“So it does work on humans after all.” Mu Chen mused as he sat on the top of a tree, reclining leisurely atop a massive branch. He was taking a short break to recover his energy.

Over the past week, he had been relentlessly hunting down any demonic beast he laid his eyes on. Usually, hunters had to examine the beast's tracks, such as footprints or droppings and then slowly narrow down the possible areas which it could be at, before finally tracking it down and hunting it.

For Mu Chen, it was much simpler. He would move in a random direction and simply sweep the surrounding area with his spirit sense, locate the nearest demonic beast, and if its cultivation was high enough to meet his requirements, he would chase it down and kill it, after which he would suck its essence dry.

Through his experiences, he observed that the stronger and larger the beast, the more qi he could obtain from it, which would increase his cultivation even more. However, he had to take care to use as little qi as possible in the process of fighting and slaying the demonic beasts, or the losses would outweigh the gains. To maximize profit and reduce time and effort, he had to pick his targets.

After absorbing the essence of the Ironfur Bear he had just slain, he had also noticed that there were two hunters watching him from the bushes while trying to stay hidden, so he conveniently used them to test if he could drain the blood essence of humans as well.

He was happy to conclude that it did in fact work on humans as well. As for the issue of murdering the two hunters in cold blood, he had not much choice in the matter. They had seen him absorb the blood essence of the Ironfur Bear, which had sealed their fates. No one could know about the matter of the stone tablet, as well as anything related to it aside from himself. All witnesses would only have one outcome. Death.

Having lived for so long, Mu Chen knew that if you managed to obtain something good, you should not show it off. Doing that was just inviting trouble onto yourself. He had seen brothers murder each other over some treasure and even bosom friends betray each other for a little benefit. If you had something good, it was best to shut up and keep it to yourself, lest it was taken from you.

Those two hunters happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.Such was life. No matter how strong you were, you never knew when you were going to die. It could be today, or maybe tomorrow, or maybe you could live a ripe old age. No one knew for sure.

Mu Chen was no saint, in fact he was the opposite of it. He was the man who was once known by all as the strongest devil, having committed many heinous acts. In his past life, he had slain countless cultivators with his own two hands and crushed countless sects and clans along the way. It did not matter to him if they were man or woman, old or young, as long as they had a shred of qi in their bodies and opposed him in any way, their end was the same.

In this world, everyone has their own moral compass. For Mu Chen, he had one rule that he lived by and that rule was very simple. If any person, no matter who, had cultivated just a single strand of spiritual qi, then they were counted as cultivators in his eyes.

As long as one was a cultivator, then they had joined the world of cultivation. As members of the cultivation world, they should expect to lose their lives at any moment. Even if they had done nothing wrong, he was free to kill them if he desired. Conversely, if there was someone who wanted to kill him, they could come at him and he would have no complaints about it whatsoever. Of course, he wasn’t a bloodthirsty murderer who killed indiscriminately. It was all about the benefits.

During the past week, Mu Chen had noticed something out of the ordinary. The mysterious text written on the stone tablet within his body was slowly but surely lighting up as he absorbed more essence. To be precise, it was the second of the nine sections of text carved into the tablet. The second section was already around fifty percent lit up.

Mu Chen was quite sure that something would happen once every single character in the second section was completely lit up. This stone tablet really was becoming more and more mysterious. The first section had given him the [Nameless Cultivation Technique], which was likely even higher grade than Divine rank. If so, what about the second section? Whatever it was, he was very much looking forward to it.

Time flew by. Soon, two more weeks had gone by. During the time he was in Thousand Beast Forest, Mu Chen’s cultivation had increased by almost two entire levels, reaching the peak of the seventh level Mortal realm. However his cultivation speed was gradually starting to decrease. Soon, he would need to find even stronger beasts to hunt.

During this time, Mu Chen had returned to the Mu residence only once, to inform his father not to worry about him and that he would be fine. He lied that he would only be staying on the outer edge of the forest. In fact, he had already ventured pretty deep into the forest.

He heard from his father that there was a powerful demonic beast possessing the strength of a Sea Forming realm cultivator living at the deepest depths of the forest. Mu Chen could not deny that he was quite interested in it, but a demonic beast at that level was a little too much for him to handle at this moment.

Despite that, he was quite confident in escaping it if they actually encountered each other. However, if the demonic beast in question was a flying one that specialized in speed, he would be in some serious trouble.

To stay on the safe side, he did not venture into the deepest areas of Thousand Beast Forest. He did not want to die, especially not to a mere Sea Forming realm demonic beast. If that happened, he would probably be slapping himself all the way to the underworld while all his slain foes laughed at him.

Mu Chen was once again hunting for demonic beasts in the depths of the forest. He had just finished up another peak Mortal realm demonic beast when he suddenly heard a commotion in the distance. It sounded like someone was fighting against a demonic beast.

“Hmm? There seems to be someone fighting over there. Let’s go take a look.” His body flickering with lightning, Mu Chen sped off in the direction of the battle.

Although there were other people wandering around in the forest, it was only in the outer regions. Mu Chen had yet to encounter someone else so deep into the forest. He was quite curious as to who it could be. He deduced that it was probably someone who was at a decent level of strength, otherwise they definitely wouldn’t dare venture so deeply in, else it was just courting death.

Of course, he was careful and took special care to move as silently as possible while maintaining maximum speed. Once he got close, he stopped using his spiritual qi and completely suppressed his qi fluctuations, as well as the sounds of his breathing. As a veteran with thousands of years of experience, doing something like that was already second nature to him.

Mu Chen leapt to the top of a large tree, concealing himself behind the leaves as he peered into the distance. He did not use his spirit sense, just in case. Typically, a cultivator could only utilize spirit sense when he reached the Spirit Core realm, which was the third realm in cultivation. If one possessed spirit sense, he would be able to detect others who were using spirit sense to probe him.

Therefore, on the off chance that there was someone at the Spirit Core realm present, they would be able to detect Mu Chen if he used his spirit sense. That person would definitely be very interested in a mere Mortal realm cultivator possessing spirit sense. Although there were techniques that allowed one to cultivate and use soul force before reaching the Spirit Core realm, those were as rare as seeing a true dragon flying in the sky.