Immortal Reincarnation Tribulation

Chapter 44 The Art of Plant Control

The deeper he went into the cave, the dimmer the light became. Apart from the stark white bones deep inside, Du Fan remained vigilant as he walked, constantly paying attention to his surroundings.

However, nothing unexpected happened. He arrived at the pile of bones without incident and discovered that it wasn't the jumbled remains he had initially expected, but a complete white skeleton—a human-shaped skeleton—with fragments of clothing still clinging to it. Besides that, there was…

"These are... marks left by an eagle's peck!"

Upon closer inspection, Du Fan noticed numerous tiny, sharp pits on the stark white bones. Recalling the giant eagle's sharp beak, he immediately deduced that the skeleton's owner must have been pecked to death by the eagle. Thinking of this, a chill ran down Du Fan's spine.

"Could it be that the giant eagle captured me to stockpile food? And this person is a former outer disciple of the Kongsang Sect who entered this place before?" Du Fan's body trembled, and his face turned extremely ugly.

As his mind raced, his gaze inadvertently swept across the scene and he spotted a cloth bag not far from the grim skeleton. It turned out that he hadn't noticed it at first due to the lighting and angle.

"Storage bag!"

Du Fan's spirits lifted, and he temporarily suppressed his fear. He took two steps forward, picked it up, and after probing it with his divine sense, he found that it was still usable. Overjoyed, he took out all the contents of it.

In addition to dozens of low-grade spirit stones and three bottles of pills, the storage bag also contained a black-covered book, a palm-sized leather pouch, and a jet-black token.

Du Fan was surprised to find no green token representing his identity as a disciple of the Kongsang Sect in his storage bag. He picked up the black token and examined it intently.

This pitch-black token, only a few inches in size, felt icy cold to the touch. One side was engraved with a terrifying ghost face, so grotesque and lifelike that it seemed almost alive. The other side was inscribed with two characters: "Burying Ghosts."

Du Fan frowned, unable to discern the token's origin. He placed it, along with the spirit stones and three bottles of pills, into his storage bag, then picked up the black-covered book and began to read. Initially, he maintained a calm expression, but after flipping through more than ten pages, his expression gradually became serious, frequently plunging into thought. Finally, he was overjoyed.

"Plant control technique! This Blue Star is truly bizarre and wondrous, far surpassing Earth. Such amazing things actually exist here!" Du Fan was filled with surprise and delight after only flipping through most of the pages, muttering to himself.

"It seems this is what they call a variant." Du Fan looked at the leather bag on the ground, picked it up, and slowly opened it. He found hundreds of seeds the size of rice grains inside. At a glance, there were about ten different types, and the rest were all duplicates. These were the variants described in the book on plant cultivation.

"According to the description in this book on plant cultivation, using these exotic species to escape from this rocky cliff shouldn't be difficult. I just don't know how effective it actually is, or if it's expired. I also don't know if the person who died was killed before he could use this technique, or if this technique has some limitations, or if this technique is simply a fake." Du Fan's expression changed, and his eyes flashed with uncertainty.

"Well, I should give it a try." After pondering for a while, Du Fan's expression changed, his eyes showed decisiveness, he sat down cross-legged, and began to look through the black-covered book, the Art of Plant Control, once again.

Two hours later, Du Fan rubbed his temples, closed the book, took out a yellow seed from his leather bag, threw it into the soil, and then released a wisp of divine thought to guide the strange seed according to the description in the book on plant cultivation.

The yellow alien, about the size of a grain of rice, emitted a slight "sizzling" sound after Du Fan's divine sense invaded it. It then began to slowly wriggle and soon burrowed into the underground soil, just like a living thing.

Du Fan had been carefully observing the changes in this object. Upon seeing the changes, he was overjoyed and also breathed a slight sigh of relief, as at least this thing was still usable. He then focused his mind, not daring to truly relax, and kept his divine sense within the alien species as a guide. Time slowly passed.

After a while, a yellow branch broke through the soil and continued to grow upwards. As it grew taller, the yellow branch also gradually thickened. When it broke through the soil to a height of ten feet and was about the thickness of a child's wrist, it stopped growing. Then, a tender bud sprouted at the top of the branch and grew rapidly at a speed visible to the naked eye. Finally, it formed a pointed cone, about a foot in size, with a pointed tip. The branch and the cone were connected together, and the whole thing looked like a thicker yellow spear.

Upon seeing this, Du Fan's face lit up with joy. He released another wisp of divine thought into it, and the yellow branch rose another half a zhang in mid-air. The root remained still, but the top bent and pressed against the stone wall of the cave, gradually outlining an arc shape. As it moved upward, the pointed tip of the branch suddenly began to rotate left and right. At first, it was very slow, but after a few breaths, it began to buzz loudly, and the rotation speed reached a terrifying level. The moment it touched the stone wall, it emitted a piercing shriek. The pointed tip seemed indestructible, and in the midst of its rotation, it instantly pierced into the stone wall and gradually went deeper.

Only after the foot-long pointed cone had completely penetrated into the stone wall did it stop going deeper and begin to move horizontally. At this moment, the cave was filled with the sharp, piercing sound of rocks breaking and shattering.

After a while, with a loud "boom", a boulder about ten feet in size fell from the stone wall, kicking up a cloud of dust. The sharp object actually managed to dig the boulder out of the stone wall.

Upon seeing this, Du Fan withdrew his divine sense and stared at the huge rock that had fallen to the ground of the cave. His eyes were filled with shock. After a moment of stunned silence, he was overjoyed.

Du Fan made no other move, but began to observe the yellow branch. He discovered that from the moment it was activated until it completely withered, it took about half an hour before finally turning into dust and disappearing. In other words, it only had a lifespan of a little over half an hour.

"This mountain-piercing branch is just one type of aberration. Since it can be activated, other aberrations should be fine as well. These aberrations don't require magic power to cast, only a little divine thought, which is quite suitable for my current situation." Du Fan said thoughtfully, a satisfied look on his face.

"However, this thing also has limitations. Each mutant seed has a lifespan of only about half an hour after it is planted, and during this time, the roots cannot be moved and can only work within a small area around the plant. Even so, the mutant seed of the climbing vine is enough to allow me to leave here safely." Du Fan's eyes flashed with a sharp light, and he immediately sat down cross-legged and began to close his eyes to regulate his breathing and recover his strength.

An hour later, Du Fan slowly opened his eyes. His body had now recovered to its peak. Just as he was about to get up and leave the stone cave, a strange expression suddenly appeared on his face.

Du Fan's expression shifted, and with a pat of his storage bag, a white positioning disc appeared in his hand.

Upon closer inspection, besides the black dots representing the seven of them, a colored dot appeared for the first time at the edge of the magic disc. It was estimated to be less than three or four hundred feet away from his location. This discovery caused a strange expression to appear on Du Fan's face.

"Let's go down first." Du Fan put away his distracting thoughts, put the positioning magic disc back into his storage bag, took a deep breath, and got up to walk towards the entrance of the stone cave.

He took out a green alien seed from his leather bag and tossed it onto the soil and rocks at the edge of the cave entrance. At the same time, following the technique of the Plant Control Technique, he quickly released a wisp of divine thought into it. As the green alien seed wriggled slightly, it burrowed into the soil and rocks. After a short while, a section of green vine emerged. Guided by Du Fan's divine thought, this green vine spread down the mountain along the cave entrance and the cliff outside the cave. It grew to a length of more than twenty feet before it stopped growing and firmly attached itself to the cliff, like a maggot clinging to a bone.

Du Fan steeled himself and climbed down the mountain along the arm-thick green vine. When he reached the bottom of the vine, he gripped it tightly with one hand and with a flick of his other hand, he pulled out another green alien. With another flick of his arm, he quickly slapped it into the rocky soil on the cliff. Soon after, another thick vine emerged and extended downwards.

After about half an hour, Du Fan finally landed on the ground after throwing out six climbing vines. He looked up at the stone cave on the cliff face and let out a long breath.

Just as Du Fan was about to leave, a clear chime suddenly rang out.

"It's that demonic eagle!" Du Fan's heart skipped a beat. Without thinking, he quickly ran into the jungle a dozen feet away, leaned against a big tree, and dared not make a sound.

A few breaths later, a dark shadow streaked across the sky and plummeted from the air. With a few flaps of its enormous wings, it landed steadily on the edge of the cave entrance on the mountainside. Upon closer inspection, several palm-sized black eagles were perched on the back of the demonic eagle, cooing as if signaling hunger.

After the demonic eagle landed at the cave entrance, it put down several eaglets and walked straight into the depths of the cave. Before long, a loud and piercing screech suddenly came from inside the cave. The sound waves spread and shocked the heavens and the earth. The screech seemed to contain a monstrous rage. Du Fan, who was far away, was shaken when he heard it.

A moment later, a dark shadow flew out in an instant, and after another screech, it flew away in an instant. It was the demonic eagle, presumably looking for the escaped Du Fan, leaving behind only a few black eaglets that kept cooing.

Du Fan breathed a sigh of relief and was about to take the opportunity to escape when a cry came from the distant sky again. This sound was sharp and unpleasant, and it was not the same demonic eagle as before.

Du Fan, who was about to leave, hesitated for a moment and had no choice but to continue hiding behind the tree.

A moment later, a scruffy vulture flew in, its body emitting a putrid stench that made one want to vomit. Its flight speed was no less than that of the previous demonic eagle. In a flash, it appeared at the entrance of the cave on the mountainside. This vulture was about two zhang in size, with a somewhat deformed beak that resembled a duck's. Its cold gaze swept over several cooing eaglets, and suddenly it opened its beak and bit a palm-sized eaglet into its mouth. There was a series of loud "crunch" sounds, and then it tilted its head back and swallowed it whole.