by Gore, A. P.
Strange. Why did he keep finding Soul Arrays in a small city like Old Martial City? There was one in the Ancient Ruins, and here one was embedded in a crossbow.
He suddenly remembered a piece of trivia about this crossbow. This was the Demon Killing Crossbow.
After he enrolled in the Heavenly Firmament Sect, one of Old Martial City’s Tian clan juniors had joined the sect by displaying a forceful might in the sect enrollment test. He’d carried a strange artifact named Demon Killing Crossbow. It had been instantly seized by the sect elders, and that kid had vanished from the sect like he’d never existed.
This had to be the same crossbow.
Anyway, this artifact might be a strong weapon, but if an elder of the sect saw this, they might just kill him to snatch it away. Sometimes wealth could kill a person faster than an enemy.
Wei was more interested in finding out what would happen if he fed a Soul Stone to this “system” inside him. The last time he’d fed it one, his divine sense had manifested, and it had unlocked a storage function that had saved all of the memories he would have lost without a powerful divine sense.
So, he might unlock something else if he fed it another Soul Stone.
Without another thought, he slammed his palm against the blue shell, but instead of cracking it, a rebound force entered his palm and intense pain shot into his bones.
“Dammit! It broke my palm.” He stared at his broken palm in a daze. It hurt a lot, but he was shocked by the resilience of this blue shell. This was troublesome. How was he supposed to break this blue shell if it didn’t budge under 1,200 pounds of strength? Did he have to wait until he broke through to the Bone Baptization Realm before breaking it?
Chapter 18
Jade Red Dragon Fruit
Li Wei sat in front of a small fire pit he had made from nearby stones from the forest. It had been two days since he’d left the place where he obtained two pieces of the Two-Colored Poison Repelling Flower, and he was still two days away from Dark Alley Town. Today, he planned to speed up his qi cultivation. Before leaving for Dark Alley Town, he had eaten an Essence Gathering Pill and achieved layer one qi Refinement Realm cultivation. Now it was time to advance it further. He hadn’t done it where the fight had taken place because he was cautious about the two Sun clan girls returning.
Thanks to his Blood Essence Body, his broken palm had healed a day before, and he felt no more pain. That damn Demon Killing Crossbow was a tough nut to crack, so he’d had to put the thing aside for now.
Sitting cross-legged in the middle of his Lesser Isolation Array, he pulled out the Jade Red Dragon Fruit from his pouch. It was a high-tier Bronze Grade fruit and contained a huge amount of pure qi, normally enough for one to directly advance by four layers in the Refinement Realm. This was a holy medicine only available in sects, but it was insufficient for Wei to advance his cultivation by four layers.
Because he had used a forbidden technique, Essence Burning Art to break through to the Foundation Realm, he would need to absorb twice the amount of qi as a normal cultivator required to break into the Foundation Realm. This was the reason why his grandfather, Shua, needed five Foundation Refirming Pills to break through three layers of the Foundation Realm. But it also became easy to break through—as long as one had enough pills or fruits like the Jade Red Dragon Fruit.
And what Wei didn’t lack was Jade Red Dragon Fruit.
Cutting the fruit into six pieces, he placed them in front of him and pulled out a porcelain bottle from a tight gray cloth wrapped around his chest. This bottle contained his Yin Yang Liquid. He didn’t want to lose it at any cost, so he always kept it near his heart. As a cultivator, he would always guard his heart, and that meant he would always guard this bottle. In this bottle he had saved 200 Yin Yang Liquid drops he’d produced by absorbing many Yin Yang Fruits. He could have gathered more, but he didn’t want to produce a huge amount and then lose it all by accident, so he played it safe.
A drop at a time, he poured the Yin Yang Liquid on the slices of Jade Red Dragon Fruit.
A medicinal aura wafted from the slices as they grew in size and age. The aroma entered his nostrils and made his heart feel tranquil, like never before. Like he was sitting in an essence-rich place, and every breath he took was precious. Yes, there were places like these in those sects, but only inner sect disciples or direct disciples of the elders could take advantage of them.
After another round of dripping, the slices grew larger, and then after the fifth round of dripping he had six Jade Red Dragon Fruit pieces that were thrice the size of the whole original fruit and contained thrice the energy. He had used thirty Yin Yang Liquid drops, and that meant he had used one Yin Yang Fruits. This was a costly affair, but it was worth it. Now, he could break through to the Foundation Realm easily.
Smirking, he picked up one slice and took a small bite.
A holy taste covered his tongue, like bathing in a stream of essence energy. Every pore on his body eased and a pure stream of qi entered through his mouth and into his dantian and then dispersed to all over his body. If Blood Essence Body cultivation was about amassing vitality, then this Five Elemental Way cultivation was like savoring bliss.
Shaking his head, he closed his eyes and focused his attention on the flow of pure qi and circulated it through the qi channels defined in the Five Elemental Way Qi Cultivation Art. Every cultivation art had two parts: absorbing essence energy and converting it into attributed qi. But with a Jade Red Dragon Fruit, he got pure qi directly, removing the requirement of conversion. Still, absorbing pure qi was only part of the process. Cultivating it efficiently was another part, and it had to be done right to advance further.
For the next two hours, Wei absorbed pure qi from the fruit and stored it in his dantian before pushing it into his qi paths. As he had already initiated in qi cultivation, he had formed a qi path, and once he broke through to the Foundation Realm temporarily, he had formed a wide qi path as well. But as it was a forbidden technique, he hadn’t cleared his qi channels perfectly, and he wanted to do that now. These qi channels traveled through his internal organs, and when combined together, they formed a qi path. In the first six realms of qi cultivation, a cultivator had to make their body familiar to the qi and widen their qi channels. After completing the first revolution of the qi through his qi channels, he had created a thread-sized qi path that would continue to widen as he progressed through all six realms—Refinement Realm, Foundation Realm, Bone Baptization Realm, Marrow Cleansing Realm, Boiling Blood Realm, and Heart Blood Realm. For others, every new realm widened the same qi path further and further. So, if one started with a thread-sized qi path, by the time they reached the Houtian Realm, they would have a qi path similar to the size of a tunnel. Hypothetically, of course.
But he was different. The Five Way Elemental Qi Cultivation Art had a different qi path for every realm, and he suspected it was because of the different elements he would cultivate. But when he used Essence Burning Art, the forbidden technique, his Refinement Realm qi path got widened. Why, he didn’t know. And when he looked at his qi path, he saw it was as wide as a tunnel.
Wait, what?
His heartbeat stuttered when he studied his qi path. Why did he have a qi path as wide as this? And how could he have missed that?
Damn, he must have missed it because he’d eaten a Qi Gathering Pill and reached layer one of the qi Refinement Realm without paying attention to anything else. That must be it, otherwise how could he miss his qi path’s width. But now, seeing it clearly with his divine sense, he could see its heaven-defying width. The qi he sucked it from the Jade Red Dragon Fruit traveled unhindered and completed one revolution through the qi path in a breath’s time. As it moved through various qi channels, his internal organs absorbed strands of qi, and by the end, only a strand of qi returned to his dantian. This was his own qi.
There were no fucking impurities inside his qi channels. How could it be possible?
Using the remaining pure qi in his
dantian, he completed a second revolution through his qi path and returned the remaining qi to his dantian.
Just like that, he had broken through the second layer of the qi Refinement Realm.
Had this happened because he’d used the forbidden technique to break through? Or was it because of the Five Elemental Way Qi Cultivation Art?
He had no clue because he had heard no one claim they had the qi path of a peak Marrow Cleansing Realm cultivator in the Refinement Realm.
If this continued, he might break through to the Marrow Cleansing Realm quickly as long as he had enough pure qi. Maybe or maybe not. If this was because of the Five Elemental Way art, there would be something missing. However, he wasn’t sure how this thing really worked, so he was eager to learn more about it. But like the Blood Essence Body Cultivation Art, he had received no substantial information about this unique qi cultivation art. All he knew was about the Refinement Realm cultivation, but he should get the new information once he broke through. So, in two months he had to step into the Foundation Realm and cultivate wood qi if he wanted to join the Divine Fragrance Palace.
With that thought, his mind became resolute, and he focused all his attention on cultivation.
He took the next bite and then another bite. Like this, he finished half of the slice and broke through the second layer of the qi Refinement Realm. When the last strand of pure qi from the fruit entered his dantian, he felt like a river breaking through a barrier, and his body quivered.
Wow! He had broken through, and there was no foul smell coming out of his body, nor did he need to wash himself. Other than a shitload of transparent sweat, he’d exuded nothing.
If someone else had seen this, they might think it was quite odd. The Refinement Realm was where one excreted the heaviest of impurities out of their body, and it stank a lot. No female cultivator broke through in front of others. Even male cultivators usually chose to do it in isolation.
Thinking about this, when Fei’er had broken through multiple layers, she hadn’t exuded even a hint of a foul smell. It was as if her body was a celestial body with no impurities, or she had broken through before like him.
It wasn’t possible. That girl must have done something to maintain herself, or she hadn’t purged any impurities. But that would be impossible.
Anyway, he had to get washed up and continue breaking through using the rest of the fruit. There were five more slices, and he wouldn’t stop until he broke through to the Foundation Realm.
Chapter 19
Basic Movement Art
Five days passed, and Li Wei only paused when he couldn’t sit cross-legged anymore. It had inevitably delayed his journey, but he chose to breakthrough. Although cultivation was a lonely path, he wanted to become a lazy immortal, so he took a break, listened to the tune of birds, watched falling leaves, and swayed on the warm air rushing through the forest.
It was bliss to live in a forest.
He even took a bath every day. Although he cared little about hygiene, Fei’er had always nagged him about this, so he instinctively bathed in a nearby lake.
Sighing, he flipped his wrist to tilt the meat he was roasting. He’d enjoyed eating with Fei’er. He really missed her.
The fire leaped higher and circled around the meat piece, nearly enveloping it from all sides. Through the yellowish fire dancing in the air, he watched two tigers heading toward the nearby lake and his mind wandered back to his previous life. Once upon a time, he’d petted a tiger cub. While returning from a lecture given to the Array Apprentices the Firmament Sect had recruited, he’d found it hanging on a tree extending out from the cliff he lived on. Heaven knows how that cub ended up there. White fur and black stripes covered its whole body, and it was so cute that he petted it.
For ten years, he attained to its needs and raised it like his little friend, but it vanished one day without saying goodbye. For days, he’d searched for the cub, but he never found it, nor was any trace left. Thinking about that cub made him realize how much he missed it too.
It was a bad period of his life.
If he ever found that cub again in this life, he wouldn’t let it vanish from his side.
A burning smell wafted from the metal rod hold between his fingers, and he realized he had burned the seventh piece of meat in the last five days.
Damn! He’d been so lost in his memories that he’d forgotten to tilt it further. It was an insult to the time he’d spent mastering roasting in a secret realm where he had been trapped for ten years. In those ten years, he had mastered roasting, and if he’d wished, he could run a restaurant with his skills.
Anyway, he had to leave this place today, and soon he would enter Black Alley Town and could enjoy readymade food from a restaurant. That should appease his heart from his failed calculations.
His effort to break through to the Foundation Realm was a total failure. With the five, hundred-year-old Jade Red Dragon Fruits, he’d thought he would be able to break through, but he’d failed. He’d only reached layer six of the qi Refinement Realm.
This was cheating. Each piece was supposed to help him break through two layers, but five pieces had only helped him break through five layers and pushed him to the peak of layer six of the qi Refinement Realm.
This might be because of his wider qi paths. The more he advanced, the purer the qi he needed to complete a revolution.
With only one piece of fruit remaining, he had no chance of breaking through to layer seven, so he’d stopped cultivating. Doing it without additional herbs would be meaningless. Even though he had a Silver Grade artifact with a Qi Transformation Array carved into it, it was insufficient to help him gather enough qi to break through.
So, he had different plans instead. The night before last, he’d read through Mad Elephant Stomp, a foot martial skill, and last night he’d diligently read through the Basic Compendium of Herbs and Alchemy. In fact, while reading through it, he’d gotten an idea and tried using the “system’s” storage function to store everything inside it.
It fucking worked.
The Basic Compendium of Herbs and Alchemy had two thousand pages, and each page described one herb and its alchemical properties. If he had to remember it by himself, he might need months to memorize it even with his current divine sense. But with the “system,” each page took only a few seconds to store, and he was done with the book in a few hours.
It was like magic. He also planned to practice a movement martial skill he had learned in his previous life: Basic Movement Art.
As the name suggested, it was the worst possible movement martial skill one could practice, and every corner store in big cities sold this skill for few gold coins. Every sect had hundreds of copies of this martial skill, and a few sects barred their disciples from practicing it. It was a low-tier Bronze Grade martial skill, something below their standards. On top of that, it was hard as fuck, and no one could comprehend it. The name was more of an irony than a showing the difficulty of the movement art.
But no one knew that this martial skill had two more volumes, and with it one could fly in the air even before reaching the Martial Realm. That’s why Wei needed to visit Black Alley Town. There was a cultivator named Juan Gu who lived in Black Alley Town, and he had the remaining two volumes of this martial skill. In a couple of years, a bandit would acquire it and make a name for himself. In his previous life, when people found out about the bandit, everyone rushed to the bandit’s lair to get the later volumes, but they failed as someone else had already killed that bandit. After that event, the latter two volumes of the movement art vanished from the Mortal Realm and appeared much later in the Martial Realm as collectible items.
Anyway, now was his chance to obtain the martial skill for himself. This should fit into his other plan: to visit the Alchemy Comprehension Tower. It was a mythical tower built by some ancient alchemy god that jutted out of a mountain peak and pierced the skies. Now that he had reincarnated, Wei guessed the tower must be a spirit artifact created by someon
e powerful.
This tower had a mystical function that let anyone below age eighteen and in the Foundation Realm charge through the Alchemy Comprehension Tower levels and receive an award from the tower. The reward could be an alchemy recipe, a cauldron, or a rare herb. This was also one of the reasons why Black Alley Town was famous for its alchemy market. Every year, youths got the chance to enter this tower and obtain a reward, but slots were limited. The current opening was happening in few days, and he hoped to get a slot for himself. Somehow. This was crucial for the Li clan’s survival, so he had to get in and obtain something good.
In his previous life, Wei had only heard about this tower, but now he wanted to try it out. With his divine sense, he should be able to obtain a good reward from the tower and exchange it for a place in the Divine Fragrance Palace.
“Let’s do this.” Wei’s face bloomed with a fulfilling smile as he dashed through the green forest, cutting through foliage and listening to the music of birds. Getting another chance at living the same life wasn’t bad.
Chapter 20
Earth Constellation -Blood Earth Force Divine Art
Li Wei sprinted through the forest, leaving behind deep footprints in the mud and foliage. However, even after intermittently running for the last five hours, he could only achieve an eighteen miles per hour pace. It was much less than the required fifty miles per hour to achieve early completion.
Stopping after a while, he rested his back on a thick wall of trees. Running had never seemed this hard before. It was tougher than practicing high-grade arrays. Worse, he must have lost a couple of pounds of fat. He was becoming thin.
Maybe this was impossible to start with. He placed his hands on his knees. Although this movement martial skill was common, no one practiced it due to its difficulty. There was only one senior who had achieved early completion it in the Heavenly Firmament Sect after he broke through the Heart Blood Realm.