Digital Shade Gu

On Qing Mao Mountain, after Fang Yuan reaches rank three, a guide leads him into the Gu Yue clan secret room and names the worms on the rock tables as rank two Digital Shade Gu that hold recipes. The worm he puts down when leaving is once called “Digital Shadow Gu” instead. ^{ch. 156}

Appearance

They are about fist sized and look alike, like silkworms. On the head are two compound eyes like bees or dragonflies, colourful and like shiny glass. The surface is not soft but covered in an insect shell with golden lustre, and the bodies come in many colours. ^{ch. 156}

Form and rank

They are rank two Digital Shade Gu, a recording type of Gu worm. One step further in advancement is the rank three Photo-audio Gu. ^{ch. 156}

Recipe colours

The guide sorts recipe ranks by colour: green Digital Shade Gu hold almost all rank one recipes, red-black hold rank two, white hold rank three, orange hold rank four, and the central purple hold rank five. ^{ch. 156}

Effect

Injecting primeval essence makes two beams shoot from the compound eyes. Aimed at a white jade plate, the beams leave fluctuating words that show a Gu’s strengths, weaknesses, fusion recipe, refinement notes, and prior Gu Masters’ experience. Fang Yuan’s first sample is a red-black Digital Shade Gu that projects the Moonscar Gu refinement recipe. Voices are not needed to store recipes, so Digital Shade Gu is enough where Photo-audio Gu would also record sound. The text calls Digital Shade Gu easier to refine and low cost, a common method to contain recipes. ^{ch. 156}

Clans prefer Digital Shade Gu over bamboo paper because stolen recipes would leak both specialty Gu methods and combat intelligence about a clan’s worms. ^{ch. 156}

Ownership and access

These Digital Shade Gu belong to the Secret Hall clan elder, but a newly advanced clan elder can use primeval essence to browse within the access that elder’s will allows. Fang Yuan cannot open the rank four and five recipes, and even with primeval essence those worms give no reaction. ^{ch. 156 ch. 157} The secret room is a clan red zone under secret observation, and each visit is capped at fifteen minutes. ^{ch. 156} The clan feeds them. The will in the Digital Shade Gu is one with the Secret Hall clan elder. A separate Digital Shade Gu that holds the Moonlight Gu reverse-fusion recipe is hidden appropriately outside this open table set. Fang Yuan judges that Spring Autumn Cicada’s aura would let him refine the table Gu and take the recipes. ^{ch. 157}

Path

Early Qing Mao Mountain chapters describe the recording use without naming a cultivation path for this Gu. ^{ch. 156}