Chapter 25: No-Brain and No-Happy

“If I say I didn’t do anything, would you believe me?”

Xu Gu blinked, looking very innocent.

Honestly, if he didn’t know his own strength, even he would’ve suspected he’d slaughtered a city after seeing this.

This sudden wave of resentment was huge.

Utterly overwhelming.

It was almost on par with the previous surge that came when the “pay-to-work” plan was first trialed inside the Demonic Abyss.

“Don’t tell me… Eldest Senior Brother thinks the pay-to-work strategy is going smoothly, and decided to fully roll it out?”

“That doesn’t make sense either.”

“It’s only been a few days! How much can you tell from a test run a few days ago? Eldest Senior Brother’s brain hasn’t been kicked by a donkey—he doesn’t look that stupid.”

“So it shouldn’t be that.”

Xu Gu shook his head, rejected that theory, and sank into deep confusion.

He really couldn’t figure it out.

In the end, when his brain had turned in circles and still found nothing, all he could do was choose to ignore it.

Turn pressure into motivation.

He crazily absorbed the resentment to cultivate. As long as his fist grew big enough, so what if the whole world became his enemy?

…

Meanwhile, elsewhere—

“Damn it!”

“Has Eldest Senior Brother’s brain really been kicked by a donkey?”

“He wants us to build an entire Pill Refining Peak in thirty days! It has to be grand, and production has to be decent?”

“How is that possible? I can dredge up pill furnaces and spirit herbs, sure, but alchemists?”

“It’s all that damned brat Xu Gu’s fault! Pulling that ‘outer saint, inner demon’ stunt in the illusion and actually inspiring Eldest Senior Brother!”

On the newly designated Pill Refining Peak, a demonic cultivator with hair and pupils blazing scarlet, wrapped in towering evil qi, was roaring hysterically.

As his rage flared, flames exploded over his whole body, threatening to burn the sky itself.

Clearly, that tidal wave of resentment Xu Gu felt had come from him.

Xu Gu had never expected that not only did “pay-to-work” offend people, the “outer saint, inner demon” righteous-cutting strategy also ticked people off—
And not just anyone, but the big demons.

“Eldest Senior Brother said, ‘You two know what to do.’”

Beside the scarlet-haired demon stood another demonic cultivator whose hair and eyes were a cold ice-blue. His expression was calm.

His evil qi was no less intense, but the flames surrounding him weren’t ordinary fire—
They were frigid blue hellfire.

These two were exactly two of the Demonic Abyss’s thirteen Heavenly Demon Elders.

Scarletfire Daoist and Blueflame Daoist.

“What does ‘you know what to do’ even mean?”

Scarletfire Daoist hesitated, then as if suddenly recalling something, frowned.

“You mean… follow the plan Xu Gu came up with in the illusion?”

Blueflame Daoist nodded.

“That would be: report all the nearby demonic factions, then spend big to lure alchemists over. If they won’t come, kidnap them. If you’re worried they’ll hold a grudge, just bring their entire families too?”

“You crazy, or am I crazy? How could that possibly work?”

Scarletfire Daoist was practically screaming, feeling himself pushed to the edge of insanity.

“It should work,” Blueflame Daoist said, still calm. “After all, it was Xu Gu’s idea, not Eldest Senior Brother’s.”

Scarletfire was speechless.

Then he sighed in defeat.

“Yeah, of course it would work.”

“But if we do that, those demonic factions we report will hate us down to the bone.

“And if we go out everywhere swindling and abducting alchemists, it’s definitely going to catch the attention of the authorities and the righteous path. We’ll get wanted by the court and the righteous sects.

“Just to build a Pill Refining Peak, you and I are supposed to offend the entire demonic path and the entire righteous path?”

As he spoke, his anger rose again, burning hotter than ever.

Then he turned and looked Blueflame Daoist up and down.

The more he looked at that dazed, honest face, the more his liver hurt.

Truly no brain at all!

Not even the slightest awareness of what the consequences might be.

Blueflame Daoist calmly added,

“What I mean is: cause and effect has a source. Let Xu Gu handle this.”

“Let Xu Gu handle it? That’s impossible—hiss… Actually, don’t say it, really don’t say it…”

Scarletfire Daoist sucked in a breath, then blinked as a sly, wicked smile slowly crept onto his face.

“You’re right. This is all that kid’s fault. We’re only in this mess because of him, so why shouldn’t we dump this job on him? If someone has to suffer, it ought to be him.

“And now Eldest Senior Brother is straight-up executing the strategy Xu Gu used in the illusion.

“If Xu Gu can’t even pull it off, then there’s no point in implementing any of those strategies.

“If he can pull it off, our task is complete.

“Win-win.”

At that point, he turned to stare at Blueflame Daoist in surprise.

He hadn’t expected this old guy, simple as he looked, to have such good luck—to actually stumble on a real solution.

Half a month later.

“I’m starving. Who the hell does closed-door training and still has to eat on schedule?”

Xu Gu drifted out of his cultivation state.

The fasting pill he’d taken earlier had worn off.

This was the annoyance of the Qi Refining Realm: you still had to eat. If you didn’t, you had to chug fasting pills, which wasn’t sustainable for long-term seclusion.

He flipped his hand and took out another fasting pill, popping it into his mouth as he checked his own aura.

“Not bad. Another breakthrough—late eighth level of Qi Refining.”

Xu Gu felt loose and refreshed all over.

The Heavenly Demon Art truly lived up to its reputation as a forbidden art.

The cultivation speed was absurd.

Best of all, the resentment he needed for cultivation was inexhaustible—completely inexhaustible.

Just as he was about to sit back down and continue cultivating, the white fox sensed movement.

Like a white streak of light, it hopped over several times and landed by his side.

“Two Heavenly Demon Elders, Scarletfire Daoist and Blueflame Daoist, have a mission for me?”

Xu Gu frowned.

As a specially treated Demonic Abyss disciple, he didn’t need to pay monthly spirit stones or contribution points.

But in exchange, he had to complete one mission per month.

Originally, it wasn’t mandatory.

Then Eldest Senior Brother copied his operation from the treasure’s illusion.

Which, frankly, was him smashing his own foot with a rock.

“And a mission personally assigned by two Heavenly Demon Elders is not something I can just say no to.”

He recalled their faces and had a pretty good idea of where this was going.

He didn’t resist too much and walked out of the cave.

He wore a simple black robe, his gaze sharp as a blade.

A sword hung at his waist, a black tassel tied to the hilt, making him stand out even more.

He was already handsome to begin with; in this outfit, he was now handsome and cool.

“Wait… what did you just say? This is my mission?”

When he arrived at the Mission Hall and received the missionheet from Blueflame and Scarletfire, Xu Gu had barely glanced at the contents before his eyes went wide.

He looked utterly stunned.

“What’s wrong, junior brother?”

The demonic cultivator guarding the Mission Hall instantly panicked and hurried over.

After the battle in the training arena, who didn’t know what kind of background Xu Gu and the others had?

The entire Mission Hall had been built for them.

With Xu Gu reacting like this, how could he not be nervous?

Xu Gu frowned and handed him the mission strip.

“Hiss…”

The Mission Hall senior brother sucked in a cold breath on the spot.

He looked from Xu Gu to the mission strip, then back again.

And sucked in another breath.

The content was very simple:

Go wipe out the Alchemists’ Association and bring every single alchemist back.

The Alchemists’ Association was the largest pill-refining organization on the entire Tianxuan Continent.

Anyone who wanted to refine pills had to go there to get certified.

The difficulty of this mission was on par with grabbing a random guy off the street, handing him a hoe, and then telling him:

“Go kill an immortal that is undying, indestructible, and eternal.”

“Uh…”

The Mission Hall senior brother felt like he was about to fall apart.

This couldn’t be real, right?

Even if this Mission Hall had been built especially for Xu Gu and the others, even if they were given all kinds of special privileges, it still shouldn’t be issuing this kind of ultra-ultra-ultra-top-tier mission, should it?

Was he really supposed to hand this mission over to Xu Gu?

Wouldn’t that offend him?

If he didn’t hand it over, wouldn’t that offend two Heavenly Demon Elders?

He felt like he was going to shatter.

A demonic cultivator’s life… was also a life!

(End of this chapter)