

After examining the boots several times, Qin Niu found nothing unusual. Then he tried throwing a live insect into the boot; a terrifying scene occurred—the insect was gradually absorbed by the inner wall of the boot.

The process was extremely fast.

Even weirder, the insect didn’t show any resistance; it seemed to cooperate.

This was highly abnormal.

Even ants cling to life; any insect instinctively fears death and seeks to avoid it.

Why, then, did the moth he’d put into the boot accept death so calmly?

Furthermore, the boot could actually consume a living insect.

Qin Niu realized that these boots could be a very powerful treasure.

He caught another beetle and threw it into the other boot. The same eerie phenomenon occurred—the beetle was also consumed by the boot.

The interior of the boot was black, showing no signs of change.

And it left no traces behind.

Qin Niu’s interest was thoroughly piqued; holding the boots, he studied them closely and conducted several experiments. No matter the insect, as soon as it entered the boot, it would be obediently devoured by it.

More astonishing was that after the boots consumed multiple insects, they showed no change whatsoever.

Thinking of how some magical items could be bound by blood, Qin Niu tried cutting his fingertip and dripping blood onto the boot. It didn’t absorb the blood, showing no reaction at all.

He then tried several other methods, all to no avail.

The pair of boots remained the same.

In the end, he had no choice but to put them away for the time being, planning to buy more books to study upon entering the city, hoping to determine what kind of treasure these boots were.

Although Elder Wu Shanle was the weakest elder of the Nine Insect Gang, diminutive in stature, and quite ugly, the fact that he possessed a jade slip and boots that could eat insects suggested his identity might not be so simple as it appeared.

If the opportunity arose, Qin Niu would surely conduct a thorough investigation into Elder Wu Shanle’s identity.

…

In the following days, Qin Niu spent every day with his wives, concubines, and Xiao Qing going into the mountains for arduous cultivation.

Although Tang Caixian was pregnant, it did not affect her cultivation.

As a first-time mother, she was extremely protective of the baby in her womb. She said that cultivation could help the child become stronger and wished for the child to be born with better physical conditions, not to fall behind from the start.

Some strong individuals’ wives, when pregnant, would hire experts to regularly nurture their unborn children with their cultivation strength, helping to open the children’s meridians.

They would even, when the fetus was a bit older, combine medicinal baths and dietary supplements to help enhance the child’s constitution.

This is truly cultivating from within the womb.

Children born in this way often possess exceptional talents and cultivate much faster than children from ordinary families.

Some are even formidable, reaching the tenth level of the Mortal Realm by age six, breaking through to the Acquired Realm by seven or eight, and reaching the Innate Realm by twelve or thirteen. For example, the young noble whom Qin Niu met on his first trip to the Supreme Sea to purchase Cultivation Techniques, who despite his tender age, had an incredibly impressive cultivation level.

But then again, having capable parents can indeed give one a head start.

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Personal effort and opportunities in the Acquired Realm are equally important.

Some people are born into privilege, never having to worry about elixirs or cultivation techniques as if born with a golden key in their mouths. But due to their parents’ overindulgence and pampering, they gradually become mediocre.

On the other hand, some children of humble origins, through their own efforts, constantly improve themselves and undergo transformations, eventually overtaking those born with inherent advantages.

Qin Niu was the latter.

He started with nothing, penniless and empty-handed.

With his own effort, he finally underwent several transformations. He had now surpassed 99% of the privileged young masters and was hopeful to become an immortal of his generation.

Children without umbrellas must run harder than others.

Nine days flew by in the blink of an eye, and Qin Niu received news that Black Tiger City had restored basic order.

The government institutions within the city were now functioning normally.

Furthermore, he learned that after defeating two major factions, the Black Tiger Gang took advantage of the victory and captured a large territory of the Nine Insects Gang. Almost all the territory originally belonging to the Seven-Star Sect had been seized by the Black Tiger Gang.

The Nine Insects Gang Leader, using complex terrain and a vast swarm of insects, barely managed to halt the advance of the Black Tiger Gang’s army.

That witch must be regretting it now.

If she had known better, she wouldn’t have attempted to challenge the Black Tiger Gang—now she has lost half her own territory.

The most tragic of all was the Shennong Sect.

At a critical moment, the Shennong Sect Leader Pan Jianjun, in order to save his beloved wife, gave up his position and swallowed the Verdant Blood Elixir to save her. His whereabouts were unknown afterward.

The Great Elder took over as the Shennong Sect Leader, but was unable to form an absolute dominance over other elders and various powers within the sect, leading to the most serious internal strife in the sect’s history.

In such a situation, the Black Tiger Gang was overjoyed.

They took the opportunity to capture a vast fertile land of the Shennong Sect, nearly all of the territory south of Tian Shui spread over a thousand miles, was swept into their coffers.

The most speechless part was about the Nine Insects Gang—seeing that the Shennong Sect could no longer hold on, not only did they not help their ally against the strong enemy, but at this crucial moment, they raided and occupied large tracts of the Shennong Sect’s mountains and fields.

The Nine Insects Gang defended strategically and seemed to have reached some sort of tacit agreement with the Black Tiger Gang, no longer attacking each other. Instead, they freed their hands to fully stabilize the newly conquered territories.

The Shennong Sect’s Spirit Qi Realm experts and large families either fled or surrendered.

With families in tow, they generally chose to surrender where possible.

While this might seem a loss of spine and dignity, it was most advantageous for their families.

They avoided leaving their homes and managed to preserve part of their family’s assets.

It was essentially like having a change in boss.

With a good performance, within a century they could become one of the top noble families of either the Black Tiger Gang or the Nine Insects Gang.

In the end, the mighty Shennong Sect was destroyed within a mere nine days.

About a third of their territory was devoured by the Nine Insects Gang, and two-thirds were shared by the Black Tiger Gang.

No one could have predicted such an outcome.

Now, Shennong City, Seven-Star City, and Mai City had all become cities under the Black Tiger Gang.

Who would have thought that the Black Tiger Gang, despite being besieged by two major sects, would not only survive but also nearly double their strength.

While the Nine Insects Gang lost the Seven-Star Sect’s territory, by swallowing up a third of the Shennong Sect’s territory, they compensated for their losses.

Qin Niu felt puzzled. Why hadn’t the Black Tiger Gang taken the opportunity to obliterate the Nine Insects Gang?

After all, allowing that vicious witch to grow stronger should not have been an option.

Keep in mind that the wife of the Shennong Sect Leader sacrificed her life to help the Nine Insects Gang Leader escape. If the Nine Insects Gang Leader had even a shred of gratitude, he absolutely wouldn’t have made such a move.

Yet that witch had the audacity to lead her troops in looting the Shennong Sect’s assets amid chaos.

If she could even seize the territories of her sister and brother-in-law, what else was that witch incapable of doing?

Sooner or later, when the Nine Insects Gang regained their strength, the Black Tiger Gang would likely have difficulty.

Qin Niu planned to take a day to enter the city.

Now that he had a horse carriage and a treasure like the Black Mare Horse, entering the city had become extremely convenient.

If he hadn’t been worried about exposing his top-tier avian mount, the Fire Phoenix, he could have ridden it to the city, which would have been even faster.