Chapter 149: The Underground Demon Realm

Since it was the Underground Demon Realm, demons living underground were bound to be present.
Not long after Su Che and Lao He set off, they saw two tall underground demons appearing in the distance.
These were the Di Sha that Su Che wanted to capture.
Although they walked on two legs in human form, these Di Sha had nothing in common with humans—some were covered in scales, while others were covered in fur. It would be more accurate to describe them as humanoid monsters.
“Di Sha” was just a general term; there were many types of underground demons. Some had lizard-like heads, while others had faces resembling evil ghosts…
A variety of shapes and forms.
“Haha, these guys are even uglier than me,” Lao He laughed loudly.
“From a human perspective, they are indeed uglier than you, but they’re definitely not as strange as you!” Su Che teased in return.
These words referred to Lao He’s true form in the Immortal Prison—his current Asura body. Though its features were ugly, it exuded a fearsome aura and a powerful male presence.
The Asura race could be considered the handsomest in the underground world.
At that moment, Lao He’s loud voice immediately caught the attention of the two Di Sha. They strode toward them with heavy steps. When they got within ten zhang, they knelt down with a thud and shouted something in a language Su Che couldn’t understand.
Even without understanding the language of the demons, it was easy to guess that it was something like “saluting the Great Asura King.”
Lao He laughed and walked straight up to them. When he reached them, the two Di Sha still trembled on the ground, too scared to move.
“Good boys!”
Lao He swung his hands and smashed them onto the backs of the two Di Sha’s heads, knocking them out instantly.
“Too easy!” Lao He muttered. “It’s like picking fruits—no challenge at all.”
Su Che stepped forward, captured the two unconscious Di Sha and brought them into the Immortal Prison. He warned, “These mere Di Sha only possess the strength of the Qi Cultivation stage. Even without the deceptive power of the Asura body, capturing them is very easy. But after all, this is the Underground Demon Realm, where we might easily encounter armies of Yakshas. Then, we’ll have no choice but to run away.”
The Yakshas Su Che mentioned had the strength of the Foundation Establishment stage and generally possessed the ability of the Dharma Eye. The Asura body controlled by Lao He could deceive the Di Sha, but it surely couldn’t fool the Yakshas’ Dharma Eyes.

Next, Su Che and Lao He moved around everywhere, taking advantage of the deceptive nature of the Asura bodies. In just over ten hours, they captured more than four hundred Earth Fiends. Indeed, as Lao He described, it was as easy as picking fruits.

The Earth Fiends would come to them voluntarily upon seeing Lao He from afar, kneeling down in worship without any resistance, allowing Lao He to knock them out. This demonstrated the unquestionable royal authority of the Asura race.

Su Che also changed his appearance, putting on a thick fur coat and a leather hat. He adjusted the characteristics of his spiritual energy fluctuations based on those of one of the Earth Fiends from the Immortal Prison, making him look like a hairy Earth Fiend who followed closely behind the Asura King.

Lao He interrogated a few Earth Fiends who had just been captured and learned that not far ahead, there was an Ink Crystal mine under attack by human cultivators. They had come out to seek reinforcements.

“Black Radiant Ink Crystal” was a high-grade material used in alchemy, naturally resistant to the five elements’ spells, and essential for crafting defensive magic artifacts. However, this material could only be mined in the underground world, so many human cultivators took risks to dive there in order to plunder it from the underground demons.

Still, no matter how valuable Black Radiant Ink Crystal was, Su Che remained unmoved. After all, he had already obtained the personal belongings of dozens of Foundation Establishment cultivators at Ghostly Ridge, whose total value exceeded 1.5 million spiritual stones. With such a large sum at his disposal, he wasn’t willing to create complications just for some trivial wealth, delaying his mission of capturing Earth Fiends.

Nevertheless, besides Black Radiant Ink Crystal, there was another thing in that mine that piqued Su Che’s interest. The Earth Fiends also mentioned that, in order to refine Black Radiant Ink Crystal, a late-stage Golden Core Asura had summoned an Earth Core Fire to create a furnace, which had been placed in the mine for hundreds of years. Earth Core Fire was a high-grade spiritual fire, several levels superior even to the underground fire veins beneath the Yin Wind Gorge. It was extremely useful to Su Che, as both his Fire God Technique and his spiritual treasure-level bronze gourd required such high-grade spiritual fires.

“Better not!” After weighing the pros and cons, Su Che decided to give up. His main mission was more important; it wasn’t worth taking risks for just a source of spiritual fire.

So, Su Che and Lao He immediately changed direction, trying to get as far away from that mine as possible to avoid getting caught up in trouble, just like what had happened in Jinghunling Market. But not far after they set off, they saw a mass of dark clouds flying in from the distance. Without hesitation, Su Che rushed Lao He into the Immortal Prison and hid under a giant glowing mushroom, suppressing all his aura to become as invisible as possible. The dark clouds were actually massive waves of demonic energy carried by dozens of flying Asuras moving at high speed. Clearly, this group of Asuras was reinforcements heading to the Mojing Mine. In the underground demonic realm, there were very few Great Asuras at the Yuan Ying stage, and even fewer Asuras at the Jin Dan stage. However, there were an enormous number of Asuras at the Zhu Ji stage, and it was quite normal for them to patrol in groups like this. In other words, Earth Fiends were just ordinary people in the underground demonic realm; only Asuras were qualified to form organized teams for patrols. That’s why Su Che had said earlier that capturing ordinary people like Earth Fiends was nothing to be proud of—once encountered by an Asura patrol, one could only flee. Whoosh… As this group of Asuras flew past quickly from above, Su Che managed to stay hidden and went unnoticed. This time, they managed to avoid them. “Hurry up and leave!” Once the dark clouds were far away, Su Che rushed forward, wanting to get out of this troublesome place as soon as possible. But considering the possibility of encountering more groups of flying Asuras, he didn’t dare use flight techniques. Running frantically, he just turned around a hill when he encountered a large group of human cultivators—at least a hundred of them. Less than a hundred feet away, Su Che didn’t want to engage with them, but he couldn’t turn back either. So he changed direction and dashed diagonally to the left, trying to bypass them. From afar, he heard a clear voice say, “Look, a long-haired Earth Fiend. It’s my turn this time.” Before the words faded, a girl in her early twenties rode her flying sword and chased after Su Che. “People from the Wuji Sect!” Based on their clothing, Su Che identified these people and realized that, due to the great distance, the girl mistook him for a long-haired Earth Fiend and wanted to chase down and “hunt” him.

Lao He reminded, “Master, among this group, the leader is a female cultivator at the Golden Core stage, with over twenty more at the Foundation Establishment stage. The rest are at the Qi Cultivation stage. It’s likely that this female cultivator at the Golden Core stage led her disciples here to gain experience in the underground world.”
“I don’t care what they’re doing; I don’t want anything to do with them…”
As he spoke, Su Che accelerated to shake off the female disciple from the Wuji Sect chasing him from above. Unexpectedly, the leading Golden Core female cultivator had already detected Su Che’s anomaly through her powerful spiritual sense.
Whoosh!
She arrived in an instant, not only stopping her disciple’s reckless behavior but also intercepting Su Che.
“Who are you?”
A gentle yet authoritative voice reached Su Che’s ears.
With no choice, Su Che took off his long fur coat and leather hat and bowed first, saying, “I am Su Che, a disciple of the Tianxuan Sect. I greet my senior.”
“Wow! He’s actually a human!”
The girl flying on her sword covered her mouth in surprise. She indeed looked quite cute, but in Su Che’s eyes, she was just an indulged, ignorant fool. With such weak abilities, she dared to fly on a sword even in the underground demon realm…
“You’re a disciple of the Tianxuan Sect…”
The Golden Core female cultivator standing about thirty feet away nodded slightly, lowering her guard a bit, but still asked, “Why do your spiritual energy fluctuations resemble those of a Earth Fiend so much?”
Su Che took out a bead from his pocket, waved it briefly, and quickly put it back into his Qiankun Bag. At the same time, he altered his own spiritual energy fluctuations to match those of a Tianxuan Sect disciple, then casually explained, “This bead was found in the head of an Earth Fiend after I killed it. I later discovered that wearing it on my chest allows me to mimic the Earth Fiend’s spiritual energy fluctuations.”
This item was something Su Che had prepared in advance, just in case he encountered human cultivators and needed a plausible explanation.
“A single Earth Fiend can produce a demon bead?”
The Golden Core female cultivator was secretly amazed, but she didn’t pay too much attention to it. The world was full of wonders—ordinary monks in the secular world could even produce Buddha relics.
Anyway, a demon bead produced by a mere Earth Fiend couldn’t possibly arouse the greed of a Golden Core cultivator. So, she dismissed the matter.
She asked again, “You seem in a hurry. Could it be that some high-level earth demons are chasing you?”
This Golden Core female cultivator looked quite young, with a gentle appearance, a clear voice, and a soft demeanor. It was obvious she was born with a good temper and rarely got angry.

Su Che briefly described the situation at the Ink Crystal Mine. Finally, out of kindness, he warned, “I think more armies of Yakshas will arrive soon. If the senior is here only to take his disciples on training, it’s better to avoid this place.”
The female cultivator at the Golden Core stage shook her head gently. “No, those attacking the Ink Crystal Mine are also disciples of my Wuji Sect. I can’t just ignore them.”
Su Che gave a low response, thinking to himself, “Well, whatever. Anyway, I’m not going to join in the chaos.”
It was then that he realized how close the Wasteland God Valley was to the Wuji Sect, and how this area of the underground world happened to be located beneath it. Thus, it was quite normal to encounter a large number of Wuji Sect disciples here on their training missions.