WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Episode 21: Core Formation Preparations (6)

──────

The queen Sky-Piercing Worm usually nested deep underground.

There, it bred countless Sky-Piercing Worms before sending them to the surface.

The most common route was through a water source.

Newly hatched Sky-Piercing Worms were small, with translucent skin that made them difficult for mortals to spot.

After finding a victim, they bored into sleeping bodies, killed their hosts, then moved on to another host and repeated the process.

Ise led them to the central well he had scouted before his companions arrived.

Judging by the flow of demonic qi, this was clearly the entrance to the Sky-Piercing Worms' breeding ground.

“The entrance will be narrow, so we'll need to shrink down. Does anyone have a spirit artifact for that?”

Seolryeong raised her hand.

“I learned the Size-Reduction Art.”

“Really? That's an interesting spell.”

“Sometimes I need to shrink down and enter spirit artifacts to repair them directly.”

“Good. Then use your spell on us, and let's go in.”

“Ugh... a worm nest.”

Now that it was time to enter, Seolryeong let out a sighing groan.

“I hate bugs...”

“What kind of Daoist gets scared stiff over a few bugs?”

Even after Ise pointed that out, Seolryeong quietly edged backward.

“Um, people are still dying and becoming vengeful ghosts out there... Can't I sit this one out?”

“Bugs don't bother me much, but there are people who need care. I think I should stay too.”

“Hong Wonseo needs to care for the sick, so she can stay. Seolryeong, you're coming with us. You need to maintain the Size-Reduction Art along the way. No evil spirit will appear just because you're gone for a little while.”

Seolryeong let out something like a horse's whimper through her lips.

“Pi Garam, you're fine with this, right?”

“Of course. We need to set up an insect-repelling formation in the nest if we want to wipe them out completely.”

In the end, those who would enter and those who would remain behind were decided.

The three of them shrank to the size of ants under Seolryeong's Size-Reduction Art and jumped into the well.

Using divine sense to feel along the well wall, they found a hole that seemed to lead to the breeding ground and swam inside.

After following a tunnel that rose and fell, the moisture gradually disappeared, revealing a worm nest of sticky mud.

When Seolryeong lit a Flame-Lighting Artifact, the tunnel's interior came clearly into view.

“Ugh... disgusting.”

Seolryeong could no longer hold it in and let out a tearful cry.

Ise did not scold her. Even he, with his strong stomach, found the sight horrific enough to make him frown.

The floor gleamed with wet mud and sticky worm fluid, while writhing parasitic demons filled every corner.

An unidentifiable, foul stench hung in the air.

They had been disgusting enough from the outside. Now that they were small enough to see them up close, calling them demons felt entirely fitting.

“They're even more horrifying when you're this small.”

Pi Garam snorted at Ise's comment.

“I'll begin drawing the formation from here. You two clear them out while I work.”

“Right. If we can't help with technique, we'll have to make up for it with muscle.”

Flames sprang up in Ise's hands.

At their normal size, the worms had only been as long as a finger joint. Now, creatures larger than his entire body crawled toward them with sickening noises.

Dozens, even hundreds, wriggled forward at once. It was a truly gruesome sight.

Their glossy, segmented bodies slid down the muddy walls.

Sucker-like mouths opened toward Ise and his companions, revealing rows of tiny hooked teeth.

Beneath their feet, newborn larvae tore through yellowish egg membranes and crawled out, spewing slick fluid in every direction.

Whoosh!

Ise swept flames over the worms, clearing out the clustered demons in one stroke.

Fire shot from his fingertips and swallowed the parasitic demons rushing toward them.

Their segmented bodies curled up, giving off a sour, rancid stench. Those that had not burned quickly burrowed into the mud.

Seolryeong followed with ice blades, crushing the worms hidden in every corner.

Meanwhile, Pi Garam trailed behind them, waving a tiny brush-shaped formation artifact through the cave and calmly drawing an insect-killing formation despite the commotion ahead.

The extermination continued for a long time.

There was no end to them.

Whenever they burned one cluster, the mud walls split open and another swarm poured out.

A worm burst from beneath Seolryeong's feet and opened its mouth wide. She screamed like a demon beast and instantly stomped it into pulp.

Admiring her quick reaction, Ise pressed ahead with flames leading the way.

At last, they reached the deepest part of the nest. Unlike the entrance, it was a vast cavern.

There, they encountered the queen worm.

Its body was swollen far beyond comparison with the others, clinging to the ceiling as it constantly spewed out eggs.

Through its translucent belly, they could see thousands of larvae wriggling inside their eggs.

The queen worm spotted the intruders and instantly scattered poisonous spikes, but Ise created dozens of Wind Blades and sent them flying at once. They neutralized every attack and carved into the queen's body.

The queen worm let out a shriek sharp enough to tear their eardrums, and unhatched larvae came spilling down.

Flames swept over them.

That was the end of it.

Lastly, Pi Garam drove stakes into the edge of the formation, set the core formation artifact in place, and hung a pouch filled with Spiritual Stones.

“It'll last at least a year and prevent any surviving parasitic demons from breeding or other parasitic demons from settling here.”

“Good. Nice work.”

“...I want to wash. Please.”

Seolryeong shuddered as she looked down at her once-clean Daoist robe, now caked in fluid.

Worm fluid covered her from head to toe.

“You don't look like a Daoist at all.”

Ise smiled as though joking and turned away.

* * *

They had exterminated both Ghost Wails and the Sky-Piercing Worms.

Ojuk County, though, had already become a land of death.

Ise sent word to headquarters that they had brought the situation under control.

Headquarters would contact the court and handle the aftermath.

The problem was that Ojuk County could no longer properly function as an urban center.

The survivors would be too busy caring for themselves, and many children had become orphans overnight with no family left.

Even if the court took charge, there would always be gaps in relief efforts.

Ise decided to gather every orphan under fourteen who had lost all their relatives and take them to headquarters.

He worried some children might choose to remain behind, but it was needless concern.

Perhaps they instinctively knew it was safer to go with him. Not one child said they wanted to stay.

“I'll come by once more. If anyone else wants to come with us, I'll bring them along then.”

After leaving those words with the older children who had to remain behind, Ise turned away.

“Heading back?”

Seolryeong asked.

“Yeah. It's shorter than expected, but I think we're running out of passage tokens if we travel any farther.”

He did not know whether he had completely filled the deficiency in his soul, which had been his original goal.

Still, his journey through the mortal world had made one thing clear.

This was not a mission where he had to meet a set quota.

From the moment he began his good-karma journey, his soul had started to grow stronger, but doing it more often did not change how full he felt.

He instinctively understood that what mattered was not the amount he had accumulated, but the direction of his heart.

He planned to make trips like this from time to time and continue relief work.

Even forming that resolve gave him the sense that the emptiness occupying a corner of his soul was no longer growing.

Ise lifted the wooden platforms from nearby empty houses and firmly joined them together with metal-aspect spells.

Then he placed every child on top.

“Hold on tight.”

As soon as he said that, he used the Telekinesis Art.

The huge connected platform rose gently into the air.

The children's faces, which had remained dark until then, instantly filled with interest, and their mouths fell open.

Ise climbed onto Bisang and took flight, while his companions followed behind on their own flight spirit artifacts.

“Your use of divine sense has reached an incredible level. I couldn't imitate that.”

Pi Garam clicked his tongue as he watched Ise move the platforms with barely any shaking.

Keeping platforms that large afloat for so long was impressive enough, but not a single child was motion sick.

“Amazing...”

“He really is a monster.”

Seolryeong and Hong Wonseo each added a comment.

* * *

After returning to headquarters, Ise went to the orphanage to check on the children he had sent ahead.

“Welcome back, seniors.”

Buchun, who now had the face of a middle-aged man, greeted them with a much brighter expression.

“I never thought I'd end up playing father, Senior.”

“If it's hard, you can hire attendants. I'll support you.”

“No, Senior. I was lonely anyway, so it's nice that life has become livelier. It's rewarding too.”

After thanking Buchun for seeing things positively, Ise handed out sweets to the children.

Soon, lively but pleasant clamor filled the place.

“Please come inside for a moment, seniors.”

Buchun led the four of them further into the orphanage.

Then he handed Ise a document listing the items Ise had requested and their prices.

“Of the items you mentioned, we can obtain a finished Tribulation-Soothing Pellet, so I've reserved one. It costs seventy thousand Spiritual Stones.”

“That was cheap.”

“Yes. Among the ingredients for the Tribulation-Failure Preservation Pellet and the Golden Core Spirit-Sealing Pellet, the difficult ones to obtain are Heaven-Blessed Wood and hundred-year-old Hau Herb. Both are spiritual herbs with extremely high demand, so they will likely be difficult to obtain for some time. I've arranged to purchase the remaining ingredients for a total of two hundred and ten thousand.”

Buchun added that headquarters had provided a great deal of support, making sure to give credit to those who had helped.

Ise remembered every name Buchun mentioned, then asked Hong Wonseo.

“Heaven-Blessed Wood can be replaced with Full-Moon Thousand-Year Herb, right?”

“That would work even better. But it would be much harder to obtain.”

Because Full-Moon Herb was used in most spirit pellets, demand was so high that it was usually harvested before it could last even a hundred years, let alone a thousand.

What they did not know was that Ise had the Living-Spirit Cave Abode and the Life-Accelerating Art.

“I'll get it. And Hau Herb seeds are easy enough to find, right?”

“Yes.”

“Get plenty of them.”

“The seeds? Understood.”

There was no point in getting seeds unless he planned to grow them for the next hundred years.

It was a difficult order to understand, but Buchun did not question it and simply answered.

“Hong Wonseo. Can you make the Tribulation-Failure Preservation Pellet and the Golden Core Spirit-Sealing Pellet?”

“You want to leave it to me? I know the alchemy methods, but I've never made them before. Wouldn't it be better to commission a famous late Foundation Establishment Realm alchemist?”

“How can I trust other alchemists? Rather than risk them switching the ingredients or giving me poor-quality pellets, I'd rather leave it to you.”

Hong Wonseo silently nodded.

The corners of her mouth twitched faintly. She seemed pleased by the trust he had shown her.

Buchun continued his explanation.

“As for the Five Elements Tribulations you mentioned, we decided to prepare for them by dividing the work among your companions as much as possible.”

Pi Garam drew a straight line with his brush beneath the section marked fire tribulation.

“I'll set up a fireproof formation to block the fire tribulation.”

“I'm making a spirit artifact for the water tribulation, as well as one to ease the spirit tribulation.”

Seolryeong drew a line next.

“Then, it seems you can prepare for the earth and metal tribulations with a top-grade Softening Talisman and a Metalward Body Mirror. The expected budget is roughly one hundred and fifty thousand in total. Counting everything so far, it will cost around four hundred and thirty thousand. Will that be all right?”

They had not even completed all the necessary preparations, yet it already came to four hundred and thirty thousand.

Buchun's expression darkened as he spoke of the enormous expense.

If a single Core Formation breakthrough attempt required this many resources, an ordinary sect could be ruined with every failure.

Of course, most cultivators only had to face tribulations at the level of lightning and spirit tribulations, so Ise required an unusual amount of resources.

“It's fine. That's within what I expected.”

“Yes... and the phenomenon called the Wood Tribulation has almost no precedent, so it has been difficult to find a suitable item. No one has heard of the spirit artifact called the Regeneration Iron Fan that you mentioned.”

“Right. Maybe vines will grow out of my body or something.”

Even Seolryeong had never heard of the spirit artifact named in the Two Principles Return-to-Origin Art secret manual.

“Either way, I'll keep asking around.”

“I'll ask Hall Master Hong as well.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

All that remained was to wait until his companions completed their support, grow Hau Herb for a year, and find the Regeneration Iron Fan.

In any case, the preparations were steadily coming together.

Not only his companions, but the sect itself was supporting every measure needed for his Core Formation Realm breakthrough.

Thinking about having to prepare all this alone was terrifying.

Ise changed the subject.

There was something he needed to ask.

“Tell me what happened to Hae Unchan.”

Originally, he had considered asking the others.

Still, it did not feel right to hear news about a fellow disciple from a third party.

If something had happened, he wanted to hear it from someone who could speak on Hae Unchan's behalf.

Silence fell again.

Pi Garam was the one who finally spoke.

“Hae Unchan... failed his Foundation Establishment Realm breakthrough.”

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried