Ji Mo picked up the black bead, and when he made contact with it, he instantly felt the powerful life force and spiritual energy it contained. He understood at once that it was the demon wolf's demonic core. It was no wonder that the beast was so powerful to the extent that even Lan Qingcheng could not handle it. As it turned out, the demonic beast had already formed by the demonic core, so it was on par with a seventh-tier tempered body cultivator.
Then, he walked to the front of the other demon wolf whose bones had all been crushed by his powerful kick. The male wolf lay panting on the ground and could not stand up.
As Ji Mo sneered, he clenched his fists tightly. With the activation of the Celestial Devil Power, he thrust his fist at the male wolf's skull mercilessly, cracking its skull open and retrieving another demonic core from the bloody flesh.
Nearby, Lan Qingcheng saw everything. Her beautiful face became pale at the sight of Ji Mo's violent actions. After all, she was a girl and was not used to such a bloody scene, hence she looked away.
Lan Qingcheng looked at Ji Mo's slim figure from the corner of her eyes. It was hard to imagine that such massive power was hidden within this scrawny body. From the slight nudge in her heart, she had to renew her outlook of Ji Mo. The seemingly delicate young boy was more than what he appeared to be.
Perhaps, he was really qualified to challenge Dong Hao and his fellow exceptional students from Tianyuan Academy.
Ji Mo held and played with the two demonic cores, feeling the life force and spiritual energy that they emitted as they brought his memory back to the demonic beast-related books that he had read before.
The Neidan of the demonic beasts were extremely important for cultivators. Some cultivators hunted and killed the demonic beasts on purpose to extract their demonic core which was then refined to medicinal pills to aid the cultivators to upgrade their cultivation base. The demonic core of a single powerful demonic beast might even contain more spiritual energy and could be more expensive than some rare and precious Celestial medicines.
Ji Mo squinted and recalled that swallowing demonic cores had been recorded in the Celestial Devil Tempering Arts. Once the demonic core was consumed, it would be refined by the Celestial Devil Power. Then, the essence, spiritual energy, and demonic Qi from the demonic core would undergo a conversion to become a native source of energy to nourish the body. Compared to some spiritual medicines, the effects of a single demonic core could be extremely potent.
At the thought of that, excitement glimmered in Ji Mo's eyes. He squeezed the demonic core, and after a short hesitation, he popped it into this mouth. Then, he chewed and swallowed it.
When Lan Qingcheng walked over, she saw that scene. Her beautiful face was filled with shock, and in a hoarse voice that seemed to trail off, she said, "You're crazy to swallow a raw demonic core! Spit it out at once! Otherwise, the demonic Qi within the demonic core will harm your body."
"I've swallowed it," Ji Mo said.
"You…" Lan Qingcheng turned pale and she panicked slightly. "Are you sure? Don't you know the dangers of swallowing a raw demonic core? Although the essence from the demonic core helps with the cultivation, refining the demonic core into essence requires the tempering of an alchemy master. Swallowed just like that, it will likely damage your meridians and you could lose your cultivation base. After all, there's an incompatibility between the demonic Qi from the demonic core and cultivators."
Facing Lan Qingcheng's dread, Ji Mo kept quiet.
At that point, he could clearly feel that the demonic core had turned into a powerful aura that flooded his meridians. The aura contained massive amounts of life essence, spiritual energy of heaven and earth, and traces of black demonic Qi. However, the Celestial Devil Power in Ji Mo's body came into effect very quickly.
Under the effect of the Celestial Devil Power, the aura from the demonic core was quickly suppressed. Traces of life essence and the spiritual energy of heaven and earth were forcibly extracted, nourishing Ji Mo's internal organs and every muscle in his body. Even the demonic Qi within the demonic core was transformed into his internal power, and every last bit of it was refined.
The effect of the demonic core was no weaker than a portion of spiritual medicine.
'The Celestial Devil Power is truly domineering! It can even turn the demonic Qi within the demonic core into a native source of energy. It looks like I don't have to spend money buying spiritual medicine. I'll just have to kill demonic beasts for their demonic cores to save some money,' Ji Mo thought excitedly.
When Lan Qingcheng saw that Ji Mo was not talking, she became nervous. "Hey, Ji Mo, are you okay? Did you...swallow another one? Damn it!"
Before Lan Qingcheng could finish her sentence, Ji Mo popped the second demonic core into this mouth. His throat twitched and he swallowed it with a gulp. He laughed and turned around to look at Lan Qingcheng to assure, "Don't worry. Nothing's going to happen. I practice a secret art that specializes in refining demonic cores, so nothing will happen even if I swallow a raw demonic core."
"Really?" she asked suspiciously.
As the disciple of a huge clan, she had never heard about this kind of secret art. The demonic Qi within the demonic core and the true Qi within a cultivator's body were totally different. Therefore, before one could extract the spiritual energy within the demonic core, a pill-refining technique was required to remove the demonic Qi. It was a highly complicated process. Therefore, ordinary cultivators would not know how to use this complicated technique to refine a demonic core, and only an advanced-level demonic beast or a demonic tribe would find the attempt worthy.
"Let's go and kill other demonic beasts," Ji Mo suggested as he led the way.
Lan Qingcheng's beautiful eyes contained a splash of splendor as she could not help reassessing Ji Mo. The apparently scrawny and weak boy seemed like he had something to hide, but fortunately, Lan Qingcheng was not the suspicious type. Consequently, she did not overthink and actually felt glad that she had found a reliable teammate.
One day, two days, three days…
Three days went by. During these three days, the understanding between Ji Mo and Lan Qingcheng grew. They killed many demonic beasts such as a three-headed snake, a two-headed rhinoceros, a green-headed lion, and a winged albino tiger. They easily defeated the demonic beasts.
Of course, they also came across some powerful ones. Among those was a golden monkey that Lan Qingcheng accidentally provoked. It was a type of primate demonic beast that had a perverse nature and was so powerful that it could easily rival a Qi Plundering Boundary master. Even Ji Mo could not fight it, so both of them could only run away and only managed to shake the perverted monkey off after tens of kilometers.
"Wait here. I'll go and get some water. Don't wander around," Ji Mo instructed Lan Qingcheng.
There was a touch of obedience on Lan Qingcheng's beautiful expression as she nodded. As the days she spent with Ji Mo grew longer and longer, she realized that his ability was far beyond what he was assessed. Although it seemed like he only had the level of a sixth-tier tempered body, his true ability was above hers. Furthermore, Ji Mo was the one who slaughtered most of the demonic beasts.
"Please be back soon," Lan Qingcheng said while she gazed at his back. These days, she seemed to have developed a dependence on him.
"Mm-hmm." Ji Mo did not turn to look at her as he walked away wielding a longsword that he had requested from Lan Qingcheng.