Eternal Life Begins with Learning

"No one in the room?"

"Really, no one. The blankets on the bed haven’t even been touched. Where did that kid go?"

"Don’t tell me he earned enough Spirit Stones and left for Jade Emperor Valley?"

Their surprised and suspicious voices echoed in the darkness as the two men looked at each other.

They obviously never considered the possibility of a hole under the shack.

After all, everyone living out here in these barren mountains was just trying to earn Spirit Stones at the mines to start on their Immortal Path. With a monthly stipend of eight Broken Spirits, it would only take a few months at most.

For a stay of just a few months, who would be bored enough to dig a cellar to live in?

Mundane thinking has its limits. The two men just stared at each other in silence.

"Let’s go back first. We don’t want to alert him."

One of the men said through gritted teeth.

"Alright."

In the darkness, the two men retraced their steps, even taking the time to rearrange the trap they had disturbed. Then, they gradually moved farther away and disappeared into the night.

Meanwhile, Chu Mu, deep in his cellar, was completely unaware that he had just had another brush with death.

Chu Mu didn’t wake until morning. After tidying himself up, he climbed the wooden ladder.

As he neared the surface, his Divine Sense spread from his body, passing through the thin wooden planks to perceive the situation inside and even outside the shack.

Confirming there was nothing out of the ordinary, Chu Mu pushed aside the floorboard and emerged into the wooden shack.

Once inside the shack, he used his Divine Sense Perception again.

A subtle, 360-degree observation without any blind spots was far more reliable than the naked eye.

Compared to mundane observation with his eyes, he was now trying his best to get used to the Cultivator’s method of observation with Divine Sense. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

’Footprints...’

In just a few breaths, the disguised footprints outside the shack became clearly visible to his Divine Sense Perception.

His Divine Sense extended. About twenty meters away, the anomaly in the pitfall trap was basically invisible to the naked eye.

Even with Divine Sense, one might subconsciously ignore it if not specifically looking for it.

But Chu Mu was different. Ever since he started living this rough life, he would meticulously scan his surroundings with his Divine Sense every time he left or returned, committing the details to memory for comparison, just in case.

’Someone was here last night, and they found the trap...’

Chu Mu’s expression flickered. After a moment of contemplation, his face returned to normal, and he headed for the mountain mine as usual.

The danger wasn’t as great during the day.

Especially at this time, all the miners living in the wilderness were heading up the mountain for their shifts. Any commotion would be known to everyone. Among those who had one foot in the Cultivation Immortal Realm, there weren’t many complete idiots.

He reached the mine, collected his basket and tools as usual, and entered the mining tunnel.

A day of mining, a day of hard work. Nothing out of the ordinary. At dusk, he returned to his wooden shack as usual.

’There were two sets of footprints. I can’t be sure if there were more people...’

Chu Mu thought to himself. He wasn’t surprised that someone had their eyes on him. After all, miners had been replaced one after another these days, but the mine’s Steward didn’t seem to care at all.

If it weren’t for the mine’s Law Enforcement Team patrolling day and night, this place would have descended into chaos long ago.

Secretly killing for Spirit Stones had probably happened countless times in the nearby mountains. It wasn’t strange at all for him, being alone, to be targeted.

Back in the cellar, Chu Mu silently prepared his medicinal herbs.

He didn’t have many skills—only his Sword Technique and his Medical Skill.

His Sword Technique and Qi and Blood Cultivation constituted his martial strength.

His Medical Skill could cure diseases and save lives, and he could perform Alchemy and Medicine Refining. But of course, as extremes beget their opposites, using poison was also well within his abilities.

With his limited resources, Chu Mu couldn’t create any exotic poisons.

But given his mundane knowledge of people and medicine, and his countless research experiments on Qi and Blood Cultivation, using poison against Cultivators like himself—neither truly mortal nor truly immortal—was practically a curb-stomp battle.

He had long been prepared to kill!

But... while the mundane world was as cruel as Hell, it had been relatively gentle to him, Chu Mu, since his arrival.

It had shown him cruelty but had never truly thrown him into its depths.

The morality of his humanity still remained within him.

Combined with his own cautious nature, he had never acted on his murderous intentions, despite having them.

Now that someone was after him, wanting his life and his Spirit Stones, he felt no psychological burden at all.

’I hope they’re not broke.’

Chu Mu murmured as he studied the medicinal powder before him, a cold glint in his eyes.

He had been worrying about not having enough Spirit Stones. If he could get rich in one fell swoop, he would leave this godforsaken place without a second glance!

The night... grew deeper.

Chu Mu was no longer in the cellar. Instead, he was in the shack, pretending to cook and eat. Only after extinguishing the lamp did he silently slip back into the cellar and, following a tunnel he had dug long ago, sneak into the mountain forest.

As for whether he would be detected...

Chu Mu was very confident. The detection range of Divine Sense was less than ten meters, and it was easy to be noticed when spying on another Cultivator with it.

Even if he was being watched, they would definitely just be using their eyes from a great distance. What he had done was more than enough to fool the naked eye.

Like a ghost, Chu Mu hid in the darkness, his gaze fixed on the area around his wooden shack.

He, the prey, was very patient. He just didn’t know if the hunters would appear again.

Chu Mu waited in silence.

’They’re here.’

His naked eye could clearly see two furtive figures in the darkness. Chu Mu didn’t stare intently. With the existence of Divine Sense, even a direct gaze from the eyes could easily arouse suspicion.

He carefully checked the wind direction, a faint smile playing on his lips. After popping a pill into his mouth, he took out several packets of medicine from his robes. He opened them, revealing a fine powder to the night air.

The evening breeze swept by, carrying the fine powder with it, spreading its effects throughout the dense forest.

Chu Mu remained still.

The poison was something he had concocted on the spot. Its effects weren’t too strong; it could only temporarily weaken a person’s Qi Blood.

But its strength lay in being odorless and difficult to detect after being poisoned. By the time it was noticed, it would be too late.

For Cultivators like them, who were neither immortal nor mortal, all their abilities were fundamentally based on their Qi Blood. If their Qi Blood weakened, they were essentially lambs to the slaughter.

However, in the open mountain forest, it was obviously difficult for the poison to achieve that level of effect.

Chu Mu had prepared a large quantity and made some calculations.

Quantity... could, to a large extent, compensate for the drawback of the open forest.

Even though he had already taken the antidote, Chu Mu couldn’t help but slow his breathing.

The two figures in the darkness grew clearer.

Once he got a clear look at their faces, the tension in Chu Mu’s heart immediately eased.

There were only about a hundred of these neither-immortal-nor-mortal miners in the tunnels. In all this time, although he hadn’t interacted with them much, Chu Mu had made a deliberate effort to remember what they all looked like.

If they were miners, the threat level was much lower.

If they were true Cultivators, Chu Mu wouldn’t hesitate to turn and flee.

He was self-aware enough to know his own capabilities.

’These two... I think they joined the mine two months ago...’

A flicker crossed Chu Mu’s eyes. Two months in the mine meant two months of stipends. For two people, that was four Monthly Stipends...

Chu Mu had to admit, he was genuinely tempted.

Their whispers in the darkness were hard to hear. Chu Mu simply watched as the two men slowly approached his shack, making no move.

The poison was taking effect. The longer he waited, the more the quantity would make up for the lack of potency, and the more advantageous it would be for him.

If he could win without a fight, that would be for the best.

"The kid’s not home again!"

Their surprised voices were faint enough that even Chu Mu could barely hear them.

"Impossible! I was watching the whole time. The kid came back and never went out!"

"Really, no one’s there. If you don’t believe me, use your Divine Sense to check for yourself!"

"Impossible... I was watching the whole time, I didn’t see him come out..."

"There’s something fishy about this shack!"

"There’s a hole under the floorboards!"

This time, with their suspicions aroused, it didn’t take long for them to discover the cellar beneath the floorboards.

"Is this kid born in the year of the rat? He actually dug a cellar!"

"You don’t think he was in this hole sleeping yesterday, too, instead of being out?"

"Very likely!"

"Good thing we didn’t alert him last night and covered our tracks."

"So what do we do now?"

"The kid’s in the cellar. We can’t just barge in, can we?"

"Who knows what he’s prepared in there?"

Now that they had confirmed the cellar’s existence, the two men were clearly in a dilemma.

Spying with Divine Sense had a high chance of being discovered.

Entering the cellar had an even higher chance of being discovered!

And... what the situation was inside the cellar was a complete unknown!

"This kid is so damn cautious!"

"Why don’t we just charge in? It’s two against one. Victory is practically guaranteed."

"Alright! It’s all just mundane tricks anyway. What’s there to be afraid of!"

In Chu Mu’s field of vision, the two men tiptoed toward the shack, having obviously made their decision.

’It should be soon, right?’

Chu Mu calculated the time in his head—the poison’s evaporation, the change in wind direction, and the total duration.

With the two men completely unaware, the quantity was now enough to make up for the lack of quality.

The outcome... was set!

"Oh no, we’ve been hit!"

One of the men seemed to realize something, his expression changing drastically.

"It’s poison! We’ve been poisoned!"

Soon, the other man also snapped to his senses, his face turning deathly pale.

"Run! Run!"

The two men no longer bothered to hide their movements, nor did they care about their target who was right in front of them. They turned and fled.

With their Divine Appearance Cultivation, even with weakened Qi Blood, their physical fitness was still terrifying. In just a few breaths, they had sprinted over a hundred meters!

But the blade’s edge that followed was faster, and more blinding!

Without stepping onto the Immortal Path, all of one’s abilities were in their Qi Blood. As for physical fitness, at this level, who would be weaker than anyone else?

The saber was a common saber. Wielded by an ordinary person, it would be difficult to injure a Cultivator of this level.

But Chu Mu was clearly not the same person he once was.

Under the surge of his immense Power, the mundane Iron Saber easily tore a bloody gash across their impenetrable skin.

"Mercy! Have mercy!"

"Brother, spare me!"

The two men screamed for mercy and desperately dodged, but the poison’s effects had already taken hold, clinging to them like a maggot on a bone, severely restricting their movements.

Whether they dodged and begged for mercy or fought back to the death...

The outcome was already decided!