Chapter 51: The Insolent Infant Tree Ghost

"You saved my life. Without you, I would have died back in the second round of the game. I have nothing with which to repay you, so I will offer myself to you! Besides, in my current state, I would only frighten my parents if I went home. From now on, I will follow you."

Huang Yu was remarkably straightforward, interrupting the speech Xia Tianqiong had already prepared in his mind.

"You are now a specter. Can you not use nether energy to repair your mutilated body?"

"I cannot. My body is still made of flesh and blood; it requires a massive amount of nether energy to reshape into a ghostly form. However, the reshaping process uses the current physical body as a template. Whatever it looks like now is what the ghostly form will become. It cannot restore missing parts."

The more Huang Yu spoke, the softer her voice became, and tears gradually trickled down her face. She was, after all, a woman who cared about her appearance, and a well-known beauty at that. Being reduced to this state inevitably brought her immense grief and sorrow.

Xia Tianqiong, however, laughed heartily. "Don't cry. I have a way to restore your physical body. Don't rush to shape your ghostly form just yet."

"Really?"

Huang Yu's eyes brimmed with anticipation, and she was somewhat stirred.

"Look at that tree. The fruit it bears can help you regrow your missing limbs."

Xia Tianqiong pointed to the infant-tree specter placed in the corner. After being collected into the mirror space, this plant-like specter had simply been left there, looking much like an ornamental tree.

Xia Tianqiong and Huang Yu walked over, and the group of contracted specters quietly followed behind.

"This is called an infant-tree specter. It bears a fruit called the infant-fruit, which can bring the dead back to life and regenerate flesh on bare bones. Its effects are extraordinary."

As he spoke, he took out fifty taels of gold and placed them at the roots of the tree.

The roots of the infant-tree specter did not burrow into the soil; instead, they were braided together like a twisted rope and coiled into a flat disc, serving as a base for the tree.

The moment the gold was placed upon it, numerous slender rootlets immediately wrapped around the gold to absorb the nether energy within it. At the same time, a small, black fruit grew upon the crown of the tree. As the nether energy was absorbed, the fruit grew at a visible rate, its shape gradually resembling that of an infant.

"It grows quite fast!"

Xia Tianqiong found this quite novel and took out another hundred taels of gold, tossing them onto the roots. In less than a minute, the gold turned to ash once more, and the infant-fruit grew a size larger.

He continued to place gold upon it, consuming over eighteen hundred taels in total. The nearby shop assistants watched with aching hearts; if any of them had been given that much gold, they could have advanced by a full level.

Finally, the infant-fruit beneath the tree crown reached maturity. The sign of its maturity was the appearance of a smile on the infant-fruit's cheeks, just like a real baby smiling.

Xia Tianqiong plucked the fruit and examined it in his hand. It was about the size of a cantaloupe and looked like an infant's statue, with even the eyebrows and hair rendered with startling realism.

"Eat it!"

He handed the infant-fruit to Huang Yu, who did not stand on ceremony; she held it up and began to bite into it.

This thing was truly miraculous. The moment she took a bite, changes began to occur. First, her internal organs writhed and contracted back into her body of their own accord. Immediately following that, her severed limbs regenerated, and physical tissues such as muscles, fascia, blood vessels, and skin slowly began to grow. As Huang Yu ate more, the rate of growth accelerated.

This obviously required a process. Xia Tianqiong found it fascinating, but after watching for a dozen minutes or so, he lost interest. Instead, his attention shifted to the infant-tree specter.

He continued to place gold on the roots, wanting to produce a few more infant-fruits. These things could save lives, so he needed to keep a few on hand.

However, an abnormality occurred next. The gold was absorbed, but no further fruit was borne.

Thinking he hadn't placed enough, Xia Tianqiong simply took out two thousand taels of gold, piling it over the entire root system of the infant-tree specter.

"Get that away! Do you want to burst me to death?!"

A childish voice suddenly issued from the trunk of the infant-tree specter, startling Xia Tianqiong.

"You can actually speak?"

"Damn it, I haven't spoken in several hundred years! If I hadn't opened my mouth now, I would have become the first specter in the world to be stuffed to death by nether gold!"

The voice was childish and crisp, resembling that of a baby, yet the tone was old-fashioned and pompous. It created a strong sense of incongruity.

The roots of the infant-tree specter suddenly began to writhe, and then, using its rootlets as legs, it walked out from the pile of gold by itself.

Xia Tianqiong was both surprised and delighted. Capable of speech and movement, this plant-like specter possessed enormous potential.

"Other specters all want to acquire more nether gold. Why are you complaining that there's too much?"

"I'm only at the fierce specter level. I need at least an interval of nine days to bear a single fruit. You fed me so much nether gold all at once that the nether energy couldn't condense into fruit and piled up inside my body. It's going to blow me apart!"

"Then why didn't you just stop absorbing it?"

"Nonsense! That's nether gold! I haven't seen any in several hundred years of life. Now that I suddenly stumbled upon it, how could I possibly hold back?"

The infant-tree specter spoke with righteous indignation, but upon closer inspection, it turned out that it simply couldn't restrain itself. Even with the risk of bursting to death, it had to keep absorbing.

And this couldn't entirely be blamed on it. Having lived for hundreds of years, it usually survived by consuming wild specters and netherworld creatures to raise its level, and it had never laid eyes on nether gold before. Everyone knew the value of nether gold, but it couldn't afford it and couldn't get its hands on it.

Now, someone had actually given it so much nether gold, and unable to restrain itself for a moment, it had frantically absorbed it. But given its level, absorption had its limits when it couldn't produce fruit. For the sake of its own little life, it had no choice but to jump out and speak up, asking its new master to take the gold away—otherwise, it might not be able to hold back and would literally burst itself to death. That would become the laughingstock of the netherworld!

Xia Tianqiong suddenly chuckled and said, "That's your own problem, isn't it?"

The infant-tree specter immediately retorted, "If you hadn't seen a woman for several hundred years, and suddenly some woman crawled into your blankets stark naked, would you damn well be able to hold back?"

"This..."

Xia Tianqiong was instantly rendered speechless.

The infant-tree specter used a childish voice to deliver vulgar analogies, its words reeking of deep hooliganism. One could tell at a glance that it was no proper specter. Yet upon careful reflection, its analogy seemed rather apt.

For a specter to encounter nether gold was much like a lecher encountering a beauty—both simply wanted to devour their target.

"Fine then. From now on, I'll feed you nether gold once every nine days." Xia Tianqiong didn't wish to bicker with this fellow any longer; it felt like a worldly gangster with a mouth full of profanities.

"That's going to starve me to death with cravings!" The infant-tree specter immediately protested. "How about this: two hundred taels a day, and by the tenth day, it'll be just right to bear fruit."

Producing a single infant-fruit required eighteen hundred taels of gold, an expense that ordinary people or specters simply could not afford.

"Alright, let's do it that way."

Xia Tianqiong nodded in agreement, turned around, and instructed the delivery specter, "This task is handed over to you. You'll be responsible for feeding it from now on. Also, take this gold note for safekeeping; whenever you need gold, just take it from there."

He trusted the delivery specter deeply. Besides, contracted specters could not deceive their masters.

"I will definitely fulfill the task entrusted to me by the master."

The delivery specter received the gold note with both hands and carefully tucked it into its bosom. It felt immensely thrilled, though it did not show it on the surface. The more the master relied on it, the higher its status in the master's heart.

The nearby shop assistants were once again consumed by envy, jealousy, and hatred, casting looks at the delivery specter that could only be described as sour. They couldn't fathom why the master would place such high trust in such a good-for-nothing!

Little Eight could no longer hold back and stepped forward to volunteer himself. "Master, I can also accomplish this task. I have more capability than it does; you can assign it to me."

As soon as it spoke, the other shop assistants grew restless as well, all eager to snatch the job.

Xia Tianqiong swept his gaze over them, his eyes finally resting on Little Eight as he uttered a single sentence: "Are you trying to teach me how to do my job?"

"I... I wouldn't dare!"

Little Eight lowered his head, and the rest of the shop assistants did not dare to speak another word.

At that moment, Huang Yu's body finally finished repairing itself. Her limbs were intact, her skin smooth, her curves voluptuous, and her figure exceptionally perfect. Most crucially, she wore only a few tattered shreds of clothing, which utterly failed to conceal her alluring naked torso.

Xia Tianqiong stared blankly, subconsciously swallowing a mouthful of saliva as he suddenly recalled what the infant-tree specter had said just moments ago.

If a naked woman crawls into your blankets, can you hold back?

Now, he had his answer. *I can indeed hold back!*

"There are some clothes of mine in that courtyard; you can put them on first." Xia Tianqiong pointed toward a nearby courtyard, looking somewhat awkward.

"Thank you for saving me once again."

Huang Yu, by contrast, was quite poised and open, showing no shyness whatsoever. "From the very first moment I laid eyes on you, I felt you were special. My intuition told me that only by following you could I survive. Sure enough, my intuition was right. So many people died, and only you and I survived."

Xia Tianqiong rubbed his nose and bluntly stated, "I saved you because you are useful to me."

"I understand, and I accept that. My intuition tells me now that following you will lead to a wonderfully different life. Let us form a contract; I am willing to acknowledge you as my master and bind myself with a master-servant contract."

That Huang Yu proactively requested a master-servant contract was something Xia Tianqiong had not anticipated. He did not put on airs either, and the two of them immediately sealed the contract.

Once the contract was concluded, Huang Yu suddenly said, "I have a small request, and I hope the master will grant it."

"You don't need to call me master; just call me by my name. What is your request?"

Though they were both tools in essence, Xia Tianqiong felt differently about Huang Yu. Much like the delivery specter, she was relatively proactive and enthusiastic. With her in the team, Xia Tianqiong could save himself a lot of worry.