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Pei Qiyu, with his keen eyesight, noticed the emblem on the statues' armor.

By now, they were no longer immobile stone statues. Not only did they move swiftly, but their attacks were fierce, making them quite troublesome.

These were not mere statues; they were clearly puppets.

Pei Qiyu, Su Molan, and Wen Qiao each fought the puppet statues. They discovered that the unique stones used to forge the puppets were extremely hard, rendering ordinary attacks ineffective.

Since direct attacks were ineffective, it was time to bring out the ultimate weapon against these unique stones—Wen Guangun.

Wen Guangun was initially reluctant, but he became motivated when Wen Qiao promised him a certain number of Spirit Restoring Pills after dealing with the puppet statues.

Shi Wuming and the others watched, speechless.

"Do you have to negotiate a reward every time you want your spirit beast to work?" Pei Qiyu had an expression that said, 'This kind of spirit beast is really not up to standard.'

If you have a spirit beast, shouldn't the owner have the final say on what they do? Who would have thought that Wen Qiao's spirit beast had to be politely asked and negotiated with.

Wen Qiao said, "If you want them to work, you have to offer rewards. What's so strange about that?"

Wen Guangun and the others were not her contracted beasts in the first place. They were free individuals whom Wen Qiao never treated as her property. Everything they did was based on their own willingness. So, when they encountered the stone sphere earlier, Wen Qiao never considered asking Wen Guangun for help and allowed Shi Wuming to negotiate with him.

Upon hearing this, Pei Qiyu and the others couldn't understand their relationship but decided not to comment further.

As Wen Qiao and the others blocked the attacks of the puppet statues, Wen Guangun quickly climbed onto one of the statues. Thanks to his Five-Rock Earth Defense, he was unafraid of the puppet's attacks as he searched for the puppet heart.

The puppet heart was easy to find since it was the most important component that powered the stone puppet. Embedded in the back of the puppet's neck, it was distinct from the unique stones. For a soil-element beast like Wen Guangun, this was not a problem.

Wen Guangun's sharp claws extended, and with one swift grab, he pulled out the puppet heart, which fit seamlessly with the statue's body.

Once the puppet heart was extracted, the stone puppet immediately lost its mobility and reverted to a lifeless statue.

Chapter 330

Despite the numerous puppet statues, with Wen Guangun, the powerful weapon, it wasn't a big issue.

As a soil-element beast, Wen Guangun could extract the puppet hearts without damaging the statues. Thus, every statue remained undamaged. Once the puppet hearts were removed, the statues lost their mobility and became harmless.

Wen Guangun carried the extracted puppet hearts to Ning Yuzhou.

Just like the statues, these puppet hearts were undamaged. Upon seeing them, everyone realized that if they replaced the puppet hearts into the statues, the puppet statues would regain their attack capabilities.

Ning Yuzhou examined one of the puppet hearts and quickly understood the forging principle behind it.

In his space, he had a puppet he had forged, Aqing. However, when he forged Aqing, his refining skills were limited by his cultivation level, so Aqing's grade wasn't high. Aqing was only capable of managing his space and couldn't perform other tasks, let alone fight.

As for these stone puppets, the fact that they were forged with unique stones gave them extremely high defensive capabilities, followed by their offensive power. Although Ning Yuzhou would be able to achieve this once his cultivation level improved, for now, the forging methods and puppet techniques of these stone puppets were, in his eyes, a masterful art.

Pei Qiyu and the others gathered around and looked at the now immobile puppet statues.

There were one hundred and thirty of them.

These puppets were likely just a portion of the underground palace, but even this number posed a significant challenge for them. If they had continued to fight them, it would have taken a considerable amount of time to resolve.

After the puppet statues came to a stop, it was time to collect the spoils.

Wen Qiao stored the nearest puppet statue in her storage bag and said to the others, "Everyone gets a share, so you should also take some."

"Take these?" Su Molan was astonished.

"Of course!" Wen Qiao said matter-of-factly, "These are prizes delivered right to us. Should we just leave them here for others to take? These puppet statues are all undamaged and can still serve as a strong fighting force. We might find a use for them in the future."

The idea of using them in a fight, throwing out a few puppet statues unexpectedly during a brawl, made the idea appealing.

Pei Qiyu, quick to understand, immediately started collecting the puppet statues.

In the end, the 130 puppet statues were divided among them. Wen Qiao and Ning Yuzhou got the most, since Wen Guangun had helped obtain them. Shi Wuming and the others took only a symbolic dozen.

Ning Yuzhou shared the puppet cores among everyone and taught them how to use them.

"After you refine the puppet cores again and imprint them with your spiritual awareness, they will obey your commands."

These puppet statues aren't actually very powerful, but their defense and attack power were impressive. Estimates suggest they had the defensive capabilities of a late-stage Yuanchuang realm cultivator and the offensive capabilities of a Yuangling realm cultivator.

The defensive capabilities of a late-stage Yuanchuang realm cultivator alone were enough to attract attention.

With their new collection of puppet statues, everyone was in high spirits.

"Good job, Wen Guangun!" Wen Qiao patted Wen Guangun’s head and, as promised, gave it a bottle of Spirit Restoring Pills and a jar of honey fat.

This made Wen Guangun extremely happy, considering the reward Ning Yuzhou had promised for its digging efforts. Wen Guangun had gained quite a lot recently and felt that working wasn't so bad after all.