Gu Worms

What a Gu is

Gu are the essence of heaven and earth, and a Gu Master is someone who has opened an aperture and uses primeval essence to feed, refine, and manipulate them. ^{ch. 7} All Gu worms have only one ability. ^{ch. 105}

Without food, Gu worms die of hunger. ^{ch. 63 ch. 91} Rare Gu that appear on the market are snatched at once. ^{ch. 50} A Gu Master too weak to hold one can have it taken by force. ^{ch. 43}

Gu can be found in the wild, not only through academy pick or trade. When a thunder crown wolf dies, wild Gu abandon its body, and Gu Masters scramble to catch them. ^{ch. 167}

Gu are also traded for primeval stones. A visiting caravan runs bidding for rare worms such as Liquor worm. ^{ch. 110 ch. 111} Fang Yuan sells rank one healing grass Gu through a shopkeeper so clansmen can buy them. Ill-intent customers are sent to wreck Fang Yuan’s wine tavern as personal harassment from a family grudge, not as ordinary business rivalry. ^{ch. 107} For Fang Yuan, money and fortune are just material goods; only cultivation is the root. ^{ch. 112}

Gu can be taken. Fang Yuan already owns a Liquor worm when he feeds it monkey wine in a wine shop to display what he holds. ^{ch. 44} He later tracks another Liquor worm opportunity to a treehouse. ^{ch. 109} He enters the bidding for that second worm. ^{ch. 110} He wins, so the second Liquor worm is already in his possession. ^{ch. 111} He fuses the two Liquor worms into a Four Flavours Liquor worm. ^{ch. 121}

Moonlight Gu as an early case

The Gu Yue academy sends newly awakened youths to pick a vital Gu from the academy’s Gu room. ^{ch. 7} Moonlight Gu is the clan’s local specialty: a rank one breed cultivated by secret method, light as paper and small enough to sit in a palm. Fang Yuan chooses one when he still has no lead on a Liquor worm. ^{ch. 8}

Feeding

Ranks of Gu

Gu are ranked on the same nine-level scale as Gu Masters. Gu Masters at rank one normally use rank one Gu, because higher rank Gu cost more to feed and to activate. ^{ch. 8} The full ladder as a system statement is covered on ranks and realms.

Getting a first Gu

The Gu Yue clan holds an Awakening Ceremony for its fifteen-year-old youths. ^{ch. 4} The ceremony grades talent and, when it succeeds, forms an aperture in the child’s body. ^{ch. 5} After the aperture opens and the primeval sea coagulates, those youths are rank one Gu Masters. The academy then sends them to the academy Gu room to pick a Gu worm to refine as their vital Gu. ^{ch. 7} Everything after that is acquisition, whether by purchase, by hunting, or by taking.

Immortal Gu

Carriers of the Great Dao

Immortal Gu feeding

Wild Immortal Gu

Treasure Yellow Heaven

Rank titles outside the usual scale