by Gore, A. P.
Wei wailed in pain. The energy was too much for his tiny dantian, and it was crashing against his dantian’s walls, trying to get out.
Wei steeled his mind and steadied his breathing. The next part was most important if he wanted to absorb the maximum efficacy of the medicine. As soon as the healing energy stabilized inside his dantian, he started absorbing essence energy from his surroundings to cultivate. Surprisingly, the essence energy inside Ten Beast Alley was thicker than the outside.
Cultivating in his current condition was hard, but no one said it would be easy. His life was never easy. It was like starting an age-old mechanical construct that hadn’t been cleaned up at all. It was rusty, hard to move, and impossible to operate.
But he continued absorbing essence energy inside his body little by little. Once he’d absorbed enough essence energy to convert it into his own qi, he would start the healing process. If he was a mortal, he would have let the medicinal pill heal him on its own. Mortals could only absorb the efficacy through blood, so any healing pill would enter their stomach, dissolve, and then spread throughout their body. But this process was inefficient. A mortal could only absorb ten to fifteen percent of the healing pill’s efficacy.
Cultivators were different. They used a different method. For example, he had stored the medicinal energy inside his dantian, and while cultivating, he would release it throughout his body along with his qi. The qi path was the best way to transfer healing efficacy throughout his body. That way he would absorb fifty to sixty percent of the energy. If he’d had a Gold Grade Spirit Root, he could have absorbed eighty to ninety percent of the efficacy. The grades of the pill and the Spirit Root had a strange connection between them. The higher the grade of a pill than one’s Spirit Root, the lower the amount he or she would absorb. But cultivators had it difficult too. They had to control their qi so they wouldn’t miss a specific qi channel to send healing efficacy to an injured organ.
Well, Wei didn’t have to worry too much, as his whole body was in bad condition. He just had to cultivate and circulate his qi to get it everywhere.
But it was damn hard. He missed his Blood Essence Body. It was so easy when his blood healed his injuries automatically. He’d just had to cultivate his blood.
After a whole minute, the essence energy finally reached his dantian and was converted into a pure stream of qi that then rushed through his qi channels. The healing energy from the pill was carried along with it and pushed it through his broken meridians. While he constantly focused on releasing the healing energy to the right organs, it was difficult without his divine sense. If his divine sense was active, he could improve this process by some margin.
Time passed slowly, and by the fifth revolution of qi through his qi paths, his internal injuries had recovered a lot. The healing energy from a Gold Grade pill was abundant—sufficient to even heal a dead person. Even his meridians showed signs of joining back together. After this healing session, he would just need to cultivate peacefully for a day or two to get back to peak condition.
System: Simulation complete. Presenting results.
That startled Wei. When did the system start a simulation?
A map of his body appeared in his mind, showing his qi paths and qi channels in different colors. It was exactly the same as the Five Elemental Way Qi Cultivation Art. All the qi channels he used for cultivation were shown in red, while the green ones were where he released his healing energy. They all fit perfectly.
Then there was another path marked in blue. With a closer look, Wei realized it was a simulated path for releasing healing energy in his qi channels. It had clearly marked where he had to release healing energy and how much.
Damn, this was better than his divine sense. With his divine sense, he could make better decisions, but not discern how much healing energy a qi channel would require to heal his organs. Wow! Should he just call the system perfect? By just a glance at the diagram, he knew he would absorb way over sixty percent of the healing efficacy.
Chuckling inwardly, he started his sixth revolution of qi, and this time he followed the exact path showed by the system.
By the time the seventh revolution ended, his body had healed to sixty percent of its peak. And there was still some efficacy remaining. With the help of the system, he had absorbed more efficacy than his Spirit Root alone allowed.
The system was awesome. If it was a girl, he would have kissed and married her right away.
After the eighth qi revolution finished, Wei guessed he still had five or six percent of the healing energy remaining from the pill, but that wouldn’t heal him to his peak. It could only get him to seventy to seventy-five percent of his peak.
However, there was another use for the same energy. He could use it to break through. One more successful revolution, and he would enter layer nine of the qi Foundation Realm.
But could he do it with just the remaining healing energy combined with the measly amount of qi he could absorb and convert from his surroundings?
It was a tough question, and he couldn’t decide on the answer. Nor could he pause his cultivation. If he spent more time, he might not break through. But if he let this chance go, he wasn’t sure if he would get another chance to sit and cultivate.
What should he do?
Chapter 49
Black Fox
Sun Nuan watched over Wei Lin, who was cultivating in a corner with a pained face. He was in a dire condition, and yet he sat like a statue. Only his mouth showed that he was in pain. Seeing him like this, she couldn’t stop herself from comparing him with other men she had met. Since she’d turned fifteen, her mother had tried to set her up with some noble clan or another in the capital, and she hated that. She didn’t want to get married right now. She wanted to do something with her life other than be a corner piece in some noble’s manor. But that was inevitable. Every royal princess had to get married by her eighteenth birthday. This was a rule set up by the Sun clan to prevent any potential female cultivator from setting her eyes on the throne. Or she could break through to the Bone Baptization Realm and join the royal army where she could never get married. Her life would then be tied to the army itself.
All her paths forward looked grim, and she had no idea what she wanted. Anyway, keeping her mother alive mattered the most right now. If it wasn’t for Wei Lin, to whom she owed her life, she would rather be back in the capital curing her mother temporarily. If she could do some meritorious service to the empire like recruit a prodigy like Wei Lin to the royal family, her mother might even get an Earth Grade Elixir to cure her permanently.
But it was Wei Lin, and she didn’t want him to join the royal alchemists. Joining the royal family’s alchemy branch would limit his progress for a lifetime.
She could join an alchemy sect and walk the path of her passion, alchemy. But the royal family didn’t allow anyone to join a sect until they did some good work for the family first, and Hua’er had more talent in alchemy, so if anyone joined it should be Hua’er. If both of them joined a sect, that would put their mother in a predicament, and her end wouldn’t be good.
Sun Nuan sighed helplessly. There was nothing she could do about her life. But before her life was wasted, she wanted to repay the kindness Wei Lin had showed her all those years ago.
Pushing all random thoughts away, she observed their surroundings. With her hereditary martial skill, she could see in the dark, and so far, she had found no danger lurking there. She wished there would be none.
As long as Wei Lin recovered and they got out of here, it would be good. This place irked her so much that she didn’t want to cultivate here. The essence energy from this place had an odor attached to it, and she was wary of how it would react with her wood qi.
But what would they do once they got out of this place? What if Tiang Fu still waited outside?
She fiddled with her finger, missing her mother’s storage ring. She had given it to Hua’er and sent her back to the capital with another bodyguard before following
Tiang Fu’s men.
Maybe she should just stay here with this handsome man. There wouldn’t be any marriage trouble or risk of the Tiang clan making trouble for her.
Red rushed to her face when she remembered holding Wei Lin’s head in her lap. Well, she’d been in shock, so she’d thought it was okay. But it wasn’t. It was highly inappropriate for a woman and man to have any physical contact like that. Even her father acted cautiously around her after she turned twelve. Wei Lin was basically a stranger. A man on top of that.
But she didn’t fret too much over it. He had saved her life once, and it was her turn to repay the favor.
Something moved in the darkness, and she instinctively jumped to her feet, her body tensing.
Two shiny red-black eyes appeared from the darkness, followed by a beast’s body. It was a Black Fox, the terrorizing beast of this valley. It looked like a normal fox, but it was a vicious and prideful Ferocious Beast. It was known for its gravity-based attacks, but it liked to use its physical force more than its gravity attacks. This thing was tough to deal with, and her opponent had already reached layer five of Foundation Realm cultivation. It was a dangerous beast, and its heart was a precious alchemy ingredient. If a mortal ate its heart, they could heal from any injury, and a cultivator would gain some comprehension of gravity-based skills. So, this beast’s heart was in demand, but it was a rare species that never appeared outside this valley.
However, now she spotted ten of them marching toward her, and they looked terrifying.
Turning back, she gazed at Wei Lin. He was still cultivating, healing, and if she woke him up now, he might not absorb enough medicinal efficacy. An injured Wei Lin was of no use.
She had to give him enough time to heal.
But could she survive against ten layer five Foundation Realm beasts?
Almost there. Li Wei pushed his pure qi through his qi path, slowly but continuously. However, after reaching seventy percent of his ninth revolution, he faced heavy resistance, and the healing energy from the pill was used up. It was growing more impossible to push it forward with every passing second.
And his own qi wasn’t sufficient to complete this ninth revolution.
Was he going to fail?
This was tough. If he failed in this attempt, he didn’t know when he would gain another opportunity. Breaking through layers in the Refinement Realm was a numbers job. With every layer advancement, one had to increase the number of revolutions to break through. A layer five qi Refinement Realm cultivator would break through when he successfully completed six continuous qi revolutions through his qi path. For him to break through, he needed to complete nine successful qi revolutions, and every new revolution got tougher than the previous one. One could imagine how much pure qi one needed to complete nine consecutive revolutions.
And when one got stuck on the last part of the ninth revolution, the fact became worse.
He didn’t know when he would find the time, much less a catalyst like the Gold Grade pill he’d absorbed.
Wait. He had another source of energy: the Chilly Dragon Fruit Ding Su had given him. That was still in his pouch.
Without opening his eyes, he fiddled with his pouch, and when he found the cold fruit, he threw it inside his mouth.
Cold energy froze his teeth, and then the fruit turned into a gust of cold energy and rushed toward his dantian. But before it entered his dantian, he felt like he sat on the tallest icy peak of a mountain. When the energy reached his dantian, it was radially converted into pure qi. The Chilly Dragon Fruit had an icy deposition and grew in pure yin areas, absorbing yin type essence energy from nature and storing it as a pure qi. It could help a cultivator break through one minor layer of the Refinement Realm. But it was mainly useful for low-level cultivators as the fruit only contained so much pure qi. This fruit alone couldn’t push him through layer eight to layer nine, but it could help him bridge the final one-third gap of his revolution.
Everything happened in a breath’s time, and Wei received a stream of pure qi to push forward. With the newly found strength, his qi dashed through the barrier like a bull crushing a mud wall, and before he knew it, he had completed his ninth revolution.
A drop of pure qi dropped back into his dantian after completing the revolution and then another one, another one, and soon it turned into a drizzle. By the end, his dantian had one hundred drops of pure qi. This was a quantitative leap in his cultivation.
Power surged through his body, and he felt like he could break a mountain. But before that, he had to take a bath. Currently he reeked like a pig in a mud pool. Disgusting. Sun Nuan had better be far away from him, else she might hate him for days.
Some deity must have listened to his wish, as when he opened his eyes, he found Sun Nuan far away from his current location. But that deity must have hated Sun Nuan because she was bleeding and battling with ten Black Foxes—layer five Foundation Realm Ferocious Beasts.
She needed him.
Jumping to his feet, Wei pulled his sword out and activated the Strength Expanding Array carved on it.
However, that wouldn’t be sufficient to win this battle. With his layer nine cultivation and strength from the sword he could barely go against a layer one qi Foundation Realm cultivator, and here he had to face ten layer five Foundation Realm beasts.
“This is exciting.” The odds were stacked against him, but he didn’t cower from the bloody battle. In fact, he loved blood.
Chapter 50
Black Fox’s Wrath
Blood leaked from her body like a slashed water skin. Her arms looked like an extension of her blood-red robe. Her spear trembled when the nearest Black Fox charged her. Its razor-sharp claw-tipped black paws struck her spear and sent a shockwave into her body.
Her eyes flickered. This was an insult. From the moment the fight started, only one beast had attacked her while the other beasts looked on as if looking down on her.
“Mad Rush Spear Thrust,” she shouted and pushed her spear forward, ignoring the shockwave that had reduced her attack power. She would give it her all. How could these beasts look down on her? She was a princess. A warrior.
The beast flickered through the air and avoided her attack, waving a paw at her spear and sending her staggering backward. Her qi was depleted, so she couldn’t use her Mad Rush Spear Thrust—her strongest martial skill—anymore.
“Enough.” She flicked her wrist, and a pill appeared in her hand. It was a Qi Replenishing Pill that could be used by Foundation Realm cultivators to replenish their qi instantly, but it had a side effect. Her qi absorption rate would be halved for the next few days.
That could be bad. But only if she survived this.
The beast flicked through the air and waved its paw again, this time targeting her neck. If she ate the pill, she would have to suffer the damage, but if she didn’t, she couldn’t defend against this attack and would suffer severe injuries anyway.
It was a tough choice, and a small part of her wanted to give up already.
Suddenly, a figure flashed in front of her and met the attack with their sword. The sword shook on impact, but it didn’t sway like her spear.
Wei Lin had broken through to layer nine, and that damn bastard could go against a layer five Foundation Realm beast with his physical power alone.
Li Wei flashed past Sun Nuan, raising his sword in the nick of time to take the brunt of the beast attack directed at her neck. She was in danger, and he had to put all he had into his stance.
His muscles flexed when the paw hit his sword like a thousand-pound hammer hitting a nail. But this nail was tougher than the hammer.
He was pushed back a step, his internal organs shaking a little.
“This is great.” With his thumb, he wiped blood from the corner of his mouth. He couldn’t contain his joy. This was a good feeling, to match a layer-six-body-Foundation-Realm-equivalent physical attack with his mere layer two body Foundation Realm defense.
In fact, he was ecstatic for the
first time. Even without using blood pearls, his body had changed into a solid rock. Of course, he couldn’t forget the Strength Expanding Array’s effect. It had raised his physical strength by two.
The Black Fox growled and attacked again with the same move.
Wei balanced on the balls of his feet and took a defensive stance. This time he didn’t stagger back because he was prepared. Good. Even though he had lost connection with his Physical Root, his basic defense was stronger than he expected. No wonder he’d taken attacks from Tiang Chi head on under the pressure of gravity and hadn’t fallen back. It was thanks to his physical defense.
“It’s my turn.” Putting more weight on his right foot, he attacked with his One Sword Strike. Power surged through his sword and arm, and it reached an impeccable harmony while slicing down at the beast paw.
The Black Fox looked startled, but it swung on its leg and raised its right paw to defend itself.
But how could it avoid the full-blown attack coming from above it? Wei had put everything he had into it, even activated the Strength Expanding Array to its limit, poured his qi inside his sword, and used the middle completion of his One Sword Strike.
Like two metal rods hitting each other, his sword and the beast’s paw clashed in the air, sending a shockwave back through Wei’s body. Wei staggered back and gulped a mouthful of blood that had risen to his throat. That bastard Black Fox had used its whole strength to defend, and that was way too much for Wei.
However, the beast was in worse condition than him. Its paw had turned into a bloody mess. It stared back at Wei with shiny black eyes, doubt flashing through them.
The nine other beasts who were looking on shifted in their places. But that was it. They didn’t seem to take Wei seriously, but they looked cautious.
The injured beast shook its bloody paw and held it tight to its chest before flashing forward with its other paw in attack mode.
