Chapter 25 Mother Gu
The water prison.
Dim light filled the cell. The air reeked of damp rot.
A man hung suspended above the pool, his body a mangled mess of blood and flesh. His wings drooped weakly behind him.
He had already begun showing beast-form traits.
Hearing footsteps, Rong Che slowly raised his eyes.
After seeing the visitor’s robes, he smiled.
“How is she? Not feeling too well either, right?”
Xie Ning looked down at him, half his face hidden in shadow, expression unreadable.
“You planted Gu Poison in Rong Yao.”
His tone was calm, yet certain.
“The mother gu is inside you.”
Rong Che wanted to laugh, but the movement tore at his wounds, turning his lips white with pain.
He could only curl the corner of his mouth.
“It’s too late.”
Rong Che stared into his eyes and spoke word by word.
“When the mother gu dies, the child gu will burst and kill its host too.”
“And with this broken body of mine, I don’t have much time left. Rong Yao will slowly suffer the same torment.”
His voice was hoarse, sounding like a demon’s whisper in Xie Ning’s ears.
“Even if you try to remove the child gu from her body now, the poison has already spread through all her limbs and bones.”
“You can do nothing.”
“She and I will be bound together forever.”
After he finished speaking, a deathly silence fell over the water prison.
Only after a long time did Xie Ning let out a soft, mocking laugh.
“What forever?”
He walked slowly until he stood right in front of Rong Che.
Only then did Rong Che clearly see his current appearance.
Under the moonlight, Xie Ning’s face looked even colder.
His brows and eyes were covered in a layer of killing intent.
“That gu was something you forced on Rong Yao. It was nothing but your own selfish delusion.”
“You think a tiny insect can trap the Azure Phoenix Imperial Princess of the Demon Realm?”
“Who do you think you are?”
He tilted his head slightly and ordered in a calm voice, “Xuan Ming, extract the mother gu from his body.”
Rong Che frowned.
“I already told you, once the mother gu dies, the host of the child gu will surely perish as well.”
He sneered.
“It seems you don’t actually care about Rong Yao at all.”
Xie Ning glanced back at him.
“Did I say I was going to let the mother gu die?”
Rong Che froze.
In a flash, he suddenly understood why Xie Ning had come today.
“You want to plant a new gu?”
His mind went blank.
He could only watch helplessly as Xuan Ming approached him.
Rong Che’s eyes darkened with malice. He gritted his teeth.
“Xie Ning, you wear this righteous face, yet you’re doing the exact same hypocritical thing as me.”
“You simply want to use this mother-child gu to become the second person controlling Rong Yao.”
Xuan Ming ignored his roars.
His fingers moved swiftly. A thin blade had already cut an opening at the back of Rong Che’s neck.
But what hurt far more than the blade was the uncontrollable agony of the gu insect leaving his body.
“Idiot!”
Xuan Ming could no longer hold back and kicked him hard in the stomach.
“You’re a madman, so you think everyone else is crazy too?”
He had been holding in his anger the whole time. Now he wanted nothing more than to beat the man to death.
“A dying mother gu, once it parasitizes a new host, will only grow weaker.”
“At that point, pouring abundant spiritual power into the child gu will make it start devouring the mother gu to absorb nutrients.”
“You’re the one who planted the gu. You didn’t even know this?!”
A dying mother gu, once it parasitizes a new host, will only grow weaker. From then on the newly implanted mother gu would be the one controlled.
This was the only way to keep Rong Yao alive.
Rong Che’s body went rigid. He looked at Xie Ning in disbelief.
Of course he knew.
But he could not understand.
How could anyone willingly become someone else’s mother-child gu?
“What’s so surprising?”
Noticing his gaze, Xie Ning withdrew his eyes and gave him an indifferent glance.
It was like looking at a corpse.
“You wanted her to live for you alone.”
“But I only want her to live well.”
Rong Che watched with his own eyes as the gu insect slowly crawled onto Xie Ning’s fingertip.
The next moment, something sharp suddenly pierced through his own body.
Blood gushed out instantly.
Rong Che slowly lowered his head.
Only then did he see it was the long blade Xie Ning always carried with him.
The other party drew the blade back into its sheath without mercy.
Blood splattered across his robes.
Xie Ning acted as if he didn’t see it. He simply walked past Rong Che with an indifferent expression.
“You made her suffer like this.”
“This is what you deserve.”