Chapter 846 - 845: Half-Step True God Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly! Perfect Closed Loop!

Chu Sheng flew up to the tentacle. It could no longer smell any foul odor. Only a faint burnt smell remained, along with a trace of the aroma of grilled squid. Relieved, Chu Sheng began to recycle the Sea Demon’s corpse.

[Ding! Successfully recycled one Sea Demon Race (Integration Realm) corpse. Essence of Origin +100 points.]

"Not bad, not bad," Chu Sheng nodded in satisfaction. "Even with only a single tentacle left, I can still completely recycle its Essence of Origin. There’s no discount at all."

Confirming this opened up a whole new line of thought for Chu Sheng. It no longer solely sought intact Sea Demon corpses. Severed limbs, severed heads, tentacles, eyes, or noses—it didn’t matter. As long as a body part met the recycling criteria, Chu Sheng recycled it all. It refused nothing.

Once it stopped being picky about the corpses, the Speed at which its Essence of Origin grew skyrocketed! Previously, finding intact bodies meant choosing the right locations and hiding from Human Cultivators and Sea Demons. Now, with bloody fragments littering the ground, a casual sweep netted tens or even hundreds of Essence of Origin points. In no time at all, its Essence of Origin surged from over a thousand points prior to its arrival, skyrocketing to more than ten thousand!

Chu Sheng glanced at the Insect Beasts raised in the Chaos Nest. Currently, the Soul-Collecting Butterfly was the only type of Insect Beast left inside. However, they numbered over ten thousand and had built a separate nest within the Chaos Nest.

"Can the Soul-Collecting Butterflies extract Divine Soul Honey Brew from the Sea Demons?" Chu Sheng looked at the Sea Demons swarming everywhere, a thought popping into its mind. "I’ll know once I try."

Historically, the Soul-Collecting Butterflies had only absorbed Divine Souls from Human Cultivators to refine into Divine Soul Honey Brew. After Chu Sheng’s Divine Blood stats increased, it would absorb Divine Souls from the brew to bring its Divine Soul Strength up to the same value as its Divine Blood. It had never tried having the butterflies extract Divine Soul Honey Brew from Sea Demons. After all, the anatomical structures of the Human Race and the Sea Demon Race were vastly different.

Acting on the thought immediately, Chu Sheng released a Void Refinement Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly. It commanded the butterfly to fly toward an isolated Divinity Transformation Realm Sea Demon nearby. Chu Sheng did not approach, opting to watch from a distance to avoid alerting the enemy.

The Soul-Collecting Butterfly landed silently on the Skull Cap of the Divinity Transformation Realm Sea Demon. Then, it activated its Skill.

[Soul Devourer!]

The butterfly aimed its proboscis at the Sea Demon’s Skull Cap and pierced it ruthlessly. Stung by the pain, the Divinity Transformation Realm Sea Demon roared in fury and raised its right claw to viciously slap its own head.

[Enchanting Soul!]

Reacting with lightning speed, the Soul-Collecting Butterfly instantly unfurled its Bewitching Domain. A pale pink halo expanded, entirely enveloping the Divinity Transformation Realm Sea Demon.

The Sea Demon’s movements froze instantly, its eyes turning glassy and dazed. A second later, it actually lowered its claw and began twisting its body, breaking into a viral street dance right then and there! Surprisingly, its waist twisted with impressive flexibility and rhythm.

The Soul-Collecting Butterfly safely and soundly drank its fill, then flapped its wings and flew back. Meanwhile, the Divinity Transformation Realm Sea Demon looked completely drained. Its legs gave out, and its body began to sway uncontrollably.

A Human Cultivator engaged in a bitter fight nearby paused in astonishment. He couldn’t understand what was wrong with the Sea Demon; it acted as if it had drunk too much. Still, he wasn’t about to reject a free kill handed right to him. Seizing the opportunity, he rushed forward and cleaved the Sea Demon in half with a single slash of his blade. After the strike, he scratched his head in confusion, likely wondering if the monster had ingested some bad booze.

Watching the returning Soul-Collecting Butterfly, Chu Sheng sensed the successfully refined Divine Soul Honey Brew within its body and nodded in satisfaction. "As long as they can feed on Sea Demons, this is another massive profit!"

Chu Sheng didn’t release all the Soul-Collecting Butterflies at once. Instead, it took out a Divinity Transformation Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly to test an upgrade.

[Ding! Consumed 10 points of Essence of Origin. Divinity Transformation Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly upgraded to Void Refinement Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly.]

[Ding! Consumed 50 points of Essence of Origin. Void Refinement Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly upgraded to Integration Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly.]

[Ding! Consumed 100 points of Essence of Origin. Integration Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly upgraded to Half-Step True God Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly.]

[Ding! Host’s Realm is insufficient. Soul-Collecting Butterfly upgrade failed.]

Listening to the system prompts, Chu Sheng quickly did the math in its head. The three upgrades cost a total of 160 points of Essence of Origin. Just like that, a Divinity Transformation Realm Soul-Collecting Butterfly could be directly elevated to the Half-Step True God Realm.

Unfortunately, constrained by Chu Sheng’s own Realm, the Soul-Collecting Butterflies could only reach the Half-Step True God Realm at most, unable to advance any further. Still, the Half-Step True God Realm was already remarkably powerful. Placed on this third line of defense, they could practically walk unhindered.

"If over ten thousand Half-Step True God Realm Soul-Collecting Butterflies appeared on the battlefield..." Chu Sheng’s compound eyes gleamed, growing more excited by the second. "Wouldn’t the Divine Soul Honey Brew just skyrocket!!! This is pure profit with zero cost!!!"

The more Chu Sheng thought about it, the more feasible it seemed. Unhesitating, it went all-in, spending the ten-thousand-plus points of Essence of Origin it had just amassed. In one breath, it upgraded 82 Soul-Collecting Butterflies, pushing all of them up to the Half-Step True God Realm. Including the one used for testing just now, it currently possessed 83 Half-Step True God Realm Soul-Collecting Butterflies.

"Go, Pika... Soul-Collecting Butterflies, drink to your heart’s content!"

Chu Sheng kept the Divinity Transformation and Void Refinement Realm butterflies tucked away, releasing only the 83 Half-Step True God Realm Soul-Collecting Butterflies. The battlefield was far too chaotic, with Spells flying wildly and shockwaves rippling everywhere. The lower-realm butterflies were too fragile and could easily be caught in the collateral damage, dying on the spot. It wasn’t worth the risk.

The Half-Step True God Realm Soul-Collecting Butterflies, on the other hand, were much sturdier. As long as they didn’t encounter High-Level commanders of the Sea Demon Race, they would be perfectly safe. Moreover, they only absorbed Divine Souls without directly killing the Sea Demons. They would strike and leave without a trace, taking nothing else with them.

Even if the Sea Demon Race wanted revenge, they could only direct their fury at the Human Cultivators who seized the chance to finish off the weakened demons. There was absolutely no way they would trace the blame back to the Soul-Collecting Butterflies. Weaving through the battlefield to work in secret was remarkably safe, perfectly aligning with Chu Sheng’s consistent philosophy of making a fortune in silence!

Having assigned the tasks to the Soul-Collecting Butterflies, Chu Sheng didn’t sit idle. It simply shrank its body back to the size of a normal White-striped Aedes Mosquito. No larger than a fingernail, it mingled amidst the piles of corpses, continuing to recycle the dead Sea Demons. With its reduced size, its presence became practically negligible. It was extremely difficult for Sea Demons to deliberately lock onto it, saving it a lot of trouble. However, compared to its two-meter-tall form, its Speed of recycling corpses was inevitably somewhat slower.

Chu Sheng was in no rush. There were plenty of Sea Demon corpses littering the battlefield anyway. It couldn’t collect them all! There were simply too many to pick up!

[Ding! Successfully recycled one Sea Demon Race (Divinity Transformation Realm) corpse. Essence of Origin +10 points.]

[Ding! Successfully recycled one Sea Demon Race (Void Refinement Realm) corpse. Essence of Origin +50 points.]

[...]

Whenever it amassed over a thousand points of Essence of Origin, Chu Sheng would immediately use them to upgrade more Divinity Transformation Realm Soul-Collecting Butterflies to the Half-Step True God Realm. It would then deploy the newly upgraded butterflies to continue extracting Divine Souls from the Sea Demons. Sapped of their Divine Souls, the Sea Demons were left with their Spirits in a daze, their strength drastically reduced. Naturally, nearby Human Cultivators would seize the opportunity to swiftly dispatch them.

Chu Sheng would then sneak up, recycle the Sea Demon corpses, and claim the Essence of Origin. The newly acquired Essence of Origin would be poured back into upgrading even more Soul-Collecting Butterflies... The entire process was a flawless, self-sustaining loop!!!