Gu Yue Qing Shu

The novel states that he is an orphan like Fang Yuan and Fang Zheng, and that his parents died in a wolf tide when he was young. Clan leader Gu Yue Bo raised him personally. After testing showed B grade aptitude at the top of that grade, even called false A grade in the text, Gu Yue Bo guided him as a clan leader candidate. He receives high praise inside the clan for a warm temperament and loyalty, and when Fang Zheng’s arrival cuts off his path to the clan leader seat, he is glad and takes care of Fang Zheng wholeheartedly. ^{ch. 105}

Later narration repeats the B grade label when Fang Yuan measures talent against him, and states that the clan elders did not want this junior to advance to rank three so quickly. ^{ch. 161}

At a young age he reaches rank two peak stage and overpowers the rank two upper stage Chi Shan and Mo Yan, which is why the clan treats him as its number one rank two Gu Master. ^{ch. 104} Outside observers at the three-clan gathering repeat the same rank two peak stage label and the same number-one rank two claim. ^{ch. 124}

Inside the group he takes Gu Yue Fang Zheng in and cares for him closely enough that Fang Zheng sees him as an elder brother. When Fang Zheng visits after a completed group mission, Qing Shu is practising Gu in his residence garden and then goes with him to meet Fang Yuan at the northern gate wine tavern over the Liquor worm. ^{ch. 104} He later warns Fang Zheng that Bai Ning Bing is Qing Mao Mountain’s number one genius and that an A grade youth should avoid direct conflict until he has grown. ^{ch. 138}

Before the wolf tide he presses Fang Yuan for a Liquor worm sale on Yao Ji’s behalf, then asks that Fang Yuan’s vitality leaves supply Qing Shu’s own group for pay rather than go only through clan channels. Fang Yuan’s raised leaf price ends that supply talk; Qing Shu warns that Lord Yao Ji will not let the matter go easily. ^{ch. 124}

Once the three clans open the battle merit board, Qing Shu’s group climbs from second to first among the listed groups, and clansmen cheer him as their number one rank two Gu Master while Fang Zheng walks behind him in the square. Fang Yuan obtains the Fish Scale Gu he needs for Stealth Scales Gu by trading a Black Boar Gu with Qing Shu in that same wolf-tide stretch. ^{ch. 127} Fang Yuan later judges that Qing Shu’s group lacks a strong investigative Gu Master, yet still refuses to lure that group because a clan elder follows to protect Fang Zheng. ^{ch. 133}

While practising, he names three Gu he uses openly: Green Vine Gu as a long vine whip from his palm, Pine needle Gu as needles from his long green hair, and Moonwhirl Gu as a green curved moonblade from his left palm. ^{ch. 104} Fang Yuan later places that Moonwhirl on the common fusion path from Moonlight Gu with Whirlwind Gu, which turns the moonblade green and curves its flight, and states that Qing Shu took that path. ^{ch. 106}

In a Gu battle contest against Xiong Li he binds that opponent with green vines, then strengthens them until Xiong Li admits defeat. Fang Yuan, watching, identifies the strengthening as Wood Charm Gu, a rank three Gu that lets the user battle as a tree spirit and absorb natural essence from the air to replenish primeval essence without splitting focus the way stone absorption would. That form makes users strong in attrition, able to fight about three times longer from the replenishment, though not endlessly. Green Vine Gu and Pine Needle Gu gain strength under that tree-spirit form. Prolonged Wood Charm use turns the body to wood and finally into a wooden corpse; ^{ch. 126} a later line groups Wood Charm with Zombie Gu as Gu that need other Gu beside them or else long use corrodes the body toward a true tree man or zombie. ^{ch. 128}

Fang Yuan also names the known fusion advancement for Wood Charm Gu: rank three fused with a hundred-years Lifespan Gu becomes rank four hundred-years Wood Charm Gu, and that rank four Gu fused with a thousand-years Lifespan Gu becomes rank five thousand-years Wood Charm Gu. Gu Masters rarely take the route because Lifespan Gu are usually spent to lengthen the user’s own life instead. ^{ch. 126}

In Fang Yuan’s memory of the unrebirthed timeline, Qing Shu dies during a later wolf tide by forcing a rank three Gu at rank two cultivation to hold a northern gate gap, destroying his aperture and turning into a treeman. ^{ch. 105} Fang Yuan later restates that previous-life death as Wood Charm Gu changing the body into a wooden corpse. ^{ch. 126}

After Fang Yuan wounds Bai Ning Bing, Qing Shu decides that killing Bai Ning Bing would keep Gu Yue clan first on Qing Mao Mountain. He judges that Wood Charm Gu lets him fight a rank three opponent, especially while Bai Ning Bing is missing a right arm. Fang Yuan’s own assessment in that scene is that reckless Wood Charm use can surpass ordinary rank three strength, but that Bai Ning Bing’s Northern Dark Ice Soul physique still makes the fight hard. A clan elder present praises Gu Yue Bo for raising such an adopted son willing to fight to the death for the clan. ^{ch. 139}

When Bai Ning Bing breaks out of ice, Qing Shu’s group surrounds him. Qing Shu pulls Gu Yue Yao Hong with Green Vine Gu, fails to save her from an ice blade storm, and then refuses Bai Ning Bing’s demand for Fang Yuan’s direction, choosing to fight instead and activating Wood Charm Gu. ^{ch. 140} Under that rank three Gu his eyes turn jade green, vines and pin needles answer Bai Ning Bing’s ice, and his flesh begins showing tree rings as the transformation advances. The text lists Green Vine Gu, Pin Needle Gu, and vitality grass as wood attribute Gu that amplify in tree-spirit form, while Moonwhirl Gu does not change the same way. Qing Shu and Bai Ning Bing speak as fellow orphans adopted by rival clan leaders who chose opposite paths; Qing Shu then forces a final exchange for the clan. ^{ch. 141}

The fight ends with Qing Shu trapping Bai Ning Bing in a wooden cage grown from ruined hands, then losing bodily control as Wood Charm Gu corrodes him toward death and overtakes his consciousness. He can no longer tell friend from foe, and keeps attacking anyone who enters while Bai Ning Bing hangs near death inside the vines. ^{ch. 142} Bai clan Gu Masters fell the tree-spirit body to free Bai Ning Bing. The narration then states Qing Shu’s death, and Gu Yue Gu Masters bring back his corpse and Gu worms. Fang Zheng mourns at a newly erected tombstone bearing the four words Gu Yue Qing Shu. ^{ch. 143}

Gu Yue Bo, grieving the foster son he raised for years, later gives Fang Zheng Qing Shu’s letter on death and duty. In that letter Qing Shu writes that Gu Masters cannot hide from death and that he can leave without regrets when his turn comes. ^{ch. 144} Afterward the novel still uses him as the local example of a Gu Master killed by backlash from forcing a Gu beyond safe use. ^{ch. 177} A later clan comparison also names Wood Charm Gu as the rank three means by which he could surpass levels in that fight. ^{ch. 145} Fang Yuan also notes that this death spends, earlier than in his first life, the sacrifice he remembered beside a lightning crown wolf assault. ^{ch. 149}

His eyes turn jade green. From a torn shirt, his injury shows rings of a tree trunk, and new muscle grows with tree ring lines. His ears become longer. His hair turns jade green, with green leaves growing in it. His hands darken, and his skin hardens into brown tree bark. He becomes three meters tall with a strong body. His hair turns into green vines, and palm-sized leaves grow on it into thick greenery. His fingers turn into sturdy wood, and his limbs into thick tree branches. His original delicate and handsome human face turns into a sharp-nosed, huge eye tree spirit face. He wears tree bark as armor, with large amounts of leaves and vines on it. ^{ch. 141}