《Divine Locket》 Prologue : The departure of a phoenix and dragon A young man and a woman stood together on the peak of the mountain staring at the approaching shadows flying towards their location swiftly. The young man¡¯s eyes flashed violently and clutched the woman tightly before scooping her into his arms. His right foot kicking off the ground to jump off the mountain peak into the sky before starting to fly. Numerous arrows flew past him as he dodged from attacks from the enemies pursuing him. Suddenly letting the woman fly by herself, the man stood in midair waiting for the pursuers to reach him, his right fist started to glow as he charged his Qi into it. A bright crimson aura flooded out from the woman to supplement the man¡¯s own aura, a beautiful crimson sun started to appear in between them. A scorching heat scorched everybody as they got closer to the aura. The leader of the pursuers suddenly stopped before releasing his own aura, a dark aura which seemed to consume all the light that got close to him. A dark visage started to appear as his aura seemed to reach the peak, a black panther could be seen as the visage started to emerge from its ethereal form. The young man called to the woman to release the power of the phoenix as he himself released the power of a dragon to form into corporeal forms. Utilising their martial technique of flames to the maximum, the dragon and phoenix started to dance a dance of flames to surround the area around their bodies. The pair looked at each other and nodded, at that moment both of them held hands and poured all their life force for one last strike before dying. They charged forwards with the two aura beasts to instantly kill all their enemies. They started to float down together, their faces were pale and breaths haggard. Smiling wryly at each other, they shared one last kiss before tears started to fall down together. The man took a locket out and the woman started to shake even more because they knew what they were about to do. To pour their soul essence into the locket to create a legacy which is only accessible to one which contains ¡°The Bloodline¡±. The locket was a treasure where it already had a dimensional space and where they had lived before the enemies were able to attack the dimensional space through their spatial techniques. Hugging each other closely, their bodies started to turn into ashes before scattering away into the wind. The locket slowly fell towards the ground before settling there, a locket which was to be passed through many hands without any clue to the use for many aeons to come. This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. The sirens are softened by thick walls. Sitting in the middle of the building, were hostages. A bomb strapped upon a young man unwillingly constantly ticks down. The man named Lin Ming, looked around for people to comfort him but was unable to find anybody. Not knowing that he has less than thirty seconds to live, Lin ming continued to sniff. Lin Ming¡¯s eyes flutter open as he could hear a voice calling for him. Looking around with his half-open eyes, he sees a smiling man. The man asks him, ¡°Do you wish to have another chance at life?¡± Lin Ming barely hesitates before fervently nodding at him. Smiling at him, the man takes out a goblet of mysterious, blood-red liquid and offers it to the young man. Grabbing ahold of the cup, Lin Ming started to gulp down the liquid, not stopping until the last drop of the liquid was finally swallowed. His vision started to fade when he realised that his head was aching, he frantically tried to open his eyes but failed. As his thoughts slowly started to fade away, a darkness started to enclose around him. Jumbled voices were heard, a man and two women are in the room. One of the women is in labour, constantly trying to push out the baby inside of her. The final grunt of pain rang through the room. The baby was finally out. The man takes a towel out of nowhere and quickly wraps it around the baby, caressing the baby slowly he thinks of a name for his newborn son. He looks upon his young son¡¯s face and decides to call him Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu stares with wide, open eyes and tries to say something, his father leans forward to hear him. The first words the baby uttered was, ¡°father¡±. His father becomes ecstatic and pulls the baby even closer towards his bosom. His eyes beaming as he carried the baby to sleep. - Prologue End - Locket Chapter 1 Ye Xiu was busy running towards the library. After learning how to read and most of the characters secretly, Ye Xiu was always slipping out of sight to sneak into the library. Everyday, he spends at least six hours reading books on the geography of the continent, the almanac of magical beasts, the compendium of medicine and herbs and the scrolls mentioning cultivation. However, Ye Xiu didn¡¯t notice that his father, Tian Ye Qiu had been secretly observing him for the past few weeks. His father was happy that his son was sensible and not like other children. This was because he was building his knowledge base, which could pave the way in his child¡¯s future. Thinking about his child¡¯s future, he remembered that he should bring Ye Xiu to test his talent for cultivation and alchemy tomorrow. Leaving silently, he took a last peek at his son before attending to his duties. Ye Xiu didn¡¯t know that he had eidetic memory so he kept on earnestly reading the same books multiple due to his interests in these fields of study. After leaving the library to get back to his courtyard, he noticed something shining in one of the bushes. Walking towards the bush, Ye Xiu glanced around to make sure others could not take away his own discovery, after all Ye Xiu was still a toddler. After making sure the surroundings were clear, he picked up the shining object to inspect it. Looking at it, he see that it was a locket with beautiful engravings etched upon the top and lower half. On the top half there was a dragon and on the lower half there was a phoenix. Opening the locket, a bright light suddenly shined, blinding Ye Xiu momentarily. After regaining his vision, Ye Xiu noticed that the locket was gone, thinking that the whole incident was just his imagination he continued on his way back to his courtyard. Reaching the courtyard, he ran towards the building where dinner was being served, seeing his parents already sitting down at the table he quickly settled down. Ye Qiu looked at his son and nodded. He started to speak before they ate. He said to his son, ¡°Tomorrow you shall be testing your martial and alchemic talent,¡± staring deeply at his son he continued speaking, ¡°I hope your talent doesn¡¯t disappoint me or you.¡± After speaking he started to eat, after finishing his portion of food he walked out of the dining to head towards the spring to clean himself. Arriving at the spring, Ye Qiu started thinking deeply on how to deal with the problems that the future could bring. Meanwhile in an abandoned building several figures were gathered together. Speaking in low tones was a figure clad in a black robe. ¡°How are the preparations going? Said the figure. Another figure clad in a blue robe answered, ¡°The necessary arrangements have been made, the parents of the spies have been notified to have their children to become closer to the City Lord¡¯s son. We know that the City Lord¡¯s son is already six years old, with a talent of grade seven he will quickly grow into a strong person once he hits the age where the growth spurt occurs.¡±Enjoying this book? Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit. A voice could be heard, sneering in disdain, ¡°It doesn¡¯t matter how strong he will become, he¡¯s not a threat to us as long as we are in control of his friends, family and actions. When he inherits his father¡¯s position, we¡¯ll have him take out their ancestral heirloom out of The Seal.¡± A timid voice squeaked out, ¡°There are still some variables which we have not been able to take care of. The Tian Clan¡¯s Patriarch hasn¡¯t been informed about this situation because of his current stance with the City Lord. I¡¯m afraid that if his son has good talent in either martial arts or alchemy then it could ruin our plans. Even though the Patriarch hasn¡¯t been informed by us, he still knows of our plans due to his various sources which has been collecting information around the city for several years. If the Patriarch does take action and make his son to become friends with the City Lord¡¯s son then we will fail for sure. The Tian Clan has a foundation of three hundred years, it will be hard for us to make any moves on them if they do decide to move forward.¡± The man in the black robe spoke again, ¡°I propose that we also send the children to become friends with the Tian Clan¡¯s Young Master, he¡¯s currently three years old so we still have time to come up with plans to manipulate him. For now, continue to observe the clans and sects for any abnormal movements. This meeting is over.¡± THe four figures separated one by one to their respective bases. Another figure crept out of the shadows with a hideous smile on it¡¯s face. Speaking to itself, ¡°Once that item is taken out of the Ancient Seal, another fragment of the Demonic emblem will be released into the Dimension.¡± As this matter concludes, Ye Xiu finished his food and headed towards his room excitedly, after hearing his father speak he started to have all sorts of ideas for the future. Lying down on his bed, he fell asleep, in his dream he saw a man wearing a robe embroidered beautifully was a dragon and beside the man was a woman wearing a dress which had a phoenix embroidered on it as well. The man started to speak, ¡°Successor of our legacy, due to the fact that you are a male you shall inherit the power of the dragons. My wife and I hopes that you can use this legacy to bring yourself to unimaginable heights. Both of us use the concept of fire as our main concept, we have used it to the point that it has formed a dao. What a dao is, is something that you should find out by yourself. You can choose to learn to use the sword or to use the whip. The sword represents dragons and the whip represents the phoenix. Once you understand the essence of either of these weapons and the way they are supposed to be used then you should be able to utilise some of the higher ranked techniques of the dragon or phoenix clan. Within our legacy it contains a dimensional space you alone can enter. The space has restrictions which will be removed as your strength and comprehension of the world increases. The basic environment of the space is currently set to have the qi from the space to be three times more pure and abundant compared to the qi outside the space. Time spent in the dimension is ten times faster than the time spent outside the space. You can only spend a total of twelve hours a day inside the dimension. Herbs will grow faster if you pour spiritual liquid over it, spiritual liquid can be taken from the lake which is located at the foot of the mountain. Bathing in the liquid will give you all sorts of benefits so you should constantly use it. The liquid will be constantly replenished so you don¡¯t have to be worried about it running out. There is a small house beside the lake, in the house there should be the cultivation technique you need and there should also be a library of martial techniques. Choose your martial techniques appropriately and make sure you don¡¯t get blinded by power and greed because learning too many martial techniques isn¡¯t always a good thing. There are other things that are important but you should discover them yourself. Oh, one important thing is that you if you need to exit or enter the dimensional space, just think about the action. I wish you good fortune alongside with my wife, please remember our names, mine is Xing Yu He and my wife¡¯s name is Tie Lu Di.¡± Talent Chapter 2 Ye Xiu started to slowly wake up after they both bade him farewell, collecting his thoughts to review what just happened, he immediately tried to enter the dimensional space to make sure it wasn¡¯t just a dream. After successfully entering the space he ran towards the lake to take a bath to see what kind of benefits he could obtain. Taking off his clothes, he jumped in. As he bathed he could feel his body getting hot and thought that it must¡¯ve been his imagination. What he didn¡¯t know was that the liquid was slowly nourishing his muscles and bones to become perfectly suitable for the cultivation of martial techniques. After taking the bath he exited the space. Ye Xiu walked towards the dining to eat breakfast, he saw his father patiently waiting for him. As he was eating his father told him that today was the yearly clan gathering and that he should act appropriately. Walking with his father towards the ancestral gathering building, he spotted a huge number of kids his age waiting patiently to get their talents for martial cultivation to be tested. Ye Xiu walked towards the platform to watch the testing. For martial talent, you would need to put your hand on a black pillar, every 0.5 meters which the black pillar is lit up is a level in talent. The black pillar was able to measure martial talent to grade ten, the highest martial talent that the country had in history was grade nine. The person holding that talent became a powerhouse in the two neighbouring countries. An average cultivator in the Xia Long country had a talent of grade two. The better your talent the more people would value you. Having grade nine talent was nothing special in the bigger empires and countries but in the Xia Long country it was extremely high. Ye Xiu looked at the pillar and saw a girl walking towards it, putting her hand on it, the pillar started lighting up before stopping at three meters high. This was a martial talent of grade six, several adults started to look at the girl¡¯s parents with envious eyes. This talent was enough for the clan to focus their resources on the girl. The elder in charge of the assessment called out the girl¡¯s name, ¡°Tian Bu Xing, Martial talent: Grade Six, Alchemic Talent: None.¡± Ye Xiu was confused because he didn¡¯t see the examination for alchemic talent anywhere, turning towards his father he asked, ¡°Father, how do they measure alchemic talent?¡± His father looked at him and kindly explained, ¡°Ye Xiu, the method to measure alchemic talent is to look at the strength of a person¡¯s soul, apart from that you also need to have the affinity of fire and nature. Soul strength for young kids such as you is measure from level one to level hundred. The basic requirement is to have a soul strength of at least twenty at the age of five whilst having the affinity of fire and wood is a must. This is because fire is needed for the alchemy processes to form pills and other such things. Wood is also required due to the fact that it is able to control the medicinal, healing and strengthening properties inside pills. Without both of them, it would be impossible to be an alchemist. Also due to the fact that such high requirements are needed to become an alchemist, there are very few alchemists. If you are an alchemist you would be treated extremely highly as long as you reach a good rank in the Alchemy Association. The reason why the requirement of having a soul strength of twenty at the age of five is due to the fact of that your soul needs to nurture your body for a long period of time. Without being able to nurture your body for a long period of time then you wouldn¡¯t be able to form your inner flame. Your inner flame has to be formed before the age of thirteen otherwise the path of an alchemist is forever cut off from you. Forming an inner flame is not completely reliant on soul strength, it also requires luck and hard work. You have to constantly train your soul everyday or your chances of forming an inner flame in the future is lower.¡± Ye Xiu¡¯s eyes started to widen whilst listening to his father¡¯s explanation, his breath was starting to get heavy. In his mind, Ye Xiu was excited that if he was able to become an alchemist then he would be treated with respect as long as he reaches a good rank in the future. Though at the same time he also knew that if he wasn¡¯t able to have the prerequisites to become an alchemist and if he didn¡¯t have enough luck to form his inner flame. Stolen story; please report. Whilst deep in his thoughts, Ye Qiu started to pull his son towards a small room where they tested alchemic talent. Once inside the room, an elder was sitting at a table waiting for them to sit down. Ye Qiu spoke to his son to try and shake him out of his thoughts. Ye Xiu quickly took control of his senses to get back to what he was supposed to be doing. On the table in front of the man, there was an orb settled on top of a black hickory stand. Ye Xiu had the feeling that it had something to do with the alchemic talent test. Waiting for the Elder to speak, he quietly sat on a chair waiting for further instructions. ¡°Please put your hands on top of the orb so we can begin the test for alchemic talent.¡± The Elder spoke. Resting his hands on top of the orb, the orb started to glow. Ye Xiu was currently seeing lots of red and green dots. He was able to perceive so many dots that his eyes were starting to blur. The Elder noticed that he was about to faint so he quickly took the orb away from the child¡¯s hand before speaking. ¡°Congratulations Ye Qiu, your son, Ye Xiu has a soul strength of fifty at such a young age. He has both fire and wood affinity. It seems like your son is a genius, I will inform the other Clan Elders to provide more resources for your son to have a higher success of forming his inner flame. Please go towards the martial talent testing platform, due to the fact that your son has such a high soul strength at the age of three, we will keep the results of the tests a secret.¡± the Elder left right after he said that. Ye Qiu pulled his son closer to him and spoke in a grave voice, ¡°What happened today, keep it to yourself and never mention it to anyone. If people find out, they will take advantage of your young age and you will be captured and sold in the slave markets because of your high soul strength and affinity for fire and wood.¡± ¡°Yes father, I¡¯ll make sure nobody knows about my Alchemic talent but I do have to ask, why do we test our Alchemic talent at such a young age?¡± ¡°That¡¯s due to the fact that the ways to train your soul are usually only known by Alchemists. The earlier you test your talent, the earlier you can find an Alchemist to teach you. Now let¡¯s stop talking about this matter, we¡¯ll be going to the platform to test your Martial Talent. Just to let you know, having Alchemic Talent is much better than having a good Martial Talent. As long as your Martial Talent isn¡¯t too bad then it can be made up with the Alchemic Talent. This is because you can personally refine pills for yourself which can make up for your talent.¡± Ye Qiu stopped speaking with his son as they walked towards the platform. By the time they reached the platform, the majority of the clan members had already one back to their homes. The Elder who was in charge of the testing nodded at the young lad¡¯s father. His father pushed him towards the platform to take the test. Ye Xiu walked towards the Elder beside the pillar before placing his hands onto the pillar. The pillar started to light up, going up by 0.5 meters every time before the pillar stopped shining. The elder looked at the pillar before smiling at the young boy. Patting Ye Xiu on the shoulder to notify him that the test was over, the Elder spoke in a loud and clear voice so the people who had still remained in the hall could hear him, ¡°Tian Ye Xiu, Martial Talent: Grade Eight, Alchemic Talent: None.¡± The Elder spoke to Ye Qiu and Ye Xiu through Qi sense so nobody could hear the conversation between them, ¡°We have hidden the Young master¡¯s Alchemic Talent, as for his Martial Talent it will be kept a secret to outsiders however we have to notify the City Lord.¡± Ye Qiu nodded at the Elder and gave his thanks. Ye Qiu picked up his son and put him on top of his shoulders to let him sit there because he was extremely happy with the results that his son gave him today. As he was wallowing in happiness, his son started to speak. ¡°Father, why did the Elder call me Young Master? I didn¡¯t know who he was until today after all.¡± ¡°Ye Xiu, that¡¯s because I am the person currently in charge of everything that occurs in the clan. Ye Xiu, listen carefully, from now on you mustn¡¯t do anything foolish. I will personally oversee your education so that you can act appropriately according to the situation in the future. Overseeing your education naturally means that I¡±ll also be teaching you martial arts once you reach five years old. Also, every time that you go to bed instead of sleeping you will be meditation. Tonight I will teach you the basic breathing method and posture required to go into meditation. I will explain the reason why and the benefits for meditation later.¡± Meditation Chapter 3 The pair both arrived at their courtyard with both of them talking happily about what they were going to have for dinner. A woman could be seen waiting patiently for the pair, smiling brightly when saw both of them connecting so well. The woman was Ye Xiu¡¯s mother, Yue Yu Er. Previously, she knew that her husband was worried about their son not having good enough talent but after receiving notice from the voice transmission jade that her husband gave her, she knew that although they are happy now the happiness wouldn¡¯t last forever. The reason why she thought this was because it was possible for hr clan to find out who Ye Xiu was if he shined too brightly. This meant that if her clan went and dug around for clues about Ye Xiu¡¯s family, then they would be able to find her. Brooding over these thoughts, she waited for both of them to enter the house before trying to clear her mind of these negative feelings. When they went in the dining room, they were greeted with a huge array of dishes due to the news which gave cause to a celebration for the family. When they finished eating, Ye Qiu brought his son to his study to start teaching the basics of meditation. ¡°Sit down and place both legs on opposite thighs like I do.¡± Ye Qiu immediately sat into position to demonstrate to his son. He saw that his son was able to sit in the position but seemed uncomfortable. Looking at him being uncomfortable because he had once experienced when he was younger as well. Just watching made him carefully look at his son¡¯s face, making him think his son was truly too cute. ¡°Ye Xiu, relax your muscles, if your muscles are too tense during meditation then after long periods of time then it will ache more than usual. Now close your eyes and pay attention to your breathing pattern, once you have remembered the pattern which you breathe at then slowly adjust the pattern to mine. This breathing pattern is to make sure that you have the best intake of the qi which is surrounding you. This isn¡¯t the only benefit that you can gain from the meditation, during meditation you will be able to sense the changes in your body more easily to when you are awake, this means that whilst you are practicing a circulation technique then you will be able to adapt to the many changes that occurs as you breakthrough. Besides that, meditation allows you to absorb as much qi as if you are awake, this means that once you wake up you would have a lot of energy instead of grogginess from sleeping. The most important part about meditation is the fact that you have to empty your mind. Emptying your mind can help improve concentration, this means that whilst meditating it is easier to contemplate about techniques or make breakthroughs for various things. This is applicable to matters outside because as long as you are able to empty your mind of useless thoughts during battles, pill refining or training then you are able to do things to the full extent. This is due to the fact that you are completely concentrated on a matter so you it is obvious that the amount of effort will eventually end up with a result which shows you have tried your best. Emptying your mind eventually ends up to being able to have sudden insights. These sudden insights are things you can only stumble upon but can¡¯t continuously look about for it.¡±Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. After seeing that his son as able to completely grasp the method of meditation, Ye Qiu quietly left the study to not startle the boy. Quickly pulling out a dark robe out of his interspatial storage, he walked out of the courtyard before slowly melting into the darkness to get to his information base without anybody noticing him. Ye Qiu came to the base today because he had to deal with the information channels within the city. The reason why he had to control the channels was due to the fact that his clan had just received such good results from the clan¡¯s juniors. There were still spies located in the clan but he hadn¡¯t been able to completely find every single one of them, after all there were spies from certain clans from several years back. By controlling the news he could make sure that no information could be leaked, however this was a hard task because he had to make sure that other big powers would not notice that the news was being manipulated by someone behind the scenes. Scrutinising the reports one by one somebody knocked on his office door before opening it. Speaking Immediately, ¡°Sir, the Robe of Souls organisation has started to probe into the Tian Clan¡¯s situation. They have sent in multiple children affiliated with them to make a move on to Tian Ye Xiu. It seems as if they are modifying their plan to come up with new solutions to deal with the Tian Clan in the future. What do you wish us to do Sir?¡± Knowing that being the head of a massive information organisation meant that Ye Qiu had to keep his identity secret in case of enemies trying to force their way into gaining information. He spoke calmly, ¡°Monitor and give me the names of the families of the perpetrators, make sure information from the Tian Clan and the City Lord Household isn¡¯t leaked out to anybody. If you find anybody trying to find information about us, kill them immediately. Otherwise, continue the procedures as usual.¡± ¡°Yes Sir, we will give you the names of those affiliated with the Robes by tomorrow.¡± bowing slightly before closing the door after leaving. Ye Qiu looked outside his office window and pondered, ¡°They are finally making their move. Seems like I¡¯ll have to contact the City Lord to make sure his son will become friends with Ye Xiu. If we both aren¡¯t able to control the situation properly, then both our families are doomed. The worst thing is if the item in The Seal is taken out. I know that it isn¡¯t the most dangerous thing inside the seal however it would bring countless problems to the world if it is revealed.¡± Whilst his father was in deep thoughts, Ye Xiu was immersed in his meditative state, due to him still being a child he was a curious lad, he constantly explored the new things which appeared in front of him. He was slowly trying to understand what each of these things were able to do and what their benefits and disadvantages were. He decided that he should remember every single thing that he saw during his meditative state and slowly try to understand them. Ye Xiu had a feeling that it would be better to understand these things by himself instead of asking for help for the time being. He was currently observing multiple specks of light coloured differently floating around him in his imagination. As he was observing this he was suddenly woken up. Manual Chapter 4 ¡°Ye Xiu wake up, it¡¯s time for breakfast. You must be hungry after your first meditation session. Usually for kids their first session usually ends up with them being extremely exhausted and hungry because they are continuously thinking about erroneous thoughts. It¡¯s hard to clear your thoughts as a child even though your minds are more innocent and simple this is due to the fact that a child¡¯s attention span is truly too short. Ye Xiu woke from his daze after his father called for him, slowly stabilising his disoriented state from standing up too quickly he walked out of the office towards the dining room for a glass of water. His father sat at the head of the table eating breakfast before speaking to Ye Xiu. ¡°Ye Xiu, you seem refreshed after the meditation session. That¡¯s good, now that you¡¯ve experienced the beginning of cultivation I¡¯d like to discuss your path on it. Would you rather focus on Body Cultivation where even those without talent can succeed or go towards the Spiritual where you focus on your soul and mind which strengthens your Qi Arts? Or is your ambition to master both styles of cultivation and rule over all cultivators? Choose carefully because this will determine your future. You can switch from Spiritual Cultivation to Body Cultivation at any time but the same can¡¯t be said for the latter because of how hard it is to catch up to your peers due to the time it takes to breakthrough. Body Cultivation will require you to have a huge amount of resources which I can give to you but the process will be painful. Whilst Cultivating both together will require sweat and blood because you will progress much slower than your peers since both Cultivation Styles have to be equal in rank before you can ascend to the next level.¡± Ye Qiu looked towards his son awaiting his answer. ¡°Father would you give me some time before I decide? This seems to be a huge decision so I wish to research on the advantages and disadvantages of the Cultivation Styles.¡± Ye Xiu was inquiring his father to give him some time due to the fact that he wanted look through the Locket for clues on which Cultivation Style would be the best. ¡°That is perfectly fine, you have plenty of time to decide because the first step to cultivation is to refine the body then to breakthrough the Qi Barrier.¡± Ye Qiu nodded towards his son approving of his answer. ¡°I¡¯ll be leaving now since I¡¯ve finished my food Father.¡± Ye Xiu ran towards the door to his room so he could look through the Locket without any suspicions.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. ¡°Now I need to look through the house for the Cultivation Techniques of Master and Mistress. Master did say that I had inherited the powers of the Dragons but I don¡¯t feel any change in my body. It¡¯s possible that Master had left the power dormant in me, hopefully he has left something behind me to answer my questions.¡± Ye Xiu started looking through the house for any places that they would¡¯ve placed their Cultivation Manuals and realised that it would obviously be in the library, ¡°How stupid can I be? It¡¯s obviously going to be in the library where all the techniques are kept.¡± Ye Xiu was in the library and spotted two floating scrolls in the middle waiting. He approached with caution in case anything nasty was left but his caution was for naught. A male voice sounded out throughout the library, ¡°Inheritor of my blood approach and receive the wisdom of the Dragons. The blood lies dormant within you until you reach the appropriate Cultivation Level where certain amounts of it will be active to enhance your physique.¡± Ye Xiu¡¯s question about the Dragon¡¯s power were answered when another voice which was female rang out. ¡°Inheritor of the Will of the Phoenix, I bid you welcome. Even though you are a male I believe you will inherit my Phoenix style of cultivation and to master the whip just like I did. I wish you good luck and to carry on our Legacy with pride. Beware of our enemies because once they recognise you, they will hunt you. In this lower realm you will be safe until you reach the highest of powers before Ascension.¡± The female¡¯s voice started to fade until it could no longer be heard. Ye Xiu walked closer towards the two scrolls and took them. Reading the first one it said, ¡®Nirvanic Phoenix¡¯s Bloom¡¯ and the second one read, ¡®Empyreal Dragon¡¯s Ascent¡¯. Ye xiu thought ¡®What domineering names these two techniques have. To experience rebirth and ascension of power? How ironic since I have been reborn once already.¡¯ Continuing on to read the scrolls there was a note at the top, ¡®Those who have inherited this technique know that both my wife and I have discovered that the Cultivation techniques of the Dragon and Phoenix can be combined to enhance each other.¡¯ ¡®The Dragon¡¯s Technique will improve your body physically through training and each level of the technique will enhance your physique. Your meridians, bones, muscles and body will all be stronger than your peers. Whilst the Phoenix¡¯s Technique will improve the soul,mind and regeneration. Both techniques will improve your affinity to fire to the highest degree possible before researching the Dao. You can only read levels that you have unlocked by breaking through them using the technique. Each level will have two techniques coming with it. One of Dragon origin and the other of Phoenix origin.¡¯ Ye Xiu was happy that he could cultivate both styles of cultivation because he knew that in the long run it would be much stronger than cultivating in only one branch of cultivation. Not rushing to immediately cultivate he decided to just look around the Locket Dimension so he could figure out where everything is before he started to cultivate to make his life easier when he needed to look for resources. Change Chapter 5 After looking through the Locket, Ye Xiu exited it to inform of his father that he would be training in both styles of Cultivation. Going towards his father¡¯s office he knocked before entering. ¡°Father, I¡¯ve decided to cultivate in both styles of Cultivation.¡± Ye Xiu told his father straightforwardly. ¡°Are you sure Ye Xiu? It¡¯s barely been thirty minutes since we finished talking and you have already decided. Don¡¯t rush your decision Ye Xiu unless you are certain of it. I don¡¯t want you giving up on your path of Cultivation once you¡¯ve set upon it because it would just waste your efforts otherwise.¡± Ye Qiu asked feeling concerned about his son being too hasty in his decision. ¡°Yes Father I¡¯m sure.¡± ¡°Fine but make sure you don¡¯t run astray of your path in the future. Also I¡¯d like you to know that we¡¯ll be visiting the City Lord¡¯s family next week. His son is of similar age to you and I¡¯d like you to be friends with him. The City Lord trusts me explicitly and many others know that. The City Lord knows that I¡¯m the only person who won¡¯t be taking advantage of his and his son¡¯s position. His son is lonely and I think you are too so it¡¯d be good for you both to get along.¡± ¡°Hmm, that¡¯s okay with me Father. Good bye then.¡± Ye Xiu nodded his head and walked back towards his room. Going back into his Dimension, Ye xiu walked towards a tree and sat underneath it to start his cultivation. Looking at the scroll it read, ¡®The first step of the Cultivation Technique will require you to unlock a portion of dormant Dragon¡¯s Blood. This process will be excruciatingly painful and if you are unable to cope with the pain you will die. Your willpower must be strong to stay awake so don¡¯t falter and keep pushing on with the technique. To begin first breathe in three short breaths and breathe out twice. Repeat this as you look into your Dantian. There you will see red liquid residing inside, revitalise that blood and make it course through your body. Once that is done, sit back and let your body do the rest of the process.¡¯ Ye Xiu sat down in a meditative pose and repeated the steps, as he did so he could feel his body start to heat up and he grunted in pain. Knowing that this was the process working he surged on with his efforts to stay awake. He could feel every single part of his body burning, his muscles were being stretched then destroyed and rebuilt into stronger ones. He could feel his eyes start to tingle and thought, ¡®This cultivation technique is truly scary, to even reforge my eyes into better ones where other techniques would simply leave them to be developed at higher stages of cultivation.¡¯ As he was thinking that, his meridians were being widened and strengthened to allow for stronger Qi flow and higher Qi flow velocity. Keeping his mind on the task to stay awake, Ye Xiu thought, ¡®Well at least this life is much more interesting than my previous life. Day in and day out constantly working after my education was finished. An endless cycle of slavery. Now that I look back my life was truly pitiful. No sense of achievements or progress in life.¡¯ As the Body conversion finished, Ye Xiu started to lose consciousness because of the lack of energy. Ye Xiu fainted inside the Dimension where he was later kicked out due to the time limit. The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Ye Qiu thought it was strange that his son had not come for breakfast so he walked towards his bedroom and found him unconscious on the ground. He quickly picked him up and brought him towards the infirmary to allow him to recover. Ye Xiu groaned as his mind started to clear up. He pushed himself up from the bed and looked around and wondered, ¡®Where the hell am I? This doesn¡¯t look like my room. Did I faint after successfully changing my body to fit the cultivation technique? I¡¯m not dead so it went well without a hitch. I know my vision has gotten better because I can see even the smallest ant climbing around the room from over 20 metres away. I can feel the strength hidden in my body, I feel like I could possibly lift up to 50kg with this childish body of mine right now.¡± Rubbing the remaining gunk around his eyes, Ye Xiu got up to stretch and realised that his flexibility wasn¡¯t affected at all! ¡®That¡¯s strange, usually when your muscles get so strong your flexibility would decrease but for me it hasn¡¯t at all! This truly is a wondrous technique that Master had.¡¯ Walking out of the room to look for somebody to tell him where he was, he bumped into an elderly man who looked at him with sharp eyes and a frown upon his face. ¡°Watch where you are going young one, you never when the next person you collide with will take offense and who knows if that person is stronger than you?¡± Ye Xiu apologised to the man quickly and asked him for directions, ¡°I¡¯m sorry for bumping into you but where is this and how do I get to Tian Ye Qiu¡¯s residence?¡± The old man looked at him with a thoughtful face, ¡°Hm you are the Young Master Ye Xiu? Well I accept your apology and to get back to your residence just walk straight out the building and continue on until you see the trees then turn right and you should get there. I¡¯ll let you know that I am the Elder of the Medical Hall for the Tian Family. Next time you see me just call me Lao Lan.¡± Ye Xiu looked at the Elder strangely, ¡°Isn¡¯t that going to be strange for others to see me greet you so familiarly?¡± Lao Lan just looked him, ¡°Bah don¡¯t care about their opinions and either way I have more authority than everyone besides the Clan Head, Pill Master and Cultivation Hall Keeper. In any case, you¡¯ll be seeing me more often because the Clan Head will send you to me for some learning of the medical arts. I¡¯ve heard you have the dual attribute of fire and wood affinity, having the wood affinity is enough for you to learn medical arts but it will be hard. However just because learning the medical arts is hard doesn¡¯t mean that you shouldn¡¯t learn it. Learning it for the future just may one day save your life after all.¡± Ye Xiu bowed towards Lao Lan and thanked him for his advice and time. ¡°Thanks you Lao Lan, till next time we meet.¡± Ye Xiu walked away from the Elder and towards the exit to go back home. ¡®Bah, what a strange mature child. To act so maturely without anybody teaching him and to be so polite. Sigh, so many impolite children these days and finally I meet a polite one. At least I¡¯ll have a possible apprentice for the Medical arts. Hopefully the other old geezers in the clan don¡¯t snatch him up.¡¯ Lao Lan was deep in thought as he watched Ye Xiu walked away. Ye Xiu was walking towards his home and was thinking of how to proceed on his cultivation. ¡®Now that I¡¯ve changed my body I¡¯ll finally be able to embark on the journey of cultivation. I¡¯ll stretch everyday so I can keep my flexibility, this will help me with my movements in fights. Since I have both Master¡¯s and Misstress¡¯s cultivation techniques I think I will learn both the sword and whip. The sword can be my close ranged weapon whilst the whip can be my mid to long ranged weapon. I should learn how to be ambidextrous because you never know when you might hurt your hand. I¡¯ll also be able to wield both weapons at the same time to keep my enemy guessing.¡± After making his plan, Ye Xiu hurried back towards his home to explain what had happened to his father. Technique Chapter 6 Arriving back at his home, Ye Xiu walked towards his father¡¯s office and knocked. ¡°Father I am home from the medical hall.¡± ¡°Ah welcome back Ye Xiu, how are you? Is your body in any pain? You fainted 3 days ago and you only woke up now! Did you cultivate a technique without supervision? You are mature enough to know that is dangerous and irresponsible. An unknown technique without researching its advantages and the consequences of learning it can ruin your future don¡¯t you know that?¡± Hearing the commotion in the house, Yu Er ran towards the office and peered inside and asked, ¡°Is everything alright? I heard shouting and thought something was wrong so I came to check.¡± Ye Qiu calmed down and looked at his wife, ¡°Everything is fine, it¡¯s just that I think that Xiu¡¯er was practicing and unknown cultivation technique without supervision.¡± Yu Er commented, ¡°It¡¯s too early for Xiu¡¯er to start cultivating anyway. He still has to wait two more years before starting Body Refinement. If his technique allows him to start cultivating at an earlier age won¡¯t he have an advantage over his peers? You and I both know that we have enemies.¡± ¡°Enemies, what enemies are you talking about mother?¡± Ye Xiu inquired curiously whilst thinking, ¡®I knew our family probably had enemies with how developed the clan is. How strong are the enemies, I wish to take care of them so my family can live in peace. I also hope that my father lets me go for practicing a cultivation technique without his supervision, like mother said this technique allows me to start at an early age without any stunt to my growth and actually allows me to develop faster than my peers. I should be able to mature fully once I¡¯m fifteen years old.¡¯ ¡°Nothing you need to concern yourself about right now my son.¡± Ye Qiu said sternly and glared at his wife for mentioning anything about the topic. His wife just casually shrugged and walked back towards the kitchen. ¡°I¡¯ll forgive you for this matter Ye Xiu but next time you want to learn anything just come to me so I can check for anything wrong. Once you are old enough I¡¯ll let you make your own decisions but until you gain enough experience to discern the bad from the good I¡¯ll supervise your training.¡± Ye Qiu looked at his son waiting for his response. ¡°Yes father. I¡¯m going to request for you to help me with my body training starting from tomorrow. Would you mind making a training plan for me for maximum efficiency, I don¡¯t mind the pain and effort that I will have to put in because I know that to continue on the path of cultivation will require blood, sweat and tears.¡± Ye Xiu implored his father with his puppy eyes so his father couldn¡¯t reject him. ¡°Fine, I¡¯m already thinking of a plan for you now anyway. During the training you aren¡¯t allowed to say you want to quit or for me to lessen the training regime¡¯s toughness. You aren¡¯t allowed to rest until I tell you to do so. Breaking through your limits the best way to achieve the best results after all.¡± Ye Qiu nodded his head sagely and waved his son out of his office.The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. ¡®Now I need to look at the sword and whip manuals that they have left behind so I can decide on how to train them best. I know that I¡¯ll train to use both weapons on both hands so I can switch at any time. Hopefully I won¡¯t be too exhausted from training tomorrow. I still need to cultivate the Phoenix Manual. Whilst I¡¯m training I¡¯ll use the Dragon Manual to refine my body and whilst I¡¯m resting or sleeping I¡¯ll use the Phoenix Manual. This way I¡¯ll be able to use my time efficiently without any delay.¡¯ Ye Xiu quickly opened the scrolls to look at the martial art styles of the sword and whip. ¡®Piercing Fang of the Jade Dragon.¡¯ A style that greatly relies on pure speed and strength to overpower enemies in the blink of an eye. Without sufficient defense the opponent¡¯s guard will be broken in a few hits. Even without being able to land the one shot kill the continuous barrage of attacks on the same spot will pierce through. Dissect the opponent¡¯s fighting style and counter it whenever the guard is let down. Requires extensive knowledge on the body to fully utilise style. Best to learn with evasive movement arts and combined together with ¡®Lonely Peak of Thirteen Dragons¡¯ is when you are able to adapt to any situation. ¡®Lonely Peak of Thirteen Dragons¡¯ A sword style based on the thirteen strongest attacks of thirteen dragons. As each level is ascended to achieve a new attack the power is multiplied by two multiplicative of each other. With strong attacks along with fast speed the opponent won¡¯t realise what hit them. Best paired with ¡®Piercing Fang of the Jade Dragon¡¯ and best to learn it with a movement art which focuses on closing the gap between your opponent. ¡®Swallow Mirage Steps¡¯ A movement style based greatly on the speed of evasion of the swallow with unpredictable movements due to it being able to fly. To be able to change direction whilst in mid-air and look as if you go in a certain direction but you move in another. As level with style increases it is possible to merge it together with another movement art to further increase its unpredictability and speed. ¡®Basilisk¡¯s Gaze¡¯ A movement style which is focused on linear speed. It is instantaneous bursts of speed which catches the opponent off guard that they freeze. At higher levels the distance travelled becomes longer. Great for escaping on flat terrain or any type of terrain without many obstacles. Requires strong muscular body to withstand and generate the speed. Without sufficient strength, Qi can be used to power the style but is exhaustive depending on distance travelled. ¡®Tyrant¡¯s Physique¡¯ A defense and body technique that is used in conjunction with cultivation techniques. Tyrant¡¯s physique boosts body defense by placing qi around parts of the body to protect. Strength from hits are increased when qi is placed in parts where strength is exerted. ¡®Thorny Rose Whip¡¯ A whip style where the whip is shrouded by Qi thorns at any moment to pierce through opponent¡¯s defense or skin. The whip¡¯s main area of attack is circular with a diameter dependent on the whip length. Recommended diameter of attack is ten metres for better control over whip. Whip moves at speeds which are near imperceptible by normal eyes at the 1st level. No specific movement arts are recommended as all work fine with the style. ¡®Entangled Roots¡¯ A whip style for trapping enemies in a barrage of attacks or for capturing enemies. Looks like a graceful dance from the movements you make at fast speeds and requires exquisite footwork to circle around your opponents as you attack. Best paired with Thorny Rose Whip style for maximum damage. ¡®Deer¡¯s Canter¡¯ A movement art for conserving energy, when an enemy slows down you slow down to an appropriate level and rises if enemy¡¯s speed increases. Helps with extended fights. ¡®Phoenix¡¯s Rebirth¡¯ A body technique which requires the bloodline of the Phoenix to reveal more information about it. After reading through all the techniques in the scrolls Ye Xiu thought that he would just learn all of them since they compliment each other. The techniques¡¯ disadvantages would be covered by each other and enhance the strength of each other. He could think of severals ways he could utilise these techniques in battle. For example, everytime the opponent tried to escape he could capture them with his whip and drag them back towards him and allow him to quickly pierce through their defenses. Ye Xiu went to sleep knowing that the day would start early tomorrow with what he knew of his father¡¯s personality. He also knew that training whilst exhausted would never allow him to train at his full potential because his determination to continue on the training would be affected by his mental state. As he went to sleep his last thoughts were, ¡®I know I¡¯m forgetting something important but what could it be?¡¯ Training Chapter 7 The next day Ye Xiu got up and started his daily stretches to prepare himself for the harsh training he was about to start. ¡®Today¡¯s the day I¡¯ll finally begin my training, I¡¯ll be able to feel the improvement my body when I¡¯m not tired if this works out. I wonder how fast I¡¯ll be able to refine my body compared to kids my age. If I want to live in this world, I have to be the very best because even with how strong my master and mistress seemed to be, even they were annihilated by forces against them. So it should be in my best interest to get as strong as I can without attracting the attention of these powerful forces. However hard that must be I must achieve that. After I finish refining my body I think I shall learn a technique for stealth. Considering that none of the techniques in the scrolls or library refer to anything about stealth means that neither master or mistress has any interest in it.¡¯ After finishing his stretches he did some calisthenics to warm himself up, knowing that during the training he was probably going to use all his muscles in his body so it would be best to warm up everything instead of crying of pain afterwards. Whilst doing this he got into the breathing pattern and circulation system of qi around his body for the Dragon Technique to see if it had any immediate effects whilst exercising and surprisingly it did. It filled his body with more energy and he felt more vigorous, Ye Xiu decided to cultivate the technique whilst training to break through his limits not on just his body but on his skill in using the technique. He thought that it would be best that he learnt how to cope under pressure whilst circulating the technique to prepare himself for intense fights in the future. Walking out towards the kitchen he greeted his mother and asked for a glass of milk, ¡°Good morning mother, could you help me get a glass of milk please?¡± Smiling at her son charmingly, ¡°Of course I will, are you ready for your training? Knowing your father it will take a long time to finish and he¡¯s going to make it ridiculously hard. Don¡¯t push yourself too hard, if you injure yourself it¡¯ll just make the training process slower.¡± She handed the glasses over to Ye Xiu. ¡°Thanks mother, I¡¯ll be going to the courtyard now,¡± Ye Xiu gulped down his milk and ran out towards the courtyard. At the courtyard Ye Xiu could see his father waiting in the middle wearing some black pants whilst shirtless. He could see the muscle packed chest of his father and how well defined he was. With a shirt on you wouldn¡¯t even realise that he was actually so fit. ¡°Ye Xiu come over here, you¡¯ll be wearing some weights for training everyday. You don¡¯t have to worry about your growth being stunted, Most Cultivation Techniques will automatically help you mature without having you be stunted even from weight training. These weights will be on your arms, legs and chest, you¡¯ll have to get used to the burden quickly because I¡¯ll increase the weight every time I feel like you have finished adjusting to them. The weights are currently only 1 kg each, tell me if they are too light for you right now.¡± Putting on the weights to feel how sluggish his movements would be, Ye Xiu said, ¡°It¡¯s too light father, maybe go up to 5 kg per weight? I feel like my body will grow even faster the more pressure that is put upon it when training so starting at a higher weight should be best.¡± ¡°Are you sure? 5 kg per weight without even entering the body refining realm and any body training at all is quite heavy especially for a child for you.¡± Ye Qiu looked sternly at his son. ¡°I believe I can do it father.¡± Ye Xiu looked back seriously at his father. ¡°Alright then I¡¯ll just increase the weight of these by adding some Qi. Don¡¯t think you can cheat by removing my Qi because only I can remove it from these weights because I placed it there.¡± Ye Qiu accepted his son¡¯s belief. After adjusting the weight, Ye Xiu could feel the burden on his limbs but it wasn¡¯t too heavy. It was hard to move his limbs but he could still move them. His whole body felt slower because of the chest weight. ¡°Now that we have settled your weights let¡¯s begin with our training. First I want you to do 100 pushups and then after that I want you to do 100 sit ups.¡± Ye Qiu started demonstrating them to his son thinking that he didn¡¯t know what they were, after all he should only be 3 years old no matter how mature he is, there¡¯s a limit to how much you can know at that age. But for Ye Xiu, his past life¡¯s memories were a huge help. ¡°Now when you are doing these repetitions, I don¡¯t want you to stop at all. You must persevere and go past your limits.¡± This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. ¡°Ok father.¡± Ye Xiu started his repetitions at a slower pace in case he would run out of stamina too quickly, he felt as if the weight kept increasing at time went on because of his increasing fatigue but he kept on continuing knowing that his father would stop him before he injured himself. Ye Xiu started struggling at the 70th repetition of pushups and his speed was become slower and slower. He kept going even with his childish body he knew that if he stopped here now then his motivation to continue would crumble down into nothingness. Training made him feel more alive than he ever did in his previous life. It was because he knew that he was training for a purpose. He wanted to reach the very top of the world and become the strongest person to have a sense of fulfillment. Thinking about this again and again he started to gain more drive to improve and to continue on. Even with his drive his body had a limit, at the 90th repetition his body was about to collapse when suddenly a surge of energy from his dantian coursed through his body and gave him a boost. Using that energy he quickly finished the set of repetitions before lying on the ground resting. His father looked at him and smiled, ¡°That¡¯s a good job Ye Xiu, you looked like you were struggling but you were able to persevere and achieve what your body would¡¯ve thought impossible. You also found out your limits which is extremely important for you to improve and for you in battles. Your drive will give you confidence and determination during a battle scenario and allow you to give your best in any situation even if it seems nigh impossible. Knowing your limits is good because you would know when to back off because you know there is no way for you accomplish something because it is beyond abilities. However that doesn¡¯t mean that you have to back off completely, it just means you have to train harder in order for you to make that impossible situation possible. Now take a rest for 10 minutes before we start your next set of repetitions.¡± Ye Xiu weakly nodded as he lay on the ground. Sweat was everywhere on the ground seeping into it. Ye Xiu knew that this would probably be the best time for him to circulate his technique to achieve gains because he had just surpassed his limits. As he was lying there he realised something that he had forgotten, ¡®I know what I had forgotten now last night! Master said that inside the Locket Dimension there is a pool of liquid which can give me benefits. I wonder if that pool can help me recover from injuries and fatigue?¡¯ For the next two hours, Ye Xiu managed to complete 3 more sets of repetitions and went back inside his home to freshen up. Instead of going inside his family¡¯s washing area he went inside his bedroom to secretly enter the Locket Dimension to get to the pool. Stripping off his sweaty clothes he jumped into the pool immediately. ¡®Bathing in this pool is pretty good, the liquid seems to remove any unwanted smells from me easily. It also seems like it helps me recover much faster.¡¯ Suddenly a fishy smell emerged around him and as he looked he saw black ooze coming from his body. He thought, ¡®I¡¯ve read a few xianxia novels in my previous life and it has mentioned similar occurrences such as this. It must be my body impurities coming out. How come the body impurities weren¡¯t gotten rid of when my body was transforming to suit the cultivation technique? Knowing now that the pool could help him get rid of impurities in his body he quickly got out and rubbed all of the ooze off of himself. After finishing his bath he went outside his dimension to look for food. Ye Xiu was hungry after all the training that he did with his father and wanted something to replenish the energy that he used. He had looked through the Locket Dimension for food after finishing his bath but found nothing. He had looked in the garden for anything edible but nothing was growing either. Knowing that in the future if he wanted to be an alchemist or know some form of medical arts, he should at least start to grow some rare herbs in the accelerated zone. As he was found his way to the dining table he thought of things he had to do. ¡®After dinner I¡¯ll have to take a look at the phoenix¡¯s cultivation technique. If I¡¯m going to improve my body now, I might as well improve my soul and mind at the same time. Father did say that in order for me to advance in cultivation in the later stages I would have to be in equal levels for both cultivation style. That would mean that I would have to put in the same amount of effort into this cultivation technique instead of slacking off. A voice broke Ye Xiu¡¯s train of thoughts, ¡°How was training my little Xiu¡¯er? Was it hard? Did you try your best and not give up?¡± His mother asked him how his training had went and it sent a warm feeling through his body knowing that he felt happy about somebody caring about him. ¡°Yes mother it was hard but it became easier when I realised the drive for me to improve would help push me further than I would¡¯ve originally. During the rest break I was able to find out that my cultivation technique allows me to improve at a faster rate after I break through my limits.¡± Ye Xiu replied to his mother. ¡°Isn¡¯t that great then? You can be above your peers in a few years time if you keep this up! The only people you¡¯d have to be worried about then are those super genii and the older generations of monsters. After all in this dog eat dog world, the older you live the more dangerous the person usually is. Cultivation allows us to keep our youthful looks so don¡¯t always judge people by their appearance Xiu¡¯er.¡± His mother started giving him advice on the world and things to be wary about so that he would be safe in the future. Her smile became even bigger suddenly, ¡°If you become strong enough, you¡¯ll be able to catch a girl won¡¯t you? Maybe make a grandchild for me heh?¡± She smirked at Ye Xiu cheekily. Ye Xiu groaned, ¡°Mother, I¡¯m 3 years old do you really expect me to think about girls right now? I¡¯ll only look for a girl when I reach sufficient strength to protect them. Also even if I do like someone they have to be at least as strong as me so they don¡¯t have to rely on me for everything.¡± ¡°Tch, you ruined my fun. It¡¯s okay, when you find a girl you like in the future I¡¯d like to meet them. I¡¯ll give them some advice!¡± Yu er grinned like a maniac. ¡®Advice my ass. I¡¯m more certain of you threatening them with that smile on your face.¡¯ Ye Xiu thought. ¡°Yeah mother I¡¯ll bring her to you one day.¡± ¡°What¡¯s this about girls I hear? I hope you aren¡¯t going to be gallivanting around trying to woo girls. I want you to focus on your cultivation right now. You never know you might be chosen to be Clan Head one day and you¡¯d have to be strong enough to protect the clan.¡± Ye Qiu looked at his son somberly. ¡°Father, I don¡¯t think I want to become Clan Head. I¡¯d be burdened with duties when I just want to travel the world!¡± Ye Xiu exclaimed. Future Chapter 8 ¡°You want to travel the world? Do you know how dangerous this world is? Since you say you so much about geography, you should know that we are in the outer region. Where over hundreds if not thousands of countries with a population of over 100 million people populate the whole region. Only those which are genii above genii can make it into the inner region let alone the central region where there are only people who are the strongest in the world! I don¡¯t think you understand the strength that is needed for you to travel out safely.¡± Ye Qiu¡¯s face was aflame with anger. ¡°I just want you to be safe don¡¯t you understand?¡± Ye Qiu¡¯s posture started to sag into the chair. ¡°Qiu¡¯er that¡¯s enough! I think your son perfectly understands the dangers of venturing out into the world. I find it brave of him to continue wanting to travel the world despite the dangers, and it isn¡¯t like we were young once wanting to venture the world. We ourselves have gone to at least a hundred countries. I know you have had bad experiences in the past but that shouldn¡¯t mean you should want to stop your son from trying to grow by going out. If you are so concerned about his safety then take the time before he goes now to train him to a level that you deem him to be safe! You have over 13 years before he¡¯s old enough to venture out anyway.¡± Yu Er started to berate her husband. Ye Qiu sighed and just accepted what his wife said, ¡°Fine but I¡¯ll be making his training even harder in that case.¡± ¡°That¡¯s fine with my father. I¡¯d also like to have my own time to train in two weapons that I have chosen.¡± Ye Xiu asked his father. ¡°Two weapons? Are you sure? A weapon will take you a lifetime to master and you want to master two?¡± Ye Qiu asked inquisitively ¡°The fighting style I want to use requires the use of both weapons at the same time so it would be best for me to gain the muscle memory to use those weapons as early as possible.¡± Ye Xiu calmly explained to his father. His mother asked, ¡°Do you need any help to learn those weapons?¡± ¡°We¡¯ll see when we get there.¡± Ye Xiu started walking out of the room. ¡°Have a good night then.¡± Waving his son off, his mother started to turn towards her father and whispered, ¡°Even if our son is unable to venture out into the world, at least he¡¯ll be strong enough to protect himself from the organisation wouldn¡¯t he?¡± ¡°That¡¯s true and are you sure that you are still strong enough to fight?¡± Ye Qiu asked his wife. ¡°Hah, you think I¡¯d slack with my own training? I¡¯m still as strong as you are.¡± Yu Er smirked widely. ¡°Our son will be meeting with the City Lord¡¯s family and the organisation has started to make preparations for infiltration by inserting other masters and mistresses into the friendship of their son. Hopefully, the organisation doesn¡¯t try anything too soon before anybody is ready.¡± Ye Qiu dragged his hand down his face in frustration. Going around to her husband¡¯s shoulders and draping herself over them, ¡°It¡¯ll be fine and let¡¯s hope our son becomes good friends with the family. Talking about our son, he seems to have a few secrets of his own at such a young age doesn¡¯t he?¡± Ye Qiu was sighing again, ¡°Yes he does and I don¡¯t want to force them out of him after all we have our own secrets that we all wish to keep. I think it is fair for us to let him live out his life and all we can do is watch him until he finally leaves us for his travels. From then on we¡¯ll just see how life progresses.¡± Yu Er charmingly smiled at her husband and spoke softly into his ear, ¡°That¡¯s what I¡¯m talking about, now how about we have some fun in the bedroom?¡± Ye Qiu smiled back at her, ¡°Let¡¯s go right now then, and let us be quieter since we do have a son who would be able to hear us if we are too loud.¡± Yu Er¡¯s shocked face was funny, ¡°That¡¯s true, I can¡¯t make too much noise.¡± They both walked out of the dining room and into their bedrooms to make love to each other. Ye Xiu¡¯s Bedroom - Ye Xiu was sitting on his bed thinking, ¡®Now that I¡¯ve gained my parent¡¯s approval to venture out into the world in the future. All I have to currently worry about is the possible enemies that my family has. However, that shouldn¡¯t matter to me at all right now because I¡¯m still too weak. In order for this to be relevant, I must train to a suitable level to protect my family from these threats.¡¯ Ye Xiu affirmed his resolve to keep improving his strength for the future and his family. After that thought was through he continued on, ¡®Now I have to look at the Martial Art Styles sections of the scrolls and see if they have any way of teaching me how to even begin training for the styles.¡¯ Quickly entering the Locket Dimension to get to the scrolls, he opened them and read the note at the very end of it.This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. ¡®Note to inheritor, any technique or style that is in the scroll or library has all the necessary information for you to begin training with them. To do this just place the scroll onto your head and insert Qi into it. The information should be transferred to you and you would be able to look through the stances and information at any time. Even though you have the information and stances be warned that you still have to put in the effort to practice these techniques because simple knowledge of something doesn¡¯t mean you¡¯d be able to do things instantly. Most techniques in this library are very reliant on the user to train them and comprehend the abilities to make the full use of them.¡¯ Reading the long note, Ye Xiu realised that he would have to put even more effort in his training if the note was anything to go by for him to achieve anything with these styles. After figuring this out he decided to make a plan. ¡®First things first, what I need to do is plan a schedule for training so that I don¡¯t get confused when the time comes. Next, I have to figure out what I¡¯m going to do when I visit the City Lord¡¯s residence in the next few days. Should I truly treat this like a new life and have friends of a similar physical age of me? Or should I go on the path of loneliness which is probably common in this world? I¡¯ll decide that when I get there. After all that is done, I need to come up with a way to retrieve the seeds of herbs and other things which can be grown for my dimension. It can¡¯t be kept empty permanently because that¡¯d just be a waste of the space that Master has left for me. I think I¡¯ll just wait for the next time I visit the Medical Hall or the first visit to the Pill Hall.¡¯ After deciding that, Ye Xiu wanted to compile a training schedule for himself. ¡®Training in the morning should usually take 3 hours and bathing then eating afterwards will take another 30 minutes. Thinking of rest, the information I received from the scrolls recently just reminded me of something. The Phoenix manual cultivation because automatic once I start my training with it so that¡¯s convenient. After I come up with my schedule, I¡¯ll start to learn the technique and let it go from there. After the break, I¡¯ll go back to the library to study more about different disciplines in this world. Knowing more about the world before I venture out is important, if I know things about most occupations then I won¡¯t be caught unawares and look foolish. I¡¯d also know the dangers of offending a high ranking person with a discipline so that would be useful. That¡¯ll take me two hours a day, then after that, I¡¯ll go back to the courtyard and start running through the styles that I received. I¡¯ll focus my training on one style for a month before training another, I want the muscle memory to build up. It doesn¡¯t mean that I would be neglecting anything I¡¯ve already learnt, I¡¯d still be taking my time each day to practice what I have already learnt to make sure I haven¡¯t forgotten it or become lacking in my demonstration of the techniques. I¡¯ll train the movement and defensive styles together with the weapon styles at the same time because I want to be fluid in their usage together. This¡¯ll probably take the rest of the day. Whilst I¡¯m training at any time I should just keep circulating the Dragon Technique so I can get the best out of everything.¡¯ After finishing with his schedule, Ye Xiu recalled the information needed for the Phoenix Technique. ¡®The way to start the Phoenix technique is to sit in the lotus meditation position. I should be glad that my flexibility is still there otherwise this would hurt like hell.¡¯ Ye Xiu grimaced thinking about that scenario. ¡®Empty your mind and focus on your dantian and imagine a burning fire in the centre of it. After that, you should feel qi coursing through your meridians and it should start to heat up. This is just your qi becoming closer to the fire affinity. As the feeling is fading, focus on the imaginary fire in the dantian and imagine the rebirth of a phoenix. From adult to ash. Ash to egg. Egg to baby. A delicate process which is wondrous after witnessing, through this process your mind and soul will start to become stronger and it will occur continuously after successful activation of the technique.¡¯ ¡®Well this seems simple enough to me, I wonder why there aren¡¯t more techniques similar to this? Could there be something more to this technique to make it more powerful compared to other average techniques? My curiosity has been lit alight by the wonders of this world. As he started the process for the technique, Ye Xiu realised that he could still sense the things around him. Especially the things he had encountered in his previous meditation session; the coloured floating orbs around him. He had theorised that these orbs were most likely the elemental affinities in the world. The more of a colour that he could see was the affinity that he was more attuned towards. This was true because he could see a huge amount of red orbs just floating by him and surprisingly there was also a huge amount of silver visible to him as well similar to the number of green orbs floating around him. He could only see miniscule amounts of brown orbs but he wasn¡¯t able to see any orbs the colour of water which he thought was fitting because fire and water don¡¯t mix well with each other. Realising that his attention had run astray he went back to the task at hand. He looked at his dantian which looked a lot bigger than the last time he had looked at it. Thinking that it was probably a change from the Dragon Technique he pursued on with the activation with the Phoenix Technique, he started to imagine a huge inferno of flames in his dantian and felt that his qi had started to burn. Thinking that he should embrace himself for a situation similar to the transformation for the Dragon technique he started to run the Dragon Technique because this situation might help him improve his body through the sheer pain that he was about to experience. The burning sensation started to increase in ferocity and he could see that more red orbs were starting to appear around him, knowing that this was what the technique had said to be the increase to the fire affinity he knew that he was attempting the technique correctly. After 15 minutes of the burning pain, the feeling started to fade and Ye Xiu knew that this was the time for the imagery of a Phoenix¡¯s Rebirth. Quickly bringing his imagination to full throttle the technique was successfully completed and he could feel the technique automatically cultivating itself. The progress of the soul and mind strength was slow but he was still young so it could only get better from there. Getting up from his position, Ye Xiu walked towards the pool to clean himself of the sweat that had accumulated around him. Friends Chapter 9 With the schedule that Ye Xiu had made during his time in the Locket Dimension, he repeated this routine for the next few days until it came to the day for him to visit the City Lord¡¯s family. Knowing that this was probably an important meeting for him, he decided to wear the best clothes he had on hand. Which wasn¡¯t much, it was a simple pair of silk robes and silk pants underneath them. His parents did not really believe in the saying that clothes made the man so they never bothered to spend the money on clothes. He didn¡¯t really mind anyway because in his previous life he was a fashion disaster so it was an improvement in this life for him to be dressing this way. Walking out of his bedroom, he greeted his mother and father who were both sitting at the dining table eating breakfast. Breakfast was usually a simple meal for them. A couple of loaves of bread, fruit and some unknown wheat product that he had never seen in his previous life together with some milk. His father began the conversation with him telling him things he was expected of for the meeting ahead. "I fully expect you to behave whilst at the City Lord''s residence, even though we are good friends with them it doesn''t mean we can just randomly waltz in and tilt their world upside down. What it means for us is that we have to show goodwill and respect towards them, this is mainly a show for other people keeping a watch on the City Lord but it has to be done for appearances'' sake." "I understand Father, also could you tell me more about the personality of the City Lord? Considering that he raised his son they would be similar in some respect." Ye Xiu was curious about the family he was about to meet and become friends with. "The City Lord''s personality? I guess I could say that whilst he is stern in public and has to put up a domineering appearance, in reality away from the public he''s a rather generous person. Especially towards his friends and family, you''d never believe it from looking at his appearance but it is true. He''s as loud as he is boisterous so he''s a very fun person to be around but he does get a bit too loud for my liking sometimes." Ye Qiu commented on the City Lord''s personality nonchalantly. Ye Xiu feigned his excitement for meeting the man, "Wow, I can''t wait to meet him! His son must be just as amazing as him too!" Meanwhile, he was thinking, ''I hope his son is nothing like him, I''d rather have a friend which talks occasionally instead of being loud all the time. I admit that I like to have fun sometimes but it would be just too much for it to be loud everyday especially when you want to cultivate in the future.'' Ye Qiu started to stand up from his chair and said, "Well it''s about time we start to leave our home to get to the residence. It''s quite far away from where we are right now so we have to make our way there early if we want to come back in time." He made his way out of the home and waited at the entrance to the courtyard for both Ye Xiu and his mother. The three of them made their way out of the Clan''s compound to get into a carriage that was already waiting for them. Ye Xiu examined the steeds which were going to be pulling them and didn''t actually recognise them. He had thought that with his knowledge he''d be able to identify what it was but he it was completely unknown to him. Seeing his son''s confused face, Ye Qiu had an idea of what his son was thinking so he interrupted his thoughts, "Ye Xiu seems like all your reading can''t help you this time now can it? It seems like the books you were reading wasn''t talking about any of the Qi Beasts that are alive in this world. All you have to know is that this is a Grade 1 Qi beast. It is called the Swift Flame Horse because it produces it flames on the hooves when it is running fast. It can run at a speed of 60 km per hour and is considered a luxurious mount in this city." Ye Xiu nodded at his father''s explanation of the horse but then thought of a good question to ask. "Father, you mentioned that the horse was a Grade 1 Qi Beast. Could you tell me more about the ranking system of the Qi Beasts in the world?" "Well, Ye Xiu the ranking system in this world is simple. Each Grade corresponds to a realm of Cultivation for us. Grade 1 is the Body Refining realm and the consecutive grades are similar as well. A Qi Beast at the peak of its grade can take down over ten men at the peak of the realm. So that should tell you to never underestimate a Qi Beast when you meet one. You can''t tell whether the beast has reached its peak due to the fact that most of the strength of the Qi Beast is from its body. However, just because most of the strength of a Qi Beast comes from its body doesn''t always mean that''s true. Some Qi Beasts are more reliant on the cultivation of Qi Skills just like us so it is always best to be cautious around them instead of underestimating them in the future. Do you understand?" Ye Qiu concluded his explanation and made sure his son understood clearly what had been said.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. "Yes I do father, it was an excellent explanation." Ye Xiu shamelessly praised his father and his father ate it all up with a shameless grin. Yu Er just shook her head in exasperation watching this scene play out. "The both of you are truly childish aren''t you?" Yu Er asked. "Well mother I am a child so what do you expect?" and "I''m a child at heart and you should know that my lovely Yu Er." both rang out at the same time, making her laugh. The other two joining in shortly after. As they continued making conversation, time passed and they soon arrived at the City Lord''s Residence. "Well, we are here, now be respectful and kind to our hosts." Ye Qiu said whilst getting off the carriage and helping both his wife and son off safely. Seeing the City Lord waiting at the gate of the residence, Ye Qiu called out, "Hello Xiao San! It''s been awhile since we''ve met up, hasn''t it? Three years or so since my son has been born and I haven''t visited you once! It''s good to see that you are still in good health." "It''s nice to see you again Ye Qiu, and yes it has been a long time since we''ve seen each other. I can see your cute son just standing beside your wife so why don''t you introduce me to him?" The City Lord asked loudly. Introducing his son to his friend, "Well Xiao San, this is my son Ye Xiu and he''s very intelligent for his age. He''s probably more mature than your own son!" Ye Xiu greeted the City Lord, "It is nice to meet you, City Lord Xiao San." Hearing his friend boast to him, the City Lord countered back, "This midget being more mature than my son? I highly doubt that considering that my son is probably just as intelligent if not smarter. Patting Ye Qiu''s back and leading him in with his arms around his shoulders. Ye Xiu just watched the scene play out with wide eyes and suppressed his giggles because of the childish manner the City Lord acted in around his father. When they had entered the residence, Ye Xiu had noticed that it had much more grandeur compared to his own residence and thought, ''Is this truly for appearances'' sake or does the City Lord actually like to flaunt his wealth? I hope his son is as carefree as his father.'' He could see antiques all around the living room and stopped himself from touching them. The City Lord suddenly approached him and said, "Now that you''re here, you can go look for my son to play with. He''s probably in the training grounds, you will be able to see the training ground right outside the window so you should be able to get there safely. Stay there until your father and I have finished our conversations, is that okay with you midget?" Ye Xiu replied with a, "Yes Sir." Xiao San nodded in appreciation, and said, "Now us grownups have something important to talk about so I''ll be off. Let''s hope you get along with my son. He needs friends at his age." The City Lord started to walk towards another door which was probably his office and Ye Xiu headed towards the training grounds where he said his son would be. Entering the training ground he could see that it was much wider than his own courtyard. Thinking that the City Lord was truly extravagant, he proceeded his search for the City Lord''s son and found him doing some exercises by himself. He walked up and greeted him, "Hey, how are you doing? Are you the City Lord''s son?" The boy barely glanced at him before returning to his exercises and spoke with a soft voice, "Yes I am Xiao Tu, are you here to extort my father for money by using me?" The boy asked with a cynical voice which was definitely beyond his age. "I''m not here to do anything besides become your friend. Also aren''t you too cynical for your age? What could you have possible experienced to make you immediately believe that anybody who approaches you is here to take your money?" Ye Xiu asked scandalously obviously offended with the tone of voice that the boy answered him with. "Considering most of the people who have approached me regardless of age have slyly tried to manipulate me then it would be obvious for me to develop this view. Also aren''t you much more mature than you are supposed to be? You look like you are barely 4 years old. A toddler at best and you want to talk to me about the way I view life?" Xiao Tu answered back snidely. "Arguing is going to get us nowhere, the both of us will just keep this argument alive by simply referring to our ages and that''s pointless so how about we start on a fresh page? Ye Xiu conceded the argument trying to start on a fresh base with the boy. "Fine if that''s what you want." Xiao Tu accepted petulantly. "How about we talk about training? It seems like you are pretty invested in it after all. I like to train as well, I''ve started my training early because I got a Cultivation Technique which allows me to." Ye Xiu boasted obviously to get the boy interested. "Training? I like to train because it keeps my mind off other things. I also plan to be City Lord one day to take over for my dad so I can protect everyone that I love! That means I can''t be distracted from my training by things such as love or girls! I just want to train because I know my father has enemies!" Xiao Tu loudly exclaimed his dream for the future. Ye Xiu smiled because he knew that he had caught Xiao Tu''s attention, "How about we be friends from now on? You help me and I''ll help you achieve your dreams." Xiao Tu thought for a moment before smiling widely, "Ok sure. Now let''s shake hands and we will have a deal." They both shook hands and they became friends just like that. A simple friendship born out of a dream. Conversation Chapter 10 ¡°I do hope our children are getting along together, the only way for us to be ready for when the Organisation moves is for us all to be united together to defend against them. Anyway, have you noticed anything strange occurring in your clan recently? I know that some of the branch members are trying to force you to step down but you should be lucky that all the other Elders of your clan still want you to remain in position. It might be possible for the Organisation to convert them for their cause against you. So you should step your foot down on any strange activities that may occur within the clan.¡± ¡°I¡¯m already looking into them so don¡¯t worry, and shouldn¡¯t you be the one who is supposed to be worrying about the state of the city? You are the City Lord so it should be your responsibility to root out the Organisation.¡± ¡°Do you think it¡¯s that easy? Also, it¡¯s not like I¡¯m not trying but I have to deal with other problems too you know.¡± The tiredness could be seen in Xiao San¡¯s face. ¡°I¡¯ve been planning to give the seal over to my son for safekeeping in the future when he becomes the City Lord. He knows about this whole situation because he overheard my wife and I talking about it a year ago. Now he¡¯s constantly training without bothering to live his life like an actual child would. I¡¯m hoping your son would be able to cure him of that habit¡­¡± Ye Qiu started laughing nervously, ¡°I don¡¯t think you should so much hope on him. My son¡¯s pretty similar to your son in a way. Ever since my son has managed to learn to read and walk, he¡¯s been going to the library every day to learn more about the world. Recently, he¡¯s even started training his body because he found a Cultivation Technique for him to train in at an early age." "Do you want to know what¡¯s worse? My son wants to travel the world, and you don¡¯t know how afraid I am for him. I, myself had wanted to travel the entire world but after seeing the clan my wife was from, I just came back to settle down. As the saying goes, there¡¯s always a bigger fish out there.¡± continued his rant until Xiao San cut in. ¡°Let¡¯s just hope the best for the future, shall we not? You did say that your son''s talent level was pretty high, what was it? 8, I think?" "Yeah, it is a talent level of 8. How about your son? With your talent, your son should''ve inherited at least a part of it." Ye Qiu asked his friend wondering just how great his son''s talent was and whether he could shove it in his face otherwise because he knew that when they were younger, Xiao San was the one with the higher talent but eventually Ye Qiu was the one who surpassed his cultivation realm. "My son only has a talent level of six, it isn''t bad nor is it great. I''m sure with the effort my son puts into his training he''ll be able to stay at a similar level as my son. After all, I''m the one who taught him!" Xiao San started to boast shamelessly. Ye Qiu''s eyebrows started to twitch violently at that statement and he couldn''t hold in his laughter anymore, "HA HA HA, you think that with your teachings your son can surpass mine? Oh my, that''s a funny statement to make. I seem to remember I''m the one who became stronger than you in the end through sheer effort?" Trying to send a biting remark back, the words suddenly got stuck in Xiao San''s throat. Seeing that Xiao San had no reply to his jibe, he looked at him and cocked his head sideways with a petty smirk on his face. "Why are you looking at me like that? Cat''s got your tongue or are you just simply speechless to the point you can''t come up with a comeback to that; or is it the fact that you admit my superiority?" The more Ye Qiu''s words started to get to Xiao San, the more scarlet his face started to become. "Well if it wasn''t for me stopping my cultivation for a period of a few years then I wouldn''t be behind you now would I?! "Trying to save yourself from a desperate situation now aren''t you Xiao San? Also, it''s not my fault you went around trying to seduce the prettiest girl in that country we had visited. If you weren''t so invested in trying to woo her then you wouldn''t be in this situation where I can tease you easily now would it? Knowing his friend was trying his best to save himself from an embarrassing situation he kept on shooting his pride so he couldn''t bring it back up anymore when the three sharp knocks sounded from the door and a voice called out. "Ye Qiu let me in right now! I can hear you teasing Xiao San without me! Did you forget that we were the best tag team when it came to pissing all the people off in the countries we visited? I can clearly remember with vivid clarity that it was me which saved the both of you from getting into trouble with the ladies for being perverted. Also, if that perverted nature gets anywhere close to my baby, I''m going to tan your backside so hard that you won''t be able to walk for days!" Ye Qiu''s face instantly turned pale when he heard the voice. He quickly whispered to Xiao San. "I thought Mei Ling was out of the city for the next few months?!? That''s why I decided to visit now because I know that every time that I''m around she likes to threaten me!" Chuckling nervously, "She said that she would be leaving for a few months, how on earth would I know that she would come back so suddenly? And you think you''re scared? I live with the woman, I''m basically whipped!" Xiao San started hissing the last sentence before walking towards the door to open it. "Hey, welcome back from your trip. Why''d you come back so early?" "I realised half-way into the journey that I forgot something important so I came back to get it." Mei Ling rubbed her neck sheepishly. Xiao San just looked at his wife and asked, "What could be so important for you to come back to get it personally?"The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Mei Ling squealed in delight when she remembered the item she had to retrieve, "Well, it''s obviously the most important item in the trip; it''s the ballroom dress! I have to look my best if I want to impress all my other friends that I haven''t met in such a long time. Most of them were jealous after I got engaged with you after all." She poked her husband''s head fiercely, "Don''t you remember? All my friends were the girls who were chasing the both of you around like headless chickens. They were absolutely crazed about you and you seem to have forgotten them?" Trying to save himself Xiao San started to speak with an attempt to not stutter, "It''s been so long, how could I possibly remember them? It''s not like I was very familiar with them after all?" "What do you mean not being familiar with them! I know that I personally introduced to you to them one by one! Oh, I know now! You must have been so infatuated with me at the time that you simply weren''t listening to me at the time, weren''t you?" Mei Ling asked with a questioning look on her face. "Yeah, obviously... I had finally managed to convince you to be my girlfriend after years of chasing and I was busy thinking of our life together!" With a smile on her face, she spoke slowly and clearly, "Since that''s the case, then how about when Ye Qiu and his family leave after today, that I bring our entire family out together to the event. Doesn''t that sound wonderful? Now I don''t have to wait for a few months to see my baby again. We can spend our time together and it''ll be so much fun. I can also continue teaching my baby everything I know about fashion!" Ye Qiu suddenly blurted out, "Your teaching your son about fashion? Fashion is for girls and for guys who like to flaunt their wealth. It would be better for you to teach him how to identify things in the wilderness." He quickly put his hands over his mouth but the damage was done. A vein was bulging on the forehead of Mei Ling and she looked absolutely enraged. "I seem to hear somebody making fun of fashion... I wonder who that person is? I wonder if he likes to get his head smashed in by an angry female named Mei Ling." Her lips started to curl upwards into a cruel sadistic smile, "That fly also seems to think that it can teach me what I should teach my baby. It simply just doesn''t want to live anymore now does he?" Ye Qiu quickly apologised, "Please accept my apologies, your Highness." Her face going back to her easy-going smile, "That''s what I thought. Now, where''s your wife Ye Qiu? I''m going to go catch up with her." "She''s probably in the kitchen cooking something up for dinner." "Ooh, I''ll go help her!" Mei Ling ran out of the room in a split second leaving the two men standing there silently. Nudging his friend whilst speaking, "I bet you feel sorry for marrying her now don''t you?" "She''s great in bed though so I can''t complain." "Is that the only reason why you are even able to survive that madness?" "Pretty much." "Perverted as always. Just like me. I''m so glad my wife isn''t like that." "Go away. I''d trade your wife for mine any day." They both stood there silently. - City Lord''s Kitchen - Screams could be heard throughout the residence, "YU ER, I''M HERE TO SEE YOU!" Startled by the sudden scream, Yu Er brought out her spear and pointed it at the said person screaming, "Oh, It''s just you Mei Ling, you scared me a for a moment there. What are you doing back here anyway? I heard you had gone on a vacation to see your friends for an event." "I left my dress at home so I came back to get it!" "Why couldn''t you just ask somebody else to bring it to you?" Yu Er asked confusedly. "Yu Er, did you forget how many times my dresses have been ripped because of mishandling? Well, not this time! This time I''m personally bringing so there is absolutely no chance of it being ripped at all!" Mei Ling proclaimed loudly. "You truly haven''t changed after all these years have you, Mei Ling? That''s good, you should always stay with your hyperactive self." Yu Er smiled happily recalling the memories that she had with Mei Ling. "Anyway, why''d you come here to the kitchen?" Mei Ling put her hands on her hips, "I''m obviously here to help you prepare dinner! Don''t you think I''m the best cook? I was the one who cooked all our meals after all during our journey!" Yu Er''s face started to pale and she thought, ''Anything but Mei Ling cooking! There was a reason why we had several food poisonings happening to us!'' Quickly trying to steer Mei Ling away from trying to help her cook she started to slyly shift the conversation towards a different topic, "How''s your son, Mei Ling? He must be a kind and generous boy just like you." "My baby is the best! He''s absolutely adorable with his chubby cheeks, I just love pinching them. For some reason, he seems to always groan when I do that to him though." Mei Ling wondered in sadness. Her cheery mood came back suddenly, "My boy is always lonely but I bet he will be great friends with your son just like us, right?!?" Mei Ling was by Yu Er''s side in a split second when she said this. "Yes Mei, Yes he will be great friends with your son just like us." "That''s wonderful! Oh, I just remembered something! I wanted to ask you if you wanted to bring your family with me to come on a vacation? It''d be fantastic to have us, four buddies, together again and the best part is that we have our children with us! I can dress up your son with my son and they''d be so cute together." Mei Ling started squealing that last sentence making Yu Er''s ears ring. "That''s a wonderful idea. I haven''t had a break in such a long time and it''d be nice to have everyone back together." Yu Er nodded to the idea. "Let''s tell our husbands at dinner which is finished cooking! Mei, could you help me set it up at the table?" "Sure! I''d love to help!" Mei Ling started to move the dishes to the dining table at an incredible speed. Yu Er just watched her place everything neatly and thought, ''Even though she''s such a hyperactive knucklehead, she is still careful with anything she does besides cooking.'' Yu Er just smiled happily knowing that the vacation was never going to have a dull moment with Mei Ling around. Mei Ling shouted loud enough for everyone in the residence and training ground to hear her, "IT''S DINNER TIME BOYS! COME BACK AND EAT YOU GRUB!" In a few minutes, everybody had gathered even the boys even though they looked to be slightly sweating. Yu Er told everyone to sit down and enjoy the food. Conversations started to flow with food to give energy to everybody. Yu Er could see the two boys chatting quietly to each other whilst eating their food. Whilst everybody was enjoying the food, Mei Ling decided that it was a good time to announce the people coming with her on vacation. "Everybody listen up! Yu Er and I have decided that we will have a joint family vacation to my friends'' event! Everybody will be going together! Isn''t that great?" Ye Qiu spat out his food whilst Xiao Tu dropped his cutlery in surprise and shock. Xiao San was laughing loudly when he saw the expression on his friend''s face. Ye Qiu spoke once he got his face back to his normal neutral face, "Would you mind repeating that again? I''m not quite sure I heard you properly." Mei Ling looked at him and repeated her sentence, "Didn''t you hear me? I''m pretty sure I said that clearly. Well, no matter, I said that we were going on a joint family vacation!" Ye Qiu sighed, " Mind giving me 2 days to get my matters settled before I join you guys on the journey?" Mei Ling just smiled, "Of course you can! But if I don''t see you on that day, I''ll come for your backside!" Ye Xiu poked Xiao Tu and whispered into his ear, "Why are you all so shocked about going on a vacation?" Xiao Tu responded discreetly so his mother couldn''t hear him, "She''s going to make us both her dress-up dolls." Both Xiao Tu and Ye Xiu shuddered simultaneously. Dinner was then finished in a peaceful manner after the reveal of the vacation. Travel The very next day was a rush for Yu Er. She had to pack for both herself and Ye Xiu for a couple of months worth of vacation. She wanted to pack the best clothes that she could find for the both of them because she knew that Mei Ling''s friends were extremely judgemental when it came to fashion. After a couple of hours of packing clothes and necessities, Yu Er took the trunks to the living room so when she had to place it all in the inter-spatial storage ring it would be much more convenient and orderly. She ran towards the training grounds to pick up the weights that Ye Xiu had been using for training and shoved it into one of the trunks as well. She knew with Ye Xiu''s new interest of training he''d be begging her for the weights and when that time came, she''d be able to use it against him so she could dress him up in the clothes to see which ones looked good on him. Smirking slightly as she knew her plan was probably inescapable. Going into Ye Xiu''s, she woke him up by tapping on his shoulder lightly. Ye Xiu started to stir and Yu Er told him to get his stuff ready and placed into a trunk so she could store them. Moaning slightly, Ye Xiu got up from his bed and made his way to the bathroom to freshen himself up. After placing all his important things which were mainly books from the library, he carried his trunk to the living room where his mother was waiting for him. "Just place it there Ye Xiu, now watch, I''ll be using an inter-spatial storage ring to store everything. One day, you''ll get one of these from either me or your father. These inter-spatial storages aren''t able to hold anything living so anything which is alive and you want to place it in, then you would have to kill it. These are very expensive and should be kept away from the public''s eye or risk their ire. You can show these off in public if you are in a capital city of any country in the Outer Region." "Mother, both father and you have mentioned the Outer Region but have never explained it fully. I seem to be unable to find any information about the Outer region and how the history of it." Ye Xiu asked intrigued. "We''ll talk about this topic when you get older, how about that?" Yu Er smoothly deflected the conversation thinking that her son wouldn''t be able to notice the topic being steered away. Ye Xiu had noticed the deflection and was thinking, ''Why on earth would mother try to deflect that topic from the discussion so suddenly? Could it be she has her own secrets that she wants to keep right now? Or is it truly dangerous for me to know so much information about the world at this point in time?'' "Ok, mother." Ye Xiu replied. "Now that we have everything stored away, let''s make our way to the entrance of the Clan grounds. When we are riding in the carriages with the City Lord''s family, I want you to make sure you don''t touch anything of theirs randomly. Most of their things are rather expensive and it would be rude to touch them in the first place." His mother stroked his hair softly as she spoke. "I want you to have a fun time on this trip because it''s supposed to be a vacation. I don''t want you to be training all the time. It''s good to take a break and relax. You can learn a new hobby instead of just reading as well." "Yes, Mother." They had arrived at the entrance to the Clan Grounds where two carriages were waiting for them. The carriages were being pulled by different steeds to the one that he had seen on his trip to the City Lord''s residence. He nudged his mother so he could get her attention to ask what they were. "Well, these are Grade 2 Qi Beasts, the Nightmare Steed. During night time, the speed of the horses increases because their innate racial skill allows them to travel faster in the shadows. Their innate racial skill is called Shadow Movement. These are horses which will be able to run circles around their opponents with ease." Remembering that she had something that she had to explain to her son she continued on with her explanation. "When Qi Beasts reach Grade 2, they develop their species'' innate racial skill. This skill is only usable by something or somebody who has the same bloodline as that species. Each species has a different innate racial skill but there are similar ones. The strength of the racial skill depends on the Qi Beasts'' strength and cultivation. Some of these racial skills are extremely powerful and dangerous and these shouldn''t be approached head-on. Ye Xiu nodded his head after she finished her explanation and continued walking towards the carriage. Where through one of the windows on the carriage, he was able to see Xiao Tu waving at him. "Ye Xiu, come on you are so slow! I have something to show you that I bet you won''t have this thing that I have to show you!"Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. "I''m coming, I''m coming!" Ye Xiu started jogging towards the carriage and looked back to his mom, "I''ll go ahead first, mother." He waved goodbye to his mother. Quickly jumping into the carriage, Ye Xiu ran over towards the excited Xiao Tu and asked him, "Ok, what did you ask me to hurry here for? If it''s nothing interesting then I''m going kick your ass for wasting my time." "Hmmph, as if you would be able to kick my ass in the first place; now look here at my finger, can you guess what it is?" Ye Xiu saw a ruby crystal on a ring resting in the palm of the excited palm. He had a suspicion of what it was but thought that his parents would hardly trust a child with such an important and expensive item. Looking at his friend sceptically, "Is that a fake inter-spatial ring you have there? It''s not funny to lie to your friend you know. Fake things aren''t very interesting at all." Ye Xiu crossed his arms together and pouted childishly. "It''s not fake! My mother gave this to me so I could keep everything precious in here! She said that I would need it to keep everything safe just in case. I bet you''re just jealous of me because I have such an expensive item and you don''t." Xiao Tu taunted his friend. "I''m not jealous! Why would I be jealous of something that I can just get from my parents!" Ye Xiu denied his ''jealousy'' by stomping on the ground. Whilst he was actually smugly thinking, ''Hah, such a tiny gizmo won''t interest me at all. After all, I do have the Locket Dimension which is so much better than a mere storage ring. I mean I can actually enter the space! I bet that''s something which is not possible for anybody in this country to have If only important people can have these rings here.'' "Hah, If you could ask your parents for a ring then why didn''t you? Or maybe you did and they denied your request because they felt that you weren''t responsible enough to take care of something precious by yourself!" "Whatever, can we just go do something else now?" Ye Xiu tried to move the conversation away from something that he found boring. "Yeah, yeah. Oh! By the way, my mother seems to want to see the both of us when we arrive. So I think it''s best for us to go to her now before she goes ballistic and rampages every trying to find us." Xiao Tu informed Ye Xiu whilst whispering the last part. As they were walking through the carriage, Ye Xiu had noticed something strange that he should''ve noticed immediately but was too focused on talking to Xiao Tu. ''That''s weird, how did I not notice this before when I came in? The carriage is bigger on the inside than the outside. Could this be similar to how the inter-spatial storage works? By placing a bigger space into a smaller one? But as far as I was concerned it shouldn''t allow living things inside. Could it be similar to the Locket Dimension then? I''m not quite sure on how the Locket Dimension and the storage rings are made but I''ll find out in the future so I can make my own Dimension or to expand the Locket Dimension. Maybe I don''t need to expand the locket Dimension because Master did say something about more things being unlocked once I get stronger. Arghh, there''s no point in thinking about this now, I''ll just leave the matter for later.'' They both arrived at where Xiao Tu''s mother was and she quickly beckoned the both of them towards her. "Look, kids, I have something I want you to try on! These are some clothes that I bought as a pair for the both of you last night! I bet you would both look so cute together wearing it." Ye Xiu looked at the outfit and realised that it was similar to those animal costumes that you could find in his previous life. Seeing that he started to turn around and run away. Before he even got far enough, a hand had grabbed onto the back of his robes and pulled him back towards animal costumes. Seeing that it was his mother pulling him, Ye Xiu knew that he had no chance of escaping. A scream could be heard throughout the carriage, "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" - Night Time the same day - The carriages had stopped for dinner and to let the Qi Beasts rest and rejuvenate themselves. As they were enjoying dinner, two sharp knocks on the carriage door could be heard when a voice called out, "Open up! It''s Xiao San and I coming to haunt you ladies for the rest of the journey!" Yu Er got up towards the door to open it and beckoned the two men inside. "Why''d you guys come so late at night?" Xiao San answered this time, "Well, we both finished handling our businesses so we came over early to surprise you guys!" "That''s good then" Yu Er nodded. They continued eating dinner and after the two boys walked off the fullness they sat down in a corner of the carriage and started reading books; they also started to talk to each other quietly as if they were a couple. "Tomorrow we''ll train as usual and then we can go read books and play some simple games I''ve come up with." Ye Xiu told him. "Okay then, are we just going to stick with this schedule until the end of the trip?" "It''s easier than coming up with a new one every day so why not?" "Then it''s decided." Xiao Tu nodded his head seriously. The boys continued on with the schedule for the rest of the trip when they had finally arrived at the capital of the country they were headed for. Besides some disastrous dress-up sessions, the trip was smooth and peaceful. After the long trip which had lasted for over a month, Mei Ling ran out of the carriage and shouted, "I''m back! This whole city will remember the name of Mei Ling!" Yu Er pulled Mei Ling back into the carriage and told her, "You can do that later, now we have to get to our accommodation. Wait, where are we going to be living for the next month or so?" "We are going to my parent''s residence obviously!" Yu Er just looked at her strangely, "I thought you hated them for trying to stop you from marrying your husband?" "They wanted to see my precious baby so I couldn''t deny them!" Mei Ling started going off on a tangent about her precious son and Yu Er gave up and just dragged her into the carriage and let them carry on into the city. Mei Lings Family Chapter 12 - ??Capital??- The carriages'' speed started to slow down due to the fact that they had reached roads with a higher traffic in people and other carriages. Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu peered outside the windows to watch the people walking by in the capital and noticed that compared to the people usually walking around in the city they were from, that the wealth was clearly much higher here. A variety of characters walked around the streets looking at shops and buildings. Some people had scars all over their body and some just wore luxurious robes and carried a fan around. Ye Xiu snickered knowing from some of the ancient cultivator dramas that he watched in his previous life had shown this stereotype as an ''arrogant young master who loves to flaunt his wealth. The carriages'' was soon blocked by a massive building and its tall walls. Seeing that they were about to end their journey, everybody started getting up and packing everything they had used and stored it back inside their inter-spatial storage. The horses finally stopped and they all stepped off the carriage which was in front of the entrance of the grand building they had seen. A loud voice shouted, "Halt, identify yourselves, no unauthorised personnel is allowed past this point." Mei Ling didn''t bother waiting for the person to finish speaking before throwing a wooden board at this person. When the guard saw it, he instantly apologised, "Sorry Young Miss! We had no idea that you would be arriving at this time." Mei Ling waved off the apology and asked for her father, "Is father home right now? If not I''ll just bring my party to the main residence. We''ll be staying here for at least a month so inform the other guards to not apprehend my friends." After speaking she walked off and gestured for everyone else to follow her. They started walking a pebble pathway surrounded by small ponds and wildlife fluttered around them. Ye Xiu could see that whoever had designed this place had a good taste of aesthetics. They walked down the pathway until they veered towards the right where a little gate stood in front of them. "Well guys, this is where everybody from the main family lives so it''s best for us to be as quiet as possible." Mei Ling informed everybody. Ye Qiu started laughing, "Mei Ling, that''s like telling a shark to stop swimming. You are the one who talks the most and it''s nearly impossible for anyone to shut you up!" Mei Ling just glared at him before pushing open the gate whilst calling out, "Mother, I''m back. Greet your precious daughter! Haven''t you missed me or were you just trying to see my precious baby instead of your own daughter?" A voice rang out from the building, "Stop shouting you imbecile! Have you no manners? You haven''t changed at all Mei Ling! Brash and bold as always. I could hear you tell your friends to be quiet when entering the building but the moment you take a step through the gate you are already shouting? Such a hypocrite!" Mei Ling''s face started going red, "Sister, I''ll have you know I''m better than before! I''m also married while you are still stuck at home like a Sheng Nu! I also have a cute baby whilst you are just sitting at home waiting for the perfect man that will never come!" The two sisters started to bicker back and forth and the 3 adults in the visiting party just shook their heads in a jovial manner whilst laughing quietly. They entered the building and Ye Xiu could see that the building was definitely much bigger on the inside compared to the outside. His interest in the expansion of the building and the carriage coming forth again, he was planning to ask his parents about this matter because he just couldn''t handle not knowing something so interesting. Mei Ling brought them to a couple of seats in the residence which were rather comfortable. After a few minutes of waiting, a woman who looked to be in her thirties walked and started to move towards the party. The adults which saw the woman just looked away, afraid of meeting her stern gaze. The woman''s gaze had honed into a specific part of the room. The woman walked even faster towards it. The woman pinched the face inhabiting the space. "Mei, you never told me you had two sons! They both look so adorable unlike you when you were a child!" Xiao Tu''s face became red from the continuous pinching but didn''t ask for her to let go; he was afraid that this woman would be similar to his mother. Before Mei Ling could even respond, the woman grabbed Ye Xiu, picked him up and placed him on her shoulders. "This adorable one looks even cuter than the older son you have! He looks like an innocent doll that I just can''t wait to taste!" If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. Mei Ling quickly picked Ye Xiu off of the woman''s shoulders before speaking, "Mother, I only have one child... the child you placed on your shoulders just now was my friends'' child. Also, what do you mean my son is not cuter than him? My son is the cutest existence to grace this world!" "I''m sorry for mistaking your child for hers." Mei Ling''s mother bowed in apology for the error. "Your son truly is adorable and I''d love to have some time with him and my grandson alone. I am called Mei Tu and I am Mei Ling''s mother if you haven''t realised it yet." After apologising she sported a similar smile to Mei Ling''s when she was infatuated with something. "Oh, aren''t you two just the cutest little things." Recovering from their shock, both Ye Qiu and Yu Er quickly greeted the elder hosting them in their residence. Ye Qiu asked a question to try and refresh the memory of the grandmother, "Mei Tu, don''t you remember me, Ye Qiu? I was the boy who always followed Mei Ling''s current husband around, watching him goof around and try to woo your daughter." "Oh, you''re the one who was perverted weren''t you? Everybody in the capital talked about the both of you for your perverted actions for days after you guys had been caught for peeking on the ladies'' communal bath." Mei Tu thought deeply whilst knowing that she would embarrass the grown man easily with that memory. "Ahh, really? Everybody knew about us from then on?" Ye Qiu asked nervously because he could see his wife''s face twitching violently. "I hope you can just forget that event and think of me as a changed man now." He asked very hopefully. "That''s fine, it was a matter from a long time ago anyway. What brings the three of you back to this country anyway? Did Mei Ling force you all on this trip or did you give your consent?" Mei Tu asked curiously. Yu Er answered for them, "Mei Ling and I both decided that it had been too long since we had all met up as a group, so we decided to take a vacation to this country since she has an event here in the next month or so and we wanted to bring our children to see and learn about new places besides where they grew up in." The grandmother kindly informed them, "I think it would be best for you to be safe in the capital this time around. Recently the streets have become more dangerous with strong cultivators being murdered during the night. It''s best for you to travel in the day and be back by sunset." Yu Er thanked her for the information and advice. "By the way Mei Ling, where did that husband of yours go? He hasn''t been here for the entire conversation." "He''s probably talking to sister again. You know what they are like when they get wind up talking about their hobby." "That''s fine then, everybody should be back for dinner by then so he won''t be able to escape me then." Mei Tu smirked deviously. Everybody started to settle down from the earlier excitement and sat down to talk quietly whilst waiting for dinner to approach. They caught up with some things that had happened in their lives since they hadn''t met for a long period of time. The two boys had secretly snuck off to the garden area where they started to train secretly. The trip didn''t give them as many opportunities to train as they had thought so they had slacked off in their training. They were trying to make use of their leisure time now to make up for lost time. Night approached and a man had entered the residence silently as the household was currently enjoying dinner whilst conversation was made. The man entered the residence suddenly and bellowed, "Who are these strangers intruding into my home? These munchkins look like I could chew them from breakfast!" The man moved towards the two children and picked them up by their robes. The adults didn''t bother moving because they knew who this man was and what his eccentricities were like. "Is that my daughter I spy with my little eye? That could only mean that these two brats are my grandchildren! Well, say hello to grandfather, the best person in the world!" The kids just rolled their eyes at the older man''s theatrics and started giggling when Mei Tu smacked the man on the head with a wooden spoon, "Sit down and eat you fool, being dramatic doesn''t make you seem more intimidating when you only just shaved your beard and moustache this morning. Now you just look like a man-child. Anyway, this is my husband, Shen Jing. He has his love for theatrics just so he can scare people." Mei Ling greeted her father and asked him how his day went. "My day was boring, as usual, the only interesting thing happening in the capital now is the mysterious murders happening at night." Mei Tu just whacked Shen Jing on the head again, "Shut up, eat your food, this isn''t a discussion for the dinner table." Shen Jing just whined like a child, "Fine, we''ll talk about this later. Mei Ling, I see that you''ve been busy with your husband. You already gave me two grandchildren. Are you going to give birth to anymore? A daughter maybe?" His eyes twinkled mischievously. "Father, I only have one son. Did you not read the letter I sent you? You always seem to ignore letters coming from people." "Letters usually mean boring things. I skip them if they don''t have an official seal." Shen Jing started complaining, "Why would I even need to read your letters anyway, you can always come back to tell me everything happening in your life." "The trip takes an entire month father, You can''t just expect me to up and leave the city at any given moment. I only came back because it was a reunion party which was organised by my friends. It was also convenient to bring everyone here because they were all at our house at the time." Mei Ling said exasperatedly. "Also, the older boy is my adorable son. The younger one is Yu Er''s son. You know Yu Er perfectly fine so I sincerely doubt that you''ve forgotten her appearance." "Yu Er? The one married to the pervert? She also had children already?" Shen Jing asked surprised. "Father, she''s literally sitting on this table right now." "Oops, my vision must be getting worse as I age." Shen Jing shamelessly lied. "Father, you forgot what she looked like didn''t you?" Mei Ling asked with an eyebrow raised. "Well, what''s my son''s name, Mei Ling? I hope you haven''t given him a terrible name!" Shen Jing hastily and very obviously steered the conversation to another topic. "His name is Xiao Tu. The other boy''s name is Ye Xiu. Now let''s get back to eating my stomach is grumbling for food." As she said this, a loud growl sounded out. "Wait that wasn''t me." They all looked at Ye Xiu who waved sheepishly, "Uh I''m hungry, may I eat?" They just laughed and dinner continued on from there. Chatter filled the night until the children fell asleep and their parents had to carry them to bed. Panic The children were put into bed and they quietly closed the door, the adults gathered once more around the dining table to discuss things quietly. Eventually, discussions were moved towards the topic of the mysterious murders. Mei Ling was the first one to test the waters and broke the ice by asking the question that everybody was thinking, "Father, you mentioned murders earlier on today. Could you elaborate on that?" "Sure I could. Recently in the capital and around a few cities in the country, we have been receiving reports about mysterious deaths happening at night and it isn''t just the normal populace which has been targeted; quite a few of the murders were of cultivators of decent strength. The bodies are being cut up pretty gruesomely. Whoever or whatever is committing this crime is obviously a cultivator and we are trying to find clues to who it is." "The only thing we are concerned about is the fact that the murders which are happening could be a prelude to something much more sinister. We have no clues right now and are just speculating and informing people to be safer in the country really. It''s all we can do with our limited communication channels." "It''s not just deaths that we''ve been investigating though; we''ve kept this from the public but people are disappearing as well. We''ve identified with the kidnapping victims being some people who have been murdered. The two crimes are most likely connected and we are trying to figure out why they are doing this in the first place." Shen Jing commented after a while. "Why not have people patrol the streets at night?" Ye Qiu asked. "There aren''t enough cultivators who have a high enough realm to patrol every street. The strength of some of the cultivators'' had reached the peak of the Qi Cleansing realm. Not many other strong cultivators would dare to volunteer themselves anyway because they are mostly cultivators from clans." Shen Jing rubbed his face in frustration. Mei Tu clapped her hands together, "Enough of such a morbid topic anyway. Let''s decide on what we are going to do for tomorrow. I want to take boys to buy some new clothes for them to wear. They''d look much better than the clothes you had them both in today." Yu Er laughed wryly, "You''d have to catch them before you can even start with dragging them along for these clothes sessions. They seem absolutely terrified whenever we talk about clothes." All the women spoke at the same time, "Men." They shook their heads and the three males awake in the household just shuddered at the thought of clothes. Shen Jing asked the two fathers what had happened since they had left the country years ago, "Nothing much has really changed since we left really. The only major change is the fact that we have children in our households now so that does take up quite a bit of our time. Both our boys have promising talent but for the genii in this city, maybe only Ye Xiu can be called a genius. There are truly too many people with strong talent here." "Ye Xiu is able to become an Alchemist in the future with his affinities so that''d be a stable income for him. Both the children are extremely mature for their age which is really strange. Other than that, all I can say is that the city does have it''s own problems but hopefully we can deal with it ourselves without asking for help." Xiao San answered truthfully. Shen Jing beckoned the two forward when he took out a rectangular strip of paper. "I''d like to give you a gift that I hadn''t been able to give you because both you and Mei Ling had left the capital too fast for us to catch up. This is a life-saving talisman that can be used at a dangerous moment to allow you travel a hundred miles in any direction from where you are at. Keep this safe and only use it when your life is truly threatened." "Thank you, Father-in-Law. I''ll keep this safe for a family catastrophe." Xiao San bowed to him as thanks for the talisman. "You''re welcome, now shove off and let us get back to the ladies'' conversation." Shen Jing suddenly pushed the two of them in the direction of the women. The conversations flowed between the adults until midnight approached and they all went to their bedrooms to rest.This narrative has been purloined without the author''s approval. Report any appearances on Amazon. - The Next Day - Three women started to drag out two little boys out into the streets and onto a carriage. Thinking that this was a good time to ask somebody about the carriage, Ye Xiu tugged on his mother''s dress and asked her quietly, "Mother, how is it possible for the carriage to be bigger on the inside than on the outside? I know it''s a similar concept to how the inter-spatial rings work but they don''t allow anything live to enter but this does. What separates the two to allow them to have similar functions but different limits?" "Aren''t you a smart boy for noticing that?" Ye Xiu''s praised him and kissed him on the forehead. "The differences between the inter-spatial storage ring and the carriage is the fact they employ the same concept but utilised in different ways. You see both the ring and carriage''s function is to carry more things in a smaller space without affecting the weight and space outside of the said object. The ring''s purpose is to store objects in another dimension whereas the carriage is being expanded in the inside by increasing the existing amount of space around inside." "The ring is powered through inscriptions inlaid all around it whilst the carriage is enlarged in the inside through the use of a formation. Inscriptions last for a longer period of time due to the fact that they are inscribed onto an existing object; whilst formations doesn''t require anything special besides the knowledge and materials to set it up. Formations last as long as the power source is able to keep the formation running." "Since the ring''s storage is in another space, no living thing can live inside it because there is absolutely no nutrients or energy for it to survive on. Yes, you could put a live person in there but they would starve to death. That''s why most inter-spatial storage devices contain an inscription that prevents living things from entering it. Did you understand that or was it too complicated of an explanation?" Ye Xiu nodded his head, "Yeah, it wasn''t too hard to understand now that you''ve explained it to me. I''d like to ask another question though. If inscriptions and formations could be used so easily then why aren''t more of them being used for daily use?" Ye Xiu looked out the carriage window as he asked his question, observing the busy streets of the capital. "Like I have said before, formations require a source of energy to use. Once you deplete that energy source where would you find one? A formation requires materials to set up and then power to sustain it. Most formations are powered through Qi, however, some formations aren''t. My friend was a formation master and he had explained a lot about this topic because it was his passion." "He had also mentioned that to create a formation you would need to know the structure of the formation you are making to the finest detail and the slightest mistake whilst creating the formation would lead to its failure. The same can be said for inscriptions however inscriptions require the continual process of the maker''s Qi to be coursing through the inscriptions the entire time. A lapse in focus and it can lead to disastrous consequences. Now enough questions, we''re nearly at the clothing district." Yu Er informed her son. Mei Ling ran out of the carriage the moment it stopped and pulled the two boys together with her. "Let''s go find you boys some cute outfits you can both wear together!" Mei Tu and Yu Er just walked behind them slowly, smiling at the scene. - Hours later - "We''ve finished buying clothes, now let''s go check out the scholar''s district for any interesting books." Mei Tu brought them to a district filled with shops which sold knowledge on foot. "Mother, Xiao Tu and I will go to that shop and check it out!" Ye Xiu spotted a shop which had a sign which boasted it''s selling of books on the different disciplines of the world and started dragging Xiao Tu together with him. "Ye Xiu, wait!" Yu Er hurriedly called out in shock not expecting her son to suddenly leave her sight. "Stop dragging me and let me take a breath, Ye Xiu! I know you are excited but there''s no need for us to get here so quickly. I don''t even know how you are dragging someone heavier than you so fast anyway. Your legs are so short! You are just like my mom when she''s excited I swear!" "I know I shouldn''t be running but come on aren''t you excited? We''ll get to learn more about the cultivation world! That means more ways we could become stronger!" Ye Xiu''s enthusiasm started to infect Xiao Tu and he also started to run at a faster pace towards the shop. Whilst the two boys headed towards the shop, their guardians ran around looking through each shop in a frantic manner trying to find them because they didn''t actually see the direction that the two boys had vanished off to. As the boys entered the shop, they saw an elderly man with a beard sitting at the reception desk. The man opened his eyes and observed the two of them before speaking, "Hello young ones, what could you be here to look at today?" "We are just here to look through the books you have here." Xiao Tu answered. "Go ahead, but don''t ruin the books or you''ll have to pay for them." The man closed his eyes again after speaking. Ye Xiu quickly dragged Xiao Tu with him towards one of the bookshelves. The boys were so engrossed in their reading that they hadn''t bothered to look out and wonder what the time was. The sun started to set and the guardians of the two boys were completely panicking. They had searched every store in the district besides the last 3 and the worry could be seen on their faces. Mei Ling asked both her mother and Yu Er to check the two other stores whilst she checked the last one on the street. Mei Ling walked into the store where the boys were currently sitting in a far-away corner where no noise could reach them. "Hello, Mister Shopkeeper, have you by any chance seen two boys run past or come in recently?" She waved her hand in front of the shopkeeper''s face. The shopkeeper opened his eyes and answered, "No ma''am, there hasn''t been anybody coming into this store for the past couple of days. I''d suggest you to ask the other stores to see if any sign of them have appeared." The man smiled kindly. Mei Ling just furrowed her eyebrows, "I''ve already checked all the stores, but thanks for your time and advice." She walked back out of the store to look for Yu Er and her mother to inform them of the failure to find the boys. The man stood up as Mei Ling left with his smile never leaving his face. His face distorted into a sadistic smile as he closed shop and moved silently towards where the boys were sitting. He stood behind them silently before knocking them out with a single strike to the nape. His smile became even bigger as he took a single strand of hair from each hair and tasted it. "How delicious these ones are." Night fell and a shadowy figure carrying a sack could be seen jumping across rooftops. Kidnapping Xiao Tu was stirred awake by the constant movements happening outside his blurry vision. He tried to move his hands towards his face to clear his vision but was unable to. He felt rope on his skin, chafing it as he tried to free himself. Knowing that the struggle was futile, he waited for a few minutes for his vision to be clear once again. Xiao Tu noticed that he could see a brown fabric in front of him; guessing that he was probably thrown into a cloth sack. He could only see vague blurs of things outside due to the fact that the old man was probably moving too fast for his eyes to catch every single detail as they travelled. He heard sounds which reminded him of the sound of footsteps when walking on polished stone. He felt the man carrying him shift his weight and heard the noise of a door grinding onto a stone floor. It was moments later where he could feel himself being weightless for a few scant seconds before landing with a loud thud on the hard floor. He could hear another thud beside him. He guessed that it was probably Ye Xiu because the last thing he remembered was the both of them reading a book on different poisonous plants that could be found in the wilderness. The sacks were taken off them and Xiao Tu pretended to still be unconscious so that he didn''t catch their captor''s attention. The sacks and ropes from their limbs were taken off before the sound of the door closed together with the latch of a lock echoed through the room. After being able to see, Xiao Tu decided to look around the room to see just where they were so that he could plan an escape for Ye Xiu. The room was completely dirty, it looked to be as if it was uncleaned and he could see dark dried stains of red and brown all over the ground. Every time he touched a surface in the room, he could feel the grime between his fingers. Disgruntled by the condition of his cell, Xiao Tu proceeded with his examination of the room. He could see a small bucket in a corner filled with a liquid which smelled rancid. His face showed his repugnance at the entire room since he had never been in such a dirty place ever in his entire life. The sound of water dripping on the floor was a constant. Xiao Tu could hear the rats scurrying about in the darkness of the room. As he re-thought his situation, Xiao Tu''s emotional state started to deteriorate. He started to sniffle and small water droplets fell from his tear ducts. Xiao Tu wasn''t able to stop sniffling until he could hear the sounds of a body moving on the ground. He looked towards where Ye Xiu was and noticed that he was about to come into consciousness. He quickly tried to stifle his sniffling and quickly wiped away the tears from his face. Xiao Tu wanted to be the tough guy in this situation, he wanted to be the one to make sure everybody would feel safe and do all the heavy work just like in his father''s stories. He had promised himself that he would protect the people that he cared about; the only people he truly cared about was his family, Ye Xiu and his parents. To him it was the responsible thing to take care of those younger than you, so with determination, he worked up his courage before he walked over and nudged Ye Xiu with his feet. "Ye Xiu wake up. I need you to wake up please." He started to shake Ye Xiu awake. "Yes, mother? What are you calling me for? I didn''t think we had any plans for today." Ye Xiu stretched his limbs and started to get up. "Ye Xiu, try and remember the last thing you saw clearly." He asked him urgently. "Weren''t we just reading a book in the store? The last thing I saw was..." Ye Xiu''s sentence trailed off. "Oh, please tell me we didn''t get kidnapped when we got knocked unconscious." Ye Xiu took his tiny hands and rubbed them over his face. "Yes we did, and it''s not the time to panic so stay calm and hopefully we''ll figure a way out of this." Xiao Tu tried to keep the situation as worry-free as possible. Whilst Xiao Tu kept on trying to ''convince'' Ye Xiu about being calm but Ye Xiu knew that it was probably also a way for Xiao Tu to reassure himself of the situation. Ye Xiu started to think of a way he could escape. ''I don''t see much in the room that can be used to facilitate an escape. There aren''t even any windows here so we don''t know whether it''s night or day which would be troublesome. We wouldn''t be able to tell the time unless Xiao Tu managed to keep his inter-spatial ring on him. I remember sneaking in a timing device that was taken from father''s office into it when I passed him a few clothes that we bought.'' ''Even with we are able to tell the time, we don''t know if our captor is powerful or not. If he''s a cultivator... we''d have no chance. Let''s just forget the idea of escape for now." Ye Xiu shook his head to clear himself of his thoughts.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. - At the same time - Mei Ling, Mei Tu and Yu Er had rushed back to the residence as fast as they could to inform the others of the kidnapping. They had rushed home because the darkness had started to close in so they were unable to search anymore. They ran towards the living room where everybody else was making conversation. ''A panting Mei Ling means something bad has happened.'' Ye Xiu thought as the women entered the room with haste. "What''s wrong?" He asked. "Our boys are missing!" Mei Ling shouted. "Missing? How could they be missing with you watching them? I know that you''d never take your eyes off either of them in any situation." Xiao San asked with a frown on his face. Yu Er stepped in to answer, "They ran into the crowd when they said they were visiting a store." "Have you checked every shop?" Shen Jing asked starting to get up from his seat. "We have but nobody had seen them." Mei Tu responded to her husband. "The best we can do right now is to spread out and look for them. Arm yourselves, it''s night time and we don''t know if the murderer is still out there." Shen Jing told them. "Wait, what if our babies were kidnapped by the murderer? You said that some of the corpses were identified to be missing persons." Mei Ling asked her father with a serious face. "Then it''s all the more reason to start searching and to find them quickly. I''ll contact my informants to see if they have any information on the whereabouts of the killer." Shen Jing started leaving the room before jumping off into the night. - An Unknown Location - The elderly man from the store sat on a chair drinking from a wine glass. He sipped the liquid into his mouth, smacking his lips together at the taste, "Human blood is always the best drink to have after a rough day." The sound of pages being rustled and then turned could be heard in the room. "It''s also a great drink to get my mood positive when I''m reading this book. ''Torture methods to drain the blood out of a body'' is such a great book to find out ways to drain these fragile body physiques of humans of blood without them dying instantly. ''I better go feed those children shouldn''t I. Wouldn''t want them to die just yet.'' The man started to get up from his chair and opened up the cellar door to feed the children he held captive. He walked into the room where the boys were held captive and threw bread and left a bowl of water for them at the door. He walked closer to Xiao Tu and grabbed his chin with two fingers; pulling him closer towards the man. "I wouldn''t want my tasty morsels to be hungry so you better eat and drink up. You''d be too tender for me to eat otherwise." The man had let go of Xiao Tu whilst laughing. The man walked out of the room and locked it again, leaving the two boys in silence. "The guy is creepy." Ye Xiu commented. "Yep. What do we do now? "I left a device which could tell the time in your ring. Do you still have your ring?" "Yeah, I do. The man never bothered to remove anything from my person. Tell me what it looks like so I can retrieve it for us." "It''s round and it has twelve numbers arranged in a circle with two arrows, one short and one long." Xiao Tu retrieved it quickly and asked him what they were going to do with it. "We have food and now we know the time. All we can do now is use the time wisely and train our bodies up. The stronger we are the higher the chance we have to survive this." "Alright, let''s begin training then." The two boys started their body exercises which they had learnt from their parents. They continued until they were tired. Ye Xiu had wanted to enter his Dimension but restrained himself because it would look suspicious for him to be clean suddenly. The two boys fell asleep quickly from fatigue. As the boys fell asleep a voice on the other side of the capital could be heard, "What do you mean you have no information on the killer! You are the best organisation for collecting information discreetly. You''ve never failed me and now when it''s urgent you have?" Shen Jing''s face was aflame with fury. "Sir, you''ll have to give us more time. We don''t have enough people in the capital right now because they are busy looking for clues in other parts of the country. Please forgive us." The masked man spoke. "Fine, just get me some kind of information by tomorrow, otherwise I''ll just kill you all and hire new people." Shen Jing sat down in his office thinking about everything that had gone wrong. He sighed in frustration. - The next morning - "Sir, we''ve found information you may want to hear." A voice sounded out from outside the window. "Come in then, don''t dawdle." Shen Jing ordered the man. "Sir, we''ve had reports from the civilians that they had spotted a man jumping across rooftops at night with what had looked to be two sacks on his shoulder. They saw him entering a rundown building in the slums. It should be easily recognisable since it''s the only building which has black tiles on the roof." "Hmm, that must be the boys. Tell the others good job and thanks for the information. You may leave now." Shen Jing dismissed his employee. As the masked man left, Shen Jing suddenly shouted, "I HAVE INFORMATION ON THE WHEREABOUTS OF THE TWO BOYS! Come here and we''ll leave immediately!" In less than a minute, everybody had gathered up. Shen Jing could see that the hair of Yu Er and Mei Ling was completely out of order. "Listen up, the boys are held by a man who is in a building in the slums. It''s a rundown building and it''s the only building there which has black tiles. Spread out and tell the others when you''ve found it. I don''t want you going alone." The group dispersed immediately, making their way towards the slums to find their children. Rescue The dispersal of the group resulted in pairs being formed so that nobody would be caught off-guard alone. Each couple went together as a pair because they had the best co-ordination after years of fighting side to side. Ye Qiu and his wife were looking through the poorest parts of the slums, hopping from roof to roof when they spotted a one-storey building''s roof covered with black tiles. Knowing that this was probably the house since no other building had black coloured roofs. Ye Qiu took out a talisman and spoke into it whilst inserting his Qi. "We''ve found the building, I''m going to shoot one of my Qi Arrows into the sky so you can track us here faster." The talisman started to decay apart before turning into dust. The talisman was a voice transmitting talisman, it was useful however it broke apart after one use. Besides the fragility it was also extremely expensive due to the fact voice talismans could communicate at a distance of 100 kilometres. The rest of the rescue party arrived quickly in less than 5 minutes. Ye Qiu asked, "Are we going in with a plan or what?" Mei Ling just shouted, "Screw plans! My precious dolls are inside and we are wasting our time!" She barged right through the door right after she finished speaking. The man was sitting in the same chair and was surprised by the abrupt entrance but quickly regained his composure. After seeing the weapons Mei Ling, he quickly got into a combat position and taunted Mei Ling with a cocky smirk, "Looking for the boys from yesterday lady?" Everybody followed her in quickly through the door when she started screaming at him madly, "YOU! You were the shopkeeper! HOW! DARE! YOU! You psychopath!" She started charging at him with her battleaxe but was quickly pulled back by Xiao San. "Don''t rush in, the man was capable of taking down cultivators with reasonably high strength. Rushing in now would just be conceding to the man''s plan. He''s baiting you so calm down and we''ll fight him together. He won''t stand a chance against everyone attacking him at the same time." "Tsk, such a reasonable man even in the face of danger. It won''t help if you are WEAK!" The man leapt towards Mei Tu and cut her with one of his knives that he had pulled out during the leap. "Surround him! Don''t give him room to move around. If he doesn''t have room, we should be able to restrict his movements with my arrows!" Ye Qiu ordered from the back of the room. Ye Qiu started to create Qi Arrows and shot them towards the men, every single arrow was shot in consideration of the movements of his teammates. Mei Ling constantly swung her battle axe whilst enforcing with Qi, pushing the man back. The constant swinging helped her build up her momentum which could be used to help her release her Qi Technique. After a terrifying swing from the side, the entire built up momentum was released into the man, making him sail through the air and crashing into the wall. The man picked himself off the ground and looked unfazed besides the dust on his clothing. "What a nice swing you got there. Too bad it can''t hurt me!" The man''s figure dissolved into the shadows before he suddenly appeared beside Mei Tu. Mei Tu instantly utilised her Qi Technique, ''Galloping Steed" which helped her regain the distance from the man. Mei Tu ran forwards with a spear poised above her head before shouting, "Aerial Pierce!" The spear barely touched the man before his figure dissolved into shadows appearing beside Mei Tu again. The man instantly thrust his daggers towards Mei Tu as she was moving towards the direction her technique had been going in. Her spear was stuck in the ground causing her to not be able to react with a block. The daggers struck a pale green shield floating around her midsection where a paper could be seen crumbling into dust. Seeing that, Mei Tu immediately regained her balance and spoke to her teammates as she dodged the continuous dagger strikes flying at her, "I think the way he''s seemingly moving to my side in an instant is due to his daggers! I was cut earlier from his earlier lunge and I was the only person that he was teleporting to! You should be able to sense the Qi increasing in his daggers everytime the ability is activated. Somebody get rid of his daggers quickly, avoid his attacks. I''ll be able to hold myself whenever he comes to me." Hearing that, both Yu Er and Xiao San activated their Qi Techniques simultaneously. "Duality of Swords: Searing Blades!" The blade of their swords started to glow a vivid red releasing a heat wave around it. The glow scorched the ground black before the two moved together, lunging at the man whilst Ye Qiu covered the escape routes with his arrows. The two struck from different vantage points forcing the man''s need to teleport to Mei Tu. Mei Tu was ready for the teleportation this time and threw her spear towards the man. The attack didn''t pierce through his defence and the spear just fell to the ground uselessly afterwards. "Shit! I can''t even pierce through his skin! We have to use attacks which can pierce through his defence and aim it in the same spot multiple times!"This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. "You think that''s easy?!?" Ye Qiu glared at Mei Tu. "He''s moving around too much for me to hit him accurately in the same spot multiple times." "That''s fine, I''ve constructed a formation which can restrict his movements." Shen Jing spoke re-entering the room with four talisman papers which were floating around him. He ran towards the man and set the talisman papers around him and infused his Qi into them. The man''s movements were immediately restricted. The others started activating Qi Techniques to end the battle quickly. Aiming at the man''s head they all struck simultaneously. An explosion of dust encased everybody when the attacks hit. The man started to become disfigured. His legs started to elongate and became furry. His feet turned into hooves and his upper body was devoid of hair. Curved goat horns grew out of his head. Instead of being able to see the figure clearly, it was shrouded by black miasmic fog. Ye Qiu immediately recognised the figure to be similar to a Qi Beast that he had met during one of his journeys into the wilderness. "Watch out! It''s the Man-eating Satyr. It''s capable of using its miasma to create realistic illusions. The horns are probably the daggers it was using earlier. The satyr was known for it''s teleporting capabilities whenever their enemies were injured by the horns. It''s supposed to be in the forbidden zone, how''d it get here? The zone''s entrances are protected by some of the strongest cultivators in the Outer Region!" "We don''t need its background information, give us a way to kill it!" Shen Jing shouted at him. "The best way is to get rid of the miasma by purifying it with hot flames, the combat abilities of the satyr drops dramatically once it is gone." Shen Jing grunted, "That''ll be easy, hold him off for a couple of minutes!" The beast spoke in a guttural voice, "You''ll die before you''ll be able to do anything!" It teleported beside Mei Tu at a much faster speed and immediately rammed her with the horns. The horns were easily able to pierce through her defence leaving her injured. Mei Tu started to lose her balance because of the miasma seeping into her body through the injuries. As she lost her balance, Yu Er managed to slice the horns away from the satyr''s head, making him unable to use his teleportation abilities. "I''m out of this fight! Try to hold on, I''ll deal with my own injuries!" Mei Tu retreated from the battle to tend to her injuries. The other four had an easier time dodging the Satyr''s attacks since the teleportation ability was unable to be used anymore. Ye Qiu managed to pierce through the satyr''s body with his arrows encased in Fire Qi. He was slowly burning away the miasma but he could see that the satyr kept on producing more miasma over time. A few minutes of attrition continued before Shen Jing managed to finish his formation. "I''m ready! Retreat now!" He gave them a warning before releasing the formation''s power onto the Satyr. The Miasma was completely obliterated and the satyr looked exposed without it. Mei Ling stepped in without hesitation to land the final blow on the satyr before it could recover, "Heaven''s Swing!" The satyr''s head was chopped off in a single clean swing. "Hmph, guess he wasn''t so tough after all." Mei Ling muttered before declaring that she would go look for the children. "Wait up! I''m coming with you, Mei Ling." Yu Er jogged to catch up with Mei Ling. They searched every single room in the building until the last door for the cellar was left. Whilst the pair entered the cellar, the others were busy discussing something over the body. "What are we going to do with its corpse? It should be pretty rare because it was a Qi Beast of grade 3 from the Forbidden Zone." Ye Qiu spoke. "We can just split up the profits when we sell it through an auction. It''d fetch a good price." Shen Jing nodded to the plan. "After this, I''m going to make sure the security in the capital is better. Something with such a high cultivation shouldn''t have been able to pass through the capital without anybody suspicious." Xiao San listened to Shen Jing before replying. "Go ahead, we''ll be heading back to our country in a month''s time at the earliest. If you need before then, I''d be happy to help." "Thanks for the help in advance then." Shen Jing thanked him. - Cellar - Yu Er and Mei Ling made it down to the bottom of the stairs after a minute of walking. They spotted a rusted metal door with multiple locks and latches. Yu Er looked at Mei Ling who nodded before taking out her axe. Swinging it in a fast motion, the locks all clattered on the ground uselessly. They opened the door slowly. Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu moved to the back of the room thinking it was the man coming in to check up on them. After seeing the two figures carefully when the light came through from door, they ran to their mothers and hugged them tightly. Yu Er finished hugging Ye Qiu before slapping him hard on the face and the same was heard similarly from Mei Ling''s direction. The two boys were scolded. "How? How could you just run off like that?!? Do you know how afraid I was about losing you? Never do that again!" Yu Er hugged Ye Qiu again before kissing him on the forehead. "Please promise you won''t do it again." "Yes, mother I do. I promise, whoever breaks the promise first eats a thousand nails." Ye Qiu reaffirmed his mother with his promise. Xiao Tu was similarly scolded by his mother, "You were the older one in this situation. you shouldn''t have been pulled along. You should''ve done the responsible thing and stop Ye Qiu." After the scolding, they all went back upstairs and met up with everybody. Ye Qiu and Xiao San just looked sternly at their sons before confirming that they would start to teach the both of them how to fight so they can protect themselves and others. They all went home and the two boys fell asleep from exhaustion. They placed them into bed together because Xiao Tu wouldn''t let go of Ye Qiu. Xiao Tu''s chin was resting on top of Ye Qiu''s head and he cuddled him like a teddy bear. The day was peaceful and nothing else significant occurred. Lao Lans Explanations Six weeks have passed since the kidnapping of the boys. The boys had started to learn close combat training with their fathers. There was no specific style taught to the boy because their fathers believed that building the foundations would be much better than starting a style immediately. They had them practice punches, kicks and ways to take down their opponent quickly by using their weight against them. This was because the boys were still young and did not have defined muscle tone. Mei Ling had a great time at the reunion event with all her friends. The event had become a fiesta after the two boys were introduced to her friends. The women were all pinching the cheeks of the two boys and some had wanted to dress them up like a doll. Though before it had got to that point, Yu Er came to take the boys elsewhere so she could prevent her boys from being harassed for too long. After the event ended, the visiting group decided to stay for a week longer so they could spend more time with the hosting family. The trip back to the city was uneventful and had been passed with everybody in a routine so the journey was much faster than it was before. Ye Xiu thought back on his experiences in the world and vowed to get stronger. With the kidnapping experience, the knowledge that the world wasn''t safe as his original world had finally sunk in. He had thought that with the strength he could gain in this world would protect him but now knowing that there was always somebody stronger than him in the world made him feel uneasy. To stop the unease from unsettling him any further, he sunk himself into training with even more vigour. His father had noticed the increased effort being put into the training from his son and was worried that the kidnapping had been traumatic for him. So he decided to speak to Ye Xiu during one of their training sessions. "What''s bothering you Ye Xiu? I can see that something is on your mind. You didn''t put so much effort into training until after the kidnapping incident. Are you traumatised? Do you need to speak to somebody about it because I''m always here for you." Ye Qiu patted Ye Xiu''s head as they were sparring. Ye Xiu''s attacks started to become more ferocious the more his father asked him about his mental state. "I''m not bothered! Stop asking me these questions and just continue on with the training!" His petulant voice tried to sound angry but failed, only adding to his cuteness levels. Blocking Ye Xiu''s assault he caught his last punch and kept it still. "Ye Xiu, I''m just trying to help. It''s best for you to get past traumatic experiences. Yes, traumatic experiences can give you the motivation to improve but at the same time, it starts to become an inner demon inside of you. Do you really want that? To be consumed by a traumatic experience simply because you couldn''t get past your grief?" "If training is a way for you to release your stress from the situation then go ahead and attack me with everything you have. I''ll receive your attacks and won''t do anything back to you so you can get everything out of your system. Would that be okay with you? After you''re done releasing that stress you can talk with either me, your mother or anybody else that you trust. I want you to get over this by this time next week. "Fine." "Now go rest and wash up, we''ll have dinner soon." Ye Qiu patted his son''s back before pushing him in the direction of the house. Ye Xiu entered the dimension to clean up his sweat from his training, as he laid on the rocky wall of the pool he thought back to the kidnapping experience. ''Did it really affect me that much?'' He started to sigh as he knew he wouldn''t get anywhere with these thoughts today. He finished cleaning up and exited the dimension to go to the dining room for dinner. He looked at his father as he spoke, "I''ll talk to someone by the time it is next week, don''t worry." His father just smiled at him and patted his head, "That''s good." Yu Er just looked at the exchange quietly with a smiled fixed onto her face. After the head rubbing stopped, Ye Qiu continued speaking, "Tomorrow, you''ll be going back to the Medical Hall. Lao Lan has been waiting for you to come back and he seems excited for some reason. I was planning to send you to him to learn about the Medical Arts when you are older but I think is a good time to take your mind off training."You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. "How early do I have to get there, father? "When the sun rises. Lao Lan doesn''t mind too much about punctuality because he''s late half the time. "Alright, I''ll get there a bit earlier though." - The Next day - Ye Xiu had woken up even earlier than expected and instead of immediately going towards the Medical Hall at such an early time, he decided to train because he knew that going to the Medical Hall today would probably messing up his training schedule. He took out his timing device to look at the time, he decided that before going to the Medical Hall, he would freshen up in the Locket Dimension. Ye Xiu had arrived at the Medical Hall just as the birds started to chirp. He entered the Medical Hall and went to the room he had awoken from before. He decided to look around the room to see if anything interesting could be found similar to his old world or if there were new things. He had looked through the room and wasn''t able to find anything besides a locked storage room filled with herbs he could see from the window. He sat on a chair that he had spotted in the room and waited for Lao Lan to arrive. He waited and waited. "... where is he?'' Ye Xiu started pacing around the room whilst checking his timepiece. "It''s already 8 o''clock." Ye Xiu grumbled just as he spotted Lao Lan walking down the corridor towards the room. Lao Lan greeted him with a genial smile on his face. "Ah, you''re already here that''s good. Well, let us get started on your education of the Medical Arts. Tell me what you know about from what you''ve read, heard or can tell from the name of the discipline." Lao Lan immediately started the lesson without delay "I believe that the Medical Arts are mainly focused on the skill to treat and cure injuries, sicknesses and diseases. From what I''ve read, I know that the Medical Arts are linked closely to Alchemy and are proficient in the use of qi that can heal. People who practice the Medical Arts are not only proficient in the usage of their qi but they are also well-known for having a vast knowledge on herbs, plants and animals so that they can use it in conjunction with their healing to boost their prowess in the discipline." Ye Xiu rambled on with his ideas of what the Medical Arts were. Lao Lan stroked his beard in a thoughtful manner, "You''re certainly well-read about the discipline that''s for sure, however, you''ve missed some of the critical points of what the Medical Arts can do. Besides using our extensive knowledge for healing, we are also well-known for using poisons in battle. Knowledge of how to heal somebody also results in the knowledge of how to kill somebody. We also learn everything about the body so we are able to heal specific parts of the body without causing any problems in other parts and the same could be said for fighting." "Alchemy and the Medical Arts are closely linked due to the fact that many Alchemy Masters are actually proficient in a branch of Medical Arts as well. You''ll learn about the branch when you begin your Alchemy lessons so I won''t teach you about it." "Our control of our Qi has to be extremely proficient due to the fact that most of the time when you are using our Qi to heal somebody, we are actually inserting the Qi into the person''s body. Without control, the Qi would just run rampant in the body and tear it apart." "Now one of the more important aspects of Medical Arts is the so-called Healing Qi that we can use. Healing qi is actually just a different way of using Wood-affinity Qi. We change the wood-affinity qi''s properties to become more focused on cleansing, purification and healing. It''s a difficult process to change the qi the way we want and that is why it will take you a long time before you even have the proficiency and qi control to even begin healing anybody." "The Qi can also be manipulated in a way to make it poisonous to anybody who absorbs it or is close to it. It is of a similar process to how we change the Wood-affinity qi. The way we improve our Qi control is simple yet complicated at the same time. We form Qi threads and use them to do daily tasks. Controlling them for fine details is hard and everytime you improve you''ll form my Qi threads and control them to do certain tasks. I''ll teach you the method for forming these Qi threads next time you come back." Lao Lan handed Ye Xiu a massive book, "Here, I want you to memorise everything in this book about plant and herb identification. Don''t come back here before you do." He started to kick Ye Xiu out of the room in a hurry. Ye Xiu returned home carrying the massive book with him. He entered the house and his father saw the book he was carrying before he started laughing. "He''s done it again, hasn''t he? Did Lao Lan ask you to memorise the whole book before going back to him?" "Yes, he has. Is there a problem father?" "It''s going to take you at least a few months before you even finish memorising it. After that, he asks you questions about different herbs. He also asks questions about on how if you take several different plants and use them together what would be the expected outcome. If you give him a satisfactory answer, then you''d be able to continue learning with him, if not then there would be no chance." "I''d just suggest you take your time and think of an answer to the question." "Alright father, I''ll be going to my room to start the book now. I''ll be back for training later so see you then!" Ye Xiu called out as he walked towards his room. Ye Xiu watched him, leaving him in his thoughts, ''He looks like he''s gotten happier since I''ve talked to him yesterday, I hope he gets over his trauma.'' - Ye Xiu''s Bedroom - He was busy thinking to himself of how he was going to approach the memorisation of the book, ''Okay, I''ll have to make a plan for the memorisation. Do I just memorise the entire book and recite it or should I try and understand every single page and be able to come up with ideas for the combinations myself? Father did say that Lao Lan asks questions on combinations of herbs and plants and their effects, so I''ll go with the latter method.'' After coming up with his plan, Ye Xiu decided to enter the Dimension to see if there were any more extensive encyclopedias for plants and herbs in the library so that he could surprise Lao Lan with his knowledge base. This carried on until his training session where his mood was visibly improved in contrast to his mood from yesterday. The day carried on as usual until Ye Xiu fell asleep. Ye Xiu went to sleep dreaming. His dreams evolved into a much more sinister nightmare and he was sweating all over from it. Talk An abyss stared at him as he ran past the corridors and ended at a dead-end. The floor started to become a black expanse advancing towards him. The longer he stared, the more he felt his heart hurt. He started to open all the doors he could see before entering the one which was the brightest. Catching his breath, he started to look around the room he had entered. The room was very white, completely bare of any items in the room. It had a clean aesthetic look which appealed to him and he wondered, ''Would this have been the room I''d have entered if I was never reborn?'' The room started to distort into a dark jail cell and he was trapped in chains struggling to break free. He could see the old man that had captured him. The man kept walking closer as he watched helplessly. The man was in arm''s distance away from and his mouth started to open before speaking, "You won''t escape your fate, it''s already written into the stars." Ye Xiu suddenly woke up from the dream because he had fallen from his bed, jarring him awake. ''That dream, was it really like father said? That I was so traumatised by the kidnapping that I''d even dream about it now? I should go look for somebody to talk to and the best person that I know of is a person of similar age to me who had also gone through the same ordeal, Xiao Tu.'' Ye Xiu quickly got ready for the morning training and to inform his father that he needed to go to Xiao Tu''s residence. The training went smoothly besides the fact the nightmare weighed heavily on his mind. As they started sparring he spoke to his father, "Father, could you accompany me to Xiao Tu''s house later? I wish to go see him today." "Today? That isn''t a problem, how long will you be there?" "I don''t know how long I''ll take so you can just leave me there and I''ll be in the care of Xiao San and Mei Ling." "Alright, we''ll go during mid-day. I''ll have to sort out some businesses before I travel out." "Thank you, dad." Ye Qiu heard the informal way of address and smiled happily. His son had finally stopped being so formal with him. Ever since he was able to talk, he''d never addressed him as dad or Yu Er as mum and it had hurt them because they didn''t know what they had done to make him call them so unfamiliarly. - City Lord''s Residence - "I''ll see you later then, dad!" Ye Xiu called out before going out on his search for Xiao Tu at the training grounds. He spotted Xiao Tu training as usual and called out to him, "Xiao Tu! I''m here to visit you today!" Xiao Tu stopped his movements and looked over to who called out to him before beaming out a smile. "Hey! I didn''t think you''d come over to visit me so quickly after the vacation. Is something wrong or did you just decide to surprise me?" Ye Xiu looked down at his feet ashamed at what he was about to ask because he felt that he was an ''adult'' at heart. What he didn''t know was the fact that with his childish body, his emotions were similar to a child''s. He had the emotional stability of an adult and knew how to react maturely but when the emotions came bursting out, then he was similar to a child his age. "Well, uh..." Ye Xiu started stuttering. "What is it? Don''t be shy, you can tell me what''s on your mind." "Well, I wanted to talk to you about our experience from the kidnapping. I got you into that situation and I''d like to say sorry! I didn''t mean to drag you into such a traumatic experience. I feel guilty and scared because of it!" Xiao Tu listened to Ye Xiu intently before answering, "You don''t need to feel guilty about anything because I forgive you. Also, you shouldn''t be sorry for dragging me into that situation because I was the one that should''ve stopped you in the first place. It''s my duty to protect those that I cherish especially the ones who are younger than me!" "B-BBB-but..." "No buts. I''ll protect you in the future and you should learn to rely on others as well. Now just stay like this for the next few minutes and we''ll be fine." Xiao Tu hugged Ye Xiu closer towards his chest, starting to pat and rub his head slowly. "Cry all you want, I''ll always be here for you." Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Ye Xiu''s sobs and sniffles could be heard for the 10 minutes before he fell asleep from fatigue. "He must''ve been tired from overthinking this... well he should just rest for now." Xiao Tu laid Ye Xiu''s head on to his lap before he fell asleep as well. Ye Qiu and Xiao San was watching from the windows of the residence. "Guess your son got over his trauma quickly." "I had to speak with him before he''d be even willing to talk to anybody else but I''m glad he''s over it. I was afraid that it would become an inner demon in the future. I''ll leave him here for the next few days. It looks like he''ll take comfort with having a friend with him right now." Ye Qiu left the property without a worry. - Night Time, the same day - "Hey, wake up Ye Xiu. It''s time for dinner, we need to wash up before we eat though." The pair were still outside at the training grounds. Xiao Tu started to nudge him softly but Ye Xiu didn''t wake up. "Don''t make me tickle you, my legs are numb now!" Xiao Tu threatened the sleeping Ye Xiu who smiled in his sleep before opening his eyes. "I dare you to make me get off your lap!" Ye Xiu smirked deviously at his friend before running away from his friend. Xiao Tu quickly got up and started chasing after him, Xiao Tu quickly tired because his legs were still numb. He was tackled to the ground by Ye Xiu and groaned. "Get off me! You''re so heavy!" "Would you like to repeat that again?" Ye Xiu asked with a deadly smile on his face. "Ow, ow ow. Jeez, I''m sorry, now stop wasting time and let us go wash up. If we''re late for dinner, my mum''s going to chase and punish us. You don''t want to know what her punishment is..." Xiao Tu shivered at the memory of his mother''s punishment. "Fine, let''s go then." The pair entered the house to wash up before dinner. - Dining Table at City Lord''s Residence - "Your father said that he''ll be leaving you here for a few days, so you can wear some of Xiao Tu''s old clothes for the moment." Xiao San looked at the overly-sized shirt on Ye Xiu which was adorable. "If you''re going to be staying here, you''ll have to obey a few rules. One, you must arrive at meals on time or suffer Mei Ling''s wrath. Two, any worries or concerns that you have shouldn''t be kept to yourself and can be shared with everyone here. This is so that we can resolve any worries that you have because keeping them in is bad for your mental health." "Third, you should feel as part of this family like you do with your own family. We consider you as one of ours so you should feel the same. Now let''s begin eating. Don''t talk while eating otherwise Mei Ling will whack us." Xiao San smiled mischievously until Mei Ling whacked him on the head for real. "You shouldn''t joke about people behind their backs. Eat up and don''t be shy. Don''t want you to be exhausted because you didn''t have enough energy from not eating enough." Mei Ling sat down on her chair, beginning to eat. - After Dinner - "Ye Xiu, you''ll be sleeping with me in my room! My bed has plenty of space for the both of us. We''re going to have so much fun together!" "S-S-SStop saying such weird things! The most we''re going to do is sleep on the same bed. Another thing, why do you know such things at such a young age!" Ye Xiu stammered in shock. "Weird things? Aren''t we just going to talk and play together? I heard it from my mother when she was talking to herself about having fun with father. She said that they would have a good talk." Xiao Tu asked innocently with his head tilted to the side. "It''s not-whatever. Let''s just leave the conversation there because it doesn''t look like your innocence has been tainted yet. Instead of talking or playing, we should just go to sleep early. Don''t you have to train tomorrow with your father? I heard you guys were going to start something new today when I was washing the dishes with your mother." Ye Xiu asked interested in Xiao Tu''s training. "Oh! Father said that we would be starting on weapons! I''ll be choosing the weapon I''ll be using as my main method of attack for the rest of my life. It''s super important and I''m really excited! I don''t think I''ll be able to sleep now after talking about it!" Xiao Tu''s mood was extremely excited as he thought about the training session for tomorrow but quickly started to be more exhausted. Ye Xiu waited for Xiao Tu to fall asleep before slipping into the Dimension. He decided to plan a training method for the weapons he wanted to use because he was going to ask Xiao San whether he could join them for training. Xiao San said that he should treat this family as his so he wanted to begin his weapons training as early as possible. ''Now, what weapon should I learn first? The sword or the whip? I feel like the sword is much more useful for different situations compared to the whip right now.'' ''First the whip, I''ll have to choose the most comfortable length for my whip, I''ll probably decide the whip when I''m fully grown because I wouldn''t have my full reach then. That means that training for my whip would have to be put on hold.'' ''Now the sword, I believe that I''ll choose one of those traditional katanas that the Japanese had used. I''d want to practice my drawing speed for the katana because I want to surprise my enemies quickly together with the movement techniques that I''ll be learning in the future.'' ''I believe that the technique that the speed draw is called the Iaido. I''ll practice the Iaido as many times a day possible for me because it''s the best way to help my muscle memory develop. As someone once said, ''I fear not the man who has practised 10,000 kicks once but I fear the man who has practised one kick 10,000 times.'' ''Besides the Iaido, it''d be best for me to get used to the basics of wielding a katana. I''d need to learn the simple techniques such as stabbing, slicing, thrusting and etc. If I don''t even know the basics then what use would my sword style be in the future?'' Ye Xiu looked through the library to find any manuals on the foundation of sword and whip wielding. He was able to find multiple manuals for each weapon so he decided to have the information transmitted into his head so that he''d be able to learn from them at any time possible. The best thing about these manuals was that it ingrained the methods for performing techniques into him. That meant that every time he felt like he had moved in an incorrect manner then it would feel instinctually wrong to him. After having absorbed all the information, he decided to exit the dimension and look for Xiao San to inform him that he wanted to join them for training tomorrow. "You want to join us for training tomorrow? Sure! I said that you can treat us like a family so you don''t have to be worried about me not letting you join unless it is dangerous. I find it adorable that you want to train with weapons so early but it''s your decision after all." "Thank you Xiao San." Ye Xiu bowed to him and thanked him profusely. "There''s no need to bow, we''re family after all." Xiao San waved off his formal way of thanking him before walking back to his office. "Go to sleep, the training will be quite long after all." "I''ll see you tomorrow then." Ye Xiu walked back to Xiao Tu''s bedroom before lying down on the bed where Xiao Tu immediately grabbed ahold of his tiny waist. Ye Xiu tried to escape the grip but was unable to. He eventually gave up and fell asleep as well. Ye Xiu had a dreamless sleep this time and was able to sleep peacefully. Qi Thread It''s been three months since Ye Xiu had visited the City Lord''s residence where he had spoken of his trauma to his friend, Xiao Tu. Xiao Tu''s comforting brought Ye Xiu''s uneasy mind to a rest. The weapon training had gone well with Ye Xiu gaining some advice from Xiao San about sword-wielding. He had noticed that Xiao San was proficient in the use of a variety of different swords so he had abused Xiao San''s knowledge for an advantage. From Xiao San, he had learnt the foundations and basics of sword-wielding. Even though he had learnt the basics, he would''ve needed to spend more time refining his foundation and basics. This was because practising a technique once doesn''t make one a master at it. The training was passed over to Yu Er because she was also skilled in the use of swords. Xiao Tu had chosen to learn to use the quarterstaff. Nobody else was able to use the quarterstaff so he had more trouble learning the basics. Mei Ling stepped in to help with training because the quarterstaff had some similarities in it''s fighting style with the spear. With that, his training went smoother but he was still very rough with his movements. After the few days spent at Xiao Tu''s residence, Ye Xiu returned back to his own home and began his study of the book that Lao Lan had given to him. Besides looking at the book Lao Lan had given him, he had also looked at several other references from the other books that he had from the library. He had noticed that the books on herbs and plants in the library were much more extensive compared to the one he had received. He had probably guessed that it was either that the herb book that Lao Lan had given to him had only listed things for the Outer Region. The memorisation felt slow to him because he was trying to remember information from multiple books at the same time. Ye Xiu could''ve had the information transmitted into his mind with the ones found in the library but he felt that it was best not to. One, he didn''t know if the amount of information being transmitted at one moment would hurt or not. Secondly, he didn''t want to just know the information. He needed to be able to comprehend each of the things being said in the book and be able to use them to accurately form conjectures for combinations of effects from questions that Lao Lan would likely ask. He also knew that he wouldn''t be able to simply get through with just reading books on the effects of herbs and plants. Because of this, Ye Xiu had looked through the locket''s library for books describing the reactions and effects of certain herbs when placed together and how you can use a plant''s known effects together with another to cancel or balance each other out. Even with an eidetic memory, it would still take time for a person to comprehend that information after absorbing it and the same could be said for Ye Xiu. Even with his memory, his brain''s capacity for understanding and comprehension had a limit to its speed. However, his speed for comprehension certainly increased as he practised the Phoenix''s Technique which led to him observing the effects of utilising the Phoenix''s Technique long-term. Ye Xiu found the subject that he was learning about was certainly interesting. He knew that in his previous life, there definitely wasn''t such extensive research placed into every single herb and plant to observe the effects. Mainly due to the fact that most of the plants in his previous world simply had no effects to be used in medicine. After his three months of perusal of the subject, he decided that he had learnt enough to satisfy Lao Lan and to begin his next phase of training in the Medical Arts. He was interested in the way to form Qi Threads because it had sounded similar to a technique that he had seen in an anime that he had watched. He made his way to the Medical Hall during the afternoon after he had finished his training. He was walking towards the building when he saw Lao Lan walking out of it. He approached him before he could get any further, "Are you going anywhere, Lao Lan? I''ve finished memorising the book that you''ve given me."Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. Lao Lan''s eyebrows shot up to his forehead, "You have? Well, I''ll be the judge of that. Let us get back inside. I''ll do whatever I have to do later anyway. I''m sure they won''t mind me being late, after all, I''m late all the time." He started to laugh with his statement. "I''ll test your basics and memorisation of the herbs first. What is the most effective and careful manner of harvesting the Midnight Eclipse petals?" "The best way to collect the petals is to harvest them during the lunar eclipse when it is midnight. To extract them from the plant, it is best for a person to form a Hand, made out of neutral qi so that the petals aren''t affected by it." Ye Xiu answered him quickly. The question grilling on basics continued on for 10 minutes before Lao Lan was satisfied. "Since you are able to at least memorise the book, I''d like to ask you a question based on something that wasn''t in the book. If you were truly interested in the Medical Arts, then you would''ve gone to go look for extra information instead of just following my instructions. Here''s the question, if you add Lamenting Root whilst it is burning together with Frosty vine leaf, what are the effects?" Ye Xiu thought for a moment, recalling the effects of the individual parts before answering. "The Lamenting Root''s melancholy inducing effect would be neutralised when it is being burnt, the Frosty Vine Leaf is to stabilise the temperature and to enhance the effect of the nightmare inducement from the Root. This would mainly be used in things for giving nightmares to enemies or for helping others and to reduce any emotions of feeling sadness or regret from the nightmare." "That''s correct but there''s something you didn''t mention. The reason why people use that combination to help others using nightmares is to bring forth their Inner Demons and to reduce any type of sadness when encountering it. Inner Demons feed upon your negative emotions." Lao Lan added. "You''ve passed my test so I can begin to teach you the method for creating Qi Threads." Lao Lan beckoned for Ye Xiu to sit down on the floor before he took out several pieces of paper and laid them in between the two of them. "I''m going to show you the basics of training your Qi Control." He formed a single visible thread coming out from his finger, "I''m going to use this thread to poke a hole into this paper right here." A small hole was present after the Qi Thread had disappeared. "It may look simple but it isn''t, what I''ve done here is control the thread''s accuracy and the force used in the puncturing. Use too much force and you''d unintentionally create a bigger hole because of the Qi ripping through the fragile paper. The accuracy of the Qi Thread is also important because you are calculating the movement of the thread when it is affected or not affected by an environment. If you can''t even control the threads, how would you be able to control your Qi to not rampage through a person''s body when healing them?" "Now to begin forming a Qi thread is simple. All you have to do is push the Qi out of your finger and imagine a single thread of string being formed with that Qi. I don''t expect you to get the formation of the threads on the first try because when you first start out, the guidance of your Qi to a single point in your body is difficult." "I want you to come back every day so we can check your progress. If you''re able to puncture a hole into the paper like I have, then it''ll be time for you to move onto two threads doing the exercise at the same time. This''ll continue until you''re able to control 10 threads for the exercise." "There are many other ways to improve Qi Control; such as making your Qi Threads invisible and to shift differently coloured sand into quadrants. These methods are still a long way before you can achieve mastery so you don''t have to worry about them for now." Lao Lan concluded his explanation before shoo-ing Ye Xiu away from the Medical Hall so he could get to his meeting. Ye Xiu went back home to try the exercise Lao Lan had set for him. He managed to guide the Qi towards his finger but was unable to force it out of his body. He tried several times but failing before he decided that instead of having the Qi extend from the outside of his finger, he would keep it connected to Qi channels inside his body. The new method worked out and Ye Xiu was able to form a single thread on his finger. He took out the pieces of paper that his mentor had given him and tried to poke a hole through it. The thread kept flopping uselessly against the paper unable to penetrate it. He decided to put more qi into the thread and used his Qi Thread to stab a hole. The hole was much bigger than he wanted. He continued to do the exercise until it was time for him to begin his evening training. He had noticed that the exercise that he did had slightly increased the cultivation speed of his Phoenix Technique. What was interesting to him was that his Mental strength had affected the speed his exercise had progressed. He was able to move the thread with ease the more his Mental strength had increased. The busy day ended for Ye Xiu. Lao Xiu Ye Xiu''s progress in his Qi Control had progressed at a relatively insane pace according to what Lao Lan had told him. He was capable of doing the advanced exercises which Lao Lan had told him about. He had reached what could be called perfect Qi Control. This had taken a year. Lao Lan had deemed his skilful enough in Qi Control for him to be sent elsewhere. "I''ve taught you as much as I can about Qi Control, it''s time for you to move on to something else and it won''t be the continuation of the Medical Arts for now. You''ll be going over to the Pill Master. I''ll follow you so you don''t get lost along the way." They walked for over half an hour before arriving at their destination. The building was slightly bigger than the Medical Hall, it was a single story building with no grand adornments on it. It was a simple brick building with what possibly looked like a window in every single room. Lao Lan briskly walked into the building without bothering to care about any formalities or whatnot. He called out the moment he was inside, "Get your ass out of the room! I know that you know that we are here. The formations informed you of our arrival so there''s no point in hiding from us! You are so lazy." A figure could be seen walking out from one of the doors on the right. "There''s no need for you to get all worked up Lao Lan. I was just taking my time to get here. After all, I''m not the one who is always late now am I?" The figure quipped back at Lao Lan for his comment. "It''s good to see you anyway, you look the same as usual. Sloppy and clumsy." Lao Lan observed the figure. "You can''t say anything else since the both of us look the same, retard." The figure came into full view and Ye Xiu immediately saw the resemblance of the man. "Ye Xiu, this here is my identical twin, Lao Xiu. He''s the Pill Master for the clan and he''s one of the best Alchemists in the entire country." Lao Lan introduced the two of them to each other. "As if you aren''t one of the best Alchemists in the country, we both took the examinations for each Alchemist level at the same time. The only reason why you aren''t the Pill Master in the Clan is due to the fact that you are so lazy! You shoved the responsibility of the role to me when you found out the high demand for the Alchemists in the Clan and you ran away." Lao Xiu wiped a fake tear off his face. "Heh, you''ve always been the more hard-working one out of the two of us. I don''t get how you aren''t bored with completing all the requests from the others anyway. It''s such a tedious job when I could be using my time to do other things." "Accepting and fulfilling the requests do give something in return. It does pay well and I also get to keep my Alchemy skills up to scratch. I can bet that your Alchemy skills have started to fall off after not doing much Alchemy in the recent years." Lao Xiu started to taunt Lao Lan. Ye Xiu just watched them both converse with each other on a chair he had spotted nearby. "As if I could lose to you in Alchemy, and who said that I''ve not been practising. Even I don''t slack off that much!" "Well enough banter. Let''s see here, do you have any questions to ask the both of us before we begin Alchemy lessons?" Ye Xiu thought for a moment before asking a question that had been on his mind for the past year, "I''d like to ask whether Mental and soul cultivation techniques are common." Lao Xiu answered this question very quickly, "No, those types of techniques are probably the rarest ones out of all the others. Cultivating a technique such as that would improve your mental and soul strength by a large margin, this allows them to be a force to be reckoned with. Usually, you''d only be able to improve your mental and soul strength through long-term meditation but the cultivation technique reduces the time needed for improvement in those areas." "You wouldn''t even need to be in deep meditation to activate the cultivation technique and you''d be able to be stronger than others who have trained for years. There are only 7 known powerhouses in the Outer Region who have been alive for a long period of time, and all 7 of those powerhouses have found a cultivation technique for their soul and mind. Their rise in strength was sudden and caught everybody off-guard with their techniques." "If you have any more questions then be my guest." Lao Lan prompted Ye Xiu. "If it takes so long to improve your soul and mind then why are there so many young alchemists in the history books? Wouldn''t the older generations be the ones who have the better strength for Alchemy?"This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. "There are ways to improve the soul and mind extremely quickly but they are extremely expensive. That''s not the only downside though, some of these methods are sinister and evil and requires the sacrifice of life." Lao Xiu said solemnly. Lao Lan interrupted the explanation, "Enough of such a topic, I''m just here to introduce Ye Xiu to you anyway. He''ll be starting his Alchemy Lessons with the both of us." Lao Xiu nodded and spoke in an elderly tone, "I''ll start with my explanation on Alchemy then. Alchemy is the discipline of the formation of pills through the usage of ingredients. We practice a branch of Medical Arts that is the art of Infusion. Don''t confuse the Medical Art''s style of infusion with a normal Cultivator''s infusion. We infuse living things with our qi during the creation of the pill and it the pills we have formed through infusion are alive." "The pills that are alive can grow for over thousands of years. The rank and type of pill determine the amount of growth it can experience before reaching its full effect. Alchemists can reduce the time needed for the growth of those pills through infusion. The Qi that must be inserted into the pill has to be the same Qi that formed the Pill originally. If the wrong person infuses their Qi into the pill, it will become obsolete." "Fine Qi control is extremely important because a single misstep in the guidance of our Qi results in the formation failure of a pill or the explosion of the Pill when infusing it. " Lao Xiu''s lips started to get dry so he went to fetch a glass of water. "Mind taking over the explanation for me for awhile, my throat is parched." Lao Lan agreed and picked up from where Lao Xiu left off, "Infusing Qi into a Pill is an extremely delicate manner because if your Qi is contaminated by any other types of Qi which wasn''t used during formation then it would fail. The control of your Qi allows you to separate the different types of Qi and allows you to infuse safely with any problem." "An Alchemist of high enough level or skill is capable of infusing Qi into a pill even if they were not the one to make it as long as they were able to extract and direct the Qi from the person or source that it was from in the first place. This is extremely difficult and tiring to do so not many Alchemists would try it because it''s not as efficient as infusing your own pills." "Formation of the Pills require intense concentration and the slightest lapse of concentration will result in failure. Formation of Pills mainly requires the usage of Pill cauldrons however some pills can be made without them." Lao Xiu took over the explanation after he relieved his thirst, "Alchemists can be trained from the Body Refining Realm when their Qi is first activated however they require the use of fire from outside sources. When Alchemists break through the Body Refining Realm, they can form their own inner flame for usage. These flames can also be used for combat." "Your own inner flames that you form are not the strongest flames that you can find, however. The stronger flames that can be found are usually found in places of danger. There is an index for rare flames that can be found in the world. This index changes the moment a new type of flame is discovered even if the person who has discovered it has not publicised the finding." "Rare flames can be obtained from others by killing and extracting it from their soul where they house it. Obviously, this is considered an evil method but this is a dog eat dog method so anything goes out there. The grades of flames are Mortal, Earth, Sky and Heaven. Heaven flames are unheard of and only one known heaven flame is known to be in existence." "Every different type of pill has a different way of refining, infusing and forming. Pills are usually formed in batches so that the quality is the Alchemist can see their formation rate. Pills are usually formed in batches of 10. Alchemy is similar to the Medical Arts because of the amount of rote memorisation and comprehension needed for a pill. You''d need to be able to adapt to any situation because when your Pill formation starts to go awry, there are still ways to stabilise it however you''d need to know the proper ways to save it." "Now the most important thing about Alchemy is obviously the pills. Pills can have all sorts of mysterious and miraculous effects. A slight alteration to a pill''s recipe or formation might actually lead to a creation of a pill with a different effect. This is how Alchemists come up with new Pills to add to the Pill Compendium. After the first accidental creation, most Alchemists test out several batches of pills to replicate the effect. Adding a new and useful Pill to the Compendium will grant rewards. Useless Pills have a place to the compendium but no reward will be granted to it." "For a pill to be added into the Compendium, the Alchemist must register it with an Alchemy Association branch in the capital of a country. The Alchemist Association will test the pills and record the method to make it. Most higher ranked Alchemists keep their rarer pill recipes away from public eyes. There are probably many pills that have been made but never submitted to the Alchemist Association." Lao Xiu started to stand up from his sitting position and walked towards one of the windows. "I think that''s enough of an explanation for today. I don''t want to bore you before we even start the actual Alchemy lessons. Here take this book to at least look at Pill effects. This book won''t have any information on forming those pills because I don''t want to take the chance of you testing it out. Alchemy is dangerous and it is rightly so as your mentor for me to keep you safe. Come back tomorrow." Lao Lan walked out to send Ye Xiu off on his way home. Lao Lan just looked back at his twin, "The kid''s talent is insane. He mastered the control exercises in a year''s time. It''s possible that he''ll surpass the two of us at a young age. With his learning speed, he''ll probably be able to complete the first Alchemy exam in a few years." Lao Xiu didn''t bother looking at his brother. "It depends if he''s impatient or not. If he is impatient, his success rate for forming pills will be low. It also depends on how much effort he''s going to put into the studies. Talent makes not the master, but hard work." The two sat down drinking tea before heading off to do their individual business. Alchemy Sounds could be heard from the training ground early before the sun rose. Two figures could be seen engaged in combat with wooden practice weapons. A tall female figure quickly weaved in between the multiple strikes of the smaller male figure. The female struck at the male with a thrust who quickly parried it to the right with his sword before disarming the woman. The woman was distracted for a split second when her attention was elsewhere. The male quickly stabbed his sword towards the throat which the female deflected with her arms and took the male down in a single smooth motion. The female spoke, "You still have a long way to go Ye Xiu if I am able to grab your weapon in mid-strike so easily." The male pouted before speaking, "I know, it''s definitely harder to hit somebody who taught me most of my basics." "Stop being such a child, go and freshen yourself up. We''ll have breakfast then you can go to the Pill Hall for your lessons." "Alright, mum." The boy left to wash up, leaving the mother alone in the courtyard. "Ye Qiu, you can stop hiding in the trees now. It''s quite creepy when you do that. I know you developed your hiding skill because of your pervertedness but seriously, using that skill just to watch us train? "Heh, you''ve caught me! I just wanted to see how the training would go for the two of you. I mean you''ve never really helped others train too often." "Qiu''er, I''ve been helping him to train for over a year and you really think I would be unable to train him safely and effectively? Wait... have you been watching every single training session we''ve done together?" "Uh... maybe?" "I''m just going to spar you to stop you from watching. If I win you stop. You win you can continue your peeking." She took out a simple, sleek metal sword and held it at the ready. "Shall we begin?" "Sure, begin whenever you are ready." Yu Er disappeared from her position before appearing by the side of Ye Qiu. Multiple thrusts were aimed at the weak spots of Ye Qiu''s defence but he was able to dodge the thrusts extremely deftly. His Qi arrows formed in his hand as he pulled the bowstring back. His muscles were taut as held the bowstring back watching Yu Er''s movements. He shot two directly towards her body whilst three other arrows was covering her advances'' path. Yu Er quickly infused the weak sword with Qi to slice throw the arrows before charging forwards. She got hit by two of the arrows but it only left scratches on her body. Her body and sword started swaying as she moved. Ye Qiu was unable to predict the direction she was going to move because of the style''s similarity to a drunk person. Ye Qiu gave up because it was nearly time for breakfast and he knew that eventually, Yu Er would just beat him into submission in different ways. "I give up. You win as usual. Now let''s go clean up in the bathroom." - 2 hours later - Ye Xiu was heading over to the Pill Hall when he realised that he didn''t read the book that Lao Xiu had given him. Slapping his forehead, he decided to carry on walking and see if Lao Xiu would punish him for not reading it. He entered the building without knocking, knowing that Lao Xiu would probably already know he was here according to Lao Lan''s words about the formations informing him about his arrival. The door opened as Ye Xiu entered; Lao Xiu and Lao Lan walked out of the room and greeted Ye Xiu. "You certainly are earlier than I expected you to be, guess Lao Lan''s habits haven''t rubbed off on you. That''s good. I''ll just pick up my explanation from where I left off." "We were last talking about pills, so I''ll talk about some of the disadvantages of pills. Consuming too many pills can cause a buildup of pill toxicity. Breaking through with pill toxicity still in your body is extremely bad for your future because it slows down your cultivation speed and it also makes the foundation unstable. The amount of Pill toxicity you gain in your body usually depends on the quality of the pill made. The pill qualities are split into 3 grades, low, middle and high." "Pill toxicity can be slowly removed from the body through various means. There is a fast method and a slow method. Alchemists and Medicine Masters can get rid of pill toxicity quickly with the same method of how we guide our Qi to heal a person''s body. Obviously, if the person removing the pill toxicity is unskilled or his concentration falters then the damage done to the body is just as bad because it''s still Qi guiding the toxicity around the body. So the Qi would rampage around the body whilst the toxicity would spread." "It''s best to get rid of pill toxicity as early as possible because the Pill toxicity builds up over time otherwise. The normal way for cultivators to get rid of the pill toxicity is deep meditation. As they meditate they don''t focus on their cultivation method but the toxicity that is hidden in their body. They can only remove this bit by bit because they aren''t consciously moving the toxicity away with Qi. They have their body consciously remove it slowly."The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. "Next is Pill immunity. For certain pills, especially ones which increase your speed of cultivation start to build up an immunity to you. This is why most people consume pills just as they are about to break through, this increases the chances of success and it is the biggest benefit you will get instead of consuming it for normal cultivation. Other pills don''t have the same restriction and can be used excessively. However, the price of buying a batch of pills is usually exorbitant." "Lower ranked pills usually have a side-effect. The ranking system for pills is Grade 1 up to Grade 9, Grade 9 being the highest. Pills of Grade 1 and 2 that improve the cultivation speed or cultivation level usually affects the user''s potential for growth in the future. This is why most cultivators only touch pills after they can afford pills Grade 3 or above. The cultivators who are stuck in the Body Refining realm or the Qi Cleansing realm usually rely on these pills so they can finally advance after years of effort." "Pills which help recover from injuries or help refill your Qi pool can be used as many times as you want no matter the grade. However, the amount of Qi toxicity in a pill for lower grades is always going to be higher than higher grade pills." "Now we can move on to how Pill formation works. Remember how I said how heat needs to be applied to the cauldron whilst forming a pill? It''s very important because the heat that is applied has to be adjusted according to the situation within the cauldron. A slight misstep can cause the quality of the batch to fluctuate." "Depending on the type of pill and method of making the pill, the speed for formation is always different. Alchemists have to rely on their observation skills to see when the pill is complete. They also rely on their observation skills to see the situation inside the cauldron." "There is a technique for Alchemists to see inside the cauldron without needing to look over it. We can see through the cauldron which makes Alchemy much easier for us. I''m going to teach you the technique and you''ll have to practice it. I''ll be there to infuse qi around the cauldron walls and inside the cauldron itself after you manage to see into it without any obstructions." "This is because when you are forming pills, your Qi will always be there to infuse it into the Pill. This means that you''ll have to be able to see past the Qi when you are practising alchemy. This technique isn''t only used for Alchemy but can also be used for the Medical Arts and fighting. Typical cultivators won''t know this technique because it''s only taught to the Medical Arts and Alchemy disciples. It''s to give an edge for the crafting profession since they have to focus more on their Alchemy." "I''ll also have you learn how to infuse Qi into pills with other sources of Qi. Most Alchemists only learn this at higher ranks because their control isn''t that great yet, however, Lao Lan has told me that you have control which would take others years to achieve whilst you achieved it in a single year. Your control should be enough for you to take the Qi and infuse it into the pill." "This exercise will also help you in the future for the Medical Arts when you have to place your Qi into another person''s body. The concept is similar and will allow you to train in that area with ease. The observation technique can be trained in conjunction with infusion so it''ll be two birds with one stone in any case." "I want you to come here every day to be in deep meditation for 2hours at least. I have something that can increase the growth rate of your mind and soul slightly and it should be beneficial for you to be ahead of your peers from the very start. If you train under me, I''ll have you be my apprentice for Alchemy until you can surpass my skill and rank." "There are 8 important points of the Cauldron. These points correspond to the directions in a compass. Each of these points will be where the ingredients would be placed. Placing it in an incorrect region would result in failure. The timing for the placing of ingredients is also important because adding it too early or too late would affect the quality of the Pill." "It''ll take practice for you to add the ingredients at the correct time but it is important. It''ll also be one of the first things we''ll rectify every time we begin a new pill recipe. I plan for you to amaze all your peers when you come out into the public. It''ll stop the weaker people from challenging you over and over again and allow you to be granted harder challenges in the form of stronger opponents. This way it''ll have the effect of making you work harder." "Enough of that brother, allow me to tell him about refining exercises." Lao Lan interrupted the explanation. "Fine, go ahead." "Thank you. Refining is an important aspect to Alchemy. It removes the impurities that can be found in your ingredients and allows for higher quality pills. It''s even possible for refining to increase the rank of the pill. Though this is rare, it is definitely possible. There are many different types of Refining techniques that can be used, but the way of refining it is always different for the type of pill." "The technique that the both of us use is called the Graceful Fingers Technique. It is a delicate technique which requires extreme control of Qi. The technique is to slowly extract and refine the ingredient or pill in question with your fingers creating a Qi bubble around the ingredient whilst moving your fingers continuously. It should look like you are weaving. This technique has the potential to remove up to 75 percent of the Pill''s current impurities however the both of us can only remove up to 40 percent." "Our skill with the technique has decreased with old age due to stiff joints. This was because we learnt the technique at too late of an age so we weren''t able to achieve the highest level of the technique. We''ll be starting you on this technique as early as possible to refine your ingredients. We''ll have you refine ingredients every day inside the cauldron whilst training the observation technique and the infusion technique. What my brother didn''t mention was that you will have to be multitasking when you are creating pills. Ingredients are best refined during Pill formation but they can be refined earlier as preparation but the Pill quality will not be as high." "Now scoot off. Come back in a week after you''ve read the book we gave you. I know you didn''t read it considering I placed a formation to tell me if you did." Lao Xiu said. "Thank you for the lesson." Ye Xiu bowed before leaving. Ye Xiu made it home and did his normal training before falling asleep on his bed. Ye Xiu''s last thought before sleeping was, ''What an interesting occupation to learn. Just what else can the world bring to add to the excitement?'' Examination Part 1 Three figures could be seen sitting inside a carriage through the window. The carriage was heading to the capital, it was stopped at the capital''s gates where guards checked over the carriage before passing them on. "Ye Xiu, are you ready for the Alchemist Association examination? You''ve been preparing for 3 years now and I think you can do it!" Another childish voice rang out inside the carriage. "I''ve been practising extremely hard for this with Lao Lan and Lao Xiu mentoring me. They believe I can pass the exam without any problems so I should be fine. Believing in myself is the first step to success after all." "You''ll do fine, I''m sad that I can''t come to watch your examination though. I only came because I have a meeting for City Lords in the capital this week. Hopefully, it won''t take too long and I''ll be able to see you during or after the examination." Xiao San commented. "Thanks for the encouragement. I''ll try my best." Ye Xiu is now 7 years old and he''s about to go take the examination for Alchemist Rankings. He has learnt a huge amount of stuff from his parents and mentors. His skills in his weapons had improved tremendously after years of training. He still hadn''t begun training for the whip because he felt like that his arm''s reach wasn''t appropriate yet. He had reached the 5th stage of Body Refining for a few months and was busy stabilising his foundation because he had broken through a bit too quickly. The Body Refining realms were for reinforcing the body and removing impurities from the body. The 5th stage of Body Refining was for strengthening the lungs. Xiao Tu had also reached the 5th stage of Body Refining and similar to Ye Xiu, he was also busy stabilising his foundation for the past few months. Xiao Tu was close to reaching the 6th stage of Body Refining and it was possible for him to break through at any time he felt like it. The carriage made it to the residence the trio were going to stay at. It wasn''t anything grand like the residence of Mei Ling''s family but it was of moderate size. It was a standard traditional, Chinese Villa with a courtyard and multiple rooms with no second floor. A modestly sized training ground could be seen next to the residence''s garden. The garden was well-groomed and have a variety of flowers growing in neat orderly lines. The trio entered the residence to get some shut-eye because of how late it was when they had finally arrived at the capital. Morning came and the trio left the residence to get some food. There was nothing to cook with inside the residence so they decided to go and eat some speciality dishes of the capital. After eating their fill, Xiao San brought the two children to the Alchemist Association Building located in the middle of the capital. It was one of the biggest buildings in the entire capital because of how rich the Alchemists were. The Alchemist Association Branch in the capital had enough manpower and strength to overthrow the current capital''s powerhouses. It was only due to the fact that the Alchemist Association had an oath to not meddle with any country and to remain neutral. Otherwise, the full power of every country would be brought down upon them. Xian San led them to the person overseeing the front desk who promptly asked, "Are you here for the 1st rank Alchemist Examination? If so please register by placing your Qi on the desk and we''ll get you to the waiting room." Xiao San pushed Ye Xiu over to the desk and placed his hand on it. Several lines glowed from the desk before fading after a few seconds. "You''re now registered so follow me to the waiting room before the examination begins. No others may enter the waiting room but spectators may view the examination from the viewing room." "Goodbye Ye Xiu, I''ll be going to my meeting now. I''ll leave Xiao Tu here to watch your performance so he can tell me all about it. I won''t be worried about anybody trying to kidnap you here in the Alchemist Association Building. Nobody wants to offend them after all." He patted Ye Xiu''s head before striding out of the building. Xiao Tu went a separate direction to Ye Xiu as he was led to the viewing room and the latter to the waiting room. Ye Xiu sat down on one of the chairs that could be found in the waiting room. He saw people of all sizes and ages just waiting there. He saw nobody as young as him however so he knew that the Alchemist Examination was probably harder than what his mentors had told him. He spotted a girl who looked young enough to be Xiao Tu''s age. Ye Xiu wasn''t too sure because the cultivation world had strange things in it. The girl spotted him glancing at her and began walking over to him.Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. "Hey, you look young as well. Are you here to take the Alchemist Examination? Of course you are, there''s no way you''d be in the waiting room otherwise right?" The girl didn''t even leave room for him to reply. "How old are you? You look the youngest out of everyone here. Are you from the Capital? Or elsewhere? I''m from outside of the country." "Slow down and let me speak for a moment, Yes, I''m here to take the Alchemist Examination. I''m from a city in this country which is named Iron Will City. I''m currently 7 years old and you look to be the second youngest person to be taking the examination here as well. My name is Tian Ye Xiu and I''m an aspiring Alchemist." "That''s great! My name is Mo Shang Yang. I''m from outside the country, I''m here to take the examination because I was passing through the capital this month so it was more convenient for me to take it now than later. My father''s one of the best Alchemists I know, so it''s my dream to surpass him and take over the family business! I''m 9 years old and I hope I can be recorded into the list of notable Alchemists." A voice interrupted the silence after Shang Yang introduced herself. "All participants in the examination, please make your way to the door on the right side of the room. We''ll begin preparations for the examination now." The room that all the participants had entered was a vast one, filled with tall stone pillars supporting the roof that could be seen. A stern elderly man could be seen waiting at the front of the room on a stage. "I''ll begin the explanation for the Alchemist Examination for those who have not taken it before. The examination will be conducted in 3 stages. The first phase will be testing the participants on their knowledge of Alchemy. This tests your basic knowledge of combinations and preparations for Grade one Pills. The second phase will test your pill formation skills and the third phase of the exam will only be known to those who pass the second phase. The third phase changes every time an examination is held." "This explanation is finished so please go back to the waiting room. The examination has been prepared there and we will begin once everyone has reached a table." Everybody quickly moved back to the waiting room where the anxiety everybody held could be felt in the atmosphere. Ye Xiu himself was nervous for the examination but he had figured out that he had eidetic memory after his first year with Lao Xiu and Lao Lan teaching him about Alchemy so he was fine for the theoretical phase of the exam. "You have an hour and a half to finish as much as you can. Whoever finishes early may leave and enter the room you were in previously to wait for the second phase to begin. You may begin." A gong was struck and all the promising candidates began looking at the paper frantically. Ye Xiu barely glanced at the questions before answering them. Eidetic memory truly was useful when coming to examinations such as these. Even though he could remember all the information the amount of writing with his brush he had to do was insane. There were over 150 different questions which require detailed answers. His wrist was probably going to be aching after this. ''I''ve got to finish this quickly so I can allow my arms to rest. I''ll need my arms for the Pill formation phase and I hope that the third phase won''t be anything hard.'' Ye Xiu finished the examination in 50 minutes but his calligraphy wasn''t as polished as it usually was. He headed towards the room they were in before and noticed that it was filled with tables and apparatus needed for Alchemy. The elderly man from before walked up to him and gave him instructions, "Please take a seat at one of the desks, do not try to begin pill formation otherwise you''ll be disqualified from the examination and you''ll have to retake it when the next opportunity arises." Ye Xiu inspected the apparatus that he was given to make sure that nothing was sabotaged or otherwise. He made sure everything was in perfect condition so that it wouldn''t influence his pill''s final grade and quality. After examining all his apparatus he sat back down on the chair and waited for the first phase to be finished. The next person to enter the room was a middle-aged man who promptly sat down on one of the desks behind Ye Xiu. Slowly more participants trickled in and not many people had failed the first phase because it was just writing speed and memorisation skills. Shang Yang ran over to Ye Xiu and asked him, "I saw you complete the first phase really quickly! You must be so amazing! Quite a lot of people failed in the middle of the exam and you didn''t notice! You must''ve been really focused on finishing those questions to not notice them leaving. The examination is marked as you finish the questions through some Qi technique, my father told me about it. He uses it to check his disciple''s work when he assigns it to them." "I bet the second phase will be interesting! I know that my father believes that I can pass the exam with ease but I still feel nervous!" Shang Yang commented suddenly. "That''s true for me as well. My mentors believe me to be able to pass the examination with flying colours but I still feel uneasy coming into this now. I personally know my own skills should be able to pass the Rank 1 Alchemist examination but it is that feeling of butterflies in my stomach which makes me worry." Ye Xiu replied to her comment "You''ll be fine. If I can pass it I bet you can! I don''t think your mentors would send you into an examination like this unprepared! Alchemists only send apprentices to these examinations once they are certain of them passing it on the first try because they want their reputation to be kept." "Thanks for calming me down. I think we should be quiet now since the old man is about to speak." The Elderly man stood on stage waiting for everyone body to settle down. "The Second Phase shall begin!" Examination Part 2 "Let the Second Phase Begin." Ye Xiu was wondering what was supposed to happen because no other was given to the participants. He started to look for any clues to what they were supposed to do for the Pill Formation. He noticed that several of them were looking in the direction of where the Proctor of the exam had stood. He saw nothing but immediately activated the observation technique, "One Thousand Eyes", he noticed a faint Qi outline on the desk. Thinking that he hadn''t put enough Qi into his eyes he placed more until he noticed that tiny words had appeared. He quickly scanned the words for instructions and saw the name of a Grade 1 pill that he had gone over with Lao Lan for a fortnight. It was one of the first pills that Lao Lan and Lao Xiu had him trying to form. ''Mild Accumulation Pill'', a pill that recovers a fixed amount of Qi when consumed, quality of the pill only lowers the amount of pill toxicity upon consumption. Ye Xiu put his Qi into one of the formations that could be seen on the table. Lao Xiu had explained that every single Alchemist desk has formations placed upon them. Some of the formations include a fire-maker, defence from explosions and temperature control. The fire-maker formation is usually for those that have not formed their inner flame. Inner flames can be formed once they break through from theBody Refining Realm to theQi Cleansing Realm. He carefully adjusted the flame''s temperature to the appropriate levels to warm up the cauldron. As it warmed up he started to place the ingredients into the cauldron. ''Evaporating Bellflower on the north, Cleansing Roots on the East. Add the water just as the bellflower starts its evaporation.'' ''This should allow me to start the formation process.'' He started refining the roots quickly and efficiently. He had managed to reach the same level as his mentors in the usage of the ''Graceful Fingers'' technique. Removing the impurities of the root, he started to place more ingredients into the different areas of the cauldron. He started refining all of them at the same time whilst beginning to form the basic shape of the pill. After refining the ingredients he started to bring up the heat of the flame to have them cause reactions with each other. While the reactions caused a smokey wisp to appear, he immediately guided it towards the rough outline of the pill he already had. He started to create a basic shell for the pill using the used matter of the ingredients that had fallen to the bottom of the cauldron. The smoke started to gather in the middle of the pill shell and condensed into a liquid. The liquid floated in the middle of the pill shell and Ye Xiu''s concentration was focused on the liquid. He was still refining the ingredients and guiding the smoke but he placed most of his attention to the liquid. He was paying attention because this was the liquid which held all the important properties of the pill he was making. He was trying to mix the liquid evenly so the concentration of the properties had spread out. This was because he had to separate the liquid into ten portions before congealing it into a core. Pills were made in batches of ten because a single ingredient usually had enough to make ten pills and with a tiny leftover to spare. It also made the numbers nice and round for easy selling. It also helped them to identify the quality ratio and failure ratio for a person in Alchemy, this standard was started and never changed. Ye Xiu felt the liquid was mixed enough and started to separate it into ten equal portions. Ye Xiu knew that he to do this whilst taking the big pill shell and form it into ten smaller ones. The Pill shell was easy to form into several because he just had to change the shape through the use of Qi. He placed the ten portions of liquid into each pill and allowed the liquid to congeal by turning off the formation on the desk. The pill core started to solidify before no other reactions could be seen from the cauldron or the pill. Knowing that the pill was ready, Ye Xiu took out Pill bottles to place them in. After finishing with those he looked to see if there were any more instructions on the desk. Whilst Ye Xiu was busy looking for more instructions, there were several people in an observation room watching over the examinations. Xiao Tu was keeping his eye on Ye Xiu''s every movement because it looked extremely graceful. He watched Ye Xiu as he used his refining technique and his fingers were doing mysterious dances around the cauldron. He had also watched him make conversation with the girl. Ye Xiu seemed to relax around her and Xiao Tu didn''t know why he felt like his heart was tightening. Every time he saw Ye Xiu laughing when he talked to the girl, he could feel himself wanting to go down to the examination rooms and strangle the girl. Xiao Tu kept a very close on both the girl and Ye Xiu as the second phase was about to finish. All the observers had now focused their attention on the stage and the elderly proctor had appeared once again on the stage.The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. Xiao Tu didn''t Xiao Tu watched as the many participants start to put the last pills they had formed into the bottles, he spotted one of the participants walk closer to both Ye Xiu and the girl trying to discreetly nudge them over as they moved closer to the stage. He had managed to pickpocket the girl without her realising it but Xiao didn''t bother trying to inform anybody about it. He thought that it was what the girl deserved for not being able to notice something so obvious. A person just walking up to you to nudge you to pickpocket you was fairly obvious to what the person''s intentions were. As everyone brought their pill bottles to the Proctor who placed them all on a table that he had on the stage. Each person handed over 3 bottles of pills over to the man before leaving the stage and stood around the room waiting for the next thing to happen. The proctor walked off the side of to the side of the stage, where another man walked past him to reach the table. "Thank you for participating in the exam and for your hard work. These pill bottles will now be taken to be sold in our Alchemist shop if it has reached sufficient quality. The next person to come up on the stage will be the one to inform you of who has passed the second phase to move on to the third." "Any money earned from the pills being sold will be added to your Alchemist Association''s contribution points when you officially past the examination. Good luck to those that move on to the third phase, I hope to see more promising Alchemists in the future." The man swept his hand over the bottles and they entered his dimensional storage before briskly leaving the stage. The observers were keenly watching the room to see who would be the ones to get to the third phase of the examination. A man with a stern posture walked onto the stage. He spoke with a commanding voice, "Those whose names that have been called out will stay behind for the third phase. Those who haven''t, please make your way out immediately. You can try your luck again next time." "Shang An Mo, Shen Xiu, Chen Cheng, Shang Yang, Tian Ye Xiu, Ma Zhihao and Xue Ren. Please follow me, I''ll be bringing you for the third phase of the examination." After the candidates left, everyone in the observation room started to leave. Confused, Xiao Tu followed them because he had no idea of what to do since everybody had left. He followed after them and they were all walking towards a room with an even bigger stage and seats crowded around the front of it. He chose a seat and sat down, waiting for Ye Xiu or his father to finish whatever they were doing. Out of nearly a hundred promising Alchemists, only 7 had managed to pass the second phase. The Alchemist Association was extremely strict in the selection processes because it had a reputation to keep. The seven candidates were led through the building until they reached a greenhouse. The man who had led the exam began explaining the procedure they were going to follow. "The third phase for this examination is for knowledge similar to the first phase. You will each be given different herbs to harvest and you''ll have to use your knowledge to procure the herbs safely and in a pristine condition. Those that damage the herbs will be disqualified from the examination immediately. If you can''t manage to harvest a herb in a controlled environment, what hope do you have in the wild?" "Go to the desk at the front of the greenhouse and look for the instructions with your name on it. The third phase will last for ninety minutes. The time starts now." Ye Xiu approached the table at the front of the greenhouse but he was also in deep thought, ''The examination was actually much easier than I had envisioned earlier. I guess that Lao and Lao Xiu knew what they were saying when they said I would pass the examination easily.'' He looked at the paper at hand before strolling through the greenhouse looking for the herbs he was required to harvest. He needed to harvest five herbs of relative difficulty. They were well known to be harmful to whoever was not handling it properly. He searched the room for any protective gloves because he didn''t want to affect the harvesting process by using his Qi. It was possible that his Qi could affect the harvesting process negatively because he hadn''t been taught the correct way to cover his hands in qi to protect them without influencing other things. Shang Yang was close to him as he was harvesting his first herb, he started to look at how she was doing and it looked like she was doing well. She was harvesting a herb of moderate difficulty for them but she was doing it with Qi protection. It was probably because her father had taught her the method so that it wouldn''t affect her passing the examination in any way. He looked back to his task at hand and began his harvesting process. The first plant was a venomous one; it released poisonous fumes when it was exposed to direct contact to the skin of any living creature. Knowing that he couldn''t touch it directly with his hand or the gloves, he decided to use Qi threads to creatively uproot the plant from the soil it was placed in. With this method, he wasn''t affected by any poisonous fumes because it wasn''t releasing anything in the first place. Ye Xiu moved to the second herb. It was a herb that was extremely delicate. Accidentally breaking the petals would release all it''s medicinal properties into the air thus making it redundant to continue extracting the herb. He used his refining technique to create a globe of Qi around it, separating the soil and the plant. He continued his harvesting until he had finished with his task. He placed them all into one of the supplied jars that the man had provided to them. He looked at what the rest were doing and saw that everybody else was still busy harvesting the herbs. Two of the participants, a man and a woman, looked to be struggling with the task. The man looked to be exhausted from the entire process and eyebags were forming underneath his eye. The woman was injured by the herb that she was harvesting. She continued harvesting it nonetheless. Time ran out for everybody in the process of harvesting the herbs and only three people had managed to pass the phase with acceptable harvests. Shang Xian "Everybody please stop what you are doing right now! The third phase is over and the prospective Alchemists have been passed. Our three new Rank 1 Alchemists are Shang Yang, Ye Xiu and Shen Xiu. Those that haven''t passed the examination please retake it at the next opportunity." "The three of you will now follow me, we''ll be awarding you your Alchemist Badge in Public. This will help you get possible offers for apprenticeship or to raise your popularity for people that may want to buy your pills in the future." The man started leading the three of them to the next place they were supposed to go. As they were moving to the next location, Shang Yang took the chance to talk with Ye Xiu. "Ye Xiu, you passed as well! I knew you would. Didn''t I tell you that you shouldn''t feel nervous over passing the exam? I bet your mentors knew exactly what they were doing so you should give them more trust in the future!" Ye Xiu just smiled, "During the third phase, I realised that the exam truly was as east as my mentors had told me. Once I got that done and over with, I stopped worrying about my poor performance and instead completed the task like I would''ve usually done them together with my mentors." "That''s great! I saw you finish the earliest again for the third phase so you must be really talented at Alchemy to be better than everybody in the examination this time around!" Ye Xiu was trying to be humble, "I don''t think I''m that great. I mean you finished the second fastest in the three phases as well. I can say that you definitely would''ve taken the top spot if I hadn''t come this time." Shang Yang flushed at the blatant praise before she returned to talking, "You don''t have to try to cheer m up! I know that I''m not as good as you and I don''t mind that. Are you going straight back to your city after the exams or will you stay in the Capital for a while?" "I''m not quite sure, I''ll have to check with my guardian. He''s on a work trip so I might be here for a couple of days. If I do have free time, I wouldn''t mind hanging out with you. My friend can come with us, he''s around the same age but we''d need an escort because we are all children and I doubt that we''d be able to take care of ourselves in the Capital." "A friend?" Shang Yang''s eyes dropped slightly. "It''s not a girl, is it?" "Nope, my friend is a guy. He was watching me take part in the examination, I''ll introduce you to him later when we meet each other. I think you''ll like him." Ye Xiu smiled brightly not even realising that Shang Yang was flirting with him. She fluttered her eyelashes whilst smiling, "I''d love to meet your friend as well. If he''s just as nice as you then he''d be amazing to talk to." The two continued to chatter until the man stopped at one of the doors. "Be quiet when we enter, I''ll inform the person who is introducing you guys about who passed. There will be a lot of people so try to look your best." Ye Xiu looked at Shang Yang with a wan smile who returned it with a confident smirk. "Don''t be nervous." The trio entered the room which was dark. The presenter will be talking about some miscellaneous things such as updating the Association on things they need to know and some weekly updates. After that, it''ll be the time for you guys to get on stage. Many Alchemists will be there so don''t do anything foolish." A few minutes of waiting passed before the presenter began to announce the Alchemist examination results. "We will now be welcoming our newest Alchemists to the Association this year! We have some very promising Alchemists this year. All three participants passed it on their first try! We''ll be watching them for their achievements. Now let us give a round of applause for the new Alchemists!" Applause rang out and the trio walked out onto the stage. They could see a huge amount of Alchemists in the seats in front of them. Shang Yang grabbed Ye Xiu''s hand and forced him to bow with her. The presenter walked up to the three and took out three badges from his inter-dimensional storage before handing it out to them. "This is the Alchemist Association Badge, it''ll be linked to your Qi so nobody else will be able to use it. Try not to lose this otherwise it''ll cost you a huge fine to replace it." The man spoke sternly to the two children especially before turning away back to his original position. Xiao Tu was in the audience, glaring holes at Shang Yang. He clenched his fists tightly before leaving the event abruptly. He waited at the lobby where they had entered for the event to finish. He was trying to calm himself down and was in deep thoughts. ''Why do I feel so angry when I see them acting so friendly together? They''re just friends aren''t they?''The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Whilst Xiao Tu was in his confused state, Ye Xiu was blushing hard because he had never held another girl''s hand in both this life and his previous life. ''Her hand is so soft.'' They were still standing on the stage and Ye Xiu could feel the stares on him and Shang Yang. Very few people were paying attention to the third participant because he was of a much older age compared to the two children standing on the stage. Shang Yang was less conscious of the stares directed at them and was smiling proudly when she spotted her father with a wide grin on his face. When the announcer bade them leave, Shang Yang quickly dragged Ye Xiu to meet her father. Shang Yang''s father raised his eyebrows as he watched his daughter drag the boy that he had seen on-stage a few moments ago at a fast pace towards him. "Daddy! I made a new friend. He''s super amazing at Alchemy!" "Is that so?" Shang Yang''s father narrowed his eyes at Ye Xiu. "My name is Shang Xian and I am Shang Yang''s father. You don''t have any ideas on my precious daughter, do you? Ye Xiu shook his head quickly, "I don''t have any feelings for your daughter." Shang Xian nodded his head happily to that statement. "Good, my precious daughter doesn''t need anybody besides me right now." He foolishly grinned as if he had the greatest treasure in the world. "Daddy, you''re embarrassing me!" Shang Yang pouted childishly as he picked her up and started to swing her around. They started walking out of the hall and headed towards the lobby. When they got to the lobby, Ye Xiu spotted Xiao Tu standing at the side so he decided to run over to him and drag him over to introduce him to his new friends. Xiao Tu''s mood wasn''t very happy but he put on a fake smile so that Ye Xiu didn''t notice anything was wrong with him. He was dragged towards the entourage, "This is my friend, Xiao Tu! He came with me to watch me participate in the examination today. His father is the current guardian of the trip so I owe his father for bringing me here on such a busy schedule." Shang Yang stuck her hand out, "It''s nice to meet you Xiao Tu. I''m Shang Yang! I''ve become an Alchemist with Ye Xiu today." They crushed each other''s hands as they shook them. Ye Xiu could see sparks flying as his two friends stared at each other before finishing their shake. "That''s great! You must be very talented to pass the examinations at such a young age like Ye Xiu did." The sarcasm was dripping from Xiao Tu''s voice as he spoke. A witty remark flew back at Xiao Tu, "At least I passed the examination unlike some plebian who didn''t even take it. I''d bet that you are just hanging on to Ye Xiu''s coattails!" Having no comeback, Xiao Tu steered the conversation away from the topic, "Tsk, whatever, I won''t argue with a child on such matters." Noticing the tension, Ye Xiu quickly continued the conversation, "Shang Yang had an idea for the three of us to hang out together whilst we are still in the Capital. I think your father should allow us to go out as long as we have an escort right?" Xiao Tu thought for a moment, ''If I don''t agree he''ll be alone with that vixen. I should just stay close to him for the entire time so that she doesn''t have the chance to sink her claws into Ye Xiu.'' Reaffirming his decision, Xiao Tu spoke out. "Sure, we''ll have to ask my father for permission for this though. We don''t want what happened last time occurring again." Shang Xian raised his eyebrows at the conversation before picking Shang Yang by the scruff of the neck. "An excursion out in the Capital? Why wasn''t I informed about this. I''d have thought my precious daughter to be kind enough to inform me of something so interesting happening in the future." Shang Yang used her puppy eyes to look at her father. "Ehh, I was planning to tell you when I got home! Daddy, may I go out with them on a trip? I promise that we''ll be safe and that we won''t do anything stupid." He immediately stopped releasing his authoritative demeanour once he got hit by the puppy eyes. "I give up, you''re just like your mother when it comes to persuasion. Fine, you may go out on the trip only if their guardian agrees to it. I''ll also be coming with you during that trip so I can make sure that the three of you aren''t being foolish." He handed over a piece of paper to Xiao Tu. "Give this to your father so that he can contact me when he has agreed to the trip." Xiao Tu stepped forward to take the paper before placing it into his breast-pocket. Shang Xian looked at the two boys before bidding them farewell. "It''s time to go, Shang Yang, we''ll meet again." The father didn''t look back as he held onto Shang Yang''s hand. Shang Yang turned around and waved goodbye to Ye Xiu then stuck her tongue at Xiao Tu childishly. Xiao Tu scowled at her but still waved goodbye. "Ye Xiu, we''ll have to wait here for my father to pick us up after his meeting is finished." "Sure, I don''t mind waiting anyway" - - - - Xiao San was rushing towards the Alchemist Association Building because he knew he was incredibly late by the looks of how dark it was. He stopped at the entrance and patted himself down to not look like he had rushed to the building like a madman. Once entering, he scanned the lobby for the two children and strolled over to them once he spotted Xiao Tu sleeping on the couch with Ye Xiu watching over him on a separate chair. Xiao San picked Xiao Tu up with one hand very carefully before making a shushing motion to Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu nodded his understanding to what Xiao San wanted before following him out of the building to get back to their residence. As they were walking, Xiao San asked Ye Xiu questions. "How did the examination go? Did you pass it? I''m sorry for being so late picking you two up today. The meeting had dragged on with everybody arguing on what they wanted before we decided to conclude it for the day." Ye Xiu just flashed him his badge and smiled. "There''s no need for apologies, Xiao San. The examination was pretty easy." Ye Xiu stopped speaking and hey made their way to the residence silently before resting. Feelings Xiao Tu woke up early as usual. He felt most of his jealousy gone after sleeping. He wanted to ask his father about the feelings he had felt when he was in front of Shang Yang and Ye Xiu. Remembering that he had to do his daily exercise, he got up and changed from the clothes that he had slept in. He saw that Ye Xiu and his father had already woken up and started their own training by sparring each other. He walked to them silently, starting his own daily stretches without uttering a noise. Minutes later, the spar had finished and Ye Xiu had noticed Xiao Tu at the side watching them. Ye Xiu decided to call out to him so that he could join in the session. Xiao Tu stopped his stretches to go over to Ye Xiu. "Hey glad you''re up already. You fell asleep on one of the Alchemist Association''s couches so Xiao San decided to bring you back to the residence without waking you up. By the way, I haven''t informed your father about the little trip we are going to have in the Capital. I thought it would be best for you to inform him because you had the paper from Shang Yang''s father." Xiao Tu''s eyes widened when Ye Xiu reminded him about the trip. "Oh crap, I totally forgot about that. I need to get the paper from my clothes later. Thanks for reminding me about it. I''ll make sure to tell father about the trip, you don''t have to worry about it." Ye Xiu took out his practice sword and brandished it at Xiao Tu, "Spar?" "Sure, I can tell father about the trip during breakfast so it''ll be much more convenient then because everyone is freshened up." The two began sparring for the next hour until the sun started to rise which meant that it was time for them to clean themselves up for breakfast. - - - They had once again gone out to eat because they had no ingredients to cook, but that was just an excuse since all three males had no interest in cooking anything by themselves for others to eat. Whilst they were enjoying their breakfast, Xiao Tu decided that this would be a good time to tell his father about the trip. "Father, Ye Xiu and I made a friend at the Alchemist Association examination yesterday and we had planned to go on a trip together in the Capital. Will you let us go? We''ll have a chaperone to take us so you don''t have to worry about us being kidnapped again like last time." "I''ll let you both go on the trip but I''ll have to go together with you guys as well. I don''t really know many people in the Capital so I can''t say that I''ll trust anybody with taking care of the two of you right now. Can you tell me how I''ll inform the parent of whoever your friend is?" Xiao Tu took out the piece of paper that Shang Xian had given him. "Shang Yang''s father, Shang Xian, told us to use this piece of paper to communicate with him when you''ve allowed us to go on the trip." Xiao San took the paper examining it, before nodding. "Whoever gave you this is a rich man. The cost of this talisman would probably bankrupt a normal cultivating family." Ye Xiu''s eyes sparkled at the new knowledge. "What''s this talisman you talk about?" "This talisman is for communicating with others a long distance away from each other. Most message talismans would disintegrate after a single use however the one that your friend''s father has given me is able to be used for as long as there is Qi inserted into the talisman." "My father in law is someone who has been dabbling in talisman and formation making for a few decades and he''s not able to make a message talisman of this rank. It tells you just how complicated and expensive this talisman would be. I''ll talk to your friend''s father now to inform him of when the trip can take place and my joining of the trip." Xiao San finished his breakfast faster than the two kids so he decided to use the time to contact Shang Xian. "Hello, is this Shang Xian I''m speaking to? Yes, yes. I am the guardian of the two children you met yesterday. I have agreed to this little excursion out in the Capital that your child seems to have suggested. However, I''d like to be there when they do go out during the excursion to make sure they are safe. Not to mean that you are weak or anything it''s just that I would feel more secure taking care of them." "What days will you be free then? I''m free every day so it''ll be your choice to pick the day which is the most suitable for you." "There will be a break in my meetings in two days so that would be the best time for everyone to go out. Is that fine with you?"Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. "Yes, I''ll just tell my daughter the good news, have a good day and I''ll see you in two days." The message talisman stopped working after he retracted his Qi. Xiao San looked at the two kids who were still eating and decided to inform them now before he had to go to his meeting. "The trip in the Capital will be in two days, I''ll be coming with you because I want to spend some precious man time with you guys without your mothers here. My meeting will be on a break for that day so you don''t have to worry about me having to leave in the middle of us having fun." Xiao Tu looked extremely happy to hang out with his father. "That''s great. What do you think we''ll be doing with Shang Yang and her father? Father, I''d also like to talk to you alone when you have time." "I don''t actually know what we will be doing on the trip so we''ll see what happens then. If you want to talk to me alone then we can talk when I get back tonight. Is that okay with you?" "Thanks, father, let''s go home now." After bringing the boys home, Xiao San left to attend the meeting to sort out everything. The two boys at home were just doing their usual routine of reading, training and playing about. They had brought a huge amount of books for them to study by placing it into Xiao Tu''s Inter-dimensional storage. Xiao San returned home with food he had bought from the stalls that opened at night. He rushed home so that the food was still steaming hot so that they could enjoy the food when it was still fresh. He arrived home to see the sight of the two boys sitting at the table just reading books. Clearing his throat he decided to disturb their peaceful atmosphere. "Boys, I''m back with some food. It''s time to eat. I hope you have both washed up so that you don''t stink up the table as we are eating." Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu looked up before placing their books on the chairs beside them. Dinner was a very quick and quiet affair as usual. It was a quiet routine that had been formed between the families due to Mei Ling''s ferocity about being quiet during meal times. Xiao San beckoned his son to follow him to the office that had been provided in the residence whilst Ye Xiu walked over to his bedroom. Xiao San sat on the chair whilst looking at his son. "Well? What did you need to talk to me about without Ye Xiu knowing? Could it be that both you and Ye Xiu like the same girl? That Shang Yang girl?" Xiao Tu''s face blushed scarlet. "O-of course not! Why would I like that vixen of a girl! Ye Xiu can''t see it but she''s constantly flirting with him. I don''t understand why I feel so angry whenever I see her flirting with him. Could you tell me why father? I''m just friends with Ye Xiu so I shouldn''t be feeling jealous of him being taken by someone else!" Xiao San understood his son''s thoughts and decided to not inform him of everything truthfully. ''He''s already developed romantic feelings for Ye Xiu at such a young age? I guess that cultivation does speed up the process of maturity. I don''t have anything against same-sex couples because it''s common in the cultivation world.'' ''He''s similar to his mother in the way that when he becomes jealous of something, his anger starts to take over his rational thoughts. I think it''ll be best for me to teach him how to control his emotions more tightly so that he doesn''t hurt Ye Xiu in a blind rage. I''ll just tell him about he''s feeling protective over Ye Xiu and give some advice from there.'' Xiao San looked at his son with a grave face. "Xiao Tu, you shouldn''t feel embarrassed about your emotions because everybody feels that way about someone. To you, Ye Xiu is like a younger brother that you have to protect from outside influences. Your experience from the kidnapping incident has reaffirmed your resolve to protect those that you love and it was the strongest for Ye Xiu. To feel these feelings should be normal for you." Xiao San paused for a moment to let his son digest the information he told him. ''I''m sorry for lying to you now Xiao Tu but it''s for the best. When you mature and have enough experience about romance and the world, you''ll understand your own feelings for Ye Xiu. You may not realise it yet but you are similar to Mei Ling in the fact that once you start feeling romantic for a person, you''ll be loyal to them forever. It''ll be best for you to realise it for yourself. Just like Mei Ling did after she rejected me multiple times.'' "It''ll be best for you to meditate on your feelings every time you feel it. It''s best to reflect on experiences that you can learn from. By meditating on these feelings, you''ll also be able to calm down and understand why you are feeling them. I''ll teach you some exercises to calm yourself down whenever you feel those feelings and have no chance to meditate. That way you won''t fly into a rage when your feeling goes past the melting point." "Thanks for the advice father... talking about it really helps. It''s like I''ve gotten this weight off me. I felt unsure what to do with these feelings because I didn''t want to vent my anger on Ye Xiu since I had vowed to protect him instead of hurting him. Have a good night father." Xiao Tu left his father''s temporary office before heading to his own room to meditate. He didn''t bother Ye Xiu because he knew that it was best for him to reflect on himself for now. Whilst Xiao Tu was busy talking with his father and starting his meditation, Ye Xiu was just inside the Locket Dimension reading books. Ye Xiu didn''t have any trouble with his romantic feelings currently because he had no idea what they felt like. With no personal relationships in his previous life combined with his young age now meant that he would''ve had no chance to gain any experience in romantic affairs. Ye Xiu was as clueless as a normal child about romantic feelings so he never noticed the things which were happening around him between Shang Yang and Xiao Tu. His clueless behaviour remained with him, giving him a sense of peace in his heart whenever he was busy doing something else that he loved. Xiao San was busy looking out the window of his office whilst sighing. ''Xiao Tu has grown up so quickly, it seems like only yesterday when I first introduced Ye Xiu to him. They''ve forged such a fantastic relationship with each other in such a short time just like I did with Ye Qiu. Hopefully, this means that they can rely on each other in the future.'' Xiao San extinguished the light sources before heading to bed. Excursion It was the day for everyone to meet up. Xiao San had called Shang Xian the day before this to inform him of his idea to have breakfast together on the day of their outing. Shang Xian accepted the idea because it sounded like a good way for the children to have fun and it would also be a good time for the two adults to get to know each other. With that, Shang Xian told the trio to meet the both of them at the Alchemist Association building where they would then look for a suitable place for them to eat at. This wasn''t a problem for the trio because they always woke up early for their training anyway so it wouldn''t matter what time they went out for breakfast. The only person who whined about the time was Shang Yang who complained about it being too early. Minutes of Shang Xian trying to convince her to wake up earlier for breakfast, he finally decided to take out his final card. He told her that the breakfast would be with Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu. When Ye Xiu''s name was mentioned, Shang Yang''s eyes lit up and her whines and complaints were quelled instantly. Shang Yang woke up during dawn just so that she could prepare herself to look as pretty as possible so that she could try and garner Ye Xiu''s interest in her body and face. When Shang Xian saw what she was doing, he just shook his head at her vanity. Shang Yang took extra care with her clothes. Even though her body wasn''t developed yet, her mother had given her lessons on how to seduce males. She wanted to put those lessons to good use because she knew that she had genuine feelings for Ye Xiu. Her mother had taught her at a young age of all the mature things out in the world so that she wouldn''t be unprepared. She was told not to tell her father anything about it because it would just cause arguments between the two of them. After choosing clothes that could show off her figure, Shang Yan walked out of the room to greet her father. The pair left their residence to go to the Alchemist Association Building. Shang Xian had some business to do at the building so he needed to get their early so that when the entourage of three arrived, he wouldn''t be wasting any time by making them wait for him. Shang Xian took hold of his daughter''s hand and brought her into the building. "I''m going to deal with some of my business. If your friends arrive before I finish just tell them to wait for awhile. I should take too long. Don''t leave the building without anybody watching you. He looked at her sternly. Shang Yang nodded her head and Shang Xian left to finish whatever business he had to do. Shang Yang was busy thinking of different ways she could start to seduce Ye Xiu to become infatuated with her when a voice called out to interrupt her train of thought. "Shang Yang! It''s good to see you again. Where''s your father? I thought he was supposed to be coming with us." "He''s busy with some of his business, he told me that he wouldn''t be taking too long to finish his work so he told us to wait for a little longer." As she finished speaking she spotted Xiao San who greeted her. "Hello, you must be Shang Yang? The boys seemed to be excited to go out on this trip with you." She gave a bland look to Xiao Tu, ''Really? I would''ve never thought that they would be so enthusiastic in meeting me again." They continued to talk for a few minutes before Shang Xian came back after finishing his business in the building. "I''m sorry I''m late. I had some business I had to deal with so I had to come slightly earlier to the building. Shall we go now? There''s no time to waste if we want to have fun. That''s the point of the trip after all." With that, the group left the Alchemist Association Building. The two adults were looking for a place to eat breakfast. They wanted it to be a special one so that everybody would remember the day from the very beginning to the end. Xiao San remembered a place that one of his colleagues from the meeting had mentioned to him. He had mentioned that it was one of the mouse famous restaurants in the Capital. It was open at any time of the day which was already intriguing in of itself. "I think there''s a restaurant that we could go to. It''s called the ''Golden Goose'' and apparently, it should be one of the more famous restaurants here in the Capital. I think we should try out the delicacies there shouldn''t we? If we want this to be a memorable day then how about we eat something which is expensive and delicious?" Shang Xian thought for a moment before replying. "Sounds like a good idea. We can split the costs for meals anyway so that it won''t cost too much in between the two of us. I don''t think I''ve brought Shang Yang to eat at this place ever since we arrived at the Capital a month ago."Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings. They decided to ask for directions from a passerby so that they could get to the restaurant and it was apparently ten minutes on foot from the Alchemist Association Building. With it being that close, the group made it to the restaurant in record time because they were wanted to sightsee around the Capital as much as possible before the day ended. They sat at a roundtable. Shang Xian and Xiao San sat next to each other with Xiao Tu and Shang Yang arguing about who would sit next to Ye Xiu. Eventually, Ye Xiu decided to move in between the two fathers to stop any more arguments from breaking out. "Can you two calm down and try not to go at each others'' throats? You have only known each other for a total of less than a day. I don''t know what happened for you the both of you to be at such odds towards each other but could we try to keep the differences between us down today? This was a day for us to enjoy not to cause fights." With Ye Xiu trying to diffuse the situation, the two stopped fighting but kept on glaring at each other. Xiao Tu eventually settled down when he looked at his father who mouthed the two words, ''calm down.'' Breakfast was a fun affair for all of them. They had tasted normal ingredients cooked with a very different style to what they would''ve normally expected those ingredients to be used. Xiao San and Shang Xian noticed that in the food that they were actually Qi infused foods. It was the reason why the foods were tastier than normal foods. The type of Qi infused into the food would affect the taste greatly. Food and drinks infused with Qi usually followed with medicinal benefits. These types of foods and drinks were extremely beneficial to a person''s cultivation because it allowed the person to invigorate themselves for the day or after they are tired. People who were able to infuse Qi into food were known as Spirit Cooks. They were very few of them but Xiao San had travelled enough in his youth to see many Spirit Cooks and the food they sell. Shang Xian wasn''t as surprised because they place he was from had many Spirit Cooks around so it wasn''t as if it was completely new to him. With that, the food was enjoyed and devoured quickly by the voracious children. With breakfast a done deal, the group wandered the Capital and took in the sights as the adults were looking for places where the children would be entertained. Xiao San spotted a place where the kids looked like they could have fun. It was the Capital''s most infamous maze. Bringing the group over to the start of the maze he started explaining what made the Capital''s maze so famous. "This is a maze which is really famous here in the Capital. With just the extraordinary craftsmanship into building the walls and beautiful areas made it so that even if you are stuck in the maze, you could at least admire the beauty of it without dying of boredom." "Besides that, if you go in, you''ll have to take one of their talismans so that if you give up on the maze they can track you down so they can rescue you from the maze. I''d suggest that we form a duo and a trio. One adult in each group, go form a group quickly now!" Xiao Tu immediately grabbed Shang Xian and Ye Xiu and headed into the maze. He grabbed Shang Xian because he seemed like the type of person you would love to get to know. His personality also seemed to be better in comparison to his daughter''s personality. Xiao Tu paused in his running for a while, "Did you guys remember to take the rescue talisman?" Ye Xiu just nodded at his friend''s expression. "Yeah, I took it from Xiao San just as you grabbed me so it''s no problem. By the way, why did you drag us into the maze so quickly?" Ye Xiu was still clueless about Shang Yang''s brazen flirting. Xiao Tu had noticed her clothes when he saw her and the flirting during breakfast. He was desperate to keep Ye Xiu away from in case that he''d fall for her promiscuous behaviour. Whilst Ye Xiu was busy deciding where to go next in the maze, Shang Xian dragged Xiao Tu over to talk to him quietly. "I''ve noticed that both you and my daughter have some conflict going on the two of you? I was watching my daughter get ready for today and I personally feel like it''s too much for just a fun occasion such as this. I know that my wife teaches her some things that she doesn''t want me to know and it worries me." "I can see that she has designs on your friend Ye Xiu. Is that why you are so protective of him? Did something happen in the past for you to be so aggressive towards strangers?" Xiao Tu looked at his feet before looking back at Shang Xian. "Yeah, we were kidnapped once and I was too powerless to stop it. After that event, I decided to take the task of protecting him and my precious people. I don''t want to feel that way when I could''ve done something for him." Shang Xian patted his head as he spoke. "It''s fine, you don''t have to worry about your strength now. It''s not just strength that protects people. You can also protect them by being there for them. I want you to get along with my daughter though. I''ve spoilt her slightly so she has a haughty attitude towards others." "I know that deep inside that she''s actually lonely because she was never allowed to play with the other children in her age group. If you can look past her flirting or if she stops, I hope that you can become true friends and support each other." Ye Xiu pouted but still agreed to what Shang Xian said. "Fine, but if she doesn''t stop her flirty attitude to Ye Xiu then I''ll talk to her sternly." The conversation ended as Ye Xiu called out to them. "Guys! I''ve found the exit, come on let''s go! Oh, by the way, Shang Xian can you contact Xiao Tu''s dad with the talisman you gave him to tell him where to meet us for dinner afterwards? It''s pretty late now and I think we can just go eat dinner." "Sure, I won''t mind. Where do you want to go eat first though?" Ye Xiu whispered into Xiao Tu''s ears before nodding. "Let''s go to the Golden Goose again. It was an amazing place and I bet they have different dishes for dinner." Xiao San and Shang Yang was informed of the meetup and the trio slowly made their way to the restaurant. Academy Part 1 Three years have passed since Ye Xiu took his first Alchemist Examination. Ye Xiu, Xiao San and Xiao Tu arrived back at the city a week after their outing in the Capital. Shang Yang had dropped her flirty attitude after Xiao San had talked to her about not being able to attract Ye Xiu that way. With that, Shang Yang stopped being extremely aggressive towards Ye Xiu and decided to slowly earn his love. Ye Xiu had returned back to Lao Lan and Lao Xiu to tell them about what the Alchemist examination was like and the results of it. They had told him the benefits of the Alchemist Badge that he had received and how he would be able to abuse the system if he used it like they did. The Alchemist Badge could be abused by cutting Qi off as the contribution points just as it was transferred. This way it won''t actually deduct contribution points but still, send it to the person or Alchemist Association with the proper amount of points. Ye Xiu abused this method to gain more knowledge from the Alchemist Association. Ye Xiu had entered an academy together with Shang Yang and Xiao Tu. They had entered at the same time so they could all be in the same year. The academy was one of the top 20 academies in the entire outer region. They had decided to go to the same academy when Shang Yang visited them at their houses when she came to their city. The Academy was called Star Whale Academy and was the 12th strongest academy in the region. The past three years were wonderful for the trio. They had each made huge gains in their cultivation and skills in their respective weapons. Ye Xiu had managed to break through into the 2nd Stage of the Qi Cleansing Realm whilst Xiao Tu managed to achieve the 3rd stage of the Qi Cleansing Realm. Surprisingly, it was Shang Yang who was able to keep up with Xiao Tu''s cultivation speed but it was most likely because of the smaller age difference. The three of them had broken the Qi barrier relatively easily because they already had an idea of what to expect for their trial. For Ye Xiu, he managed to break through by using his immense soul and mental strength. Xiao Tu he managed to break through by constantly barraging it with sheer willpower and all the qi he could gather at his disposal. Shang Yang had naturally broken through the Qi barrier due to her cultivation technique which allowed her an easier time for cultivating because of her body type. Lao Lan, Lao Xiu and Shang Xian had the trio be tested for their body type and roots. The testing was done by two different elixirs they had concocted and a small stone talisman that Shang Xian had brought. The elixir was to help cleanse the body of impurities and poisons so that no outside sources could contaminate the results. Xiao Tu had a body type called the Smith''s Masterpiece,'' his physique was fantastic for body cultivation techniques and he had a high affinity to fire and metal. It also meant that his talent for smithing was extremely high and that if he didn''t choose to learn to Smith in the future, then that talent would be wasted. He also had 3 heavenly roots attuned to fire and metal. Shang Yang had the body type named, ''The Vixen''s Allure.'' It was a body type which enhanced the body to a beautiful state and had extreme skill for illusions. She has 4 heavenly roots and they were attuned to water, fire and wood. Ye Xiu had an unknown body type but he had 9 heavenly roots attuned to fire, metal and wood. Shang Xian had brought Xiao Tu to find a master of Smithing so that he could at least help support Ye Xiu and Shang Yang in different ways. Xiao Tu wasn''t the only person to be taken because Lao Lan had told Shang Xian about Ye Xiu''s high affinity for metal as well. With this, the two were to find a master to teach them smithing. They had only started to learn to smith for a single year so they were unable to take the Rank one Smithing Examination. They had come to the Star Whale Academy because their master for Smithing had been hired as a teacher here. The teacher was a well known Smith, and they were lucky enough that the man had accepted the both of them once he realised Ye Xiu''s high metal and fire affinity, and Xiao Tu''s physique instantly made him accept them both. Ye Xiu had started his training with the whip because his body had started to mature. With that, he had begun his training for the whip styles that he had obtained from the Locket Dimension. He had managed to learn the first move of the ''Lonely Peak of Thirteen Dragons'' which was called ''Solitary Stand.'' In a moment of enlightenment, Ye Xiu had managed to reach the stage of Minor completion in his auxiliary techniques such as ''Swallow Mirage steps'', ''Basilisk''s gaze'', ''Tyrant''s Physique'' and ''Deer''s Canter.'' He wasn''t able to reach the Major completion stage for any of the techniques because he just didn''t have those moments of enlightenment. However, he was patient with it because he knew that things such as this came when you least expected it.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Besides that, he had started to be able to fight against his mother using his sword skills against her. He could fight her head-on and the outcome was even. Though if his mother did use Qi, he would''ve lost instantly due to the big disparity in their cultivation realm. Xiao Tu didn''t find a suitable movement style to go with his staff style. He decided to wait till the academy to look for a movement style or a teacher that would be able to help him with his staff arts. Since he had only focused on his staff and body, he had reached Major completion stages in his supportive body technique and he had reached major completion in the Defensive Turtle Staff. With this, he was able to fight against Ye Xiu even though Ye Xu had movement arts to boost his speed. This was because the body-supporting technique that Xiao Tu had cultivated was for the muscle strength, this, in turn, improved his speed and power. Shang Yang was the type of fighter that used the opponent''s force against them. She used her bare fist against opponents and didn''t worry about ruining her image. Her fighting style was learnt from her mother who was skilful in dance and force-borrowing. With this, her fights were extremely graceful unless she met long ranged fighters. Shang Yang had taken the Rank 2 Alchemist examination together with Ye Xiu, which they both passed again with flying colours. With them passing at such a young age, many people sought for their services in pill making. Shang Xian had visited Lao Lan and Lao Xiu often for consultation. Ye Xiu and Shang Yang learnt from three teachers which helped prevent any flaws in their technique from appearing or any gaps in their knowledge. They had started learning about Elixers in Alchemy. A liquid form of pills but had much more benefits compared to them. The difficulty to make Elixers, however, were several times higher than pills. They had just enrolled to the Star Whale Academy and were about to take the examination for determining the ranking they would be in. The ranking system was to reward the people who did well in their cultivation or had managed to defeat a person. Ye Xiu stood out from his peers because of his young age but the academy had several prodigies as well so he wasn''t given too much thought. "Ye Xiu, do you think we''ll be separated if we rank badly?" Xiao Tu asked worriedly. "Probably but the system is mostly for showing the differences in cultivation and strength of an individual. This way the academy would be able to reward the more ''talented'' students and to give them the motivation to work harder." Shang Yang joined the conversation after buying some food for them from the outside stalls around the academy. "How do you think they''ll rank us?" "I think they''ll rank us by just assessing the realm of cultivation of each person and then having a tournament and rank people based on that. It''s not the most accurate ways of assessing a person''s battle strength because some people wouldn''t be able to showcase their strength because they match up against stronger people in the beginning." "It''s best not to do too well in the ranking examination to try not to catch the attention of other students at first. The majority of the people in the high ranking academies have connections with older students and teachers so it might not always be fair. I think we should just stay average for the first year before trying to stand out in the second year." "We can try to find teachers who would be able to help with our respective fighting styles. Shang Yang and I don''t have to worry about Alchemy because we were already prepared for the move over here. It sucks because we aren''t allowed to visit our family for the duration of the time we are in the academy." The cultivation assessment passed quickly and the tournament started. Ye Xiu decided to fight three rounds to see the average fighting ability of the students in the academy. If they were stronger than he expected, then he would put more effort into his training to make sure that he wouldn''t fall behind all his peers. Xiao Tu and Shang Yang had forfeited their third fight after winning their second fight to prevent standing out too much even though they defeated their two opponents easily without any injuries. Ye Xiu was fighting his second opponent and he was dissecting the opponent''s movements. The opponent was a girl who looked to be in her teens. She used a sword and was very agile in her movements. If Ye Xiu did not have his movement techniques then he would''ve fallen to her battle rhythm and lost the fight. She had been trying to aim for the weak spots on his body but he had always kept out of her sword''s range. The girl was slightly confused due to Ye Xiu''s ''Mirage Swallow Steps''. His constant swaying made it hard for her to predict where exactly he would move next, and she wasn''t fast enough with her strikes to be able to cover all his routes of escape. She began using a Qi Technique which she wasn''t able to conceal. Qi Techniques'' activation can be concealed if you knew how to control your qi well enough to prevent the glowing from occurring in the first place. Since Ye Xiu had his observation technique on the entire time, he was able to spot the glow much easier compared to others who didn''t have an observation technique. He quickly moved out of range before taking out his whip from his dimensional ring that his mother had given him. The whip was an unadorned weapon but had the effect of being able to change it''s length when Qi is infused into the whip. Brandishing his whip, he started to strike at the girl''s feet. He was trying to catch her ankle so he could stop her from moving around so much. He had trained his body to the point that he was able to pull a weight of 30kg with his whip towards him so that it was in range for his sword attacks. He was able to snag the girl''s ankle with his whip, with a quick pulling motion, he dragged her towards him before attacking her with his fist. He was able to knock the girl out with a single hit which was surprising to him. Seeing that the battle was over, Ye Xiu quickly left the arena to rest for a moment and to talk to Shang Yang and Xiao Tu about what they thought of the average fighting ability of the students here. Academy Part 2 Ye Xiu jumped off the arena to the stands where Xiao Tu and Shang Yang were observing the battles from. He had noticed that it wasn''t just the freshmen who were watching the fights but also the senior students. They were probably watching to see who they could recruit or who they had to watch out for. Shang Yang had obtained some information about the academy from her father so she had some knowledge of what to expect. Several of the seniors had looked over to where the three of them were sitting and had pensive looks on their face before returning to the matches or talking to other students. Ye Xiu sat down in a meditative pose, recovering his Qi whilst speaking. He had mastered the technique to be able to converse with others even though he was meditating. The technique would allow him to stay in meditation as long as he was in the Lotus position. "What do you guys think of the average fighting ability?" Shang Yang kept on watching the matches for a few seconds before replying. "There are definitely a lot of people of similar strength to us. I spotted a few that had high cultivation during the assessment and they fight like they have experienced life and death situations. We haven''t been bloodied yet so I can''t say for sure if we can be of a similar level but I think your suggestion of laying low, for now, would be good." Xiao Tu nodded to the reply before adding his own thoughts. "We should catch up to their cultivation realm. It doesn''t mean we should slack off with our other training but it''s definitely important. It''s either that or we cultivate techniques that can allow us to fight above several cultivation stages above us." Ye Xiu took in those comments before speaking his mind. "If Yang Shang and I can start crafting elixirs or Grade 3 pills, then we''d be able to boost our training speed without any potential being lost. We''d lose a tiny amount of time from removing the pill toxicity, but I think that the both of us should be able to help you to get rid of the pill toxicity with relative ease." "We should try to slowly move ranks as the first year progresses to see if we have improved. I''ve noticed from a lot of the matches that there were simply just too many people who had a higher stage of cultivation due to their age or through being genii. Most of the freshmen look to be between fourteen to sixteen but I can''t tell for sure due to cultivation maturing people so that they can fight at an earlier age." "I''m just guessing from their general appearance to tell guess the age so it''s not entirely accurate. Whilst we train, we''ll need to gather some information about our fellow freshmen and seniors. If what Shang Yang had said was true about there being multiple groups in the Academy, then it''d be best for us to know information so that we aren''t caught unprepared." The trio nodded seriously just as one of the announcers called Ye Xiu for his third match. "I''ll be off, try to keep your eye on the stronger ones so that we know whose information would be more important to us." The two wished him good luck as he got down from the stands and into one of the arenas. Stepping up onto the arena platform, he met the gaze of a boy of similar height and youth to him. The boy bowed deeply before speaking a few words whilst getting into his fighting position. "I wish for a good fight." The boy readied his fists as he waited for the teacher overseeing the match to begin the fight. Hearing the boy say such words to him, he decided to say them back as a courtesy. "I wish for a good fight as well." The moment he finished his words, the teacher started the match instantly. Ye Xiu didn''t bother pulling out his weapons from his dimensional storage this time. He decided that he should test out his unarmed combat skills against someone who is a specialist in that field. The other boy closed the distance in a few steps, making Ye Xiu go on the defensive for the first few seconds because he wasn''t able to dodge in time. Crossing his arms together to lessen the blow''s impact, he was pushed back by a few steps. Taking note of that distance, he used it to build up his momentum for his roundhouse kick as the boy was still in the middle of his punch''s follow through. The boy was able to retract his arms in time to block the kick with his body turned sideways but he was sent flying from the kick because he couldn''t brace himself enough. The boy flipped in the air before cartwheeling to get back on his two feet. The boy shook his arms for a moment and checked them for a moment. The boy''s face showed surprise at the minor bruises that he got from the single kick. The boy smirked before the atmosphere around him changed to become more energetic.If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. The boy dashed at Ye Xiu again but he was ready for the attack this time. The boy barraged Ye Xiu with punches who quickly dodged them with his movement technique. He was utilising ''Deer''s Canter'' to try and conserve his energy. Ye Xiu knew that the fight would probably be a short one because he didn''t have too much stamina for prolonged bare-handed combat. If it was a battle attrition, then Ye Xiu''s opponent would''ve won instantly due to him being a bare-handed combat specialist. With this in mind, Ye Xiu decided to dissect the boy''s movements just like he did with his previous opponent. He did this to figure out the weaknesses of the opponent''s style, the flow of the style and to use that knowledge to add to his own combat skills by training and reviewing the things he''s seen. Ye Xiu didn''t have much combat experience in the way of different types of opponents because he only had Xiao Tu, Shang Yang, the five adults: Mei Ling, Ye Qiu, Xiao San, Yu Er and Shang Xian. He wasn''t able to spar with Lao Xiu because he was too busy with the Alchemy whilst Lao Lan was too lazy to fight even though he had the most time out of everyone. He only had knowledge of a few styles and weapons so it wasn''t very helpful for him to improving his styles to have no flaws. When the boy realised that his assault was futile, he quickly stopped his attacks before stepping back and assessing the situation. The boy had noticed that Ye Xiu was being extremely passive and opting to evade every single one of his attacks. The boy adopted a different stance to the one he had employed earlier. His two arms were in a relaxed pose while he walked at an average person''s pace towards Ye Xiu. Once he got into striking distance, he slowly lifted his hand and extended his palm in a calm and slow manner. His movements were similar to the tai chi practitioners he had seen in the parks. Knowing this, Ye Xiu didn''t let down his guard but instead moved further away from the boy. Ye Xiu knew that the basic principle of Tai Chi was to use an enemy''s force against them similar to what Shang Yang does. Figuring out a plan to defeat the boy wasn''t hard it just depended on whether he could overpower the boy in time so that he wouldn''t be able to use his force against him. Knowing that this strategy had worked on Shang Yang a few times, he decided to test it out against the boy to see if it work. He wasn''t too sure it would work because the boy was significantly stronger than him which he had realised when he braced himself for the first attack. Deciding to not just use his physical body against the boy, he started to infuse some Qi into his strikes. He had utilised the lessons he had learned with Lao Lan to make his Qi similar to scalpels. With this technique, he''d be able to at least try and cut the skin of the boy so that he could try to make him faint from his injuries. The first few hits had left some very shallow cuts on the boy''s skin. The boy hadn''t noticed until he saw the back of his hands as he was blocking. Scrutinising his injuries, he looked at Ye Xiu''s hands before realising what was possibly happening. The boy encased his arms with his Qi and utilised his defensive technique. As they stood, staring at each other. The boy spoke, "Shi Die, that''s my name." Ye Xiu responded, "Ye Xiu, it''s good to meet you." With that short conversation over, the two went back to their battle. Ye Xiu''s observation technique was on and saw that Shi Die had covered his arms with his Qi. Abandoning his Qi scalpels, he decided to kick him where he was unprotected. The flaw for most cultivators in the early realms of cultivation was that they were unable to move their Qi fast enough to different parts of their body. Hitting Shi Die''s legs who was had actually managed to conceal the glow of his defensive technique on his legs. Thus there were no injuries to Shi Die''s body. Shi Die manoeuvred his legs around to trip Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu suddenly surrendered to Shi Die and bowed to him before thanking him for the match. "Thank you for the match but I think I''m outmatched in bare-handed combat by you. I hope that we can meet again to spar and hope that we''ll be friends." Shi Die''s eyes were wide at the sudden request of him wanting to be friends. Shi Die was extremely surprised to the request but he accepted it tentatively. Grasping the outstretched hand of Ye Xiu he shook it to seal their friendship. The teacher announced the winner of the match, "Shi Die will move onto the next match of the day when we call your name. Be ready and rest up for your next fight." With that being said, Ye Xiu dragged Shi Die with him over to the stands towards Xiao Tu and Shang Yang. The two noticed the new addition to their gang and greeted him before turning their attention to Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu pointed at Shi Die. "Shi Die. Meet Shang Yang and Xiao Tu. Shang Yang''s the girl and Xiao Tu''s the boy. I hope that the three of you can be friendly with each other because I''m not friends with Shi Die. Xiao Tu scrutinised Shi Die''s appearance and demeanour when he was with Ye Xiu before nodding his head satisfied. Xiao Tu whispered a few words to Shang Yang, "He''s not a threat to our competition so we can treat him nicely. The only thing we have to watch out for is if he would betray us in the future. Currently, he looks extremely harmless and rather shy so he could be a person who doesn''t have much experience in socialising." Shang Yang smiled at the examination of Shi Die that Xiao Tu had given before she grasped Shi Die''s hand firmly. "Now that you are our friends, I guess it''s best for us to get along." Shi Die blushed at the contact and quickly tried to release Shang Yang''s hold on his hand. Shang Yang noticed and let go with a slight smirk on her face. "You seem quite shy, have you never had contact with a female besides your mother?" Shi Die''s face became even more crimson before a meek voice could be heard, "I''ve never had a mother because I''m an orphan. It''s also my first time having friends so I''m sorry if I''m shy." Xiao Tu took control of the conversation, "Well you won''t have to be shy around us. We''ll be here to support you and we''ll also be relying on you to help us too. Will that be okay with you?" Shi Die nodded his head. "Sure..." With that confirmation, the group that would be known throughout the Region was now finally formed. Academy Part 3 The tournament had finished and the group was waiting for Shi Die to come back to them. Shi Die had fought in the Final match and had lost against an older opponent. He was disappointed but he was quickly cheered up by his new friends. "Don''t look so glum Shi Die, it''s just a single loss. In the future, you''ll lose many battles. It doesn''t mean you are bad or anything. It could be that the opponent was too strong or that you were unable to counter your opponent because of lack of experience. Your losses will help you improve because you learn to correct your own mistakes. By losing you''ll be able to see where you went wrong and you can correct those flaws. It''ll also prevent you from getting big-headed from winning too much." Shi Die smiled at Ye Xiu for giving him such an inspirational speech, "Thanks... I''ve never had somebody cheer me up before. Back when I was younger, on the streets, a loss would mean death. I had the instinct of survival is victory ingrained in me." Xiao Tu decided to comfort him. "That instinct in the future may actually save your life. It''s good to have that instinct ingrained into you from an early age so that you would always try your best in everything that you do. It gives you a sort of motivation, to know that if you don''t try your best in training or other things, it could cost you or others'' lives." Xiao Tu was not as wary as before when he heard Shi Die speak about his life. "Could you tell us more about yourself?" Shi Die hesitated for a moment before thinking that it wouldn''t do any harm to be truthful to his first few friends. "I don''t remember much of my life before I was three, but I know that I was left on the streets for as long as I can remember. I was thought how to fend for myself by a kind old man who left to continue his travels around the countries by himself. He had taught me bare-handed martial arts and gave me a cultivation technique to learn." "He gave me a cultivation technique that would last me until the third realm of cultivation and I''m very grateful to him for it. I managed to reach this stage of cultivation by fighting the beasts in the forests around the city I had inhabited. From there I got lots of combat experience and had several life and death situations. The Qi Beasts that I was able to kill earned me some money by selling their carcasses." "The original martial arts I had learned was the first one I had used against Ye Xiu, however, I learnt two other types of martial arts when I found a cave when I was trying to escape one of the Qi beasts that I had tried to kill. From there I was able to expand my repertoire of bare-handed martial arts. I''m looking for more fighting styles that I can learn so that I''ll be able to react to most situations." "I never made any friends because they would run away at the sight of me. I managed to enrol in this school by pure luck. The vice-principal had spotted me fighting and had asked me for my cultivation realm and age. When I told him that I was only 10 years old, he had asked me whether I wanted to join the school to have a stable environment to train. I decided that it might be possible for me to make friends here so I accepted his offer." ''Now that I''ve made friends, I feel happy. He told me that I had great talent and that true talent can''t actually be identified by talent stones. It''s because the talent stones only test a person''s current talent but don''t actually test if their talent will continue to improve or whether it would degrade." Ye Xiu nodded at his words, "That''s very true, the three of us haven''t used any resources just like you but have cultivated without any resources. Shang Yang and I are both Alchemists so in the future when we are able to form pills of the third grade and higher, we can use the pills to expedite our gains during cultivation." "When both Xiao Tu and I start to be able to forge our own weapons, we can help you forge things like gauntlets to improve your striking power. You don''t always have to use your bare fists and legs to fight. You can wear protective items to protect or to trick your enemy that your body isn''t as strong as it actually is." Shi Die looks slightly worried and uncomfortable. "Are you guys going to ditch me...? The three of you can provide each other with something whilst I don''t actually have any type of support that I can give you guys. I''m afraid that I''d be dead weight in the group..." Shang Yang slapped Shi Die with a furious expression on her face. "Don''t you dare think that again. You are in our group now and a friend of ours. We won''t ditch you for such a small issue. Also, you can''t depreciate yourself like that. You''d be our main attacker for most fights if we get into trouble so you''ll have to disrupt the enemy as much as you can. We have to be the ones dishing out the damage which isn''t as important as keeping everybody away."Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings. Xiao Tu nodded with a serious expression on his face, "Very true, you''ll be taking most of the damage in fights so the least we can do is help support you. You don''t have to worry about being dead weight because we''ll support each other whenever there are troubles." Ye Xiu smiled at the side as his friends comforted Shi Die. The bonds of friendship were strengthening at this very moment and would continue to do so. The group had arrived at the academy''s assembly room. All the students and staff of the academy were there milling around and talking to each other. A man with strikingly bright crimson hair walked in from the side of the stage. The arrival of this man quickly stopped all conversation in the room beside the freshmen''s. With a single throat clear which was audible to all those in the room, the freshmen stopped talking to look at the man. "Thank you for those who have joined or come back to the academy this year. It''s a start of a new year, and there are things I''d like to announce. The new gravity training rooms have been built so please utilise it for your training as best as you can. There are only twenty rooms available at a time so you may have to share if you have not reserved a slot beforehand. Please try not to wreck the rooms this time. The rooms are expensive to replace and if it happens again then the rooms will have to be restricted." "We have a few new staff this year, so I''ll be introducing them. First, we have our new hammer combat teacher, Xing Liu Fan." Ye Xiu nudged Xiao Tu, "Look there''s master. Not surprised he''s teaching how to fight with a hammer." The group tuned out the rest of the introductions and were talking to each other silently which most students were doing as well. "The last thing that I have to say is to keep on striving and cultivating with determination. If you don''t believe in yourself then how will you be able to make progress? The rankings for this year are displayed on the board outside of the auditorium and will change as usual. Register who you will be living within a dormitory room. Mixed rooms are fine, just go to the academy''s front entrance and register from there." With that, the man left the stage briskly and the noise levels began to rise in. The four left the auditorium to go register for a room. They were tired from the trip and the multiple fights that Shi Die had fought had definitely made him fatigued. The walk to the registration desk was long and tedious. By the time the four reached the desk, they were exhausted from the day. Ye Xiu prompted the person at the desk to look up. "Are you here for room registration?" "Yes, I''d like a room for four people, a mixed gender room. The four of us here will be living together." The receptionist wrote something down before handing over four tiny badges over to Ye Xiu. "These badges will help lead you to your designated room. People without the badges will be unable to enter the room if they aren''t invited. The badges will be linked to your Qi signature so you don''t have to worry about theft." With the badges in hand, the group started their long trek over to the student residence. The walk took them an entire hour until they spotted other students around the massive entrance. Most of them were just talking and heading into the building. With the exhaustion bearing down on them, they quickly followed where the badge was pointing to. The badge was an arrow that spun to the direction of the room when held in the hand. This made it extremely easy for students to find their rooms and not get lost. They found their room, entered it and locked the doors. Shang Yang, Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu started unpacking their things from their inter-dimensional storages whilst Shi Die just stared. Xiao Tu noticed the stare and tilted his head in confusion, "Aren''t you going to unpack?" Shi Die looked at his feet and mumbled. "I didn''t have anything to take with me..." Ye Xiu just hugged Shi Die from behind. "It''s fine I''ll lend you some of my things until you get your own. We''re both the same size so we can just share. My mum packed way too many clothes as usual. It won''t matter if I lend you a few of them." Shi Die just nodded in appreciation for Ye Xiu''s kindness towards him. It took them an hour or so to finish unpacking everything. The boys decided to go and wash themselves up first whilst Shang Yang decorated the room with things she had brought with her. The bathroom that the academy provided was definitely classy in Ye Xiu''s opinion. It had several things similar to what hotels would have back in his previous life. There were different types of scented bar soaps around the area where bathing could take place. The water was heated and changed by several formations placed into the building. Even indoor heating and cooling was added for when the seasons changed. The boys had a relaxing bath and when they got out, their room was completely changed. Shang Yang had brought multiple things with her to decorate the room. She had vases for flowers on the bedside tables and study tables. She had placed candles so that there would be light for a person trying to study or read something. Ye Xiu was extremely surprised at the decorated walls however, it had seemed that this world had things such as wallpaper. She had placed a simple oriental flower styled wallpaper to make the room less dull. She had hung several paintings around the room. Ye Xiu whistled at the sight and Shang Yang beamed at him. "Do you like it? I brought so much to decorate our room. I still have more but I think this should be enough for us." "Yeah, it''s definitely enough. How much did you bring exactly?" Shang Yang''s eyes lit up. "I still have like a quarter of the room''s space worth of furniture and decorations." Xiao Tu snickered. "You really do like decorating don''t you?" "Of course I do. Now I''m going to take my time to wash up. Turn off the light formation if you don''t need it. Qi stones are costly to replace though that shouldn''t be a worry for Ye Xiu and I." She walked out of the bedroom and into the bathroom with sass in her step. The boys decided to just rest for the next day and the room was silent when Shang Yang came back. Smiling at the innocent faces of all the boys in the room, she walked over to her bed to sleep. Pact A week had passed since the ranking tournament and room registration. The gang had started to get used to the daily life of the academy. They were allowed to choose which lessons they wanted to attend and you could choose not to take any lessons at all. The food and drinks that the academy provided were all Qi infused. If not for the fact that Shang Yang and Ye Xiu were able to provide money for the group, they would''ve been poor a long time ago. The food had definitely sped up their cultivation, most cultivators ate Qi infused foods not just for the speed of cultivation but due to the lack of impurities found in them. Most foods that haven''t gone through the hands of a Spirit Cook contains a minuscule amount of impurities and toxins within them. Eating these mortal foods in excess would lead to toxin buildup in the body which would take time to get rid of. Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu had visited their smithing teacher when they had free time to continue their lessons. Shang Yang had tried to reserve a slot for the four of them in the gravity rooms however it was packed full with the older students so she eventually gave up. Not being able to enter the room was fine for Xiao Tu and Ye Xiu because their fathers had given them gravity altering bracelets and anklets to use for training. They were able to adjust the gravity up to five times the current gravity. The only downside to the bracelets was that it had to constantly use Qi to keep it powered. This left people slightly tired if they didn''t have a fast enough Qi recovery speed or if they didn''t have a high Qi capacity. Their group''s total Qi capacity was currently the same amount as twenty cultivators in the fifth stage of Qi Cleansing. They had a high capacity due to their cultivation technique, body type and ''talent.'' An average cultivator in the fifth stage of Qi cleansing could use the accessories for six hours at most. The Qi drain from the accessories didn''t bother them so they shared it with each other so even if they were unable to use the gravity room, they''d be able to train in similar conditions. The academy offered a huge amount of different classes they could take. There were classes ranging from all types of obscure weapons to things such as tracking and survival lessons. The four of them took survival lessons to learn how to skin, dismantle or cook a Qi beast that they might catch. To be truthful, Shi Die didn''t really need to take the lessons because of his years of experience in the wild but he continued the lessons so he could be with his friends. Besides the survival lessons, they had also taken classes for their specific weapons. All of them had joined the same class for close-combat fighting so they met up frequently during the day. Since it had only been a week since they started lessons, they had not been able to take all the classes they wanted or needed because some lesson''s times overlapped with each other. Besides learning new things in the academy, the group had also explored the academy grounds to see what they could use for training. They had seen a field with arena platforms with lots of students sparring and fighting. The duelling system there worked on the fact that whoever won would be given a prize by the loser. Official duels for ranks would need to have a teacher overseeing the match for the rankings to be actually changed. These matches usually had crowds of students to watch especially when it came to the higher ranked students of the academy. The ranking system gave many benefits to the students who stood at the top. They had a special place for training, have a monthly quota of pills given to them and numerous other things. One of the greatest benefits was the lack of restrictions on those students. They were free to leave the academy premises at any time to visit families or et cetera and the school wouldn''t bat an eyelid at them. Besides the arena grounds, there was the academy library. The library had three floors. The ground floor was public to all students that wished to peruse manuals that the academy has deemed appropriate to show the masses. The second floor was for those that had won an event, placed high on the ranking board or has paid academic points to the librarian. Dependent on the techniques and manuals copied by the librarian, the number of academic points paid will differ. Different techniques and manuals would have different prices. The third floor was apparently for those who had contributed heavily to the school and not even teachers were allowed up without permission. Every single thing in the library that is taken out from the library is actually a copy of the thing in question. This way the academy can keep the original safe without losing and more copies of it can be made. There was a building that had multiple rooms with a similar amount of students around just like the gravity room building. The rooms in the building apparently had a higher Qi density than the outside so that students would be able to cultivate faster. Ye Xiu had entered one of these rooms and noticed that the Qi density was hundreds of times lower than the Locket Dimension''s Qi density. Finding this out, he decided that he wanted to tell his friends about the Locket Dimension so that they could share the space and reap the benefits together. Ye Xiu decided to look for the wills of his predecessors to see whether they would prohibit him from being allowed to grant access to the training grounds to his friends.If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Searching through the office had yielded results. There was a scroll that detailed rules for any situations that his successor had stumbled upon. 1. If the successor has any friends he explicitly trusts and wishes to grant them access, a soul pact would need to be sworn to the successor. Once a soul pact to not reveal any information, have any despicable designs or any malicious feelings towards the successor has been sworn, then said people may be allowed to enter the Dimension. 2. The successor has no need to worry about anybody attempting thievery of the Locket due to it being bound to the successor''s soul. Only when the successor''s soul is devoured or destroyed may the locket be removed from his person. 3. Any attempt to enter the Dimension through other means besides successor''s Locket will be made known to the people inside or the successor even if they are not inside the Dimension. Any enemies able to breach the defences and tear a hole to get into Dimension must be treated with utmost caution and shouldn''t be approached unless specific signals known to allies has been seen. Further rules will be shown when the successor is deemed ready for further functions of the Dimension. Ye Xiu scanned through the rules once again before breathing a sigh of relief. The soul pact that the rules had mentioned was one that everyone knew not to break. Breaking it would mean the destruction of the person''s soul. Nobody knows how the person''s soul would be destroyed because nobody dared to test it out. He left the Dimension quickly and waited for everyone to get back to their dorm room so that he could ask them to swear the pact. Ye Xiu didn''t want them to swear the pact but it was the only way that he could give them the benefits fo the Dimension instead of hoarding it all for himself. Everybody had returned to the dormitory for rest. Ye Xiu had substituted his sleep for meditation even though the others continued sleeping instead. After the first few days of the academy, he decided that meditation was a better alternative to sleeping. He had started to notice the deeper intricacies of what awaited during meditation. His father had repeatedly told him that meditation would be better than sleep but the matter was always put away into a small corner of Ye Xiu''s mind. Yes, he did eidetic memory but you don''t recall something unless you want to recall that memory. Due to that, he never bothered to try meditating. besides on the days, Lao Lan and Lao Xiu had told him to meditate for. Ye Xiu knew that he had his own flaws. One of the biggest being that he loved to dismiss things for later but never going back to them. Before they went to sleep, Ye Xiu decided to stop his meditation to tell everyone what he had planned for them. "Can you all gather around my bed here? I need to tell you guys something very important." Shi Die tilted his head to the side in confusion as he sat down on Ye Xiu''s bed, bouncing on it lightly. "What''s so important that you need to gather us around?" Ye Xiu''s face turned solemn as he spoke, "You know how I told you guys about the higher Qi density building in the academy? Well... I actually have a better alternative to those rooms." Xiao Tu''s curiosity was aflame. "How''d you manage to find something that could be better than the rooms in the academy? As far as I was concerned it should be really hard to find something that can help us increase the density of the surroundings. There''s a reason a lot of students go to the building for a reason you know." Ye Xiu bobbed his head up and down. "When I was three years old, I had stumbled upon this object. This object has a dimensional space, similar to what our rings have. This dimensional space, however, can hold living things so that means we can go inside of it. The dimensional space has a higher Qi density than the building so I thought that we could use it together." Shang Yang blinked a few times. "If you had this the whole time, how are you not in a higher stage of cultivation than us?" Ye Xiu scratched his in embarrassment. "I didn''t want to get a head-start without you guys. It felt unfair to have an advantage over you guys even if you didn''t know anything about it. I can tell you guys now because you are all informed about the higher Qi density rooms so it''s the best time to tell you all about it." Shi Die pouted. "You should''ve just used everything you had at your disposal. It''s a dog eat dog world. It doesn''t matter what is fair and what is unfair. What matters is that you survive." The other two nodded at Shi Die''s words. Ye Xiu decided to keep on going with what he had to say. "Anyway, I''m only telling you guys about the Dimension but the three of you have to swear a Soul Pact to never tell others about the dimension, to not have malicious thoughts about me or any despicable designs. You have to swear the Soul Pact in order to enter the dimension and even then with my permission." Xiao Tu didn''t hesitate before speaking the words necessary for a Soul Pact. "I, Xiao Tu, swear to my friend Ye Xiu that I will never betray him to anyone unless he gives his explicit permission. I will not have any malicious thoughts or despicable designs towards him. I will protect him to the best of my ability. I shall not tell anyone of his secrets unless told to. If I break this oath, may the heavens strike me down." Ye Xiu opened his mouth to protest. "Wait! You didn''t have to swear those to me! What if you can''t protect me?" Xiao Tu just shook his head. "I promised myself that if I wasn''t able to protect my loved ones then there''s no point to cultivating in the first place." Shi Die and Shang Yang looked at Xiao Tu''s determination to protect before swearing the exact same to Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu started crying but tried to speak as he did. "I, Ye Xiu, swear to my friends Shang Yang, Xiao Tu and Shi Die, that our friendship shall never waver even in the direst of situations. I will protect them to the best of my ability and I shan''t betray them unless explicitly told to. Their secrets are theirs and mine to protect and shall not be spread without permission. If I break this oath, may the heavens strike me down." The other three proceeded to swear to each other just like Ye Xiu did. As the oath swearing session was finished. thunder could be heard near the academy before disappearing shortly after. Xiao Tu was slightly impatient after the swearing. "Are we going to check out this Dimension of yours now? I can''t believe you kept this a secret from us for so long! I don''t blame you, but this Dimension must really be something if you required us to swear a pact." With that, they entered the Dimension together when Ye Xiu grabbed ahold of their hands. Dimension Inspection The group landed underneath the entrance to the house inside the Dimension. Xiao Tu got up and patted himself to get rid of the dust on him. "Woah! This place is amazing, it''s so big, I can see why you never showed us before! If information about something like this got out, you''d be hunted forever." Shang Yang looked out into the distance. "Ye Xiu, are those plots of land for growing herbs? Why do you only have so few things growing? You''ve only used up to two plots of land." Ye Xiu scratched his head. "I have to harvest and plant everything by myself. It''s tiring and time-consuming. Most of my time is used for training and lessons in smithing and alchemy so I don''t really have the extra time to plant any more herbs and plants. I actually have to spend quite a bit of time to harvest the plants because the dimension actually has time dilation and herbs grow much faster here than the outside." Shang Yang''s face was completely shocked, "Time dilation? My father said that''s probably one of the hardest formation types known to him. Formations that can tamper with time are probably one of the most complex formations due to the fact that you are subverting so many of the natural laws." Ye Xiu was shocked inwardly, ''They know about the natural laws of the universe from my previous life? Just what else could they possibly know which is similar to my previous life?'' "Well, you can only stay here for 72 minutes of the outside world time in here. It''s basically 12 hours in here." Shang Yang glared at Ye Xiu. "Do you not realise how valuable this is? How have you not abused this privilege earlier? I know that generosity and humbleness can only go so far." "I may have put the time dilation part of the dimension to the back of my mind?" Ye Xiu replied meekly. Calming herself down, Shang Yang continued to speak. "I can''t believe you even said that you had no time to plant anything. That''s basically 12 hours you could spend on cultivating the land with new herbs and plants! What have you been doing the entire you are in here? Training? Sleeping?" "I took time to wash in the cleansing pool before leaving the dimension?" "I''m going to ignore what you said about only spending time for washing up and ask the sensible question. What benefits does that cleansing pool of yours provide?" "I''m not quite sure but it definitely contains purification and recovery effects." Shi Die had fallen asleep when they had been talking to each other. Xiao Tu started poking Shi Die. "Is Shi Die standing up? Whilst sleeping? "Yes, yes he is." A reply came from Ye Xiu when he went over to the front of Shi Die to wave his hands in front of him. "Ignore him for now, I still have things to say!" Shang Yang placed her hands on her hips. "I''ll help you manage the gardens if you don''t have the time to do it. I''ll probably look for you so I can enter the dimension to do whatever I need to do." Ye Xiu nodded to Shang Yang''s suggestions. "There''s also a technique library that we can use instead of the academy''s library. I know for sure that this library is much more extensive compared to their library. The only thing is that thought it is much more extensive, I''m very certain that most of the books in the library don''t cover too much of the basics." "Only the manuals and scrolls for techniques, cultivation styles and fighting styles are extremely in-depth so that they start from the very beginning of the way to train to the extremities that technique has been found to go to." Xiao Tu''s eyes were sparkling in delight when he heard about the library. "Can I go visit the library now? Pleeease? I want to see what things are in the library! I''m so interested now." "Calm down Xiao Tu. The library won''t be going anywhere so you don''t have to be in such a rush. You can take your time to look through them later on. I''ll have to allow you guys through the defences of the house first. The defences would probably kill you guys if you tried to forcibly enter the house." "I won''t be able to allow you guys to enter some of the rooms but opening up the bedrooms, dining room and library should be enough for now right?" Shang Yang nodded. "Yeah, that''ll be enough. Just let us put Shi Die into one of the bedrooms whilst we do whatever we can in the remaining we have."Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. Ye Xiu quickly granted access for his friends to get past the defences and they put Shi Die down. Shi Die even stir from his sleep and was resting extremely peacefully. Xiao Tu looked at Ye Xiu. "Now may we go to the library? I promise I won''t touch anything without your permission!" Sighing at his friend''s behaviour, Ye Xiu gestured for Shang Yang and Xiao Tu to follow him. They walked through the corridors to get to the library. "When you go into the library and want to look at something, please be gentle with whatever you find. I don''t want to risk them being damaged in any way, shape or form." Xiao Tu nodded eagerly and bounded into the gigantic library as Ye Xiu opened the doors for him. "I give you the permission to take whatever you want to as long as you put it back and not damage it." "Sure, no problem, you can just leave m in here for now." Shang Yang and Ye Xiu left Xiao Tu to savour the library. "Where are we going to next?" Ye Xiu was thinking. "There''s a place in the dimension which was unlocked recently because I had managed to get past the Qi barrier and made it into the Qi Cleansing Realm." Shang Yang had a quizzical look on her face. "So different functions unlock in the dimension whenever you get stronger or pass a trial? I guess that''s definitely a way to prevent a person from becoming too power-hungry and reliant on the resources that you can have here." "I don''t mind really, it helps to keep up the mystery of the dimension. It also allows me to not focus too much on it because I know I can some of the things that are found in the dimension in the outside world. It helps me to not rely on the dimension but the main reason why I don''t really use the dimension too often beside for washing up is due to me pushing the things I should do for later but forgetting them." Shang Yang patted Ye Xiu on the head. "That''s fine, it won''t happen as often now. Xiao Tu, Shi Die and I are always going to be here to remind you of things that you''ll forget. You won''t have to worry about losing out as much than before." Ye Xiu blushed before smiling. "Thanks." Shang Yang continued patting his head. "Now could you tell me more about how the garden works? You said that things grow faster there." "Since time in the dimension goes ten times faster than the outside world, the plants already grow ten times faster. You can also water the herbs and plants with the cleansing pool''s water to further speed up the growth. Anything planted there grows ten times faster than the outside world. So things basically grow a hundred times faster than the outside world. Due to this, I''ve had to harvest the things found here often and that''s why I don''t have as much time to plant." Shang Yang struck a thinking pose before clicking her fingers together. "Why don''t you leave some of the herbs out for a longer period of time. You know that in alchemy that the older the plant is, the better it is." "I just harvest them when they are ready because I need most of the ingredients here to make pills so I can sell them out to the public for some money. I''ve been making a lot more pills recently because of how expensive the food here in the academy is so I will try my best to grow as much as I can to keep up with the demand." "That won''t be beneficial for you in the long run. How about keeping at least one plot of land for herbs to grow for a longer period of time? Don''t you think that''ll be much better? You can use the herbs that are not as aged as the ones in that plot of land to make the pills. Those herbs can be used for special occasions." "I can see that most of the herbs that you have here are pretty common but I can definitely see some of the rare herbs that would only appear once every few decades. You also have to tell me how the herbs and plants are surviving in the plot of land. Some of them aren''t even supposed to survive in this type of environment but you can still see them growing healthily." "Apparently, planting them in the plots of land provides them with whatever they need. No matter what type of plant or herb. It''s strange but I think that my predecessor had probably needed to grow a lot of precious things with different types of environments so they made this place for them to grow." "That''s definitely neat. While you are busy with your smithing lessons, I can take that time to go find rare plants for us in the future when we can get out of the academy. I don''t have anything to do on the days that you have your lessons so it should be perfectly fine. That way we won''t waste as much time. After all, we''ll be sharing the dimension space together won''t we?" "Yeah, we will. I think we should get back to the library so we can check up on Xiao Tu. We can also go look for some techniques and manuals for you to learn. You have a very small repertoire that does you good but I think it would be better for you to expand in just in case of emergencies and you aren''t able to use your normal techniques." Ye Xiu started pushing Shang Yang in the direction of the library. The pair walked back into the library where they spotted multiple books and scrolls splayed across the tables and floor. Xiao Tu was looking through each of them with intense concentration before putting back most of the things he had taken out before reaching for more things he could find. "Xiao Tu, you seem very concentrated. Is there anything that you found that interests you to learn or is there nothing?" Shang Yang asked curiously. Xiao Tu didn''t take his eyes off the page and continued scanning through them. "There are plenty of things here. It''s just that I can''t seem to figure out which ones I might want to learn. The ones that do seem interesting don''t match up to my fighting style so I''m not quite sure if I want to pick it up." Ye Xiu sat his buttocks right on the floor next to Xiao Tu and idly looked through the things that Xiao Tu had displayed. "You should learn at least one different style to what you normally use. If somebody manages to figure out a way to counter you then what use would that particular style be? It''s best to have alternatives to turn to." Xiao Tu''s frustrated face slackened into a more calm expression before sighing. "You''re right, I''ll choose something that''ll work for me, don''t worry about it. I''ve definitely spotted a few body cultivation techniques that I might want to learn though. The current one I''m cultivating is reaching it''s limit soon so I might want to switch over these more advanced ones." "That''s good." Ye Xiu rested his head on Xiao Tu''s shoulders and Shang Yang slept in one of the library chairs as Xiao Tu kept on his perusal of the library. Gravity Room The next day came, everyone who was kicked out of the dimension was lying on top of Ye Xiu''s bed. Ye Xiu''s bed was big enough for two people but to have four people squeezed together, he felt very uncomfortable as he tried to stretch his arms out. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu were grabbing ahold of Ye Xiu''s arms, with a person on each side of him. Hearing movement from Shi Die, he tried to call out for him to ask for help in escaping the grasps of his two friends. "Psst, Shi Die, are you awake? Could you help me move these two bears out of the way?" Shi Die got up from the bed and started a few stretches before walking towards the bathroom. It was as if Shi Die didn''t hear Ye Xiu calling at all. Ye Xiu sighed knowing that it would take Shi Die awhile to come out of the bathroom. He tried to get free by himself. He managed to tear his hand away from Shang Yang''s grip but Xiao Tu was holding onto his other arm way too tightly. He started to poke him in the face so he could wake up. "Wakey wakey, please let go of my arm." Ye Xiu kept on his efforts on poking Xiao Tu for several minutes before his eyelids started to flicker open. Groaning, "Hrrgh? Why are you poking me?¡° Ye Xiu pouted. ¡°I want to get up. You''re holding my arm. I can''t get free of your grasp. The only way I could get up was to wake you up so you could stop holding on to me." Letting go of his hold on Ye Xiu''s arms, he rubbed his eyes. "What time is it anyway?" Ye Xiu looked at his timepiece. "It''s about midnight. I think we''ve only been just kicked out of the dimension but because we probably slept quite early when we had a lot of time in the dimension, we are well rested." Xiao Tu grabbed ahold of Ye Xiu and lifted him up. "That''s great, why don''t we do some training in the gravity rooms they have. I really doubt that many people would be awake at this time." "I don''t mind but we might want to wait for Shi Die, he''s currently in the bathroom so I''m not quite sure if he wants to come with us or not. Shang Yang looks to be deep in her sleep so I don''t think we should bother her." Xiao Tu nodded. "We''ll wait for him." They waited for the time it took for an incense stick to burn before Shi Die came out of the bathroom. By this point, Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu''s bladders were about to burst even though they didn''t have the urge whilst they were waiting for the first few minutes. They quickly ran past him to use the bathroom, not caring about privacy. Shi Die just shrugged and went to his bed to change out of his clothes. After the two finished relieving themselves, they went over to Shi Die''s bed who was reading a book on different types of food. "Hey, we''re about to go out to the gravity rooms to see if nobody is there because it''s super late. We want to ask you whether you want to join us." "If it''s training sure, we only have enough gravity altering accessories for two people at one time so it''d be better for us to go to the gravity room. I also heard from some people that have been using the gravity room, that''s it actually an improvement to it''s original." Ye Xiu started to pack some food for them so that if they got hungry whilst training, they wouldn''t have to leave the gravity room if they got in. Shi Die was bringing his book on food with him. "By the way, are we not going to wake up Shang Yang?" Xiao Tu mischievously smiled. "Just leave her be, she needs her beauty nap. When she sees us missing she''ll be so scared." He snickered at the thought of her being scared. Shang Yang had mentioned to him once by accident, that she was afraid of people ditching her. Shi Die still looked unsure but went along with Xiao Tu anyway. "If you''re sure about this then let''s go." The trio left the room quietly to not disturb Shang Yang''s sleep. They spent much less time to get to the gravity room because they decided that they should run to the building. This was to serve the purpose of being a warm up and it also helped that it would waste them less time travelling to the building and for warming up later. They made it to gravity room building and they started their stretches before they looked for a room. Ye Xiu managed to find a few empty rooms but he gestured for his two friends to join him in a single room. Ye Xiu had thought of a plan for their training in the gravity rooms. He decided that they should wear weights, do weight training and spar against each other. This would help them improve their strength and it would also help them get used to the environment that they train in.Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon. Obviously, after training in a higher gravity environment, they would spar each other again to get used to their strength changes so that it doesn''t screw up their fighting momentum. Ye Xiu had also thought to bring their gravity altering accessories to test whether the effects would stack upon each other. The accessories altered the gravity on the person whilst the room altered the gravity in the surrounding area. Ye Xiu wasn''t sure whether his idea would work but he decided to test it anyway. They closed the gravity room''s door, locked it and blocked the windows so that nobody could get in, look inside or disrupt their training. Bringing out the weights from their dimensional storage, they put them on. Ye Xiu handed over Shi Die''s weights because Shi Die still hadn''t had the chance to go out into the surrounding markets around the academy with the money that had been given to him by Shang Yang and Ye Xiu. They walked over to the wall that held the instructions on how to operate the room. Instructions on how the change the gravity of the room 1: Insert Qi into this wall and the formation will take in the Qi that is inserted. 2: Make a clockwise turning motion with hand to increase the gravity. One full clockwise turn makes gravity one times stronger. 3: Counter-clockwise turns to decrease gravity. Ye Xiu looked over to his friends. "How much do you want to increase the gravity by?" Xiao Tu thought for a moment. "Make it three times stronger. We''ve only had our accessories alter the gravity to two times as strong as the normal gravitational field. We should slowly up the gravity every time we get used to it and eventually, we''ll reach the highest gravitational change available in the room." Shi Die nodded. "It would be a good plan. We should stop when the gravity change slows our movement to half the speed we usually move. It''d probably be the best training environment for us and it''ll help us become stronger too. It''ll also mean that we won''t have to change our weights because the gravity would effectively do that for us." Ye Xiu agreed with his friends'' proposals and cranked up the gravitational pull to three times the strength. The trio immediately felt the weight pushing down on them. Moving, the three moved at a sluggish pace which surprised them because it was the gravitational pull was only 1.5x times stronger than what they were used to. Knowing that this was probably their limit, for now, they decided to move around to get used to the weight, no matter how slow they moved. It would help them make their muscles stronger in the long term which meant that they wouldn''t mind the harsh training as long as it gave them something back. They continued their adjustment to the weight for the next three hours before exhausting themselves. They decided to take a break but still wear the weights whilst they were at it. Ye Xiu took out the food that he had packed from his dimensional storage and placed it down on the floor so that they could eat together. Whilst they were busy eating, Shang Yang woke up in a daze, she walked into the bathroom to take a toilet break. She returned to the room with the sight of everyone gone welcoming her. Her eyes were wide and started to frantically pace around the room, muttering to herself. "They couldn''t have possibly been kidnapped right? The academy is extremely safe so I doubt they''d be able to be kidnapped. They have to be training now. Right? What time is it right now?" She quickly checked her timepiece on her drawer and saw that it was 3 in the morning. "Ok, if they''re gone they must be at the gravity rooms because the Locket already has a higher density environment. I bet it was Xiao Tu who told them not to wake me up to scare me." After she managed to think of where they went, she assigned the most likely culprit for ditching her in the room She sprinted across the academy grounds to get to the gravity room building. She looked through all the rooms and saw that only one was occupied and that she was unable to see inside it. Deciding to bang on the door, Shang Yang shouted. "Open up guys. I know you''re in there." The three were enjoying their food and break when Shang Yang''s voice broke through their peaceful event. Ye Xiu looked in the direction of the door before getting up to open the door for Shang Yang. Xiao Tu quickly grabbed his arm. "Don''t open the door! She''s going to kill us for ditching her! Have you forgotten how scary she is when she''s angry?" Ye Xiu was very calm. "She''s going to kill you and you only so Shi Die and I will be fine." He shook off Xiao Tu''s grasp and opened the door for Shang Yang. "Thank you Ye Xiu, now I must punish Xiao Tu for playing such a prank on me." Shi Die and Ye Xiu quickly finished their food and watched Xiao Tu get punished by Shang Yang. "Not the face! I don''t want to look like a swollen prune!" Shang Yang obliged with his request and continued her assault on his bottom. Shi Die went back to his training whilst the other two were still playing around with each other. Ye Xiu took out the gravity accessories and proceeded to put them on. He wanted to test his theory out for the future and see if it would help them. The gravity altering accessories started to drain his Qi to power itself. Ye Xiu could feel that the weight on his body was much heavier than when he was training earlier. He knew from this that the effects of the room and the accessories could work in conjunction. It was at this moment that Ye Xiu realised something strange. ''Wait, how is Shang Yang moving so quickly? We''ve had the gravity in the room as 3x as strong the whole time.'' He quickly shook his head after dismissing such a useless thought. ''Oh wait... she''s not wearing any weights. Man, I''m stupid.'' The group eventually started to spar against each other with their weights on. Shi Die had the most wins out of everyone due to his stronger body and faster adaptability to the high gravitational pull environment. It was unsurprising that Shang Yang had the least wins because she had less time to adjust to the environment and had a slightly weaker body due to the fighting style she was training in. Ye Xiu had the second least amount of wins because his speed was greatly reduced. His fighting style currently relied on his speed because he hadn''t mastered the dominating strength and power the style was also supposed to go hand in hand with. With this, Xiao Tu and Shi Die easily countered him. They kept on sparring until it was time for them to leave the room as the sun started to rise. Offer The next few days had basically been a routine for the group. Go to lessons, train, into the locket, sleep and then the gravity rooms. They had taken the time to sleep after all their classes and training had finished which was during the evening. Ye Xiu was the one to go get the food for their training in the Locket dimension and the gravity rooms. They weren''t going to eat dinner because they would be sleeping at that time but they would be able to sate their hunger during their training breaks. Some of the teachers that had spotted them running around during midnight to go to the gravity room building definitely found it weird to see them do it for several days in a row. One of the teachers was extremely impressed with one of the students that he had seen running around at night. He had started to observe him in several lessons that the student partook in to see what the student''s performance was like. He knew that this was inappropriate but he didn''t think the teachers of those classes would mine because of his status. Nobody in the academy really dared to offend him besides those of equal status or higher. The teacher prowled around his office thinking of whether he should take in an apprentice or not. He looked out of the window before deciding what he wanted to do. He decided that it would be better to try and teach all of the students accompanying the one he had been watching to make it look like it wasn''t favouritism. He walked out of his office and headed towards the gravity room building where he had last seen the group of students run to. - Gravity Room - Ye Xiu and Shi Die were at each other''s face whilst they were sparring. This time Ye Xiu was using his whip to fight against Shi Die. He had a bigger advantage than Shi Die because of the gravity affecting both their speeds greatly. Even though it slowed down the speed he could lash out his whip, it was much faster than the speed that Shi Die could react to at this point in time. "Come on Shi Die. Your reaction has to be faster even with the weights on you! If you can''t react to my whip flying at your face then try to predict the pathways at least. I''m not even doing any irregular movements with my whip. If you can do this, you''ll be able to at least have a chance against arrows flying at your face." Ye Xiu was trying to motivate Shi Die who was getting more and more irritated by the second. "How about you try to get something lashed at your face multiple times?" Shi Die snarked at Ye Xiu. "I wouldn''t mind it if it helps me improve now, wouldn''t it? " He lashed back at Shi Die with his own snarkiness. Xiao Tu and Shang Yang pulled the two away from each other. With Shang Yang acting as the mediator she managed to defuse the situation from escalating any further. "How about we just stop training for a while and eat something? We''ll feel better after we eat. A good meal always releases the stress." The food was laid out on the floor with Ye Xiu and Shi Die eating it with a glum expression and Shang Yang was just about to sit down when a knocking noise could be heard from the door. "Could you please open up? I''d like to speak to a few of you about something important." When the group heard it was an adult, they didn''t relax their guard but instead cautiously unlocked the door. As the man speaking outside turned the handle of the door and pushed it open, he was greeted with four weapons to the face. "Well, that''s an interesting welcome you kids have for me. Lower down your weapons now, I''m a teacher from the academy so you don''t have to worry about me ruining your innocence." The kids continued to stare at him with suspicion, sighing, he decided to take out his teacher''s badge. "Here does this prove that I''m a teacher at the academy now?" Shang Yang snatched the badge out of the man''s hand and was under scrutiny by the sharp eyes of Ye Xiu and Shang Yang. "It looks real enough to me." She tossed the badge back to the teacher who caught easily. The teacher quickly placed the badge back into his bosom before clearing his throat. "I''m Jin Yuan, I am a spirit cook and I''d like to talk to the four of you. I''m willing to teach you four the methods of cooking. If you manage to at least manage to pass my course then I want to see if I can pass on my spirit cooking skills to at least one of you." Xiao Tu narrowed his eyes at the teacher. "I see what we get from it but what would be the benefit for you? Nobody just randomly hands out such good deals for random people they''ve never even met."If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Jin Yuan smiled at Xiao Tu''s scepticism. "Very good young man. At least you are still questioning my motives but alas I have no motives besides wanting to pass my skills down to somebody." Xiao Tu continued his questioning. "Why us? We haven''t shown any aptitude for cooking or any interest in it as a matter of fact. The only person I could say that would possibly take to your training would be Shi Die because he''s been entranced with cooking manuals recently." "It''s simple, you kids seem like hardworking students. Much more than everybody else that I''ve seen in the academy. You kids train for what 18hours a day with six hours of rest? You don''t see many people at such a young age willing to dedicate most of their time to training. Just because of that I''ve watched the four of you for days to see what your personalities were like. I''d say that it''d be a pretty decent offer don''t you think?" Xiao Tu looked at Jin Yuan for a second. "Give me a moment to discuss this with my friends." Xiao Tu started whispering with his group. "What do you guys think of his offer?" Ye Xiu replied to Xiao Tu''s question. "Shi Die and I don''t mind taking the lessons, I''m not quite sure about Shang Yang though. She''s still deciding whether shaving off some time off her training time would be worth it for the lessons." Shang Yang joined in on the conversation after thinking about the pros and cons of the offer. "I''ll take the offer, it''d be handy to learn how to cook some delicious food with benefits. You only learn the bare essentials in the survival lessons which isn''t too helpful when it comes to satisfying my palate." Xiao Tu rolled his eyes at Shang Yang''s comment but addressed Jin Yuan anyway. "We''ll accept your offer to teach us. How often are these lessons? How long are these lessons?" Xiao Tu bombarded the teacher with questions. "The lessons can be on any day you find convenient/ I don''t have any other students and I only cook for mealtimes. How many times a week you want the lesson is up to you. The duration of the lesson is also up to you but I''d recommend having the lesson time to be at least two hours long otherwise you wouldn''t even have enough time to prepare most of your ingredients." "I''ll get back to you in a minute." Xiao Tu returned back to the group to ask them what times would be best. Shang Yang took charge of the times. "We have five hours free on Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. Two of those free hours on each of those days can be our breaks. So it''d be a three-hour lesson with the old geezer." Jin Yuan huffed. "You know, I can hear you calling me an old geezer from here! I''m only 47 years old this year. Absolutely not old!" Shang Yang blinked her wide eyes at Jin Yuan. "You''re practically thrice our age and you have the nerve to say you aren''t old?" "Tch, you kids are just young. When you get older you''ll know how I feel when people call me old then." "Your immaturity isn''t really helping your case you know." Shang Yang spoke in an impertinent manner. One of Jin Yuan''s veins bulged on his head in irritation. "Bah! Whatever, I won''t argue with a child. I''ll see you kids on the days you have specified. What time should I be expecting you?" "6 o''clock in the evening. Tell us where we have to find you!" Shang Yang shouted at the fading figure. "Just go to the mess hall, I''ll be there and finished with my cooking by that time." He waved goodbye to the group before disappearing off into the distance. Shi Die released his breath when Jin Yuan left. He had a very excited expression on his face. "I can''t believe that we''re lucky enough to be offered to be taught in the art of Spirit Cooking!" Ye Xiu tried to calm down the excited Shi Die. "Don''t get too excited, you still have to pass his basic cooking courses before you can even start to learn Spirit Cooking." Xiao Tu asked a question that had been on his mind for the past few days. "Why are you so interested in cooking anyway?" Shi Die looked shy when he heard the question. "I never really got to enjoy the taste of my food in the wild and when I came to this academy and ate the Qi infused foods... well, I can only say that I was entranced with it. I mean it also gives you benefits from eating it!" Shi Die spoke his last sentence in an even quieter voice that they could barely hear, "I-I also wanted to support you guys and not be totally useless." "I know what you guys said about me not being a dead-weight but I feel like I have to do something to get rid of the guilt. I mean I also get to learn something that I enjoy so that''s a bonus. It means I can start to have my own hobby whilst learning a trade to support you guys in the future." Shang Yang stroked Shi Die''s silky black hair as she held him. "That''s so nice of you. I really appreciate the effort and thought that you put into this matter. Now you get to do what you want the most." Shi Die melted into Shang Yang''s embrace as she continued stroking him. "Okay, now let''s get back to training. Just because we were offered something else to learn doesn''t mean we should slack off on our training. If nothing else, this opportunity is more likely to have us working harder in our training because we have less time." Ye Xiu nodded. "Get up Shi Die, let''s continue your reflex training. You shouldn''t slack on it now!" Groaning, he got up from Shang Yang''s embrace and readied himself for Ye Xiu''s onslaught of attacks. "Bring it on. I''ll master this training eventually." "You do realise that every time you do get used to it, it''s either we increase the weight or that the speed of my strikes gets faster." Shi Die just waved him off. "Don''t try to demoralise me. I''m already trying my best." Shi Die was energised from Shang Yang''s stroking and was alert for Ye Xiu''s speedy whip lashes. Their training continued for the next few hours. Xiao Tu and Shang Yang were sparring each other bare-handed and were evenly matched even though Shang Yang was much weaker than Xiao Tu. Due to the slower striking speed, Shang Yang could accurately predict and use Xiao Tu''s striking force against him. This went on and on and on. Until they were tired. Food It was now Wednesday afternoon and the group were getting ready to go to the mess hall for food. They decided that they would eat food before they would go to Jin Yuan''s class. They were waiting in a queue at the mess hall when a voice called them over. "Yo kids, get your butts over here!" Shang Yang smacked her face and dragged it down when she realised who it was. "Yeah yeah, we''re coming." The other students were staring at them and Jin Yuan wondering why a teacher would call for some random students that they''ve never seen. They quickly went back to talking to each other once the group left their sight. Shang Yang was not amused. "Why''d you call us out? We were going to get some food so that we wouldn''t starve when we are in your lessons." Jin Yuan had a mischievous smile on his face as he beckoned the group towards him. "I''m working right now, don''t you want to be able to skip that queue and eat my very fresh food? It''d be much more beneficial and tastier that way. Most of the food that''s displayed is warm but not hot. What do you say?" Shi Die poked Shang Yang and had an adorable expression on his face. "I want to taste his fresh food! He''s a spirit cook and if the food that we take is already cold but tastes so delicious... I can imagine the taste just thinking about it." Shang Yang shook her head fondly at the dreamy look Shi Die was showing. "Fine, but don''t you have to serve the other students." "Bah, there are other Spirit cooks here as well. I''m not the only person who can cook well. I''m just the highest ranking Spirit cook here. I can just hand over my work to some of the lower ranking spirit cooks. It doesn''t matter if the food tastes different. Most of the students here only care about the benefits that they can gain from eating the food." Shang Yang stuck her tongue out at Jin Yuan. "I care about the taste and the benefits. If I must have one then I have to have another.¡° Jin Yuan raised his eyebrow at her. "What a greedy person. That''s what I like. You should continue to be greedy but please do know the limits of being greedy. There are times and places for being greedy and there are other times where you should know to stop yourself. Knowing this line would help you when you get to the higher echelons of society." He gave his advice for the future. "Okay, tell me what you guys want to eat. Make it hard and surprise me. If you manage to name something that I have no idea how to cook then I''ll give you guys something beneficial for cultivation. Doesn''t that sound great?" Shang Yang smirked. "I know a lot of exotic foods, are you sure you want to test me on what foods I can force you to make?" "There are not many foods that I don''t know about but you can test your luck." Jin Yuan taunted Shang Yang. She started to glare at him and sparks could be seen flying between their eyes. "Challenge accepted, old man." "I''m not old!" The old man waited for the kid''s orders. He sincerely doubted that they would be able to name a food that he''d never prepared or known before. He had tasted and made all kinds of food on his journey around the regions. It was what had helped raise him into a Third rank Spirit Cook. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu didn''t really want to spend too much effort on thinking on what to eat so they decided to go along with whatever Shi Die would ask Jin Yuan to cook. Shang Yang announced. "I want you to cook Spirit Leaf wine-braised pork chops." Shi Die told Jin Yuan what he and the guys wanted. "The three of us would like you to cook three servings of Bak Kut Teh." Jin Yuan smiled at Shang Yang in a condescending way. "Ah, Spirit Leaf wine-braised pork chops you say? That''ll be simple, I''ll make that immediately. Don''t worry boys I heard your order, I''ll get there when I finish with hers first." The group watched Jin Yuan take out several ingredients from his dimensional storage and started his preparation for Shang Yang''s food. The meat was stripped bare, cleaned before immediately working on mixing the ingredients he needed for the braising. He took out a wine bottle and smiled at Shang Yang "Thought I wouldn''t have one of these did you?" He continued his work on the mixture before placing the pork chops into the mixture and placed it into the oven powered by Qi stones. Shi Die looked slightly nervous, "Sir, are you sure you want to cook foods with alcoholic content?"The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. Jin Yuan waved his hands at Shi Die''s concerns. "Consuming foods with alcoholic content won''t make you drunk so it''s fine. Also, your request is something I''ve never even heard of so I don''t know how to make it. Mind telling me the method of how you make this Bak Kut Teh you spoke of?" Shi Die smiled before telling him the instructions on how to cook the several dishes of Bak Kut Teh. He knew that he had managed to win the competition that Jin Yuan had set for them. Jin Yuan was listening intently to the instructions of how to make Bak Kut Teh and was actually surprised in the many steps and different dishes that combine together to make Bak Kut Teh actually taste good. He continued to listen so that he could learn more about this interesting dish. After the instructions were given, Jin Yuan tried his best to prepare the food for the three boys. He placed the clay pots onto the tables and asked them to start eating. "By the way, none of these foods are Qi infused. This is because I want you to see the difference between a well-cooked meal without any Qi infused into them to a meal which solely consists of fine cooking and Qi infusion. You may begin eating." Shang Yang savoured the taste of the pork chops and she knew that she had lost this round. Not only did he know how to cook such an obscure dish in the region, he also had the wine to cook it in the first place. She knew that her father had paid quite a bit of money to get a single bottle of that wine when he visited that small secluded city in the mountains once. "Hmmph, you''ve won this time old man. I didn''t that you''d have visited such an obscure place." Shang Yang admitted her defeat. "I wouldn''t have thought a young girl like you would''ve even known about the wine or the dish. Do you come from that secluded city? I don''t see many children of this age travelling around too much because they spend that time to cultivate." Jin Yuan asked intrigued. "My father brought me to all sorts of places from when I was 7 years old. I can cultivate pretty quickly so I can keep up with most of my peers. It also helps that not spending my entire time training didn''t make it a boresome thing for me. If I trained all the time like these boys over here do, then I''d probably collapse from exhaustion and boredom. I really dislike monotonous activities but I still do them in order to improve." Jin Yuan nodded. "A good mindset." He looked at the boys eating his first trial at the food they had asked for. "You should try to at least adopt some of her mindset. Take some time to relax and enjoy life. Cultivation shouldn''t be the only thing on your mind until you''ve become a boring old man. By the way, how''s the taste? I wasn''t quite sure of the way to blend some of the herbs and spices into the soup but I''ve tried my best." Shi Die nodded his head. "I''ve never actually tried it before either but it''s definitely good. I only learned about this dish from reading some of the obscure books that Ye Xiu had." Jin Yuan looked at Ye Xiu with curiosity. "May I borrow these obscure cooking books of yours? It might give me the motivation to ascend past the third rank of Spirit Cooks. I get lots of motivation from trying and making new foods. It gives me a reason to improve." Ye Xiu thought for a moment. "I''ll lend them to you in exchange as payment for offering us those lessons in cooking. Though I''m not sure how much those books would be able to help you." Ye Xiu was thinking of the books. ''I''m very sure that the books that Shi Die took were on just normal food cooking methods that were in the library. I haven''t seen him take or read anything on the Spirit Cooking section.'' Jin Yuan shook his head. "No that''ll be enough, for me learning about new foods is definitely worth the price of me teaching the four of you my skills. It''ll be even better if I managed to break through with these books. I also won''t renege on my deal if at least one of you have the potential for Spirit Cooking." They quickly finished their meal and helped clean up their bowls that they had eaten with. Jin Yuan went back to cooking for the other students. The group were just lounging around in the private eating area waiting and talking to each other when a person came in and tried to shoo them out. "What are students doing in here? Get out this is a private area for people invited inside. I don''t know how you managed to get in here but you aren''t allowed here." Shang Yang narrowed her eyes at the person trying to rudely force them out of the room. "Excuse me, we were invited into the room by a teacher who goes by the name of Jin Yuan. What right do you have to force us out of the room? For all we know, you aren''t even authorised to come in here either." The man looked at Shang Yang with a disgusted face. "I''m sorry, I''m a Spirit Cook of the first rank hired by the academy. I probably have more qualifications than you to be in this room. I sincerely doubt that you would personally know the highest ranking Spirit Cook in the academy. If you are so bad at lying then don''t try to lie in the first place!" The offended look on Shang Yang was funny to the three boys. "You think being a first rank Spirit Cook means you can be all high and mighty? Well, sorry to burst your bubble mister. I''m a rank two alchemist with my friend right here. We outrank you! You can''t pull rank on us if we have a higher rank than you." She flashed her Alchemist badge at the guy''s face before continuing her tirade. "If you wanted us to move from the room then you''d have been much more polite and given us a clear reason to why we should leave. I gave you a reason for why we were in here and you should''ve investigated it from there. You could''ve gone to find Jin Yuan to confirm that we are indeed people that have or haven''t been allowed access to the room." As she finished her verbal assault, Jin Yuan popped his head around the corner of the door to see what was going on. "What''s with all the shouting. I could hear you guys from outside. Keep it down." He narrowed his eyes when he spotted the man. "What did I tell you about being here Jin Tian? Are you trying to flaunt your position again? Just because you''re my nephew doesn''t mean you can just abuse that position." "Get out of the room and don''t taunt my students again. If I catch you, I''ll have you do menial labour for the whole year." The man left the room quickly after Jin Yuan''s scolding and Jin Yuan sat down on one of the chairs. Lesson "I''m sorry you had to see my nephew like that. He''s usually not such a bad kid but he''s been hanging out with the wrong crowd. I didn''t have enough time to correct his ways before I came to the academy. He''s been in the academy for the past two years and it''s been getting worse. Enough of that though, I shouldn''t unload my worries onto the children. Shall we go over the basics of cooking?" Jin Yuan stood up from his chair and gestured for them to follow him to his private kitchen. "My private kitchen doesn''t let anybody inside unless I authorise them. The only person that you could possibly see is my nephew if I allow him access to it to get something. I''m trusting you kids to not trash my entire kitchen. It''s expensive and I have a lot of valuable ingredients that I store here for usage." He showed them around the room and which things went where. "This is where we will be holding most of our lessons. Remember where it is now?" The four nodded at his question. "Good, now look here. The basics of my cooking style revolve around simplicity. No flashy movements, no extraneous movements, none at all. This is why I''m willing to teach the four of you cooking. It''s fast and no time is wasted." "I''ll bring my nephew over to help with the lessons. I want you kids to get along with him despite how badly the first meeting went. He has a good grasp on the basics and his own style was built on that foundation. I want you all to treat each other with respect in the kitchen because that''s how we work. We respect each other to get the work done and to satisfy the people that eat our food." The kids nodded in affirmation to acknowledge the fact that they understood what Jin Yuan had asked of them. "My style of cooking doesn''t need you to learn much. It requires you to be able to follow the instructions. It requires you to at least know the basics of every single cooking method. With that, it''s basically easy to cook. You wonder how I manage to get the food to become delicious? That comes with experience." "You take a look at the recipe and you use herbs and spices to accordingly season it. It''s just that simple. Do you kids get it?" He pointed his kitchen knife at them. The four nodded their understanding. Jin Yuan continued his explanations, "The important things I''ll get you kids to learn are the basics, ingredients and how they are or can be prepared, and different herbs and spices. Each and every single of these will eventually lead to you being able to cook well." He whispered very quietly so that none of them could hear, "Unless you are so hopeless to the point that everything in your hands becomes a disaster." He clapped his hands together. "So the first lesson of cooking we''ll be having... is to train your basics up to notch. I want you people to be able to recognise common ingredients and the way to prepare them. There are multiple ways to prepare an ingredient and it would be best to know each of them to be able to become a good cook." The next 3 hours went by quickly as Jin Yuan demonstrated and corrected the four''s cooking skills. He was immensely pleased with Shi Die''s fast learning speed. He managed to complete most of the exercises that he had set for them with extreme ease. He had Shi Die help the others so that the lesson could go faster. At the end of the day''s lesson, the four walked out of the private kitchen room with various expressions. Jin Yuan had given them each a book on herbs and spices and told them to memorise them well. Shi Die and Ye Xiu were immensely proud of the progress they made whilst Xiao Tu had a bored expression on his face. He found cooking to be boring for him and wanted nothing more than to just go out and train. Shang Yang was completely devastated and was muttering to herself. "How, how, how? How am I not able to cook well?" Xiao Tu noticed her muttering so he went over to her. "Hey, you okay? It doesn''t matter if you can''t cook. Shi Die and Ye Xiu can be the ones cooking for everyone in the future." Shang Yang looked up at Xiao Tu with crazed eyes. "I must be able to cook my own food. I''ll never survive by myself." Xiao Tu started snickering but quickly stopped when he realised that Shang Yang was being serious. "You know what they all say, practice makes perfect. So I''m sure with more practice in cooking you''ll get better. Not everyone who is good at cooking started out as a good cook. They also had to practice to get to where they are you know? It''s the same principle for cultivation." Shang Yang had a hopeful expression. "I hope you''re right."You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. Ye Xiu and Shi Die were discussing the cooking methods they had learnt with each other when they realised they had forgotten to buy food for their training session later. "Do you want to go back to get the food?" Ye Xiu asked. "I''ll get the food this time, you shouldn''t be the one to always get the food. I also want to choose the food that we eat this time. It''d be nice to have a different flavour of food than the usual one we eat." Shi Die made his way back to the mess hall to get the food for them. He quickly picked the different foods that he had wanted to try last time and went back to their dorm. They were about to go into meditation. Ye Xiu had pounded the fact that meditation would be more beneficial for them in the past few days especially after they had gained access to the Locket Dimension. He had placed all the food into Ye Xiu''s dimensional storage that had been given to him so he could carry the food and handed it back to Ye Xiu. "What''s on our agenda today?" He asked. "We''ll be meditating for a few hours before heading into the Dimension. Ye Xiu and I have bought quite a few herbs and plants for us to plant in the yard for our alchemy." Shang Yang answered. His ears perked up in interest. "I want to ask, would it possible for me to use at least one plot of land so that I can grow ingredients for cooking? You never know when it might come in handy." Ye Xiu thought for a moment before nodding. "Yeah, it''s definitely fine, I would''ve eventually done that myself but I guess you want to do it? We have a lot of space for growing things so there''s absolutely no problem with how much you actually want to grow. The only problem would be how you would harvest it all by yourself." "I''ll do the harvesting and planting by myself. It''ll help me ensure the ingredients quality and it''ll also help me practice my skills if I do become a Spirit Cook in the future." Ye Xiu nodded before looking at Shang Yang. "Did you really have to mention our rank to Jin Yuan''s nephew? I know you were angry for his rudeness but you could''ve just mentioned your own rank instead of mine. I still want to keep a low profile in the academy. Though that''s ironic seeing how we were seen conversing with the top rank Spirit Cook in the academy but still there was no reason for you to flaunt it like he did." She rolled her eyes. "I''m sorry. I didn''t mean to do that, it was a spur of the moment thing. Would you forgive me?" Ye Xiu sighed. "What''s done is done. Let''s start meditating now. No point in wasting any more time on pointless chatter." The group went to their separate beds and started to meditate away from each other. Ye Xiu was prodding the numerous spheres of elemental Qi that he could spot towards each other. He wanted to see if he could do anything with the Qi that he saw during meditation. It didn''t go as well as he had thought it would. The green spheres which were of the wood affinity immediately disappeared when they were in contact with the red spheres. The red spheres increased in size whenever he did this. He had deduced that the spheres acted the same way as the typical Chinese element chart. Wood would feed fire and fire would feed earth. He found it weird that fire would feed the earth but then when he thought of it logically, it made sense. Fire burnt things and after they were burnt it left the soil much more fertile than it was before. Knowing that he had at least sated one of his curiosities, he decided to focus on utilising his cultivation technique. He was on the verge of breaking through for both his cultivation techniques and wanted to push through that last bottleneck. The dragon and phoenix technique were ready for the second stage but the bottleneck just wouldn''t budge. He kept on pushing and pushing for the rest of his meditation session before waking up after three hours had passed. He decided to wake up his friends and pull them into the Dimension. "Shang Yang and I will go over to the fields to get some planting done. Don''t wreck anything as usual otherwise, I''ll come for your head." Ye Xiu and Shang Yang headed over to plant the herbs and plants that she had gotten over the past few days by sneaking outside. Shi Die looked at Xiao Tu. "Do you want to just cultivate? I have too much energy from the cooking lesson so I want to release that energy and it''s either cultivating or sparring? Do you want to come with?" Xiao Tu thought for a moment. "I''ll join you in a few minutes. I want to pick up a book from the library and test it out during sparring. It had some cool interesting moves that fit my fighting style so I want to try it out and practice it if it goes well." Xiao Tu ran into the house to find the book that he was talking about before meeting up with Shi Die at the training yard. "Right go easy on me for awhile. I need to get used to the movements for the techniques." Shi Die moved at a much slower pace because he had borrowed Xiao Tu''s gravity accessories. He decided that if Xiao Tu was going to practice his new techniques, he might as well take the time to work on his strength and speed. He quickly got used to the slower pace and the two started sparring at a faster speed. Xiao Tu was able to land more hits than Shi Die due to his faster speed without the gravity accessories. He was trying to get into the rhythm that his fighting style required him to be in. He eventually took out his quarterstaff and started to fight at a further range. The fight became slightly more even because Shi Die was able to hit with stronger attacks and pushed the quarterstaff into awkward angles. Shang Yang and Ye Xiu were busy at the fields deciding where to plant things. They wanted it to be easier for them to harvest so they decided to put the faster-growing plants and herbs that were going to be used for alchemy on the plots of land closer to the house whilst the ones that would be left to grow on the plots of land that were further away from the house. Their day was very good considering all the gains that they had made. Exercises Weeks of cooking lessons led to Xiao Tu, Shang Yang and Ye Xiu to dropping the class. They were unable to keep up with the speed and difficulty of the lessons were at. Shi Die was keeping up easily with what Jin Yuan had to offer and Jin Yuan had eventually decided that only Shi Die was going to be capable of keeping up with his lessons in Spirit Cooking. With that, the trio left Shi Die alone in his lessons and they went back to focusing on their daily training. Jin Yuan was much more strict during the Spirit Cooking lessons compared to when he had been in the normal cooking lessons. This meant that Shi Die couldn''t afford to make any blunderous mistakes that could be counted as basic to Jin Yuan. Shi Die''s progression in Spirit Cooking was much slower due to the caution he had placed on his work. Every time he managed to finish something, Jin Yuan had examined it with a close eye. If it wasn''t up to a certain standard, he''d dismiss it and ask him to start again. It was harsh and difficult but Shi Die knew that if he truly wanted to help out his friends in the future, he''d have to put in the same amount of effort as he did during training. Shi Die was fascinated with how Spirit Cooking worked and wanted to ask Shang Yang and Ye Xiu multiple questions due to some of the similarities in the occupation that they had chosen. He had decided that he would ask them after today''s lesson which Jin Yuan would cover the basic Qi control exercises that he needed to learn. He was in the private kitchen, waiting for Jin Yuan to start the day''s lesson. He was patient because he knew that Jin Yuan still had to cook for the students and sometimes he had to cook for longer due to whatever hunger pangs those students faced. Jin Yuan couldn''t just leave the kitchen because he still had to keep an eye on the cooks to make sure nothing went wrong. The academy didn''t want to offend the many families that had their children enrolled in the academy. Just because the academy was considered as a very strong academy, in actual fact, it didn''t have that much reliable manpower. Most of the teachers were associates or friends to the numerous clans that mingled within the academy. Which meant if an actual fight broke out, the academy would lose pretty much instantly due to internal strife. Jin Yuan took over an hour before he appeared. Jin Yuan had made their lessons become five-hour lessons but most of the time they were shortened to three to four hours due to Jin Yuan''s work. Jin Yuan walked into the private kitchen at a brisk pace. He ordered Shi Die to come to the front table so that he could directly show him how he trained in his Qi control. "You see here, Spirit Cooking relies on Qi control as well. That also means that we have to practice these exercises so that we can have our control at it''s best. We use the same exercises as those that practice the Medical arts and Alchemy. They may say that others don''t rely on Qi control as much as they do but that''s a lie." "Many disciplines rely on Qi control, exercises may differ from different disciplines but ours don''t. We follow the same exercises that those who practice Alchemy and Medical arts because the original founder of Spirit Cooking was actually a person who was a master in the Medical Arts." "This master had wanted to find out if there were ways to improve a person''s health or to speed up a person''s cultivation based on the food and beverages that they consumed. Through this, many experiments were conducted to eventually lead to where we were now. He built it on the foundation of infusing Qi into a live body from the Medical arts and eventually managed to infuse it into an object that was dead for an indefinite amount of time." "From there, he tried to experiment on different effects that the infusion could create and over several years, he became famous and the ways of his methods of cooking started to spread. If you have trouble with these exercises, I''d suggest you go ask your two friends, Shang Yang and Ye Xiu. I know that the two of them are decent alchemists and the level of control you need for it is much higher than Spirit cooking." Jin Yuan started demonstrating the basic techniques for what he was going to start his control on. After the demonstration, he told Shi Die to go back because the lesson was finished. "Sorry for the inconvenience but there''s a meeting today that I have to attend." Shi Die nodded and left the kitchen. He went to the mess hall to go get the food for the group''s training later. Shi Die was busy trying to figure out how Jin Yuan had managed to do the exercise. Jin Yuan seemed to be in a hurry today so he didn''t show the technique or explain the exercise well enough for him to understand. Shi Die was the one to get the food on those days because he was much closer to the mess hall than they were. Life didn''t change much for them besides the fact that more teachers in the academy were now getting interested in several students. Teachers usually waited for weeks to pass in the academy when it first starts out so they can see the potential in the students.Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. The scouting process was unknown to many of the new students but those that had knowledge of it already were the ones who trained much harder and strived to perform at their best in every lesson that they attended. Obviously, the group had no idea that this was a thing in the academy and just did what they usually did. When teachers chose the students that they wished to teach, it was a very private affair. Teachers didn''t like being badgered by students so that they could be chosen. They disliked it more when they were harassed because of the student they chose. They kept who they had chosen to teach in quiet so that if they had done well under their tutelage, they could shine above their peers. This was how many of the teachers were renowned throughout the academy. They chose those of high potential and only allowed them to participate in the teacher''s name once they had reached a suitable level that the teacher had deemed appropriate. Some of the teachers had their eyes on the group who had been running around at night. They had noticed their speed of cultivation and their effort that they put. This alone attracted interest and many teachers wanted to see more of the four''s potential. Deciding to just go back to the dorm room so that he could ask Ye Xiu or Shang Yang for help on the exercise. He saw that the three of them were already meditating. He scratched his head because he didn''t know where to put the food. Deciding to just call for Ye Xiu who would probably hear him. "Ye Xiu, mind waking up? I''d like to ask a few questions and I also need to use your storage to put the food in." Ye Xiu''s eyes opened suddenly and he got up from his meditating position. He passed over his storage ring before stretching for a while. "What do you need to ask me?" He looked at Shi Die as he stretched. Shi Die was placing all the food into the storage as he answered Ye Xiu. "Jin Yuan told me that I needed to practice Qi control and that the two of you, Shang Yang and you could be asked to help me for my control. He said that the Qi control exercises for Spirit cooking were the same as the ones you practice for the Medical Arts." Ye Xiu looked at Shi Die surprised. "I didn''t think Jin Yuan knew that we were alchemists. He probably he heard it when Shang Yang was shouting at his nephew though." Ye Xiu was deep in his thoughts before snapping out of it. "Why does Spirit cooking use the same control exercises as the Medical Arts though? I know that for smithing, Xiao Tu had to practice a different type of control so it should differ for most disciplines shouldn''t it?" Shi Die nodded at Ye Xiu''s question. "Apparently, the start of Spirit cooking was started by a person who originally was a master in the Medical Arts who wanted to make food and beverages benefit cultivation and the body." "That''s very interesting." Ye Xiu clapped his hands. "Oh right, you wanted help with your Qi control? What exercises did Jin Yuan set for you to practice?" Shi Die took out pieces of paper and Ye Xiu understood the exercise because it was the first one he had practised. He started to slowly go over the sensation and how to guide the Qi in his body to come out of his finger. With Ye Xiu''s help, Shi Die managed to guide his Qi to his finger but was unable to externalise it. He was panicking thinking that it was supposed to be easy. Ye Xiu noticed and calmed him down. "It''s fine, most people don''t get it on the first try. Just imagine that you are pushing out poop but from your finger. You have to force it out. Imagine it like you are threading a needle and it finally comes through. It''s similar because the Qi thread can come out of your skin pores." After several minutes with a face that looked like he was constipated, Shi Die finally managed to push out a single thread out of his finger. He looked at Ye Xiu who smiled at him. "Good job. Now we have to practice your thread movement. I don''t want you to head straight for the exercise because it''d be more beneficial if you learnt how to control the movement of the thread first." Shi Die practised his thread movement so that it became more natural to him. Ye Xiu instructed him that instead of making it move with physical motions, he should use thoughts to move the thread. He had told him that Qi control mainly relied on the mental strength and soul strength. He tried to acclimate to the weirdness of the sensation of moving the thread with his thoughts. It felt very unnatural because he couldn''t physically feel the movement of the Qi thread and could only observe the movement. He persisted with the exercise because he really wanted to continue with Spirit Cooking. He also didn''t want to disappoint Ye Xiu because he was taking time out of his schedule to help him with the exercises. After a few hours of moving the thread around, Ye Xiu told him that he could begin piercing the thread through the paper. "I want you to pierce the paper with your thread, the holes from the thread can only be the exact diameter of the thread. If it isn''t, keep on piercing until you manage to pierce all your holes with exact precision. The others started to wake up from their meditation and noticed Shi Die poking holes onto a piece of paper. Shang Yang was intrigued. "Shi Die, are you doing Qi control exercises?" Shi Die made a mistake when he heard Shang Yang and quickly looked up. "Ah.. yeah. Jin Yuan told me that Spirit Cooking required me to have good Qi control so he decided to set me exercises to improve it. Ye Xiu helped me with the thread so I had much less trouble in starting the exercise.: "That''s good, we''ll be going into the Dimension now so you should come with." Shi Die nodded, he walked towards Ye Xiu who took ahold of their hands before entering the Dimension.Exer Recruitment The next few weeks were interesting, to say the least. More and more teachers were observing lessons which they were not a part of but was doing this to see if there were any students that had good potential for whatever the teacher wanted to teach them. The teachers didn''t bother trying to hide their presence from the students because they would eventually be able to figure out what was happening from gossip. Even the most clueless of freshmen in the academy had noticed the huge amount of teachers loitering around in their classes. Gossip spread between the students before the senior students informed them of what was actually happening. With that, many students started to put more effort into their classes. Of course, the teachers weren''t very pleased with some of them. Yes, some did have potential but only started to take things seriously when there was a benefit in for them. Some teachers didn''t mind this behaviour but it was still rude nonetheless. The teachers who had been in the academy for several years had gotten used to the sudden change of behaviour from the students so it was ignored in favour of good potential. They didn''t mind because they would be able to whip them up into shape by giving them an extremely harsh schedule to keep. The teachers mainly observed for a period of time to see the progress the students made in their training and cultivation. This would give them a decent baseline for them to compare the students on before picking a student or refraining from choosing at all. Most teachers had their eyes on the younger students. The younger students had much more ''potential'' than most of the older students but that wasn''t always the case. Like Shi Die''s benefactor had told him once, "The talent that you can see now is a lie, it all depends on you and how your choices affect your latent talent for the future." Some students had already been chosen by the teachers in the academy and had been taken into seclusion. Their friends which wanted to meet them were not even allowed access to see them which attracted a lot of ire from the freshmen but their qualms and rage were easily squashed by the senior students who calmed them down with their knowledge of the situation. Those who were taken by the teachers disappeared for several days before a few of them reappeared back in the academy. When they were asked about the training with the teacher, the only thing they could say was, "The training that they give you is insane." With that, those that thought that they could have a good time with a teacher were worried that they wouldn''t be able to cope with the harsh training that they would be forced into if they were picked. Despite knowing this, some students continued striving for the teacher''s tutelage. They believed it was their only chance for them to get stronger in a shorter period of time and it didn''t matter to them if they had to do harsh training. A few teachers had approached Ye Xiu''s group to ask them whether they wanted to be trained by them but were quickly rejected. They were able to ask their Smithing mentor whether they would be allowed to have the four of them train under him. Xing Liu Fan didn''t mind because he would be spending most of his time teaching Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu anyway. Shi Die asked for his help on body strengthening and other martial arts he could learn from him, Shang Yang was also strengthening her body so that she wouldn''t get overpowered by stronger opponents when she tries to fight them. Her style does use the opponent''s force behind them but it also relies on the fact that the people utilising the martial art are able to stop themselves from being overpowered in the first place. Unlike other teachers, Xing Liu Fan was a very laid back person. Your first thought meeting him would be that he''s a big, stern man who has no time for silliness but once you get to know him... You''d realise that he''s a hilarious person who likes to mess around. Obviously, he knew when there were times to mess around and times for him to be serious and he was a reliable person in general. He was patient in his teaching, unlike many others who were impatient when their students didn''t understand even after numerous explanations. He explained that his patience was from his own teacher who had mentored him in the ways of Smithing. When he was younger, he wasn''t able to understand most of the things explained to him even in the simplest of manners. His teacher was extremely patient with him and it helped him learn a lot more. He decided that if he ever had any students in the future, he''d teach them the same way he was taught. Xiao Tu definitely appreciated that way of thinking very much. He knew that when it came to academics he was definitely not as bright as Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu''s eidetic memory made it easy for him to absorb most of the information that was learnt quickly.This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. Even though Ye Xiu had an eidetic memory, his progress in the actual smithing skills was definitely not as fast as Xiao Tu. Xiao Tu breathed in the physical work of Smithing as if he was born for it. He mastered the skills and basics quickly as if he had done it for his entire life. Their teacher had told them it was due to his body physique. The physique gave him basically everything he needed to progress in Smithing. Liu Fan did not let Xiao Tu progress too quickly though. He had him learn the knowledge to go with his skills because not knowing enough in Smithing could cause him to have a fatal accident if he did the wrong thing. This meant that his progress was just as fast as Ye Xiu and it was balanced out. If Xiao Tu had Ye Xiu''s memory, he would''ve long progressed to become a Rank 2 Smith. This limitation didn''t bother Xiao Tu because he also enjoyed taking his time to learn more about things instead of rushing into things headstrong. Their teacher informed them if they had a body physique, the potential would slowly come out until they reached their sixteenth birthday. That was when cultivators progressed the most in their training. He had told them the chances of a person having a body physique was like finding a needle on a mountain. Not a haystack but a mountain. It basically told them that the chances for a person to have a body physique were nearly null. With that, the three kept their mouths shut about their body physiques and told nobody else about them. They were unsure if Shi Die had a body physique but they couldn''t find out because they didn''t have the necessary things to test it. Many teachers still approached the four to see if they could take them under their wing because the four were still allowed to go out in public view. Liu Fan didn''t really mind letting them out in public because nobody really would expect him to take a student under his wing. Shi Die was technically under Jin Yuan''s wing but Jin Yuan didn''t want to spend his entire time teaching Shi Die and only taught him things related to Spirit Cooking. Besides that, Shi Die never saw Jin Yuan around besides the times he went to the mess hall to get food for the group. The group had started to look through the library for things to learn. Xiao Tu was way ahead of Shang Yang and Shi Die whilst Ye Xiu had started his training for his techniques long ago. Shang Yang had started to take a shine towards throwing daggers which she could use to stab and throw at people. It also fit her fighting style because she was able to take them out for combat with ease as she fought. She started to train herself in throwing accuracy. She knew that it was possible to get flying knives but those were for people who were in the third realm of cultivation. It was also out of their price range. It didn''t matter if they were alchemists or not, the price for weapons that could fly was astronomical due to the rarity and usefulness. Her accuracy wasn''t great but she was quickly improving. She could throw the knives at a fast enough speed that Ye Xiu could barely stop them in time with his whip. Shi Die could now catch the knives with ease especially after his reflex training in the gravity rooms. Ye Xiu had been improving what he had already learnt and didn''t have the time to learn much more until everything he started learning in the first place was finished. He had just started his reflex training in the gravity rooms with Shang Yang''s dagger throwing. Shang Yang''s accuracy was greatly reduced in the gravity room and also required her to throw with much greater strength. Ye Xiu wished that his eidetic memory extended to muscle memory but he really doubted that he would''ve been lucky enough to get something like that when he was born. He found out that he was making more progress in his movement techniques when he was in the gravity room. With this finding, he reported it to his friends so that if they wanted to train in movement techniques in the future, it would be best to do it in a place with higher gravity. Shi Die was working on the least new techniques out of everyone in the group. He was learning a new style from Liu Fan but besides that, he was working on a new body cultivation technique that he had found in the library. It focused on his pure strength and speed. Xiao Tu also practised a similar body cultivation technique to Shi Die that he had found but it had him increase his flexibility in fighting as well. The training for his flexibility was painful and he wanted to get it over with even though he knew that it was going to be helpful for him. He had picked up several quarterstaff styles that could fit his defensiveness and another few that could help in being more aggressive. He knew that being defensive wasn''t going to always help him and he would need something to give him that fighting power in a duel. He practised techniques mainly for attacking instead of defence because he felt that his defence would be supported by his body cultivation technique. He also felt that he would be dodging and blocking most of the attacks flying at his face anyway, so it didn''t matter too much to him. Since he had so much to learn, however, his progress was slower than most of his friends''. Due to this, he began to drop a few of the styles so that he could focus on a select few and mastering them before moving to another. This improved his training speed for the individual styles by a huge margin. With all the improvements that the kids had gained, they had one or two ranking matches in the academy to see how the majority of the new students had fared in their training for the past few months. They were surprised that they were way above the majority but they had seen a few ranked matches of the higher ranked freshmen and they knew that they couldn''t be complacent. As the kids were in Liu Fan''s courtyard training with him overseeing them, a man stepped out of his office. "I see that someone worthy has come." The man disappeared from view and could no longer be seen. The man reappeared in front of Liu Fan''s residence, looked at it for a few seconds before vanishing once more. Strange man The next days were a blur for Ye Xiu. He had finally managed to craft several Rank 3 elixirs and he was happy that he had progressed to such a point in a short amount of time. Shang Yang was still unable to produce any elixirs but was extremely confident in making different Rank 3 pills. Ye Xiu could also do the same and wanted to have more experience in crafting elixirs so he had that certainty about passing the Rank 3 Alchemist examination. He was currently in his Dimension with the others eating. They were discussing the average level of students that they had seen from the ranked matches. They were talking about the stronger opponents'' fighting styles and how it would be possible for them to counter it. Ideas flew at each other and most of them wanted to test their theories but they didn''t have a suitable opponent. They were about to leave the Dimension when Ye Xiu stopped them. "I want to talk to you guys about something." Xiao Tu looked back at Ye Xiu. "What do you need to tell us? Do it quickly, we need to get to the gravity rooms for training." Shang Yang rolled her eyes at him. "There''s no need to rush. We have plenty of time. Not many people are going to the gravity room so why should we rush? If you are that crazy about training then I''ll make sure you stop before you hurt yourself from overworking." Ye Xiu cleared his throat to get his friends'' attention. "I want you guys to know that I''ll be spending more time on Alchemy for the next few days. I think it''s possible for me to take the ranking examination in a week''s time so I want to be as best prepared I can possibly be." Shi Die nodded his assent. "I don''t mind, if it''s something you love then you should always take some time out for it." The others agreed with what Shi Die had said. Ye Xiu looked at them before smiling. "Thanks, I can still help with training for today but after that, I''ll be doing my own things." Ye Xiu was happy that his friends understood that he wanted to do something else besides training. With that, they left the Dimension to get to the gravity rooms. As they ran towards the building, they never noticed a shadowy figure following them in the darkness. The figure followed behind them until they reached the building before it disappeared. The group had no idea that anybody had been following them and continued their conversations as they entered the building. Once they had entered the building, the shadowy figure appeared once more at the entrance. "Such a late time at night for children to be training. The worthy one might is intriguing, he has potential and talent whilst training more than his peers. I hope he manages to impress me... otherwise, I don''t have any hope of passing my family''s art to anybody else." The figure vanished on the spot, leaving no traces of where he had been. Inside the gravity room, Xiao Tu and Ye Xiu were sparring. As they sparred, Xiao Tu started pestering Ye Xiu with questions that he didn''t understand because he knew that he wouldn''t have the chance to ask him in a few days. This meant that he was taking the opportunity to pester him. Besides his normal cultivation questions, he also barraged him with questions on whether he would be safe alone without anybody around him and talked about his safety. Ye Xiu''s eyebrows were twitching violently at this point because the spar was supposed to be a quiet affair. "Please stop the questions... I''ll be completely fine. I''ll be in the dormitory room practising Alchemy. I sincerely doubt that any teachers would be barging into the room to look for me. I haven''t done anything to make myself stand out so there shouldn''t be a reason in the first place." Xiao Tu attacked Ye Xiu but had a worried look on his face. "I don''t want you to be left alone though. You don''t know what might happen. I think I should stay with you when you are practising alchemy." Ye Xiu was fed up. "I''ll take Shang Yang with me. I can help her with Alchemy at the same time so I don''t think she''ll have any qualms about it. That way I won''t be alone and your worries should be unfounded then." His irritation could be heard in his voice and was reflected in his more aggressive attacks. Shang Yang stopped her throwing and walked over to the two boys with a questioning look on her face. "I heard my name being mentioned. What are you guys talking about to warrant my name needing to be mentioned?" Ye Xiu pointed at Xiao Tu with haste. "Xiao Tu''s been bothering me about my safety when I''m no longer a child. I can protect myself! I won''t be caught off-guard if I''m in the dormitory room but he has been saying that it won''t be enough. I decided that if there was going to be anyone with me, it''d be you because I can help you with your Alchemy at the same time. Two birds one stone. It should stop him from worrying too much."Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author''s preferred platform and support their work! Xiao Tu dodged Ye Xiu''s aggressive attacks and replied. "If you are sure she can keep you safe then I''ll be fine with it! Just don''t do anything stupid without supervision." With that decided, Xiao Tu and Ye Xiu placed their focus back on the fight and attacked each other. They were reaching the point where their fighting ability underneath 3x gravity was reaching its peak and they were going to be increasing the gravity to 5x the gravity soon. They continued training in peace for the rest of the training session. As they were leaving the gravity room, a man stood in front of the entrance of the building. The man looked up from where he was staring before and called out to the group. "Hello! I''d like to speak with one of you privately." The group was wary once again because they didn''t think that anybody would be waiting for them out here at such an early time in the morning. Ye Xiu took charge of talking to the man. "Anything you can say to one of us privately can be told to the rest of us. None of us has any secrets that we keep from each other and we don''t spread secrets or rumours anyway." The man hesitated before nodding at what Ye Xiu said. "If that''s your decision then that''s fine with me. I''d like to ask if you want to train with me. I wish to pass down my family arts to you specifically because you have the potential that I seek. Your body is perfect for the family arts I practice." Ye Xiu was confused. He never told anybody that he had a body physique outside of his mentors and friends so he sincerely doubted anybody would''ve been able to get information on him without him knowing. He trusted his friends and mentors well enough to not spread something like this because everybody had agreed to keep it a secret. Ye Xiu denied the man with confidence. "I don''t know what you''re talking about. As far as I''m concerned my body is an average one. I think you have the wrong-" Ye Xiu was cut off from finishing his sentence. "I''m not wrong. I can sense the blood of the dragons inside you. I can only sense a miniscule amount of it but you are the only other person that I''ve met with dragon''s blood inside them. I''ve been searching for many years for one that can inherit my family''s art and now I have finally found you." Ye Xiu was still wary of the man. "If you said it was a family art then don''t you have any relatives or descendants for you to pass that family art to? " The man''s face was solemn. "My entire family was slaughtered because our enemies believed that the art we were practising must''ve been a very powerful art. They were correct, but the only people who can even begin training with the art are those who hold a dragon''s bloodline." Ye Xiu was alarmed when he said that he could sense a dragon''s bloodline inside of his body. "How were you able to identify me for having a dragon''s bloodline?" The man was surprised with Ye Xiu''s question. "All families that hold a bloodline have a technique for sensing those that hold a similar bloodline to theirs. This allows us to keep the bloodline relatively pure and allow us to hand down our family arts to those that do hold the bloodline. If we didn''t have this ability our bloodlines would''ve long been diluted and eventually vanish." Ye Xiu was slowly letting down his guard and was interested with what the man had to say. "So your offer to teach me your family art was genuine? Are you a teacher at the academy because I won''t be allowed to exit the grounds until I''m of a higher rank. If you are a teacher then I wouldn''t mind going with you." As he said that, Xiao Tu frowned at the statement. "Ye Xiu, you can''t just go with a random stranger! You don''t even know if he''s telling the truth!" The man took out a badge from his pocket and handed it over to them. "I am a teacher at the academy so you don''t have to worry about wandering out of the academy grounds. If you don''t trust me then it''s fine but it''s not your choice. It''s your friend''s choice on whether he wants to learn from me or not. You can''t restrict him because he has free will." Ye Xiu was thinking to himself. ''If he knows a technique that relies on a dragon''s bloodline then it''ll be good for me. As far as I was concerned, no techniques from master''s cultivation technique relied on the dragon''s bloodline so far. It''s possible that there will be such a technique in the future but that''ll be really far away considering master''s strength. It might be best for me to learn a bloodline technique if it''s useful. It could possibly help me in the future.'' Ye Xiu looked at Xiao Tu before taking in deep breaths. "I''d like to learn under you. If it means that I have to leave my friends for a period of time, I''ll do it. I''ll get stronger to protect them and so that they don''t have to worry about me." The man looked shocked but quickly shook his head. "You don''t have to worry about leaving your friends, our training is nothing secret after all. The only people who can use the family art are those with a bloodline so even if they witnessed the training from start to end, they''d be unable to do anything with that knowledge anyway." "in fact, you can bring all your friends, I might as well teach them something so that it''s fair. You all seem like bright and talented kids who put in a lot of effort into training. This should mean that I won''t be disappointed. However, if I notice anyone slacking off during my training sessions, I''ll make sure you suffer for it and that will ensure that you''ll never slack off in those training sessions again." The man smiled sadistically. Shi Die cleared his throat and broke through the awkward atmosphere. "Excuse me, sir... you haven''t introduced yourself to us." The man rubbed his head in embarrassment. "Right, where are my manners. My name is San Guo. If all of you accept my offer of training, I''ll be expecting to be called Sir and nothing else. Is that clear?" The kids shouted. "Yes Sir!" San Guo gestured for them to follow him back into the gravity room. San Guo They followed San Guo back into the gravity building, wondering what they were going to go back there. They had only just come out of the gravity room so they were relatively tired and wanted to take a break but none voiced their concerns about their fatigue. San Guo looked back at the group which was following him and only noticed their fatigued faces. Noticing that, he decided to change up what he was planning to do with them immediately and give them some brief respite before beginning whatever he had planned for them originally. He started to walk up the stairs of the gravity building and the group was surprised because nobody else was allowed up there. Shang Yang was about to tell San Guo that they weren''t allowed to be up here but refrained herself from doing so because if he was a teacher, then he''d probably be allowed into most places in the academy. San Guo ascended the stairs until they reached the second floor. It was a vast and spacious place with only ten doors which led to different rooms. He gestured for them to follow him into the furthest room that could be seen on the floor and made them settle down. "We''ll be training here for the majority of the time. You won''t have to worry about anybody trying to kick you out of the room because nobody else is allowed in here. I know all of you are tired so I won''t force any of you to do anything strenuous for the time being, instead, I''ll have the four of you meditate in here." Shang Yang was brave enough to ask him a question. "Sir, why are we meditating in here when we can meditate in other places?" San Guo looked at Shang Yang with satisfaction. "You remembered to call me Sir, that''s good. The reason why I want you to meditate is here is because during your meditation I want you to try and move your Qi around your body." San Guo stopped for a moment before his face showed his curiosity. "You''ve been training in the gravity rooms for quite some time, have you guys not noticed what happens to your Qi in here?" Ye Xiu was confused. "No, is there something special about our Qi in the gravity room?" San Guo shook his head in despair. "That''s so much training you could''ve gotten done with your Qi lost. Oh well, we can make up for the lost time anyway. The gravity room basically slows down the speed you are able to circulate your Qi if you aren''t used to it. Your bodies may have gotten used to the gravity but the Qi inside you definitely hasn''t. I think the reason why you kids never noticed was that you were mainly using your bodies to physically fight instead of using your Qi for techniques or whatnot." "If you meditated in here, you would''ve noticed it immediately so I''m surprised that you kids didn''t." Xiao Tu spoke up. "Sir, we are not tired when we are training and we only meditate after our training sessions for the biggest gains that way. It also helps us rest that way." "That I understand, but did you never think that the gravity room might help you in more aspects than just your physical body? Oh, whatever! It''s time you meditated in here now instead of elsewhere. It''ll at least help you develop your Qi control to higher levels." Ye Xiu spoke up again. "Sir, all of us have training in Qi control. How much do you think the gravity room would help us in that respect especially because I have near perfect Qi control." San Guo was stumped to hear that all four of them had already begun training their Qi control. "Well, for those who are still learning to control their Qi, will learn to control it much faster here so it''ll help them anyway. For you... well it''ll help you get used to the speed of your Qi and the way it affects your Qi control in here. Gravity does affect your Qi control so I wouldn''t be surprised if your Qi control was lacking in here more than outside." "You''ll see what I mean when the four of you start to meditate. When you do start to meditate, just utilise your cultivation technique as usual and you''ll notice that it''s much slower. Don''t worry, you''ll get more gains from it once you eventually manage to push your cultivation technique''s speed back to normal when you get used to circulating your Qi around your body. By the way, what was the gravity multiplier you guys are training at now? I don''t want to go too high by mistake." Shi Die answered for them as they were all getting settled down on the ground. "We just changed the gravity multiplier to five times the normal gravity. We haven''t been using that gravity multiplier for long. We''ve only just changed it today so we aren''t too used to it." San Guo nodded his head. "Well, that''s fine. Meditating now would help you get used to the gravity just like training in the room does. Ok, get to it, don''t waste time dawdling and start meditating. I''ll wake you all up once I feel you are all rested enough. Once you are rested enough I''ll have you display your individual fighting styles one by one so I can think of a plan for each and every one of you." San Guo ordered them to slip into meditation so that they could test out what he had said for themselves. If they truly wanted to see all the benefits, they would have to experience it for themselves instead of hearing it from him. It''ll give them more experience for things that pop up in the future. If a place has any weird effects or benefits, the kids would be able to notice it and take advantage or be cautious of it.If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. Ye Xiu was the first one to sleep into meditation and started circulating his Phoenix technique his body. He used his observation technique to see what was happening in the body. He might be able to feel the Qi but it was best for him to be able to see the Qi and see what was actually happening. He noticed that his Qi was definitely moving at a much slower pace even though he pushed it with a huge amount of effort. He noticed that even though his Qi was moving at a much slower pace, his Qi density was much higher than he thought. The volume of the Qi he could move at one time was increased underneath the high gravity environment. He could see that San Guo was telling the truth that if he managed to have his Qi move as fast as it did in a place with normal gravity, then his cultivation speed would rise by multitudes. With this in mind, he started to concentrate on making his Qi move faster. It was much harder to force the higher density Qi in his body to move around because of the gravity slowing it down. Ye Xiu utilised his lucid meditation technique so that he could discretely practise his Qi control. He never told anybody that it was possible to practise Qi control whilst meditating because it didn''t rely on physical movements. For the past few years, Ye Xiu had been practising his multi-tasking. He was able to split his attention for two things and be able to do it equally well. He was hoping that someday, he would be able to multi-task with three things at the same time. He knew that it had made his speed of improvement much faster than his peers in Qi control because he was able to sense the changes in his body whilst trying to practice his Qi control at the same time. It also helped him with Alchemy because he had to pay attention to multiple things at the same time so that nothing would go wrong. Shang Yang''s main problem was not being able to split her attention but Ye Xiu never offered his help on the conscious splitting method. He felt that if he wanted to at least beat his friends in something, he might as keep some things secret. He never spoke of things that he knew such as his own reincarnation because he was scared of alienation and he was also scared that he would be targeted for that reason. Ye Xiu wanted to forget what happened in his previous life but still use the knowledge that he had in his previous to his own advantage. Ye Xiu''s multi-tasking technique was one that not many people knew until higher levels of cultivation. This was because it took years if not decades of practice to use it efficiently. Ye Xiu had only managed to do this because his mental strength was strong enough for him to focus on different things. Mental strength not only affected his comprehension speed but also the amount of brain potential he could tap into. He knew that in the future it would be possible for his mental strength to allow him to multi-task with much more ease. This meant that he was trying his hardest with his normal computing strength to allow him to get to the peak of multi-tasking with using his mental strength as a supplement. San Guo nudged all four of the meditating children with a wooden stick that he had gotten out of his dimensional storage. "Wakey wakey. It''s time for show and tell session." Ye Xiu dodged San Guo''s whack because he was aware of his surroundings. This surprised and pleased San Guo with his action. He waited for everybody to get up and loosen their body before speaking again. "Ye Xiu, you managed to dodge my whack when I tried to wake you up. When did you learn to be aware of your surroundings during meditation?" Ye Xiu thought back to when he was first able to stay aware of his surroundings after practising the technique. "It''s probably been a year at the very least since I''ve been able to do it. I felt that it would be much wiser for me to be alert to my surroundings." He refrained from mentioning that the technique was also learnt so that he could be allowed to multi-task on things such as Qi control. He had a dream that one day he''d be able to practise alchemy whilst in deep meditation. His multi-tasking skills weren''t up to scratch for him to be able to achieve that because he needed to do multiple things with his Qi threads in order to do it. It would also be hard for him to be able to use his ''Graceful Fingers'' technique but he believed that if he learnt another technique that didn''t require physical movement, that he''d be able to achieve what he was dreaming of. He was planning to search for such a technique in the library later. He had only recently thought of the idea as he was planning his retreat for his few days of alchemy practice. With that in mind, he decided to tell San Guo about that little session he had planned. San Guo started nodding. "Very good." He looked at the other three. "Do you three not know how to do this? It may very well save your life one day if you learn how to do it. I''ll teach the three of you the technique to staying alert if you don''t know it. I''ll have Ye Xiu practising something else whilst you are at it." Ye Xiu spoke up after he finished. "Sir, I have a week-long session for me to practise alchemy already planned... they could use that time to learn the technique whilst I''m in my sessions. Instead of taking Shang Yang with me, I''ll just improve on my alchemical skills by myself. Xiao Tu was about to protest before San Guo stopped his protests by speaking before he did. "Is that so? That''s fine. You can practise your alchemy in my office so that I can keep an eye on you there so that I can make sure that you aren''t slacking off." Ye Xiu bowed before thanking San Guo. "Thank you, Sir." San Guo looked back at the other three. "Answer my question! Can you or can you not do what Ye Xiu has done?" The three shook their heads to San Guo''s question. San Guo sighed and rubbed his face, "I want you three to tell me what you know and I''ll polish up the basics and the foundations. I''m not having any student of mine not being able to know fundamental lifesaving techniques." He pointed at Shang Yang. "You''ll be the first one to show me your skills and techniques and you can tell me what you know. I hope you don''t disappoint me. I chose you because you looked like the least hardworking person in the group." "Go on then." He gestured for her to begin. Show and Tell Part 1 Shang Yang stepped up in front of San Guo and everyone else so that she could show him what she knew. She took out her daggers before throwing them at San Guo with all her might. The daggers were quickly blocked by San Guo with his wooden stick. "At least you''ve got accuracy and strength behind those dagger throws. Most of those daggers were aiming at sure-kill spots on the body." San Guo threw the daggers back at Shang Yang who caught them with ease. She had been training her reflexes for just as long as Shi Die had because she was the only other person who used her body as her main weapon of combat. With the daggers back in her hand, she slipped the extras back into several sheaths hidden on her body before using two daggers that she held and charged at San Guo. She had no specific fighting style for her dagger usage but she focused on the basics of stabbing and slashing parts of the body that she knew would cause huge amounts of damage if it hit. Even though she was charging at San Guo and was attacking him with a flurry of attacks, it looked like a dance instead of a fight. Her hands and body were moving in a graceful manner instead of the stiff movements of those who used daggers to stab with no regard. San Guo didn''t seem too interested with Shang Yang attacking him and blocked the attacks with disinterest. After ten seconds of assault, Shang Yang backed off before putting her daggers back into their sheaths. San Guo raised an eyebrow at her, "Is that all you have to show? I''d be worried about your friends if this is all you can do. They trust you to protect them but I wouldn''t trust you because of your low skill. Show me more or you''ll be a lost cause to me!" Shang Yang took a few seconds to breathe in deeply and calmed herself down to make sure that San Guo''s taunts didn''t affect her. Instead of going towards San Guo this time, she beckoned him to attack her this time. San Guo saw her gesturing for him to attack her. Taking his time, he leisurely strolled over to Shang Yang with his stick. Once he was in striking range, he struck with a slow yet powerful strike to see if she would let her guard down if he struck like that. Shang Yang didn''t disappoint him this time and kept her guard up. She dodged the strike by moving to the side before grasping the stick and pulling it towards her. With the pulling motion and San Guo''s actions of not taking the battle seriously forced him to get pulled by the motion as well. San Guo was pulled into Shang Yang''s range who immediately shot out a quick palm strike to his stomach. San Guo blocked it with his leg and flipped backwards to get out of her range and watched her. He could feel a slight pain in the thigh which he had used to block her attack. Ignoring the pain, he went back to attacking Shang Yang. Shang Yang made multiple jabbing motions with her fingers towards several parts of his body. Most of the attacks missed or blocked but the few that hit him slowed down his movements. San Guo examined his injuries curiously. "Your attacks are laced with Qi and are used to cripple my motions and inner Qi pathways. You need faster attacks to make sure your opponent can''t dodge them. If your opponent figures out what you are doing, they''ll make sure to stay as far as possible so it''s best that you have a movement technique that allows you to close distance quickly." "If your enemy knows how to remove the blocks on their Qi pathways then you should be careful. If you have a technique which allows you to observe the inner state of your opponent then use it to make sure that the opponent''s Qi pathways stay blocked otherwise they may be able to launch a surprise attack at you because you thought their pathways would stay blocked." "An experienced fighter would be able to get rid of the pathways in seconds depending on the damage to the pathways. If you manage to paralyse most of the system, then even the most experienced of fighters would be down for more than a minute trying to get rid of the paralysis. Besides that, your style is great as long as you don''t meet long-ranged opponents." "That''s what your daggers are for though. I''m not sure how you''ll manage to get your daggers back once you throw them, but we''ll come up with an idea for that in the future so that you are prepared. If you incorporate your bare-handed martial arts to your entire body and daggers, then every single attack you make would cause your opponent to get an injury. Even if they block it." Shang Yang took in his words and absorbed the information because it was extremely useful to her improving. She knew that she had some problems with her fighting style because she had started to run out of ideas to allow her to cause more damage or stop being disadvantaged by her opponents. With that being said, Shang Yang stopped her attacks on San Guo before speaking. "I have nothing else to show you but I can tell you the majority of my skills. I have relatively decent Qi control and I am a rank 2 alchemist who is close to becoming a rank 3 alchemist. I''m not as close as Ye Xiu but I''m considered as a prodigy for others my age." "I''m currently learning a movement technique that allows me to confuse my opponents whilst moving quickly. I haven''t mastered the movements yet so I was unable to use it in a combat situation lest it affects my battle potential just now. I''m also learning a technique which supports my body to become more flexible and agile. Other than that, I don''t have any other notable things that I know."If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. San Guo was nodding to her skills until she spoke the last one. He facepalmed before speaking. "I''ll just go through all the basics with all four of you. If you know any of the basics I''m teaching you, either you or all of you can skip it if you do know them so that we can move on and not waste time." The four chorused with a "Yes Sir!" San Guo pointed to Xiao Tu to demonstrate his skills next. "You''re up, Shang Yang, go on back to the rest and take a breather. Review what I''ve told you and watch the match to see what other pointers you can offer to your fellow friends and tell them what weaknesses they have. We''ll tell each other how to improve and what their weaknesses are after everyone shows their skills and techniques. I''ll also be listening to see how observant you children are." Xiao Tu walked up towards San Guo leisurely and attacked him with a fist to the gut. San Guo was caught off-guard. "I didn''t tell you to start yet!" Xiao Tu looked at him with a cheeky smile on his face. "Sir, you should always pay attention to your surroundings and opponent. If you don''t then you''ll be injured heavily and you might not be able to recover from it." San Guo''s eyebrows rose up extremely high. "If that''s how you want to play it then be my guest. Good job on the surprise attack anyway. Next time use a lethal attack if it''s an opponent that you don''t know." Xiao Tu rushed in with his legs covered in Qi before doing a roundhouse kick at San Guo. San Guo protected his hand with Qi as well and grabbed onto Xiao Tu''s leg before raising it above his head and throwing him back onto the ground. Xiao Tu managed to recover from the attack before he hit the ground and quickly released his quarterstaff from his dimensional storage. The staff acted as his support and allowed him to stop from falling any further and using that momentum, he pushed himself back towards San Guo and used his technique that he had been practising for the past few weeks. "Falcon Aerial Kick!" The kick was designed to be used in mid-air to attack the opponent with a vicious strike. The technique concentrated the Qi into a singular spot of the legs where the kick would impact the opponent and disable it for the rest of the fight. San Guo''s experience with fighting led him to always be aware of what his opponent was going to do. San Guo didn''t need to utilise an observation technique because he had nothing that would be used to disrupt the opponent''s Qi. Though he didn''t have an observation technique, he was able to feel the Qi gathered up in Xiao Tu''s leg and was able to react appropriately by guiding his Qi into the spot that Xiao Tu was going to hit. Xiao Tu''s kick struck San Guo but didn''t do any visible damage. Not even a single bruise or scratch was on the clothes of San Guo which puzzled Xiao Tu. San Guo smirked at Xiao Tu before pushing him away a couple of metres back. "Surprised by me taking absolutely no damage from your attack? There''s a technique where you can fortify your clothes with Qi to the point that it receives all the damage from an attack for you. I''ll teach the four of you the technique if you are interested in it. It comes really handy because the things you fortify such as clothes can also be made extremely sharp." The four nodded when he asked whether they wanted to learn the technique. "The technique requires doesn''t require good Qi control. It only relies on you being able to push as much Qi into the thing you are fortifying in a short period of time. Not many people know the technique because it was one I developed myself. Others have a similar ability but they only manage to have it be able to receive attacks instead of fortifying the sharpness of an object." "This allows me to use something as simple as a leaf to cut through things." He demonstrated by taking a piece of a paper from his dimensional storage before throwing it at the walls of the room. It was stuck in the wall. As he was demonstrating the technique, Xiao Tu took the chance for him to attack San Guo with his quarterstaff. He kept well out of range of San Guo so that he could retreat in time if San Guo retaliated. He used the more aggressive quarterstaff style that he had been learning to attack San Guo''s defences. San Guo blocked most of his attacks by fortifying his stick and using it as a sword. He parried most of the attacks, not going in for any of his own hits and let Xiao Tu do whatever he wanted. San Guo was mainly here to see what they knew and only attacked once in a while to test the defences of Xiao Tu. He noticed that Xiao Tu''s transition between two completely different styles was extremely smooth and was pleased with it. With such a smooth transition between styles. he''d be able to catch his opponent because he would start using a different attack pattern. Xiao Tu''s footwork was nothing special but he was able to utilise it to the best of his ability. Xiao Tu was planning to use all of his Qi in a single attack with a killing move that he had started to learn. He knew that the move would probably not even faze the teacher but decided to try it anyway. Shouting the technique''s name in his mind, Xiao Tu spun his quarterstaff at San Guo''s ribs. ''Horse Clean Sweeping!'' San Guo stumbled back several steps but otherwise, he was unfazed. Xiao Tu stopped attacking before speaking. "That was my last attack... I guess it didn''t even faze you, Sir. I''m currently on my way to become a Rank 2 Smith. I have Qi control that is decent underneath normal gravity. I learnt three quarterstaff styles to cover my weaknesses for each one and a single movement technique." "I''ve also learnt a body support technique to increase my defence and strength. Besides that... my bare-handed martial arts are probably the third best out of the group since Shi Die and Shang Yang use it as their main methods of combat. I''m more of a defensive type of fighter but I don''t mind going on the offence." San Guo nodded. "Shi Die, you''re up next." He pointed at Shi Die with his stick and Shi Die stepped forward. Show and Tell Part 2 "Shi Die, you''re up." Ye Xiu poked the daydreaming Shi Die who was lost in his own thoughts. "Huh? Oh... Is it my turn already? Sorry, I was thinking about something when I watched the fight and it inspired an idea I could possibly try out later." Shi Die apologised for his inattention to the situation. Shi Die stepped up towards San Guo and bowed in his usual manner. "I wish for a good fight." "What manners, even in a fighting situation. Be careful that you don''t do it to everyone because as you take the time to greet them, they might just use that distraction to attack you." With that, San Guo attacked Shi Die to prove his point. Luckily Shi Die had fast reflexes and was able to dodge out of the way in time. "Your reflexes are pretty good just like Shang Yang. Who has the better reflexes, you or Shang Yang?" Shang Yang answered for Shi Die who was concentrating on the fight. "His reflexes are better than mine. He has done more training for his reflexes because he has a more aggressive fighting style than I do. This means that he can react to sudden close-range attacks quickly." San Guo nodded whilst brandishing his stick and attacked Shi Die with it. "That''s good, you''ve at least thought of the things that might affect you during combat and have trained accordingly to what you have thought that might be useful to you. I expect you to keep up this mindset because it''ll help you in the future if I''m not there to provide guidance to you." Instead of dodging the attacks, Shi Die went for a brute force tactic to try and get rid of San Guo''s stick. Every time San Guo swung his stick at Shi Die he tried his best to grab onto it. San Guo noticed and kept the speed of his swing above the speed that Shi Die could react after observing him for a while. He did this to see if Shi Die would be able to predict where his swings would start or end. If he was able to do this with frequency then it''d be useful because Shi Die could use that knowledge to counter his opponent easily. It didn''t take long for Shi Die to begin to adapt to the speed he was swinging his stick at. His grasps for the stick became closer, and he eventually managed to grab onto the stick and pulled it away from San Guo. "Good job, keep this lesson in mind, everybody. If something is too fast for you to see and react to, then predict where the person is going to strike or move. Do this by watching their body and how it moves." "These little muscle movements can tell you a lot about how a person moves and how they will next react. If you manage to learn these tells, you''ll eventually have an easier time fighting a person. You won''t have to worry about what they are going to do next. The only time you''ll have to really worry is when your opponent utilises a movement technique that allows them to move in ways that you can''t tell what direction they would actually go." San Guo was dodging Shi Die''s attacks now that he no longer had his stick in hand. Shi Die stopped using his aggressive fighting style and changed to a more reserved stance. He attacked the weak spots on San Guo''s body everytime he got close. However, San Guo''s fortifying technique stopped the damage from going through. San Guo was about to tell the children the counter to fortified objects when Shi Die charged forward with a huge amount of Qi in his hand. The punch landed on San Guo''s stomach and he wheezed as he flew back several metres. "Well done! I was about to tell you the counter to my fortification technique but you managed to find a way to get past it! I commend you for thinking of a method quickly and I have to appreciate the amount of force you put into your attack to manage to push me back so many metres." San Guo dusted himself off as if he wasn''t just hit. "The counter to the fortification technique is simple; all you need to do is to do more force than the fortification technique can handle in a single hit. It''s best to apply most of the force into a single point so that it does the maximum damage. It also pierces through the object so that''s a bonus." "Most fortifications can do this but some of the much more advanced techniques are able to stop the piercing from happening and the only way for you to be able to get past is to either exhaust all of the opponent''s Qi or barrage the opponent so that they have no time to put any Qi back into the object to fortify it." San Guo pointed at Shi Die. "Do you have anything else you can show me? Or was that your final attack, similar to what Xiao Tu did? I sincerely doubt it though because Xiao Tu used multiple abilities before exhausting himself, so are you going to continue your engage or stop the fight and tell me what else you know?" Without responding, Shi Die started to get close and personal with San Guo. San Guo decided to have a close-combat fight with him now and wanted to test how good he was with his styles. He started to use his legs to hook Shi Die''s ankles to make him unbalanced, but Shi Die managed to have a firm hold on the ground. only sliding around instead of being tripped.Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. With San Guo''s tripping efforts being futile, he started to strike at joints. He was trying to see how Shi Die protected his body from attacks that would cripple him if they hit it too hard. San Guo wasn''t disappointed when Shi Die managed to block most of the attacks and the damage from the attack that had made past his guard was taken by the back. Shi Die turned so that his back took the hand knife attack since it wasn''t effective for anything else besides disabling joints. Shi Die backed off a couple of steps before bowing towards San Guo. "Thank you for the match, Sir. I have nothing else I can show you because I know that my third style is probably useless against you. If I try to go on the defensive, I''ll probably be whittled down until my stamina is gone." "I''m still improving my reflexes by training with Ye Xiu and his whip and I just started my Qi control training recently. I don''t have control anywhere close to my friends but I am improving by doing the exercises that have been set for me. I''m also learning how to be a Spirit Cook. I''ve picked up a few techniques that I''m still in the process of learning but they are going to help me with my disadvantages." San Guo nodded at the things Shi Die knew. "I can say that you''ve covered your basics at least. Your reflexes are relatively good but you need training in predicting attacks and where they will go. You''ll need a way for you to get close to long-range combatants because if I was hitting you from afar, it''ll be difficult for you to close the distance." "You might be thinking that to have fast reflexes might help with that but it''s always best to be able to close the distance because a long-ranged combatant can slowly wear you down and when you can no longer move, they''ll take the chance to take you down. I might teach you a technique that allows you to strike from a far distance but that''ll depend on how good your Qi control is." "Besides that, you have relatively good close-combat skills and you should learn more aggressive Qi techniques to push that advantage even more. Most of the people in the academy don''t physically train the body to the extent that the few of you do. They spend most of their time learning their Qi techniques and cultivating to improve the amount of Qi they have. Only those that practice both sides or the singular side of body cultivation could match you in blows." "With your strong body, you should also be able to outlast your opponents so that can always be the choice for you to take if you do want to go on the defensive. I, however, think that you should learn techniques to reduce the amount of pain dealt and felt by you. This will increase your pain tolerance and it''ll also help you prevent lasting injuries that would affect you in the fight." "Your transition between your different styles were smooth and can definitely lull the opponent into thinking that the styles you use are only one. Other than that, I''ll let the others say something at the end of the session. If they aren''t able to say anything else about what you can improve, then I''ll take over." San Guo now waited for the last person, Ye Xiu to begin the demonstration of his skills. "It''s your turn now Ye Xiu. Hopefully, you''ll be able to impress me because those with dragon''s blood inside them should be able to achieve a stronger body than those without it. Our blood helps improve our body at a much faster rate than others when you continuously push yourself to your limits." Ye Xiu was smiling wryly because he knew that his body was definitely not as strong as Xiao Tu''s or Shi Die''s which made him nervous. What San Guo had said about most academy students focusing on their techniques was ironic because he was one of them which actually did that. He had no idea that having dragon''s blood inside him would boost his body improvement at all. No books actually mentioned it to him. Ye Xiu started to hesitantly speak. "Uh... I haven''t trained my body much compared to my techniques. I didn''t know that having a dragon''s bloodline inside of me would boost the speed of improvement of my body. I''ve done the bare minimum of two hours of body training compared to the six hours that both Xiao Tu and Shi Die spends every day." San Guo was listening to Ye Xiu speak and got more and more irritated by the second. "Did you or did you not know about your bloodline from the beginning? If you did then it should''ve made sense for you to use it to your advantage from the beginning." Ye Xiu scratched his head. "I knew about it from the very beginning but I never thought it would actually help. Nobody has told me about it until now." San Guo was curious. "Are there no books that mention bloodlines? That''s really interesting because where I''m from there a lot of clans with bloodlines so it''s common knowledge that bloodlines give a certain boost to a person. For us, it''s our body strength and speed of improvement when it comes to body cultivation. I''ll forgive you but in order to make up for it, I''ll be pushing your training mainly towards body tempering and you''ll focus less on your techniques." "I might as well take this time before we begin to explain what else the bloodlines do. The purer the bloodline, the benefits become even better. Even though your bloodline is purer you have to put in just as much effort to gain the benefits in the first place because nothing comes for free in the world. People can''t tell what your blood purity for a bloodline is until you voluntarily leak your blood essence." "Never leak your blood essence. It''s dangerous and it weakens you for a period of time afterwards. Those with a similar bloodline can sense others with it. Dormant or active it doesn''t matter. That reminds me... I need to check whether your bloodline is dormant or not. If it''s dormant then I won''t blame you for not training too much because you don''t actually get the benefits before it''s active." San Guo appeared by Ye Xiu''s side within a second and placed both his palms on Ye Xiu''s back before activating a technique and observed the situation inside Ye Xiu. After a minute of looking, he removed his palms from Ye Xiu''s back and sighed. "It looks like you don''t have your bloodline active yet. We''ll have to do the activation later after we finish this session. It''ll take a while so the others can just rest during that period." "Now that I''ve checked that... show me your techniques that you''ve spent so much time working on! They better impress me otherwise I''ll be very disappointed with your efforts!" Show and Tell Part 3 "It''s your turn now Ye Xiu." San Guo gestured for Ye Xiu to step forward so that he could demonstrate his abilities just as his friends had before him. Ye Xiu was in deep thought because he knew that if his techniques didn''t impress San Guo he''d probably be in for a beating. The knowledge of the bloodlines gave him a nasty shock because he didn''t think that there would be so many benefits from having a bloodline in the first place. He was still curious as to why his Master didn''t bother to put that information down but he can''t blame him. His master can''t think of everything or maybe it was because his Master had thought it was common knowledge just like San Guo said it was for him. He was calming himself down before his showcase so that he could do his best to impress San Guo. After he took in several deep breaths, he proceeded to run forward at San Guo. He was planning to catch him off-guard with something that nobody else had done in the fights previously because they didn''t use the weapons he did. As he neared closer towards San Guo he took out his whip from his dimensional storage and whipped it out to catch San Guo''s legs. The speed of the whip was slow with the gravity bearing down onto it. Ye Xiu''s training under high gravity environments had allowed him to attack at fast speeds with his whip but the gravity slowed it down tremendously. San Guo jumped up to dodge the whip but Ye Xiu had it follow him closely and managed to wrap it around his ankle. Ye Xiu pulled on the whip so that San Guo would be closer to him before taking out his katana out of the sheath for a quick slash. His slash was relatively fast after years of training in iaido starting from when he first picked up the katana and until now under high gravity environments which helped him improve in his iaido technique. The speed that the katana closed in toward San Guo was fast but he was still not panicking. With a smooth swipe of his hand, he had stopped the advance of the sword and he was able to push back on the sword to flip himself backwards away from Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu was confused as to what had happened so he backed off and turned on his observation technique to see the situation. He noticed a white vertical line the length of the distance that San Guo''s hand had travelled. Ye Xiu concluded that it was some technique of his to stop the attack from going through. Whilst he was observing the fading vestiges of San Guo''s technique, San Guo had managed to retrieve his wooden stick from where Shi Die had flung it to. He was approaching Ye Xiu at the speed that Shi Die had attacked him with and was about to attack when Ye Xiu looked up from his observation before raising his katana to block the incoming overhead strike from San Guo. He used the basics of quarterstaff blocking a sword strike in this instance so that the force was distributed all along the katana. This meant his katana would take less damage and it would also prevent him from flying off if the attack was extremely powerful. This left him a chance to counter-attack by thrusting the katana into San Guo''s stomach. San Guo had fortified his clothes to be even sturdier than what Shi Die had managed to break through before, leaving the katana to bounce off when the attack met the cloth. Ye Xiu quickly manoeuvred out of San Guo''s striking range with his ''Swallow Mirage Steps''. This allowed him to get out of range without San Guo being able to predict where he was going. Ye Xiu brandished his whip in his left hand and swung it towards San Guo in a weird motion. The whip was constantly moving in different directions as San Guo dodged the whip from getting close to him. San Guo was intrigued with the whip''s behaviour and was planning to ask Ye Xiu about it later. San Guo tripped on a small hole that was on the ground which allowed the whip to catch up to him and wrap around him. The whip tightened and even through the fortified clothes, he could feel that the whip was constricting his movements and was breaking down the fortification on the clothes through unknown means. He dropped his stick so he was unable to use it to help him escape. Ye Xiu was concentrating madly on the many Qi thorns that he had managed to form on the whip. His skill with the ''Thorny Rose Whip'' was not great and he had a hard time forming and holding the Qi thorns from a far distance. Usually, his control under normal gravity would allow him to hold the amount of Qi thorns he had easily but here in a higher gravity zone, it was much harder because he sent his Qi at a much slower pace than usual. San Guo tried to spin his way out of the constriction but only managed to make his defences get torn down at an even faster pace. Realising that the whip probably had abilities similar to thorns, spinning was a stupid idea on his part. Instead of forcing his way out he decided to come up with another method. Whilst San Guo was thinking of a method, Ye Xiu let go of the whip and cut off part of the whip so that it could continue the constriction on San Guo. Putting his whip back into his dimensional storage, he arrived at the front of San Guo in a burst of speed due to his movement technique, ''Basilisk''s gaze.''The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. With San Guo still trapped, he started to pour Qi into his katana so that he could use ''Solitary Stand.'' The attack boosted his attacking power by twice his usual strength and would be considered a finishing attack due to how long it took him to activate and charge. ''Solitary Stand'' was only the first attack of the ''Lonely Peak of Thirteen Dragons'' technique and he had yet to even master it. To move onto the next attack, he would have to be able to use the first attack in an instant. Ye Xiu used ''Solitary Stand'' in conjunction with ''Tyrant''s Physique'' enhancing the strength of his arms. This would help him attack with higher strength and ''Solitary Stand'' would boost that strength as well. It took him three seconds to fully activate the technique and for San Guo, three seconds was enough for him to quickly come up with a plan to escape. As Ye Xiu''s attacked neared him, he observed the areas on the body that the attack would hit and focused all his Qi into fortifying those areas. His plan was that instead of him doing anything to break free, he''d use Ye Xiu''s attack to cut the whip whilst he took no damage. He knew that it would work since his strength was leagues above Ye Xiu''s. The attack hit the fortified areas as predicted by San Guo, allowing him to escape. With his arms free and the attack finished, San Guo enhanced the defences on his hand so that he could grasp onto the katana without injury. Doing exactly what Shi Die did, he flung the katana out of Ye Xiu''s grasp so that he had no chance of getting it back. He instantly pinned Ye Xiu down afterwards by the throat for a few seconds before letting go. "That was an admirable attempt but when you ask an observer how it went, they''d probably say it was horrendous. They were many good things I can say that you did well in that fight but many mistakes as well." "You managed to do well by trying to get out of the way once you immediately noticed the attack had failed. You thought of restricting my movements at first before you struck was smart because most opponents rely on their legs to evade most attacks instead of taking hits straight on. Going with a quick strike of your katana afterwards was smart too because they would have no time to erect their defences to block the attack." "Your speed with your katana was fast even under a high gravity zone which I have to appreciate. Your body isn''t as terrible as I thought it was but it could definitely be better. The attack would''ve definitely worked on those with a lower cultivation than the third realm because they would be unable to use only their Qi to block an attack. Most people at that stage can use their Qi for defences." "You might think it''s weird for us to know how to attack with our Qi before defending with it but it isn''t that strange. Most attacks with Qi is just releasing the energy to injure an enemy whilst some do have a physical solid form to do damage. That swipe of my hand was an advanced technique that you won''t have to worry about for years to come because it requires years of training to get a solid form like that." "With good enough Qi control, you''d be able to make it invisible so that your enemies are caught off-guard if they are unable to see or sense it. The same goes for invisible attacks, which is why being able to observe the movement of Qi in your opponents is very useful. I personally can''t do it that well but I am able to sense the Qi well enough for me to dodge most attacks." "Your thorns on the whip were a smart move to stop me from escaping and to shred through my defences at the same time. If they had a physical form, the damage would''ve been disastrous. I was lucky that you can only use the Qi to shape it into thorns to deal damage to things which contain Qi. This is damaging enough so it''s definitely useful." "The movement techniques that utilised should be continued to be practised because they are very good. I can''t say anything about flaws in them because the execution made me unable to see any weaknesses in them. Your usage of the techniques was smart to use them in different situations. One to escape and dodge whilst the other to close the distance." "The final part of the battle had the most flaws. You managed to make a small pothole so that I would trip and then used to your advantage to trap me. You probably used your whip to make that hole as it was chasing me right? I''m definitely interested in how you managed to make your whip move so weirdly but that can be your secret. That was definitely something that would catch a lot of people if their evasive skills were any poorer." "Your final attack took too long to charge and if it was in a real battle, a person would''ve taken that time to get out already. If you plan to use that final attack again, I''d expect you to manage to get the activation time to down to one second at maximum. Next, you shouldn''t have even been attacking from close range. You had me trapped there and you should''ve continued to use your whip to wear me down. I was still able to put Qi to fortify my clothes if I had to so you should''ve just been whittling me down instead." San Guo took a deep breath and sighed before speaking again. "Anyway good job, tell me what other things you know so that I can come up with a training plan later." Ye Xiu was internally sweating from the harsh beratement of his decisions but tried his best to speak anyway. "I''m a rank 2 Alchemist just like Shang Yang but in a week''s time, I''ll be taking the rank 3 examination which is why I asked for that week of training to prepare for it. I''m the best out of the entire group when it comes to Qi control, I''m also a rank 1 Smith but definitely nowhere as good as Xiao Tu is." "I''ve another whip style that I could''ve used against you instead of charging at you but I forgot about it." He started to scratch his head in embarrassment. "Besides that, I don''t really have many other notable skills beside my eidetic memory." San Guo sighed. "Instead of having everyone tell each other their weaknesses now. Reflect on what happened today and we''ll convene with each other once Ye Xiu has finished his examination. By the way, Ye Xiu I need you to come with me so I can awaken your bloodline. The rest of you just go rest for now." San Guo led Ye Xiu away to his office. Bloodline Awakening As San Guo had ordered them to do, they decided to take a break whilst Ye Xiu had to be led away by San Guo to do their secret things. They decided to go to the mess hall so that they could go grab some food. They hadn''t eaten anything since the sun rose and it was nearly 9 o''clock in the morning. Shi Die also went to get some food for Ye Xiu for when he came back just in case he was hungry from the awakening that he had to go through. San Guo was leading Ye Xiu to his office, it took them over half an hour to walk to the office from the building. San Guo spoke to Ye Xiu as he walked. "Remember the way to the office because I won''t show you the way a second time. You''ll be coming here for your Alchemy practice so that I can keep an eye on you." "The room has things set up so that I can observe anything that happens in the room and I''ll know if you start to slack off. I need you to take this badge so you can enter the office." San Guo handed over a metal badge to Ye Xiu and when Ye Xiu touched it, he could feel his Qi being drained by the badge. "The badge drains your Qi when you first touch it because it is bonding to your Qi signature. That way nobody else can use the badge to enter my office. My office is private so only people I invite or give the badge to can enter. There''s only one other person who can enter the room because he has a badge as well so you don''t have to worry about interruptions. I''ll let one of your friends bring food over to you so you don''t starve to death in there." "You can leave the office at any time you want but you need to inform me before you leave and tell me why you have left so that I know that you aren''t slacking off. If you want to take some time to train instead of completely focusing on Alchemy because that''ll cause boredom then you can always use the private training grounds at the back of the office." "I''ll leave some exercises for you to do so that you can improve your body there after the awakening. It''ll be extremely important for you to focus on your body from now on once I''ve awakened the bloodline. I didn''t say the actual truth inside the gravity room because you never know who might be listening in." "There are other ways to tell a person''s bloodline purity and that''s when you first awaken it. The person who is awakening and the person who is the one awakening the other can both feel the bloodline purity as they activate it. It''s not entirely accurate because you can only feel and compare it to another person''s bloodline purity." "Nobody really has a benchmark for how pure a person''s bloodline can be by comparing it through our senses so we use the blood essence potion in order to tell blood purity instead. The blood essence can be used as a power-up when you use your bloodline techniques. It can either be used as a substitute to Qi or it can be used together with Qi to make the bloodline technique stronger. Obviously, this isn''t advised because using blood essence will weaken you for a period of time until you recover it." San Guo opened the door to the building before leading him to his office. "When we get inside, take off all your clothes. We mustn''t have anything obstructing your body when we awaken your bloodline. The process will be extremely painful so scream all you want, nobody will hear you anyway. I''ll explain the rest of the benefits after the awakening. You need to do your best to stay awake otherwise the awakening won''t boost your strength as much as it should." Ye Xiu started to take off his clothes, not caring about being embarrassed, instead, he just wanted to get over the ordeal and see the benefits of it. ''If San Guo had said that bloodlines are so miraculous, then the benefits have to be surprising to a normal person shouldn''t it?'' San Guo pushed Ye Xiu onto the floor and made him sit in the lotus position. Once he was sat down and calm, San Guo started to paint on Ye Xiu''s body with a red liquid. San Guo had placed all his concentration on finishing his tasks and making sure that no mistakes in the lines were made. Every time a mistake in the drawing was made, it was erased by San Guo''s stick. After several minutes of San Guo drawing lines all over Ye Xiu''s body, he was ready to begin. "I''m ready to begin, brace yourself so that you don''t fall unconscious. The lines were to show the main pathways of the meridians on the body and I''ll be using a bloodline technique to ignite your Qi so that it will awaken your bloodline. Hopefully, this doesn''t end disastrously because this is the first time I''ve done it." Ye Xiu was sweating internally at San Guo''s words. ''What do you mean this your first time?!? How would you even know the method to awaken a person''s bloodline if it was your first time?!'' Ye Xiu''s internal rant stopped the moment San Guo slammed his palms onto his back. Ye Xiu could feel the lines on his body igniting on his skin and he could feel his body burning. Ye Xiu activated his observation technique to watch what was happening to his body. He decided to do this because he felt that if he had his attention on something else, he could ignore the pain for longer. He could see the Qi from San Guo''s palm flowing into his body and straight towards his Dantian. His Dantian was absorbing the Qi from San Guo and slowly the Qi inside his body started to give off a burning sensation.If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. He was burning on the outside and the inside, he was starting to writhe in pain when San Guo restricted his movements but binding him with his Qi. He noticed that his Qi was taking another colour and it felt more alive than it was before. It was slowly giving off a more primal aura like a beast and it was like it wanted to rampage around his body. San Guo was keeping the primal Qi at bay with his own Qi. His blood was becoming denser and the structure of his blood was changing. He noticed that his original human blood was starting to change into blood similar to a dragon''s. Ye Xiu heard of stories in his previous life that bathing in the blood of dragons would improve their body tremendously and he could honestly feel his body being strengthened by it. His body was being torn down and being rebuilt with a stronger body due to the changes in his blood. The changes continued for over six hours before they stopped. San Guo was sweating and looked extremely pale. With a weak voice, he spoke, "That''s insane. I had to expend quite a bit of my blood essence in order to continue the awakening." San Guo started to meditate and his face started to have some more colour. "I''m lucky that I saved up a lot of blood essence for nasty situations like this. Anyway, I didn''t expect your awakening to take so long. Most awakenings take two hours at most even with all the changes in their body. The length of the awakening varies depending on the bloodline purity so yours is definitely strong." "I compared your purity to mine and it''s leagues above mine. I never took a bloodline purity potion before so I can''t be sure just how pure it is. As far as I''m concerned your bloodline purity is probably because you are a direct descendant of a dragon." Ye Xiu stared at San Guo. "I sincerely doubt that because neither of my parents had mentioned it, and something big like this would''ve been told to me a long time ago." San Guo shrugged. "I don''t know but your bloodline purity is insane anyway. How are the changes in your body? Do you feel stronger and did your energy levels rise?" Ye Xiu started to examine his body and asked to go to the training ground to test out his newfound strength. "May I go to your private training grounds to test out my strength? I can''t say how much I''ve grown in strength but I can say that the feeling is definitely proof that I''ve grown much stronger than before. I can feel the latent power coursing through my muscles every time I move." San Guo nodded and led Ye Xiu over to his private training grounds. "Go ahead and test all you want. You can spar against me if you want to see how it measures." Ye Xiu took in several deep breaths before attacking San Guo. His raw speed was twice as fast than it was before. San Guo expected the rise in speed but definitely not to the extent that Ye Xiu had. "Your speed has doubled and that''s without a movement technique! I''d be hesitant to fight you even if I was five stages above you in cultivation." Ye Xiu did a simple kick to San Guo with all his strength and felt like his strength had increased by multiple times. San Guo was estimating the strength increase. "Your strength is probably similar to Shi Die''s now but if you continue to train your body, you''ll be stronger than him in no time." Ye Xiu sat down to meditate to see the changes in his Qi. ''My Qi has turned into that primal Qi that I felt during the awakening. Could it be that my Qi had to change in order for me to get such a pure bloodline? The Qi was much denser than it previously was and it gave him much more energy than his old Qi. The Qi was moving slower than before but he could respect that because the Qi had gotten denser and the quality of the Qi had little to no impurities." He had noticed that his Qi control had degraded and that he needed to train it even more now because of the changes in his Qi. The Qi felt like it had a mind of its own so he had to spend more effort in trying to control it. It also didn''t help that his Qi was now moving slower so he would need to take time in the gravity room to make it move at its normal speed or an even faster speed." The lower Qi control didn''t bother Ye Xiu too much because he knew that even this amount of control would let him pass his rank 3 alchemist examination. It just meant that he had to be slightly more careful with his alchemy now and concentrate on each process. He knew that he his soul and mental strength had improved due to the awakening so he would be able to get his Qi control back to normal at an even faster rate than before. San Guo interrupted Ye Xiu''s thoughts and stirred him out of meditation. "Wake up! I''ll finish my explanations on the bloodline and I''ll let you be on your way." Ye Xiu got up and waited for San Guo to say what he wanted to say. "Anyway, now that your bloodline has been awakened, you can start training in the family arts later. A dragon''s bloodline should help increase your body strength when you awaken and will continue to do so the more you train." "The purer your bloodline, the faster you strength grows and the more gains you get from training. The purer your bloodline is, the stronger your bloodline techniques are, this means that you should have an advantage over other people who have a less pure bloodline and a similar cultivation to you." "The dragon''s bloodline raises the limit you can increase your strength in a stage of body cultivation. For instance, a normal person''s limit for a stage of body cultivation is 10 kilograms of force whilst a person with a low purity dragon bloodline can train up to 20 kilograms of force. The purer your bloodline the higher the limit of each stage of body cultivation. I guess in a way, not training your body too much has given you future benefits as well." "Now off you go, scamp. I''m tired and you should get something to eat. I''ll tell you everything else later." San Guo gave leave to Ye Xiu and he went to his office to sleep. Ye Xiu walked back to the dormitory rooms to find his friends. Auction Part 1 A few weeks had passed since Ye Xiu had gotten his bloodline awakened by San Guo. He had taken his week of Alchemist training and managed to pass the Rank 3 Alchemist exam. He was considered one of the youngest Rank 3 Alchemists in their generation as the alchemist guild didn''t know if there were any other alchemists of the same rank with a similar age to him. He had attracted a lot of attention because of the examination and decided to lay low for a while. During his week of Alchemy, he had made thousands of batches of Grade 3 pills and hundreds of elixirs. For every ten batches of pills that he made, he kept two batches for his and his friends'' usage. The rest he sold so that he could get the money back for the ingredients that he had used for Alchemy. He had saved up a lot of money from this and was going to spend it today. The elixirs were kept for their own personal usage because he knew that all the elixirs he made were good for training and healing purposes. San Guo was planning to take the group out to the city because there was going to be an annual auction where most of the rare things would be sold. San Guo told Ye Xiu that he wouldn''t have to worry about not being able to not buy anything in the auction because he probably had more money saved up than some of the families and clans in the city due to his excessive selling of pills. Ye Xiu was eager to see what rare things would possibly be displayed in the auction for San Guo to be willing to take them out of the academy for the day. Shi Die voiced his concerns over the teachers noticing that they were leaving but San Guo waved them away easily. All San Guo said was "Don''t worry, they wouldn''t say anything to our group leaving the academy premises anyway." With that, Shi Die had nothing else to say. It wasn''t just San Guo going along with the children because Jin Yuan and Liu Fan were also following them for the auction. Though Liu Fan earned much less money than Ye Xiu would be able to if he set his mind on making pills, he still earned a generous amount of money through his salary at the Academy which was high because he was also the Academy Smith and he also earned money from his side jobs which required him to Smith. Smithing wasn''t as lucrative because it took the Smith a much longer period of time to craft an item than it would take an Alchemist to make a batch of pills or a single elixir. If the Alchemist was of high enough skill, they''d even be able to make two batches of pills at the same time and they''d earn even more money compared to Smiths. Jin Yuan had a lot more money to spare compared to Liu Fan because Spirit Cooks'' food is expensive and people require to eat food every day. He earned 20% of the money from the students that paid for food in the mess hall every day because he was in charge of every other Spirit Cook who was hired by the academy. He had more money than Ye Xiu had even after he sold his thousands of batches of pills which wasn''t surprising considering the number of students at the academy eating at the mess hall. Ye Xiu was also extremely excited to go to the auction due to a certain friend of his that he had recently made. After his bloodline was awakened by San Guo, his next entry into his Locket Dimension was very surprising to him. He had entered the house as usual and was greeted by a voice that called him master. Ye Xiu was obviously surprised at the sudden voice but calmed down afterwards once he remembered what the voice had just said. As he was pondering this, a strange little figure had appeared in front of him. It was apparently the voice that had been speaking to him. "Hello there Master! I''m Xiao Bai, a treasure spirit. I''m a spirit that was formed after millions of years inside of this dimension and have been given the task to help and protect the Master in the Dimension. I was unsealed from the house once you managed to achieve the appropriate goal that he had set. In this case, the previous Master had me be unsealed once you managed to awaken your bloodline." "It''s strange that you hadn''t unsealed me earlier because the previous Master had said that I would meet you fairly quickly! He said that in the year that you inherited Master''s will, you''d have been able to unseal me with your bloodline awakened. I don''t know why it took you so long but at least you''re finally here!" Xiao Bai was extremely enthusiastic after finally being unsealed after many years. After weeks of talking to Xiao Bai, the group had managed to learn more about the functions that would be unlocked in the future once Ye Xiu managed to achieve a goal that the previous Master had set. The goals were unknown to Ye Xiu and would be discovered once Ye Xiu managed to reach the goal. When Ye Xiu heard about the auction, Xiao Bai immediately pressured him into going to the auction because Xiao Bai wanted to see if there was anything useful for his Master. Xiao Bai was able to tell if something was rare or was useful to Master after it''s many years with the previous Master. His previous Master had taught him how to sense for rare treasures and how to identify them. Xiao Bai was a relatively powerful treasure spirit due to the high density in Qi and the years that it had been formed for.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. The auction building was massive to accommodate the many people that were going to be entering for the auctions. The city that was around the academy was apparently one of the twenty largest and most prosperous cities in the Outer Region. All the biggest cities had an academy there which was why the cities had grown to be so big and prosperous in the first place. Ye Xiu could see many students around the auction which wasn''t surprising because most of the students were from families or clans that had extensive amounts of money that they could spend in the auction. There were several entryways into the Auction House and San Guo led them through one of the more private ones so that they wouldn''t be waiting in a huge queue to enter. The Auction House usually had stringent checks on people so that they don''t cause any trouble at the regular entrance, however, the private entryways were less stringent because only people who had been recognised by the Auction House for their patronage by using a card that was given to the one who was recognised. Those who held the card could bring anybody they wanted through the private entrances and be unmolested by the masses and the checks. San Guo continued to lead them through the Auction House and into the Auction Hall where hundreds of people had already gathered in the seats around the stage. The seats were for those who did not have a private Auction Box and they were usually squished together when big auctions such as this came about. San Guo walked up the many stairs in the Auction Hall to get to one of the private Auction Boxes that were in the Hall. "Here, this will be where are for the Auction. I''ll explain how the auction works." San Guo sat down on one of the seats in the room and explained how the auction works. "The auction box we are in is one reserved for those of high ranking in the Academy. Most of the auction boxes are for those who are influential in the city or have good relationships with the Auction House. The Auction House is considered one of the main powers in the city due to it only being a branch of the Skylight Auction Organisation. The Skylight Auction Organisation is the main Auction organisers in the Outer Region." "The organisation can be called the S.A.O, the S.A.O is one of the powerhouses in the Outer Region because of their branches in many cities that rake in huge amounts of money every year in their Auctions. With this money, they are able to hire many talented cultivators to work under them and that is why many people are very hesitant to attack any Auction hosted by the S.A.O." San Guo looked to the door where a person was peeking in and he stood up to go talk to the person at the door. "Mind taking over the explanation Old Yuan?" Jin Yuan shrugged. "It''s not like I have anything better to do. The Auction Houses give out cards to esteemed guests and these cards lower down the prices that they would have to pay for every successful bid that they place. The higher the card rank is the less they have to pay. Usually, the cards cut down the prices by percentages, and the card that San Guo has can cut down the price for things successfully bid on by 20%." "In order for us to bid in the Auction Box, we have to insert the card into this slot here and state the amount of money you want to bid. The slot ''reads'' the Qi inside of the card so that it knows who bid and where it was bid from and when you successfully bid for an item, the item will be brought to the box and we will pay." "If you''re unable to pay for an item, and you are the highest bidder, you''ll be banned from the Auction House depending on the mood of their manager. An item which was unable to be paid for will be sold to the one who bid the second highest price and it will continue to go on until someone manages to pay for it or it goes back to the Auction Lists." "Always make sure you have enough money to pay for your items because Auction Houses usually keep a record on those who don''t play. You won''t have to worry about being attacked in the Auction House if you manage to successfully bid for an item because the Auction Rules prevent them from even trying it lest they wish the be punished harshly. The moment you step out of the Auction District, however... all is fair game and you should be careful of your surroundings after every auction." "The first item of the auction is usually the worst item an Auction can offer, each subsequent item is higher in price and rarity. This helps keep those bidding excited for what''s next on the Auction and they''ll continue to spend as much as they possibly can. The very last item is usually the rarest or most expensive item that the Auction can offer and most of the time, fights break over the item after the Auction leading to bloodshed." San Guo came back with drinks and food in hand, provided by the kind staff of the Auction House. "Glad to see you are wrapping up with the explanation. I''ll take over form here now. In order for you to place an item to be sold in the Auction, you must go through stringent checks to make sure that the item is rare enough to be sold on the Auction. The Auction House doesn''t care about what kind of person sells it and will keep their identity secret unless the seller wishes their name to be known." "Sometimes before you can even place the item on the Auction, the Auction House will even offer prices to buy it directly off the person. Usually the price for the direct price is lower than what can be obtained from the Auction so I suggest you to only do something like this if you are extremely desperate for money. I highly doubt you''d run out of money since your group is filled with people in disciplines that can earn a huge amount of money in a short amount of time anyway." As San Guo started to stroke his face, he stopped speaking once he realised that the more influential people were entering the Auction Boxes. Auction Part 2 San Guo watched the influential people of the city walk up to their boxes and was busy scrutinising them. "You kids must remember these people that walk up to the Auction boxes. They are some of the more influential and powerful people in the city and shouldn''t be offended. These people usually have alliances with each other and not knowing the situation would be costly." After saying his piece, an old man walked up on to the stage and began clearing his throat. "Welcome to the Annual Auction hosted by the Skylight Auction Organisation. I am the auctioneer for this Auction and I wish the best of luck to all those who bid for the rare items we have this year." The Auctioneer''s voice was loud enough for everybody to hear him and his tone of voice made people feel the need to buy the rare items otherwise it would be gone forever. "As usual, I''ll be announcing the rules for the Auction for each item when it is displayed so please be patient when it is brought out. Be warned, those that who bid falsely and are unable to pay will be banned by the organisation for however long we feel like it. Now, let the auction begin!" "First up, we have a rare ingredient! The Moonspike thorn with an age of 100 years. Bids start at 25,000 silver and bids must rise by 5,000 silver each time." The auctioneer announced the first item which lit the audience''s enthusiasm like a fire. The group tuned out the voices and spoke to each other because this item wasn''t of any interest to them. Ye Xiu was hesitating between wanting to buy it but he dismissed it because he wanted the seeds of the plant instead of the actual plant. Jin Yuan observed the auctioneer carefully before nodding his head. "They sent out a stronger auctioneer than usual this year. It seems like whatever items they have up for bidding this year are probably extremely precious if they are sending out such a strong person to be the auctioneer." Shang Yang tilted her head slightly and asked. "What do you mean? Why would the auctioneer need to be strong? Isn''t he just announcing the items and their price?" Jin Yuan shook his head. "No, the auctioneer is always a strong person. This is because the auctioneer would be the one to protect the items if anybody tried to attack the auction. Most of the time the items are not too precious so they have an auctioneer at the strength of the strongest person in the city. However, this time they have a person who is in the fourth realm. Nobody would dare to attack this time unless they are suicidal." Liu Fan nodded his head. "It''s the same in all auctions. It''s the standard thing to do and as far as I know, none of the auctions I''ve been to have been attacked. It''s just that much of a deterrent when such a strong person is defending the auctions." San Guo looked bored. "Most of the better things will come at the end of the auction anyway. Only buy things that are essential to your growth or combat power otherwise it''ll be pretty much useless for you to buy it in the first place. If you don''t have enough money to buy something you can borrow money either from me or from Jin Yuan." "We have plenty of money to spare. Also remember that if you successfully bid for something, take into account the 20% price reduction from the card we have. You''ll be able to buy more items that way." They continued to watch the many items being bid on for the next half an hour until there was an item that caught Ye Xiu''s attention because of Xiao Bai''s screaming. "Master! Whatever that next item is, you must get it! It''s extremely rare and I sense that it''ll help with your cultivation greatly. Don''t bid on it too fervently otherwise, some of those people will realise that it could be valuable!" Xiao Bai urged Ye Xiu to get the next item. The Auctioneer brought up the next item for sale. "Next up, we have an unknown item that wasn''t able to be identified even by our experts. We have no clue what it does but it does emanate some strange aura. This is a rock that will be for sale! Bids start at 100,000 silvers!" Many people in the audience gasped because of the starting price for something that was virtually unknown in usage. The Auction Hall was silent and the Auctioneer was about to announce the failure of the sale until Ye Xiu placed the card in the slot. "Ah, a bid of 100,000 silvers from No.003 has been placed! Any other takers?" Still, nobody else bothered to answer the auctioneer. "Going once!" "Going twice!" "Going thrice. Sold to No. 003 for 100,000 silvers! The item will be brought to you shortly." The auctioneer left with the item to have one of the staff bring it up to them privately. Xiao Bai was beaming inside the Dimension and was pleased that his master was able to get the item cheaply. "Congratulations Master! You managed to get the item without any hassle! I''ll tell you the usage and how to use the item after the Auction. You''ll be really surprised with the effects once I tell you!" Xiao Bai made the Locket on Ye Xiu''s body slightly vibrate from his enthusiasm.Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators! San Guo was looking at Ye Xiu who was in deep thoughts curiously. "I wonder why you bought an unknown item, you saw that everybody else in the Hall didn''t even bother bidding for the item so why did you?" Ye Xiu just smiled at San Guo. "I just have a good feeling about this item and it''s telling me that this item is important to me." San Guo just shook his head. "Whatever. It''s your money after all. You''d be able to earn that money back in a single batch of Grade 3 pills anyway so I can''t say much. How much money do you have on you right now anyway?" Ye Xiu thought for a moment. "I have 100,000 Gold on me right now." San Guo was surprised. "That''s quite a lot of money you have there. A thousand silvers is a single Gold. Your Pills must''ve been quite high quality if you managed to get so much gold from your pills." Ye Xiu scratched his head. "The quality was pretty good and I had batches upon batches of pills to sell so even I was surprised that I would be able to get this many pills. The number of pills I sold would probably last the City demand for a while. There''s only 7 Rank 3 Alchemists in the City right now so it''s in quite a high demand but it''s not too high." One of the staff knocked on the door of their Auction Box and they let him in. The staff held the item and Ye Xiu quickly paid the staff with the money and the item was safely passed to Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu stored it into his dimensional storage quickly because he didn''t want to lose the item that even Xiao Bai was excited about. Shang Yang started to pester Ye Xiu about the mysterious stone that he bought but Ye Xiu was not bothered to answer any of her questions. Ye Xiu tuned Shang Yang out and was telepathically talking to Xiao Bai about the item. "Xiao Bai, you can tell me about the stone because nobody else can hear us. You can always stop your explanation when an item that I want or that is intriguing to you is up for bidding." "Okay, Master! The stone is actually just something which is holding the actual item. Inside of it is a gem that will allow you to rise in cultivation levels multiple times without your foundation being damaged. It is best used when you are at a higher rank of cultivation so I suggest you to just keep it safe for now inside of the Locket Dimension. This is because the gem can still grow and collect more Qi inside of as time passes so it will be best for you to put it into the Dimension for now." Xiao Bai nodded his head. "Currently, the gem should be able to help you rise 5 cultivation stages if you were in the third realm. If you can find other gems like this, it''ll definitely help you raise your cultivation by multiple times. These gems can be found in places where the Qi is extremely dense. Most of them are covered in their stone casing and it''s supposed to be the full size that they can grow to. This gem is considered pretty small to the ones I''ve seen." Xiao Bai was gloating about the sizes he''s seen Ye Xiu heeded Xiao Bai''s words and decided that he would let the gem grow in the future. The auction went on, Liu Fan and San Guo bought multiple items that they needed. Liu Fan was able to bid on several rare materials that he needed to craft for his growth weapon. Growth weapons could grow with their owner and the owner could only have one growth weapon unless their soul was able to house multiple weapons. Most ordinary cultivators could house only one growth weapon but for someone like Ye Xiu, he could possibly house 4 growth weapons due to the Phoenix Technique that helped him cultivate his soul and mental strength. The last three items were left in the auction and many people were already leaving. Most of the people that stayed behind were either those who were gunning for the last few items or were those that were there to watch the show of the influential people bidding. It was entertainment because most of the time, the influential people got into each other''s faces and started shouting matches so that they would relent and let them buy the items. The last three items weren''t as exciting as they thought it would be and when they were all introduced, San Guo led them out of the Auction House and back to the academy. As they were heading out they noticed several fights going on outside of the Auction House. None of the fights actually affected the Auction House itself due to the many inscriptions and formations that they had placed for protection. The Auction House was the most fortified building in the entire city and it wouldn''t be affected by the many fights that occur around it because there were hundreds of formations being powered by Qi stones. San Guo led them through the fights without issue because many of the combatants stopped fighting the moment they saw San Guo. Those who weren''t aware of who San Guo was, ran away after he let out his powerful aura. San Guo was probably one of the strongest people in the entire city even when he was restraining his strength. Ye Xiu and the others only felt his strength of one at the Foundation Establishment but Jin Yuan knew better than to underestimate San Guo. He knew that San Guo kept many secrets and he noticed that he hadn''t even told the children about his true occupation at the academy. With the Auction over, they could see many people heading back towards the academy. Xiao Tu took a look at the crowd and noticed that many of them were much older students. This obviously made his curiosity get peaked because he rarely saw any of the students which were above the 3rd Year. Deciding to sate his curiosity, he asked San Guo his question. "Sir, why is it that I rarely see students above the 3rd year? I noticed that they rarely come out but today they''ve all appeared like they were always there." San Guo kept on walking. "The majority of the 4th and 5th-year students do missions for the academy so that they can earn income and earn points for themselves. You know that the library requires a lot of points so they do this for contribution. Most 2nd and 3rd year students just stay in the academy because they don''t have the strength necessary for most of the missions that get assigned to the students." With that done, they continued their walk to the academy. Annual Contest Part 1 It had been three months since the Annual Auction and the Annual Contest for the Academy was beginning. The Annual contest was similar to the tournament style ranking at the beginning of their enrollment and there could only be one winner. The Annual contest had the best rewards out of all the contests every year and all those who were stronger came out during that period of time. Some students who were still taught by teachers were still kept hidden however because of those teachers'' pride. San Guo expected the group of kids that he had personally trained to at least reach the Top 10 because he knew how much they had progressed in the time that he managed to find them. Ye Xiu had made the most progress due to his bloodline. His body became the strongest out of the entire group quickly and continued to grow at an exponential rate that didn''t seem to slow down. Due to this, Ye Xiu actually had to spend a lot of his time fighting to get used to his new strength. The Annual Contest always started with the first years and ending with the fifth years. It was the perfect time for everyone to scout each others'' strengths and weaknesses. After the Annual contest, the Top 10 winners of each year would fight with each other to see who would be the strongest in the entire academy. Most of the time it was the fifth year students who won but occasionally a few fourth years won and on even rarer occasions, third years winning against their peers. It was usually the fifth years who won but San Guo still wanted them to fight against them because he said that it would be good for them to experience fighting against those stronger than them. They should learn when to back off and when to attack against stronger opponents. He wanted them to know that even though they were strong there was always going to be somebody stronger than them. They were reminded of this daily by San Guo when he trained them but he wanted them to know that there are geniuses. He wanted them to never underestimate somebody, no matter their appearance. San Guo knew there were a few older students who had the appearance of a child but was still able to defeat those who had fully matured. San Guo was also expecting Ye Xiu to at least be able to hold out against the older students using the strength of his body. He had made Ye Xiu become unstoppable by constantly pushing him to his limits. This meant that even if Ye Xiu looked like he was tired, he would still be able to fight against his opponents with his full strength and effort. He would also be able to think clearly under high-stress situations and when he was tired. Ye Xiu and Shi Die were cooking up some food for the group before the tournament began. They knew that the mess hall would be full at this time because too many students would be awake earlier to train and to get ready for the tournament. San Guo promised that there would be good rewards for the four of them if they managed to make it to the Top 10 of their year. He also promised that if any of them are able to defeat a student which is in the 2nd year or higher, then he would give them a reward which would greatly help them in cultivation. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu were duking it out on San Guo''s private training grounds to get their blood pumping before the tournament. They had improved greatly when it came to skill and strength. Shang Yang was much more graceful in her movements and had started to learn a movement technique that would help confuse her opponents. She learnt the movement technique for the sole purpose of integrating it into her fighting style so that her opponents would have a smaller chance of winning against her. Xiao Tu definitely had a hard time against Shang Yang but was able to prevent himself from losing due to his long reach with the weapon. His defensive style kept her at bay and was going to tire her out. They stopped when Ye Xiu called them over so that they could eat their food and rest a bit before the tournament started. Shi Die went over the strengths and weaknesses of the high-ranked freshmen. They had observed multiple ranked matches to see what their opponents were able to do and came up with appropriate plans against them. The time for the tournament came quickly and they ran over to the Arena grounds where they could see that it was nearly packed full by students. It was surprising, to say the least for Ye Xiu to see so many students when he usually only saw half the number of people daily at the mess hall. They went to the seats which the Arena grounds offered and sat down to wait for the tournament to start. They saw no point in wasting energy or making their muscles sore by standing around. They watched as people flooded the grounds before a voice sounded out throughout the grounds.Stolen story; please report. "Are you all ready for the Annual Contest? This year our prizes for the top contestants will be even better compared to last year! I hope you''ll try your best so that you will be able to get the rewards. Also, we''ll be scouting for potential candidates to participate in an upcoming competition in a few years time. If you manage to impress any of the staff, you might be able to get private training from them." "We''ll be starting off with the freshmen fights and it''ll go pretty quickly! We have several groups and those who win the most fights in those groups will advance to the Top 16. The groups have been decided and we will call out the students for each fight so you don''t have to worry about forgetting. If however, you don''t arrive at a match by five minutes, you''ll be disqualified and that''ll count as a loss for you and a win for the opponent." "I wish the best of luck to all those that fight. The first fights will be announced in five minutes." Several fights had passed for Ye Xiu and the others and they had won the majority of their matches. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu lost a single match to the same person because they were in the same group. The person they lost to was apparently of a higher stage of cultivation and had impressive techniques that were able to counter Shang Yang and Xiao Tu easily. They were currently recounting their experiences with the guy they had fought and eventually gave up because they only saw him use two techniques. One of the techniques was the technique that defeated the both of them and the other was an unknown technique that allowed the person to move quickly yet silently. They were sneak attacked when they least expected it and lost the fight. They were unable to get to the Top 16 and they were depressed because of it. Ye Xiu was consoling his two friends of their losses. "You don''t have to worry about your loss. As long as you learn from your mistake, you''ll be fine. This was just a normal match in the academy, not a life-threatening one. You''ll live to survive another day. You also more chances to compete in the next few years. I know San Guo expected all of us to at least get into the top 10 but I think he won''t mind as long as he knows our actual strength. The most he''ll do is make all of us train harder." Xiao Tu sighed. "I guess you''re right Ye Xiu. Just be careful if you do meet that guy. I pointed him out to you earlier so you should be able to remember his face. As long as you move fast enough he shouldn''t be able to kill you. Out of the four of us, you and Shi Die have the best chance against that guy." Shi Die nodded. "Thanks for telling us about him. My group was pretty easy besides a single person that caused problems with his bow and arrow. Luckily, the reflex training that we did allowed me to catch or dodge most of his arrows. I would''ve lost from fatigue if I wasn''t able to do that." Ye Xiu looked at the Arenas. "I can''t say much about the other fourteen opponents because I wasn''t watching the matches when I was resting. I was busy breaking down the different styles of fighting that I fought against and how I would be able to improve in the future fights. I should pay more attention because the Top 16 are probably the better fighters in our entire year. I''ve seen many of the students in the top 16 going back to a teacher to talk so they definitely are receiving advice after each fight." Shi Die stopped the brooding that was happening in the group. "How about we have a break now. We won''t be fighting anytime soon and the two of you won''t even be fighting anymore so we can eat to get our energy back. Ye Xiu and I made some sandwiches. I''ve made a few Qi infused foods this morning so I hope you enjoy and gain all your energy back." Ye Xiu took the first bite of the sandwiches that they made together and definitely noticed that the taste was a lot better than what he usually made. He looked at Shi Die who scratched his head. "I learnt how to increase the taste of the foods from Jin Yuan, I''m not actually that skilled when it comes to taste because I think Ye Xiu does a better job when it comes to the raw taste of the food without Qi infusion." Ye Xiu shook his head, "You just need more practice and experience, the flavours just go together in my head like how it does for Alchemy. It just makes everything tastes better so I can always teach you the different recipes I do so that you can make them taste just as good." "Do you mind taking some time off training or during our rest times so that we can have these cooking sessions together? It might help me a lot if you''re there to help me." Ye Xiu was surprised by Shi Die''s request. "Sure, I mean I guess... Yeah, why not. I shouldn''t be training all the time. I can also improve my cooking skills at the same time by trying new recipes that I haven''t had the time to test out yet. If you can teach me some tricks of your spirit cooking, I''ll continue to help you with your Qi control during those sessions as well." Shi Die nodded his head happily when Xiao Tu popped his head in between the two. "If you are having these cooking sessions, I want to be the taste tester. All that wondrous food can go into my stomach." Xiao Tu''s eyes were sparkling at the thought of the food that they were going to make in the future. Shi Die just laughed. "Sure, you can have all the food you want." He looked at Shang Yang, "Do you want to be a taste tester as well? You don''t have to worry about gaining weight since we train every day." Shang Yang bit her lip. "Fine, I''ll taste the food as well. I was worried about my weight until you reminded me that we all train for long periods of time anyway. After one hour of rest, the break was ended and the matches for the Top 16 were about to begin in the next few minutes. Ye Xiu and Shi Die headed down from the stands to go to the arenas. Annual Contest Part 2 "Ye Xiu and Fu Fan, please make your way to the centre arena. Your match will begin in five minutes." A voice sounded out throughout the entire Arena grounds to inform the two that their match was about to begin. Ye Xiu made it to the Arena quickly and waited for his opponent to show up. It took three minutes before his opponent showed up. His opponent looked bulky and muscular but every step that he took was graceful. Just watching him move made Ye Xiu go on guard. Being able to move with such gracefulness with such a massive body isn''t easy at all. As Ye Xiu was observing Fu Fan, the referee for the match interrupted his thoughts. "Now that the both of you are here, we''ll begin the match. Start at three. One. Two. Three! Begin!" Fu Fan flew at Ye Xiu''s face with a roundhouse kick which Ye Xiu was able to block easily with his superior body strength. Ye Xiu could feel the amount of power behind that kick and he was slightly disappointed because he expected more power from a person of that body size. With Fu Fan being in midair after his roundhouse kick, Ye Xiu decided to just end the fight quickly. He punched him in the stomach sending him flying out of the arena. The referee didn''t stop the match because the rules of the matches changed once they hit the Top 16. The fight would only end if one person surrendered or if the other person no longer had the capacity to fight. Fu Fan quickly got up from the ground because he was informed of this rule by his teacher. He jumped back onto the stage and approached Ye Xiu carefully. He started to move as if he was dancing to music, whenever he got close enough though, Ye Xiu quickly backed off. He had no idea what Fu Fan would do so he took out his whip so that Fu Fan would have no chance to get close or utilise this weird movement technique. To conserve his energy, he stopped using his ''Tyrant''s Physique'' and attacked Fu Fan with his whip in the ''Entangled Roots'' style. Fu Fan''s advance was stopped with the whip moving at a high speed. He wasn''t able to see the whip and knew that if he got close he''d get hit multiple times before he would even have a chance to retreat Knowing this, he just held his position and waited for Ye Xiu to come towards him. Ye Xiu saw what Fu Fan was doing and sighed. He knew that there was no choice but for him to get closer to Fu Fan. He started to advance to Fu Fan with his whip held at his side. Once he got in range to attack Fu Fan he started his whip assault again. Every time Fu Fan retreated, Ye Xiu advanced. Ye Xiu was slowly turning the battleground into his own personal playground by creating obstacles everywhere his whip hit. Soon Fu Fan had nowhere else to move and decided to advance towards Ye Xiu instead. If he had to lose he should at least lose with some dignity. Losing without even being able to attack was just humiliating to him and he didn''t want to be the laughingstock of the academy. He utilised his strange dancing technique again and was able to avoid some of Ye Xiu''s whip attacks. The others that he wasn''t able to avoid, hit him and left multiple scratches on him. Fu Fan narrowed his eyes when he felt the scratches on his body and was surprised that Ye Xiu could inflict so much damage to his body. He thought about it again before realising that his surprise attack at the beginning was also easily countered by Ye Xiu. He let the whip fall on his body multiple times, using his eyes to try and tell where the whip was. He eventually managed to predict where the whip was going to strike and next and managed to grab it. What he didn''t notice was that Ye Xiu was already behind him and the moment he had done the last strike he had let go of the whip and took out his sword and pointed it Fu Fan''s neck. "Surrender or you die." Ye Xiu''s voice came from behind Fu Fan. Fu Fan turned shocked at Ye Xiu''s arrival from behind him. "I surrender." The referee immediately declared Ye Xiu''s victory over Fu Fan and called for the next match''s participants to go up to the arena. Ye Xiu left the arena to look for his friends and to rest for a moment. Ye Xiu had a feeling that the next 7 fights would last longer than his so he decided that he would look for the others so that they can observe the matches and break down their fighting styles. Shi Die was standing with Shang Yang and Xiao, smiling brightly. "Good job on that match. Your opponent had absolutely no chance against you." "He didn''t have a way to attack from long range so I just abused the fact that I can use a whip. I''d think that if it was someone else fighting him, they''d probably have a much harder time. The guy had a weird movement technique that allowed him to dodge a few of my attacks. If he was any more agile and flexible, I''d have no doubt that he would''ve been able to get past my attacks." Ye Xiu shook his head at the thought.A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. Instead of continuing that train of thought he decided to ask Shi Die a question. "Are you ready for your own fight? I''d love to fight you at full strength instead of our normal spars." "I''d have to win my own fight first before I even get to you. We might not be lucky enough to meet each other until the Final matches. It all depends on our luck." Shi Die was being very lacklustre in his enthusiasm to fight Ye Xiu. They went back to watching the matches with Xiao Tu and Shang Yang offering their own comments on each combatant''s fighting style. Soon it was Shi Die''s own turn to fight. The moment Shi Die stepped onto the arena, the referee gave him little to no time to compose himself for the beginning of the fight. The referee started the match immediately. "Begin!" Shi Die looked at his opponent and noticed that it was a girl. Obviously not surprised that it was a girl, he decided to overpower her like he usually does to Shang Yang. He knew that the majority of the female cultivators that he knew of or heard of did very little training for the body. They mainly focused on their techniques and skills to win against others. Though that was true, he didn''t underestimate her strength because that would be a foolish thing to do. Going with his aggressive style of fighting, he lashed out with a scissor kick towards the girl''s face. He knew that it was a cheap trick to aim at a girl''s face but it''s a dog eat dog world. Girls liked to keep their appearances so attacking their main source of attraction would force them to defend it. As predicted the girl blocked the kick with her palms which gave Shi Die the chance to kick her once again as he twirled around on his hands to give him momentum to sweep the girl''s legs. The girl was kicked off balance but was able to gain her stability by retreating with backflips. The girl took out a spear and stood in a stance and waited for Shi Die to attack. Shi Die now knew that he was at a disadvantage because of the longer range that the girl had over him. With the difference in range, all Shi Die could hope for was that his skin was tough enough to withstand the piercing power of the spear. The girl attacked with several jabs with the spear before thrusting it towards Shi Die''s body. Shi Die managed to block a few of the jabs and quickly flipped back to kick the spear that was thrust at his face. The spear point was forced upwards and gave Shi Die enough time to get into arms range of the girl. He quickly punched her in the stomach and got up close and personal with her. He did this so that she would have absolutely no space to move her spear and it would deny her the advantage of long range. He was certain that if he went for hand to hand combat against her, he should win because the girl would''ve probably focused on her spear skills instead of barehanded martial arts. He knew that the spear usually would''ve been able to defeat a cultivator who fought bare-handed due to the longer range. It was lucky that he was able to move fast enough for him to react to her attacks so that he could get close enough to make the fight more fair for himself. He knew that if it was another person with much more strength wielding the spear, the spear wouldn''t have even been able to be budged by that single kick. The girl took the punch in the stomach and used it to her advantage. With the punch making her fly due to her weight, lack of blocking and Shi Die''s strength, she was able to distance herself once again. She used the spear to stop herself from flying any further and got back into her fighting stance. She was much more careful now that she knew how strong Shi Die was. Shi Die ran towards her to attack. The girl quickly threw her spear at him and ran towards him. Just as the spear was about to hit Shi Die and he was about to block it, the girl quickly jumped onto the spear''s end pushing the point up and towards Shi Die''s chest. Shi Die managed to block it before it got there with his legs and tried to wrest control of the spear from the girl. The girl flipped the spear from the ground and into the air and she jumped up to avoid Shi Die''s legs. As she was in midair she brought the spear downwards to hack Shi Die. The force and momentum from the downward swing were enough for Shi Die to be careful with blocking the attack and he quickly rolled to the side whilst still being on the floor. With the downward swing missing, the girl groped the spear and twirled it around her body to start it spinning. The girl did this for the sole reason of making Shi Die unable to predict when she was going to attack. Shi Die saw the speed of the spinning and wasn''t fazed by it. He had seen much faster things flying at his body during his reflex training with Shang Yang and Ye Xiu so he decided to grab on to the shaft as she was spinning it. If the girl had much more muscular strength, Shi Die wouldn''t have dared to attempt to do this because he would''ve been swept away by it immediately. He knew this from experience from fighting Xiao Tu and the similarities between his quarterstaff fighting and the girl''s spear fighting. With that in mind, he lashed out with his leg to kick the shaft in the very middle so that it would fly out of the girl''s grasp. The girl''s grasp was strong but with the direction the spear was kicked, her body was dragged with it. Shi Die dashed to her and pinned her down with his legs whilst she was in midair. He quickly placed her into a hold once they fell onto the ground with his fist right above the throat. The girl surrendered immediately once she saw it. "I forfeit this match. I can''t get myself out of the situation." The referee nodded and had a frown on his face as he looked at her. "Shi Die wins and advances to the Top 8." Shi Dies Surprise With all the matches for the Top 16 finished all that was left of the day was the fight for those that lost in the fights of the Top 16 to compete for the two leftover Top 10 spots. Knowing that was all that was left, the group decided to go back to their dormitory to rest for the day. They didn''t feel the need to go look for any of their teachers because their teachers had placed their trust in them knowing that they wouldn''t need their help in the tournament. As they made their way to their room, they spoke to each other of the things for the future. "You know, after this tournament is done, I was thinking whether we would want to return back to our own home to visit our parents. I know that the academy doesn''t usually allow us to do so but don''t you guys feel like we should go back home to visit them? They haven''t met Shi Die yet so they can always meet new people that way." Shang Yang was thinking of visiting her father because she missed him a lot. Xiao Tu shook his head at her question. "Our parents trusted us to be independent for the entire time in the academy and I''d say we are doing fairly well even if we do have some help from our teachers. I think it''d be better for us to go back in a few years time instead of this early because they''ll be able to see the growth of our strength and our maturity. It''d be best to be a surprise that way after all." Ye Xiu agreed with what Xiao Tu said. "I agree with what Xiao Tu''s saying. I think we should just stay away from our families for a while longer. I feel like I''m overprotected and spoiled when I''m stuck at home. I know it''s probably their way of making up for the past trauma but it still makes me feel restricted in a way. Here in the academy, I can at least do anything I want to my heart''s content without anybody worrying about me besides the few of you and the teachers that are taking care of us." Shi Die was strangely silent during this conversation which Shang Yang noticed immediately. "Shi Die, aren''t you going to voice your opinion? It would be awesome if you could be introduced to our families. They''ll love you the moment they see you. You don''t have to worry about them treating you badly because our families are always kind to friends." Shi Die had a frown on his face, "The talk about families and everything kind of got me down." Shang Yang frowned as well when she remembered that Shi Die had no family to call his own. "I''m sorry about this but you can treat our families as your own! You were never going to be alone once you became friends with us." Shi Die smiled at Shang Yang''s attempt to cheer him up. "Thanks, Shang Yang., you always know what to say to cheer people up. I do agree with what Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu have said though. The points that they made about your parents seeing your own growth in a few years time would be better than visits that happen every year. When your families let the three of you come here, I believe that they thought that the three of you were mature enough to handle and take care of yourself." Shang Yang sighed and pouted. "Fine, we can always visit them in a few years. I was just feeling a little bit homesick." Xiao Tu butted into the conversation once again. "You don''t have to feel homesick because wherever you go, we''ll always be there to make it feel like you never left at all." Ye Xiu joined in as well. "I suggest that everybody go rest now. The tournament starts rather early tomorrow and we still have a huge amount of time in the Dimension to spend. I want us to be able to not fall asleep during the battles otherwise that''d be disappointing. Imagine losing due to fatigue." "Ehh?!? I''m hungry though. I didn''t eat enough during the break because you guys only made a few sandwiches for us." Xiao Tu started to whine because of his hunger. Ye Xiu sighed, "I didn''t want any of us to eat too much during the tournament because you might get indigestion or a stitch whilst fighting. I really doubt your body would''ve been able to digest the food that quickly before the matches started if I made a huge amount." "But... I''m hungry now!" Xiao Tu''s petulant whining could be heard throughout the room. "Shut up Xiao Tu and go meditate. That should at least stave off your hunger for now." Shang Yang replied to him irritably. Continuing to pout, Xiao Tu jumped on his bed. "You''re no fun, Shang Yang." "I''m tired and you are acting immature. Is this always going to happen when you see food?" Her face was deadpan as she asked the question and called out from the bathroom. "Yeah, of course, it''s going to happen all the time! I appreciate food unlike you." Xiao Tu bit back with a response. Shang Yang raised her eyebrow as she walked out of the bathroom. "I appreciate food just like you do, I just appreciate the finer tastes in food compared to you, you don''t have such a select taste like me."Stolen story; please report. Xiao Tu just grunted in irritation and turned away from Shang Yang and sat in the lotus position before going into his meditative state. For the next half a day they spent their time resting, eating or in the Dimension. They were walking down towards the arena for the Top 8 fights when they heard a voice call out Shi Die''s voice. They were looking for the source of the voice when they realised that it was coming from the referee that was announcing the matches. Shi Die rushed to the arena because he had no idea how long it had been since the referee started to call the names. He arrived onto the arena and noticed the person that fit the descriptions of what Shang Yang and Xiao Tu had told him. He wasn''t surprised that the guy was in the Top 8 because he was able to easily defeat Shang Yang and Xiao Tu that even he would have to spend some time against. He kept Shang Yang''s words of caution to be aware of the guy''s strange ability to get close to people and defeat them in a single blow and watched the entire arena for any signs of foul play before the referee started the match. The pair stood face to face and waited for the signal from the referee to start the match. In the stands were the other three watching Shi Die intently. Ye Xiu asked Shang Yang a question, "That''s the guy you fought last time?" "Yeah, it''s definitely the same guy. Every time I think back to the fight, I''m trying to figure out what he did to defeat us so quickly. I can''t say that it was just his pure speed that allowed him to move that quickly because even you don''t have such speed even with a strong body and training in the gravity room." Xiao Tu put in his own opinion of the guy. "He''s probably had some training when it comes to moving silently. Even with such speed, he didn''t even make a sound when moving. It should be impossible for him not to make the wind move from that speed or make a sound with his weapons out like he has them. I don''t know if Shi Die can defeat him because it''s probably going to be his bane for the tournament." Ye Xiu nodded at Xiao Tu''s observation. "If what you say is true, Shi Die won''t even have the chance to get close or attack the dude unless he has some kind of instincts of a beast. If he has a danger instinct then it would probably be possible for him to attack the guy. I think I should have a chance against the guy since I developed a danger instinct after my bloodline was awakened. It''s truly useful to fight against things when you cant actually see what''s coming. It''s how I avoid most of Shang Yang''s daggers." Ye Xiu wished Shi Die luck because he needed it. "Let''s wish him good luck and hope that his body will be able to withstand the sneak attacks of the guy." The group looked to the arena where the referee had appeared and was about to start the match. "Are the two of you ready to fight? If so, nod your head and we''ll begin on three." The two nodded and complied with the referee''s orders. "On three. One!" "Two." Shi Die''s body tensed as he was about to jump towards the guy so that he wouldn''t have the opportunity to do his vanishing act. "Three!" Shi Die lunged at the guy and was aiming to attack the legs. If the guy couldn''t move then he wouldn''t be able to utilise whatever movement technique that he used. The guy threw a dagger at Shi Die and waited for Shi Die to continue lunging at him. Seeing that a dagger was thrown at him, he continued his lunge and caught the dagger in his right hand before using it as a weapon for himself. He didn''t need any skill with the dagger to stab the guy in the chest which is exactly what Xiao Tu did. The guy blocked Shi Die''s stab with another dagger and that was when Shi Die''s body continued to move forward. He was confused because his stab was blocked so he shouldn''t have any more momentum to keep going forward. His eyes widened as he realised what the guy was probably trying to do and turned around just in time and lashed out with his foot to back kick. The guy was caught off-guard and retreated several steps. Knowing that his sneak attack failed, the guy took out another dagger and wielded both in his hands. The guy was rushing into close quarter combat with Shi Die because he knew that a sharp weapon would do more damage than Shi Die''s fists. He was correct because when Shi Die dodged one of the guy''s strikes he saw the dagger leave a clean mark on the arena ground. He frowned because he knew how sharp those daggers were and was thinking of another plan to stay away from the guy. He definitely wasn''t proficient in the use of the dagger but tried to do his best anyway. He used the dagger to block the attacks of the guy, and any that he couldn''t block was quickly evaded. He noticed that several of the attacks were aimed at his organs and definitely was scared of the daggers stabbing him. ''I can''t lose this fight. I know that Ye Xiu and the others have told me that losing is fine but in my heart, I still feel like every fight must be one to win. Therefore I shall try my best to win this match.'' Shi Die''s conviction was lit aflame and unconsciously, marks started to appear over his entire body. Several teachers and students who were watching the fight were confused as to how that was possible and some dismissed it as just a normal Qi technique. San Guo who was observing from a secret location frowned. ''I''m surprised that this kid has a bloodline but that''s definitely not any bloodline technique that I recognise. Could it be an innate bloodline technique that he can naturally use? I''ll investigate after the tournament.'' He continued observing the match. Shi Die''s speed was greatly increased and fangs and claws grew. He was able to catch up with the guy''s vanishing speed and attacked him ferociously. Shi Die was slightly bestial in his behaviour and his instincts were heightened because of the transformation. The guy sighed at the speed that Shi Die displayed and sighed once again because he knew he had to use his finishing move for assassinating targets with strong defences. The guy placed all his Qi into a ceremonial dagger that he took out from his dimensional storage. He strengthened it with the metal Qi in the surroundings and went for the kill. Shi Die''s claws reached the guy''s face and the guy''s dagger reached Shi Die''s stomach. The both struck each other at the same time. Ye Xiu cried out in shock. "Shi Die!" The guy got up and bowed even though his face had claw marks all over it. The referee recovered from his shock and declared the guy as the winner. "Yan Guo advances to the Top 4!" Once the referee announced Yan Guo''s win, Shang Yang and Ye Xiu rushed towards the stage to heal Shi Die. When they arrived there, they were clearly surprised by the sight they were presented with. Jing Hua Fei The sight they were greeted with was surprising, to say the least. They could see his wounds that he had received from Yan Guo quickly disappearing before their eyes. They were definitely surprised due to the fact that they had never seen such a thing in their life before. In their years of learning Medical Arts, they had heard of such a fast regeneration speed but it was usually aided with the help of Qi but Ye Xiu and Shang Yang could see no Qi being used with their observation technique. Ye Xiu likened it to a superhero that he had read about from the comics that were very popular in his previous world. The speed was definitely just as fast as that superhero''s regeneration and Ye Xiu thought that it must some kind of genetic defect that allowed him to heal this fast. As Ye Xiu was thinking about it, Xiao Tu also leapt up onto the stage and nudged the two who were just staring at Shi Die. "Oi, get Shi Die off the stage, the referees want to begin the next match. Just bring him to the stands where he''ll be safe because Shang Yang and I can watch over him there. You can just stay near the arena so that you can get to your match quickly when you''re called." Xiao Tu started to crouch and threw Shi Die over his shoulder and carried him off to the stands with Shang Yang following him. Shang Yang looked over her shoulder at Ye Xiu, "We''ll ask about it when he wakes up together. I''d rather not be explaining this over again if we ask it whilst you''re at a match or busy with something. It''s definitely interesting how his regeneration was so fast though." She walked off and disappeared into the crowd that surrounded the arena. Ye Xiu wasn''t watching the current match that was going on because he was thinking about Shi Die. "His regeneration... could it be linked to that transformation that he had earlier? There were marks on his body that I could barely see which were pulsing with Qi that appeared together with his fangs and claws. That means that whatever power that he gained was definitely from a source that was a predator." "His transformation gave him speed but it didn''t seem to actually give him strength besides the extra power behind his blows due to his claws and the speed behind them. That means that it''s a fast predator as well." Ye Xiu shook his head because he knew that he wouldn''t be able to figure it out. He had too little knowledge of the mysteries of the world and it would do no good for him to trying to unravel it when he had his own matches to worry about more urgently compared to this matter. ''I''ll just ask Sir when I meet him again. He should have a clue as to what it was if Shi Die doesn''t know.'' Ye Xiu watched the competitors fighting each other with disinterest because the fight was boring. It wasn''t that the people weren''t strong that made it boring, it was the fact that neither of them used any flashy moves or did anything to pump the blood of the audience watching. They were just trading hits which Ye Xiu noticed was due to the fact that both the fighters had obscenely strong bodies on par with his. Though they had strong bodies, they had a rather lacking Qi pool. They had a Qi pool smaller than the average person and it could be due to the fact that they were born like that. The two were twins which also made the match boring because the twins probably knew each other''s tricks like the back of their hands so there really was nothing they could pull out to surprise each other especially when they had the same fighting style and moves. Ye Xiu was thinking of ways to beat Yan Guo. He had said that he should probably be able to beat the guy but his confidence inside was lacking because he hadn''t come up with anything to stop the guy disappearing constantly. ''The only thing I can think of is to use my ''Entangling Roots'' style and hope that it''s fast enough so that he can''t slip through the attacks. But from what I''ve seen, he''s definitely fast enough to do just that.'' ''Nobody has actually seen my sword and whip dual wield besides my friends and teachers... Yes! I can use that to my advantage. If he doesn''t expect me to be able to block him because of my whip then he''ll be surprised. I think that instead of actually blocking his attack, I''ll just evade instead. He''ll be continuing to move forward with his follow through with his strike that means I can strike his side during that time. I should also make potholes around the arena so he won''t be able to move as freely.'' Ye Xiu nodded when he came up with a basic plan to deal with Yan Guo if he met him. The twins'' match lasted for over thirty minutes until one of them got a lucky hit in on one of their weak spots. The arena was quickly repaired and cleared of any debris that would obstruct the fighting. Ye Xiu''s name was called out clearly for the next match and he stepped up to the arena to see a girl with a bow on her back. Ye Xiu narrowed his eyes when he saw the bow because he knew just how deadly a proficient archer was as proven when he sparred against his father. His father had painfully reminded him to never underestimate the accuracy of an archer especially if they used it as their main weapon. This had been beaten into him every time he lost against his father. ''I hope my reflex training will help me enough if I have to go close quarters or if the arrows get past my whip. I''m confident that my reflexes and speed of my whip will be enough to block the arrows but you never know. Father can use his Qi arrows that can''t be blocked by physical weapons and can only be blocked by a defence made out of Qi. If she does start shooting Qi arrows, I''ll try my best to evade. Father told me that his homing arrows are a speciality skill of his so that shouldn''t worry me.''If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Ye Xiu readied his whip and didn''t bother hiding it because he had been using it for the majority of the tournament so people must assume that it''s his main weapon. The referee was ready to start the match. "On three. Three!" The referee''s sudden three without any count up was a surprise but didn''t catch Ye Xiu off guard for long. He quickly lashed out with his whip directly to the girl''s bow who promptly dodged it and took several arrows from her quiver. What the girl didn''t expect was for the whip to be able to continue coming after her even after she dodged it. She didn''t even see the movement of Ye Xiu''s body to move the whip. Ye Xiu employed the same tactic that he used against San Guo because he knew that if he kept her busy it''ll be harder for her to shoot. Obviously, for an expert archer, this wouldn''t even faze them because they would be able to shoot just as accurate when they are moving as to when they are stationary. It wasn''t unexpected for Ye Xiu when she started to shoot arrows whilst dodging his whip. Ye Xiu knew that a movement technique for an archer would usually focus on evasion so he made sure that he would turn the battleground into his own playground where he could control where the girl moved with his whip''s attacks. Ye Xiu kept his observation technique on the girl to watch for any buildup of Qi in the girl''s hands because he would be able to dodge Qi arrows if she was able to shoot any. The girl shot an arrow which was able to get past his whip movement and when Ye Xiu dodged it, he noticed that the arena floor was melting. ''Acid?'' He looked at the girl again who was smiling. "You better dodge those arrows now! I wouldn''t want to mar that beautiful face of yours!" She started to make a kissing motion with her mouth whilst she shot more arrows at Ye Xiu who was bewildered by the girl''s shamelessness. Ye Xiu wasn''t distracted for long when one of the arrows flew right by him as he dodged in time. He placed his concentration back on the fight. The acid which melted the ground only lasted for a while but did decent damage to the floor. With a grin inside of his head, he knew that he could use it to his advantage. By having the girl shoot her acidic arrows at him and evading them, she''ll basically be helping him accelerate his plan. He took out another whip from his dimensional storage and started to use both at the same time. He hadn''t perfected the skill needed for both to not disturb each other during their flight but had enough skill to avoid that from happening the majority of the time. He had been trying to learn to dual wield whips for a couple of months as a secret move so that it could catch his enemies off guard by the unusual combo. No books on any kind of whip dual wielding could be found in the libraries of the Academy or Dimension. He had only one style that he figured out that he would use for this manner of fighting and it was completely for defence. Though now that he thought about it, he could actually use this defensive method to deal damage or change the landscape whatever way he wanted whilst having his opponents completely focus on dodging the whips if he so decided to attack. To him, it was obvious that this style would tire anybody out extremely quickly due to the insane amount of movements he would have to make. After his bloodline awakening though, the muscular endurance and cardiovascular endurance that he had, had improved by leaps and bounds. This meant that his original ten minutes of whip dual wielding had extended to over an hour of him continuously using his whips at high speeds. His body got rid of most of the lactic acid buildup in his muscles fairly quickly so he felt no muscle weakness most of the time. With that in mind, he had an ''impenetrable'' sphere of defence around his body that would hurt anybody that touched it. The girl could clearly see his arms moving but not the actual whips. She utilised her observation technique that would help her increase her dynamic visual acuity. It was useful for her because it allowed her to see high-speed objects or targets that would be impossible for a normal person to see. Qi helped in improving a person''s vision but it definitely did not make a person''s vision superhuman until you were in an extremely high realm. This technique allowed her to see blurry images of the whip but it was definitely enough for her. She didn''t exactly want to aim directly at Ye Xiu but more to stop his whip movement. This meant that she was going to aim for parts of the whip and hope that the acid can burn through the whip and make it useless. The plan was a foolhardy one but one that she would try nevertheless. Ye Xiu watched her as she nocked several arrows back and prepared to shoot them at him. He raised his eyebrows because he found what she was doing was ridiculous but was still cautious. The girl shot her arrows and one arrow managed to successfully hit one of the whips with the arrowhead. The acid started to burn through a part of the whip which she thought would render it useless. Ye Xiu raised his eyebrows once again and smirked inside his thoughts. ''Too bad she doesn''t know that I can make my whip longer or repair it with my Qi.'' He let her success get to her head and pulsed Qi into his damaged whip. He attacked her quickly and captured her with his whips. He started to use his ''Entangling Roots'' style and formed Qi thorns to drain her Qi and tire her out. She struggled but not with enough apparent strength to tear her way through the whips. "I surrender." The girl called out after several minutes of being trapped by the whips. "Ye Xiu wins and advances to the Top 4." The referee held Ye Xiu''s arm and lifted it up. Ye Xiu nodded to the girl as she spoke to him. "I can''t believe I lost so easily, I didn''t think of the whip being able to be repaired. Your whip also rendered my bare fisted martial arts completely useless so I never had the chance to even use it against you. How''d you know how to counter my arrows by grabbing the shaft of it with your whip?" Ye Xiu smiled at his memories of training with his father. "My father is an expert archer beyond your skill level. I''ve sparred against him enough times to at defeat those of a lower skill level than him after he beat lessons of never underestimating an archer into me. He manages to get the most ridiculous shots past my defences and that is why I learnt to fight against bow and arrow users." The girl sighed when she realised that she had no chance in the beginning. "Thank you for the match anyway. Get rid of your whips around me, I''m plenty tired now because of you. My name is Jing Hua Fei. I hope we''ll meet each other again." She made kissing motions with her mouth and hand once again when she was free from Ye Xiu''s whips and sauntered off the arena. Ye Xiu shook his head and went to the stands to find his friends Group Banter Ye Xiu was walking towards the stands where he spotted Xiao Tu waving at him at the entrance of the Arena grounds. Obviously confused to why Xiao Tu would be waving to him when he could find them in the stands easily, he ran towards Xiao Tu. "Ye Xiu, you did well in your fight! I didn''t expect you to be able to use two whips at the same time! Was this what you were keeping from us the entire time? Was this going to be a secret move that you would take out in the future to fight us or something?" Xiao Tu wasn''t sad that Ye Xiu had kept his new fighting style a secret from him but was actually extremely excited at the thought of fighting Ye Xiu whilst he is using his new fighting style. "We can talk about my fighting style later when the others are here. Has Shi Die woken up yet?" "Nah, he''s still unconscious. Shang Yang is taking care of him right now so if you want to head to the stands we can go now. All the matches are nearly over right so you don''t need to stay to watch the matches anymore. We can just go back to our dormitory rooms and leave Shi Die to rest there." "Sure, why not. I want to rest now anyway. Even though swinging around my whips may not tire my muscles it still consumes a huge amount of energy. I''m absolutely hungry right now and I want to eat a huge amount of food to counteract this hunger. What sucks at the same time is that I don''t feel like cooking anything right now and the Mess Hall is so far away that I''m too lazy to walk." ''An opportunity for me!'' Xiao Tu beamed when he thought about it. "I''ll get the food for us! What do you want to eat?" Ye Xiu thought for a moment with his finger on his bottom lip. "Surprise me with whatever you buy! I''m sure if you ask a favour from Jin Yuan, he''d definitely agree to cook something up especially if you say something about Shi Die being injured or that something abnormal had happened. Just get as much food as you can. Everyone here eats a lot of food, so get as much as you think we''re going to eat." "Just put it into your dimensional storage so that it stays warm because I''m just going to go meditate first as you get the food. I want to at least recover from my fatigue so I can taste the food and remember the taste of the food. I like to enjoy the taste of my food when I eat it so I don''t want to be too tired to even care." Xiao Tu just noticed. "Leave it to me! If Shi Die wakes up, don''t ask him anything yet and wait for me!" Xiao Tu started to run out of the Arena grounds and towards the Mess Hall. Ye Xiu shook his head at his friend''s antics and went to the stands to look for Shang Yang and Shi Die. Ye Xiu spotted Shang Yang stroking Shi Die''s hair as his head was resting on her lap. She noticed Ye Xiu and waved with her free hand. "Hey, saw your fight. That was definitely something else. I''ve never seen anybody have a fighting style like that and I''ve travelled with my father to many different places." Ye Xiu scratched his neck. "I wanted to come up with a style that enemies would be unable to counter easily because they''ve never met it. That fighting style is not completed so it''s still extremely rough when it comes to the techniques that I know for the style. I only really know one kind of ''technique'' for it, and it''s basically employing the same concept as my ''Entangling Roots'' style just with two whips." "I haven''t added my Qi thorns to it yet because it''s extremely hard to concentrate on making sure the whip doesn''t meet each other in mid-air and make the entire thing fall apart. My current limit is just to have the two whips attacking and just shoving my Qi into the whip so that it is sturdier, hits harder, becomes longer or repairs itself. Things as intricate as Qi thorns for the both are out of my league until I learn how to multitask for more than three things at once." Shang Yang listened to Ye Xiu ramble on about his new fighting style intently. "I''m sorry if I''m just going off on a tangent, I have so many ideas and problems with the style that I want to do or fix so if I talk about it, I go into my own world." "It''s fine Ye Xiu. By the way, have you seen Xiao Tu? He was supposed to go find you but he hasn''t returned yet seeing as you are already here." "Oh, Xiao Tu is going to the Mess Hall to get some food for the four of us. I feel famished and I think Shi Die would like to get some food into his stomach when he gets back. I was going to tell you that we''ll be returning to our room now that all the matches that we need to see have finished. The only matches that are going on now are the second year''s group stage fights so it won''t be too interesting yet."The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Shang Yang nodded. "If that''s the case then you should help me carry Shi Die back to the room. I''m too lazy to carry him right now since I have no strength in my body." Ye Xiu was snorting in amusement, "I can''t believe you said something so unrealistic. You having no strength in your body since you have barely done anything today is a joke. Don''t be that lazy, it''s not good for you. Out of the four of us, you are probably the laziest person in our group when it comes to training." Shang Yang bobbed her head up and down. "A girl needs to do something else besides just training every day. I spend my time to do my hobbies and to live my life. I''m still young so I want to experience what I can before I''m too old to experience anything. I''ve travelled a lot more compared to any of you so you don''t understand how weird it is to be stuck in a single place for a long period of time." "I don''t know how you feel but I get what you are saying. I''m not condemning you for not training as hard as us, it was just meant as a joke but I won''t say it anymore if it bothers you." "It doesn''t bother me, my mind just feels like it should be elsewhere rather than be tied down in a place for years." Shang Yang looked at the darkening sky. "We should get to the rooms now. Xiao Tu would probably already be finished buying the food if I know him well enough." Ye Xiu sighed. "I totally forgot about that. I was busy listening to you and forgot about Xiao Tu going to buy food for us." Smirking, "Are you going to help me carry Shi Die or not?" "Fine, fine. I''ll help you carry Shi Die, don''t worry about it." Ye Xiu crouched down so he could pick up Shi Die. "Let''s go." They walked back to their room quickly and saw that Xiao Tu was already. "Hey! You guys took a while to get here." Shang Yang took the opportunity to annoy Xiao Tu. "More like you were too much of an excitable puppy which is why you got here at record speed." Xiao Tu ignored her. "Jin Yuan managed to cook up some food extremely quickly! I don''t know how he managed to do it but I''ll just keep on thinking that it is some kind of Spirit Cook thing that allows them to achieve such miracles easily. I managed to get a lot of food so you don''t have to worry about running out of anything to eat today! By the way is Shi Die awake yet? If not I can always wake him by shaking him violently." Xiao Tu had a mischievous smirk on his face. "No he''s not awake yet and no you may not shake him awake. Who knows what actually happened to him during the fight. It could be very tiring for him to have that happen to him. I know that it definitely looked painful to see what happened to Shi Die and it was intriguing at the same time but I have his safety first. Leave him alone and let him wake up of his own accord." Xiao Tu pouted at Ye Xiu''s blatant refusal. "Fine. We''ll just wait for Shi Die to wake up and wait for him to tell us what happened." He spoke in a resigned tone. They spent several hours eating and meditating before Shi Die woke up. "Ugh... Where am I?" Shi Die grunted as he tried to get up from his bed. Ye Xiu rushed to his side and popped a pill into his mouth quickly. "That should get rid of any after-effects of whatever you experienced." Xiao Tu gave a wan smile. "Thanks for the help Ye Xiu. Do you know what happened to me after I collapsed? I can only remember the both of us striking at the same time before falling unconscious." Ye Xiu nodded. "You lost the match to Yan Guo. He apparently managed to strike you in the stomach where you started to bleed. You managed to scratch his face severely and it looked like he was rather uncomfortable with the injuries though he was trying to prevent himself from showing any emotions. Besides that... I can only say that Shang Yang and I saw an interesting thing occur to your body as we went to heal you from your wound." Shi Die frowned. "Interesting? Was it related to whatever happened to my body during the fight?" Ye Xiu was contemplating the question. "The most likely answer would be yes. It probably had something to do with that transformation of yours during the fight. You had grown fangs and claws and had marks all over your body which seemed to be pulsing with energy. Your speed greatly increased and after you were injured, you managed to heal in mere seconds after the injury was inflicted. I have no clue as to what your ability was or if it has any side effects for you but as far as I can tell it''s beneficial for you." Shi Die was unsure whether he should talk about what he felt during his transformation but went with what his heart told him anyway. "When I was transformed it felt like I was ruled by animalistic urges. I had the urge to rip my opponent apart into pieces because he threatened my survival. It also felt like I wasn''t in control of my body, it was like I was a spectator inside of my body just watching and feeling what my body does but being unable to do anything to stop myself." "I could feel where all of you were. It was strange... I couldn''t see any of you but I knew where you were during that time. That animalistic side of me that came out... Believed you guys were no threat to it and felt like you were part of its family. I can''t tell you much else about the power really. I felt like I had more energy and besides the burning sensation that could be felt throughout my body... I don''t know what else to tell you." Shi Die sighed in frustration. "Look, it''s fine. I was planning to ask Sir about what happened during the tournament anyway. I have a theory on what it could be and he could possibly confirm it for me because he knows much more about this kind of stuff anyway." Ye Xiu consoled Shi Die. "Thanks, Ye Xiu." Ye Xiu passed the food over to him so that he could relieve his hunger. San Guos Conclusion The next day had arrived and whilst the others were in the bathroom freshening themselves up, Shang Yang was reading a book when a note was shoved underneath the door of the room. Looking over the book she decided to put down her book and go over to the note to see what it said. "Dear my lovely students, please meet me at my office when you are all fed and watered. I''d like to discuss something with all of you present. You don''t have to go to the Arena grounds today because it is only the second year''s group stages. Your own semi-final matches will start during the weekend together with the second year''s semi-finals so that more people can watch and that the mood of the event is much more exuberant." Shang Yang read the letter out loud to herself and Ye Xiu heard her speaking as he was drying his hair with his towel. "What''s this about going to somebody''s office? Who is the person who sent it to us?" "The most likely suspect that sent the note to us was probably Sir. I don''t see Jin Yuan sending such a letter to all of us because nobody else besides Shi Die still studies under him. We can also rule out Liu Fan simply because he wouldn''t send such a polite letter. He''d be more likely to come to our room and knock on the door loudly or wait for us to come to him instead." "If it''s Sir who sent it then we''ll just have to hurry our way over." Xiao Tu popped up behind Ye Xiu startling him slightly. Shang Yang shook her head. "There''s no need for us to hurry. He told us to eat something first before we go to him. It''s probably not urgent if he didn''t come to find us himself." Ye Xiu was thinking as they were walking out of their room. "I might be able to take the chance to ask Sir about what happened with Shi Die when we meet him." Shi Die looked at Ye Xiu as he said that. "Do you really have to ask Sir about what happened yesterday? I''m slightly uncomfortable with others knowing about the transformation that I had." Ye Xiu patted his head. "If you were worried about something like that then you shouldn''t be. I''m pretty sure everyone in the academy that was watching your fight saw your claws and fangs emerge. Your marks were definitely invisible to others unless they had an observation technique that can visually see Qi." Shi Die sighed. "I guess so. If everyone''s already seen the transformation guess I can''t hide it. Has anybody questioned either of you about it?" "None that I''m aware of." Ye Xiu replied. "I guess it''ll be good to identify what that transformation was. If it can happen once, then it can happen again. I don''t want to lose control of my body because that''s just terrifying." They went to the mess hall to get food so they could eat. "What do you think Sir has to tell us?" Shang Yang asked. "I have no clue, we''ll find out when we get to his office. All will be revealed when we see him." Ye Xiu idly commented as they were walking to San Guo''s office. They could hear someone shouting loudly when they got close to San Guo''s office. "What do you mean that we''ll be hosting the Inter-school competition in two years?!? How was this not revealed earlier! We have so much preparation to do especially the different types of training we have to figure out for the fighters that will participate! This is why I hate joining these competitions! The only reason why I have the academy still joining is so that I bring in benefits for the students! There was no reason for you to withhold that information unless you are an accomplice with the lower-ranked academies "No! Don''t give me that bullshit. The majority of the organisation team was part of the lower-ranked academies! You can''t lie to me if I''m looking at the names directly you dumbass. How did they manage to bribe you anyway? I offer you enough money each month to keep you happy for several years and we''ve known each other for years!" "What?!? Fine, I won''t be contacting you again. Just tell me the specific date when the academies will be arriving. Thank you. Goodbye." A sigh could be heard from inside the office as the group approached. They knocked on the door tentatively scared that San Guo would erupt in anger if they stepped on his toes. "Come in." The children could see San Guo rubbing his temples and was sighing. "Oh, you''re here, that''s good." Ye Xiu was the one to ask the question that they were basically broadcasting. "Sir, what was that about a competition?" San Guo looked up from his papers. "Oh, the competition... it''s nothing much. It''s just a competition that happens twice every decade. It''s the competition that decides the ranking of the Academies in the Outer Region. An Academy is chosen every time to host the competition and usually, it''s the Top 10 Academies who get that honour. Surprisingly, the organisers of the event this time were mainly from the lower-ranked Academies. How that happened, I don''t know but it''s frustrating that they want us to host it."Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. Xiao Tu was confused. "If they wanted to get someone to host it then why not the eleventh ranked Academy?" San Guo smiled at Xiao Tu''s indiscreet try at trying to lighten the atmosphere. "The eleventh-ranked Academy has a similar strength to those ranked in the lower half of the Top 10. Between our Academy and that Academy, there''s a huge difference in the strength of the staff, the number of students enrolled and the average talent of those students. I personally may be strong enough to stand against multiple teachers and principals of those Academies but they can still overwhelm me with numbers." "Since these Academies are so strong, they lure in all the genii of the generation towards their Academies and we are left with the weaker ones. It is why even after thirty years of me being the Principal of the Academy, that we have still not been able to pass the eleventh ranked Academy. Enough of that anyway, let us talk about what I wanted you here for." "I called you here so that I could talk to you about what happened yesterday during Shi Die''s match. I have a hunch that the four of you have already discussed what you''ve noticed about Shi Die''s transformation but I''d like to enlighten the rest of you a bit more." San Guo cleared his throat before taking out a massive book from his dimensional storage. "Here is a book passed down in my family that records the many bloodlines that we''ve seen or encountered. I''ve looked through the book multiple times but have been unable to find any mention of what Shi Die''s bloodline is. I''ve deduced that Shi Die''s transformation is due to a bloodline due to the animalistic traits that he displayed after the transformation. There are similar bloodlines that have an innate bloodline ability that allows them to take on the traits of the animal that they inherited the blood from." "All bloodlines have an innate ability that they can use. The bloodline ability that can be used is dependent on the Qi Beast that your bloodline descends from. If your bloodline is merged with multiple different types of bloodlines, it''s possible to create an entirely new bloodline with a new ability. Innate bloodline abilities can only be used by those that have a very high bloodline purity. I myself do not have such a high bloodline purity to be able to use an innate bloodline ability but I think that for Ye Xiu it is possible." "I have no clue what kind of dragon he''s descended from but it should be possible for the innate bloodline ability to emerge during a life or death crisis. What Shi Die displayed was an innate bloodline ability for sure, I can confirm that much. What I can''t confirm is what bloodline it is because it isn''t recorded in my family''s bloodline compendium. As far as I can extrapolate from similar bloodlines is that the bloodline is of a canine." San Guo explained the bloodlines thoroughly. San Guo stroked his chin. "It''s interesting to see Shi Die to have a bloodline that was already awakened. The only way that I can say why his bloodline was awakened is that his bloodline purity is extremely high to the point that it was already awakened from the moment he was born or that he was awakened by somebody and didn''t tell anybody." Shi Die shook his head vehemently. "The latter is definitely impossible. I haven''t let anybody get close to me for whatever the awakening requires for the past few years. The only time that somebody has gotten that close to me is when I''m within the Academy with you guys... or when my teacher first taught me some things." Ye Xiu interrupted Shi Die. "Did your teacher ever put his palms on your back or anything or make your body burn on the inside and the outside at the same time?" "No, that''s definitely not possible. He never caused me harm besides when we sparred." Shi Die shook his head negatively with a frown on his face as he thought back to the times he was with his teacher. "Then the only other possible explanation is the former. I don''t have a potion for checking bloodlines and nobody in the country will even know of bloodlines so it''s fine. All we need to know is that you have a bloodline and we''ll need you to be able to use your innate bloodline ability to the best of its ability. Innate bloodline abilities are powerful for a very good reason, and mastering it will allow you to be above your peers that''s for sure." San Guo stroked his chin in thought. "This new discovery can allow you to keep up with Ye Xiu in combat power. I''ll come up with a training plan so that innate bloodline ability of yours is used to its maximum potential. I don''t want a powerful ability like that to be squandered. I''ll have you spar with Ye Xiu to get used to your that ability of yours. What we need to figure out first though is what circumstances would make you most likely be forced to use that ability again?" "Tell me the circumstances of when the transformation started to occur. If I can emulate that situation again, I can force you into it so you can train in your usage of the ability. Don''t leave any details out of the explanation." San Guo gestured for Shi Die to speak. Shi Die sat on a chair that was in the office. "I know I was thinking about not wanting to lose the match. I felt like my pride would take a hit if I lost it and my feelings were more to the point that I developed the habit to never lose because it would count as my death back in the previous conditions." "I''ll stimulate that during our practice sessions. I''ll make you feel hopeless to the point that even if you die trying, you''ll die fighting at your very best. That should be enough to stimulate your transformation to come out. Anyway, take this book on bloodlines and keep it safe. It will do you good to be able to identify different types of bloodlines and their abilities if you see them." San Guo kicked them out of his office and told them to relax for the rest of the day. "Go and have fun, don''t do anything strenuous. Train lightly and keep your skills in shape otherwise I''ll murder you in training next time." Wang Zhu "Who do you think you''ll be fighting Ye Xiu? I hope you get to fight that Yan Guo guy, I want to see you pulverize him." Xiao Tu was being very loud in the bathroom as they were cleaning themselves up for the start of the day. "Quiet down Xiao Tu... It''s too early in the morning for this. I don''t mind who I go against as long as it''s a good fight. If it''s a bad fight where my opponent has absolutely no idea what they are doing then there is no point in me trying to fight them in the first place because I''m here to prove myself and to get battle experience against others." Ye Xiu groaned. Xiao Tu''s exuberant smile died as he frowned for a few seconds before going back to his sunny disposition. "You''re no fun! Show more enthusiasm for your fights! How can you expect to do your fight if you''re not even excited about it?" Xiao Tu kept on pestering Ye Xiu trying to get him to be enthusiastic about his upcoming match. Ye Xiu sighed as he ignored Xiao Tu''s pestering to continue with his daily routine. After he finished washing his face he replied to Xiao Tu. "Not everyone has the same ways to prepare for a fight Xiao Tu. For some people to fight at their best, they are at their calmest and it''s the same for me. I like to keep a calm demeanour as I fight so I don''t lose track of my surroundings because I have to keep an eye on multiple things at the same time. I have to do so much more to win a fight compared to you." "Your excited manner may work for you and other people but it definitely won''t work for me. Sometimes I may be extremely excited about a fight but I become calm pretty much after we start the match. Don''t try to incite my excitement for the fight. I just want to have a calm resting period before we go over to the Arena grounds. If I can have a peaceful day besides the fight then it''ll be fine for me. I can''t wait for the tournament to be over. I''ll have to participate against those older students though." Ye Xiu left the bathroom after saying his piece and was getting dressed as Shang Yang walked into the bathroom. "What did you do put Ye Xiu in such a glum mood?" "Nothing. I was just trying to get him to be excited about participating in the matches today. I mean, he''ll get to fight the strongest opponents in our year so it should get his blood pumping shouldn''t it? Just thinking about it makes me want to get into action!" Shang Yang was washing her hair as she heard Xiao Tu''s enthusiasm through his shouting. "Not everyone is the same. I''d probably be more nervous instead of being excited for a match like this. Just let Ye Xiu do what he wants for now. If being calm before a match helps him win then let him be. It is all about the results in the end game, not the immediate rewards." Shang Yang continued to wash her hair when a voice rang out throughout their dorm room. "Shang Yang, Xiao Tu and Shi Die! I''ll be going out to the Arena grounds first. I don''t know if they will start early or not because the referee is different this time! I''ll see you guys later, cheer for me alright?" Ye Xiu closed the door behind him quietly and ran towards the Arena grounds. He wasn''t completely calm which his face did not suggest but inside he was actually screaming in excitement. ''Even though I told Xiao Tu that I wasn''t excited I know that I was just lying to myself. It probably also didn''t help that I had just woken up and my mood wasn''t exactly great for being too excited.'' Ye Xiu sighed after rethinking what he had said to Xiao Tu. ''I hope he doesn''t hold it against me and understands my reasoning.'' Walking towards the Arena grounds, Ye Xiu noticed that a lot huge amount of people had already gathered and some of the contestants that were going to be fighting later were sparring with their friends as a warmup before their matches. Ye Xiu sighed once again because he should''ve asked one of his friends whether they would spar with him so that he could warm up. ''Well, what''s past is past. Hopefully, they make it here soon so I can spar against them. It''d be bad if I don''t warm up.'' Ye Xiu started to stretch since his muscles had already been prepared with his stretching session due to his run from his room to the Arena grounds. He noticed shadows over him as his head was bowed down to stretch his upper and lower body. He looked up to see Xiao Tu grinning above him. "FOUND YOU!" Xiao Tu picked Ye Xiu off the ground easily and hugged him like a bear. "Xi-Xiao Tu, you''re crushing me here. I can''t breath!" Ye Xiu was gasping for air as his body was being crushed by the tight hug that Xiao Tu was suffocating him with. Looking at the floor like a chastised child, Ye Xiu was let go from Xiao Tu''s hold and he promptly fell to the floor trying to inhale as much oxygen he could possibly get into his lungs. "Seriously Xiao Tu? Did you have to hug me so tightly? You could''ve just hugged me like an ordinary person and that would''ve been completely fine. Why did you hug me so tightly anyway, we saw each other a few minutes ago. If I hadn''t seen you for a long period of time then I''d understand..."If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. Xiao Tu blew a raspberry at him. "I just like giving strong hugs like that. It feels much more sincere if I do it this way. Are you ready for your fight?" "I need your help as a sparring partner, you can see that the majority of the others that will be fighting later are warming up by sparring against their friends. I think it is a good idea because at least I can see if I''ve improved slightly in the past few days and it''ll also help me warm up at the same time. So what say you?" "Sure why not? Xiao Tu took out his quarterstaff from his dimensional storage and jumped onto an empty arena that was close to them. Start whenever you''re ready." Xiao Tu pointed an end of his quarterstaff at Ye Xiu beckoning him to begin the match. Ye Xiu slowly got up to the arena and took out a single whip. "Same rules as usual?" Xiao Tu shrugged. "Okay. When are you going to fight me with your two whip style?" "When you deserve to be fought with it." Ye Xiu smirked devilishly. Xiao Tu raised an eyebrow and smiled at Ye Xiu. "Do you really think I''m not worth you using your whip style? Do you think you are the only person who has hid techniques in secret?" Xiao Tu took out another long object from his dimensional storage and when Ye Xiu saw it he was surprised. "You actually learnt how to use the spear in secret with your mother? Did you do it because of the similarities between fighting with a quarterstaff and a spear?" Ye Xiu asked quizzically. "You know me too well. If I learnt to fight using a bo staff then I wouldn''t have learnt how to wield a spear because of the differences in grip and whatnot. At least with a quarterstaff, the wielding styles are very similar to each other." Xiao Tu was smiling very brightly as he wielded his spear. Ye Xiu shook his head because if Xiao Tu thought that him wielding a spear would help him win the spar then he was wrong. "You''ve got the wrong idea if you think you can beat me with a spear. I''ve fought your mother multiple times so I have a basic idea of fighting spear users as well just so you know." "Thinking that you know my mother''s style would mean that you know my spear style is definitely the wrong misconception. I''ve obviously learnt a different spear style from what my mother knows so that you wouldn''t be able to counter it too easily." Xiao Tu boasted about his skills and leapt away as Shi Die attacked him with his lone whip. "Your whip movements are the weirdest I''ve seen. I still don''t understand how you''re able to get that whip to keep following people so easily. Also doesn''t your whip have a range limit?!?" Xiao Tu started to rant but was quickly defeated because he wasn''t paying attention to what Ye Xiu was doing. He had brought out his second whip and discreetly used it to bind him. "That was easy." Ye Xiu stood over Xiao Tu''s bound body. Pouting, Xiao Tu got out of the bindings as Ye Xiu relaxed them. "I''ll beat you next time. I won''t be caught unaware by that second whip next time." They went to the stands and talked to each other, waiting for Shang Yang and Shi Die to appear. After an hour of waiting for the referee for the matches stepped up to the Arena and announced the names for the first match. Ye Xiu was already walking towards the arena when he heard his name being called and promptly made his way there at an even faster speed. He made it there and noticed that his opponent was an unknown one. He deduced that this must''ve been the person who won the fight after Ye Xiu finished his fight. Ye Xiu stared at the person and the person stared back at him. "My name''s Wang Zhu. Give me the best you have." Wang Zhu stared at him with an arrogant expression on his face and Ye Xiu wasn''t very excited to fight a person with such a bad attitude. "My name''s Ye Xiu. I hope for a good fight." Ye Xiu went for a polite approach to appease the person''s ego and was snorted at after he said it. "You better not disappoint me. Everyone in the tournament so far has been so weak." Wang Zhu''s arrogant words made Ye Xiu narrow his eyes in response. ''I''ll show you weak... If you want to be so arrogant, I''ll stuff that attitude into your mouth so you have nothing to say when you lose.'' Ye Xiu calmly observed Wang Zhu as he ranted inside his head and noticed that whatever Wang Zhu used as a weapon was not very obvious. He watched as Wang Zhu took out a massive war hammer that was blunt on both sides and wielded it as if the weight didn''t bother him. Ye Xiu knew that he would definitely have to stay out of Wang Zhu''s way unless he wanted to get his skull bashed in by the vicious attacks that were certain to be coming his way. Ye Xiu took out both of his whips since he knew that he wouldn''t be getting close to him anytime soon. ''I''ll just have to evade him for long enough. He''s probably not going to tire from wielding his war hammer the way I see it...'' ''So tiring him out isn''t an option. An option of mine is to disarm him but I have no clue if I have enough strength to rip it out of his grasp with the whip. I guess using the ''Entangling Roots" style to accumulate injuries and sap away his Qi would be a better idea.'' Ye Xiu tried to reaffirm himself of his confidence and came up with several plans to try and defeat Wang Zhu. The referee looked at the two opponents and raised his hands. "On the count of three. One! Two! Three!" Wang Zhu threw his war hammer directly at Ye Xiu which was extremely surprising to him and he quickly dodged it by using his ''Swallow Mirage steps.'' Ye Xiu started to sweatdrop at that sudden attack. Wang Zhus Anger With the sudden attack of Wang Zhu, it gave Ye Xiu ample time to try and snatch the hammer away from him. He used his whip to latch onto the hammer and realised that it was a stupid idea. He was pulled along with the hammer as it made its return toward Wang Zhu and he promptly removed his whip''s grasp of the war hammer. Ye Xiu frowned at the strength of the throw and cried inside his mind. ''This guy is insane! The hammer was returning to him but it still had so much strength in its return. Imagine if I actually got hit by that...'' Ye Xiu didn''t want to continue imagining his sorry fate if he was to be hit by Wang Zhu. Vowing to make sure to evade him for as long he possibly could, he picked himself off the ground where he was left after releasing his whip''s grasp of the hammer. He retreated back several metres and watched Wang Zhu take hold of his hammer again. He attacked just as Wang Zhu got ahold of his hammer. He knew that it would take a while for Wang Zhu to be able to throw his hammer again due to how heavy it was. It wouldn''t be easy to throw a hammer with that sort of strength and it would tire him out. Of course, Ye Xiu didn''t count on the exhaustion of Wang Zhu because that would be nearly impossible seeing how he threw the hammer with ease. He tried to bind Wang Zhu with his ''Entangling Roots'' but Wang Zhu dodged it easily whilst carrying his hammer, not giving up, Ye Xiu made his whip continue to follow Wang Zhu''s movement so that it wouldn''t give him the chance to attack. As long as he kept far enough from him, the only thing that Wang Zhu could possibly to hit him from that distance would be to throw his hammer but if he kept him moving all the time it would be impossible for him to throw it just like the first time so that it would go back to the owner. If Wang Zhu had enough experience he would''ve thrown the hammer and have it return to his next position but he didn''t have enough skill with his technique to be able to do such an intricate attack such as that. The only thing he could do was continue to dodge whilst moving closer towards Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu didn''t give him the chance to get close because whenever Wang Zhu was able to make it to a five-metre radius around Ye Xiu, he immediately moved to a different position. Wang Zhu was obviously getting more and more irritated by the minute as Ye Xiu continued to dance and play him like a fiddle. "You coward! Come and fight me like a man or are you such a weakling you have to rely on such tricks to win? I won''t accept my loss in this manner if it continues!" His face became red from his shouting and exploding anger but Ye Xiu didn''t let that affect him. Ye Xiu took the chance to taunt Wang Zhu because it was an opportunity that he had been waiting for and had been trying to create with his actions. "If it was out on a real battlefield, do you really think that your foe would give you the chance to attack when they can easily win like this without injury? You''re too naive. If you really think that then you''ll be the first one to die on the battlefield!" Several of the teachers who were watching the tournament were nodding their heads in amusement or in appreciation for Ye Xiu''s words toward Wang Zhu. Wang Zhu, who took it as an insult became more enraged and dismissed any more words he wanted to say and directly ran towards Ye Xiu with his hammer ready to strike. "I don''t need you to tell me what I can do! I''ll just pulverize you into a pulp so you won''t be able to say these types of things to me again!" He was trying to close the distance between him and Ye Xiu but his speed just wasn''t as fast compared to Ye Xiu''s. He had a lot of raw strength and power in his muscles but compared to someone who had trained to be able to keep their distance away from their opponents, then Wang Zhu had absolutely no chance in getting close to Ye Xiu unless he managed to catch him off guard. "Get back here you little runt!" Ye Xiu''s evasion tactics worked extremely well to continue inciting Wang Zhu''s anger. Wang Zhu gave up chasing him and took something out from his dimensional storage and placed his current hammer into the storage. He took out a meteor hammer which had a long chain connecting the handle ends'' of the hammers together. "I didn''t want to use this until we fought the seniors but you''ve forced my hand!" Wang Zhu held one hammer and swung the chain to make the other hammer spin extremely quickly. He immediately threw the swinging hammer towards Ye Xiu and it missed him by a hair''s breadth as Ye Xiu took out his other whip to help him change the direction that the hammer was flung at. Ye Xiu took that chance to get into the mid-range distance of Wang Zhu. He knew that he had only a small window of opportunity bind him before the hammer was pulled back but he went for it anyway. He had a single whip go for the ankles of Wang Zhu to make him slip whilst the other would wrap around his arms and body so that he wouldn''t have the chance to stop himself from falling.Stolen story; please report. Wang Zhu retaliated with the single hammer that he had and used it to pin the whip that was aiming for his ankles and crouched to avoid the whip that was going for his upper body. Ye Xiu could only have the single whip that was dodged by Wang Zhu try it''s best and bind his movements by following him but it was too late because Wang Zhu managed to get the thrown hammer back into his hands and used the sharp point on the hammer to cut the whip. Wang Zhu managed to get out of the crisis and calmly got back up onto his feet. Taking the chain into his hands, the distance between the two hammers shortened so that he could easily spin both of them at the same time with both of his hands. The meteor hammer that he was using was obviously much heavier and larger than the standard sizes that he had seen in the armouries that he had visited. Even though the meteor hammer was big it didn''t affect the smoothness of his techniques and effectively used it to attack Ye Xiu from a distance. Of course, it wasn''t as far as Ye Xiu could attack Wang Zhu but it was enough as long as he could get close enough to Ye Xiu. One of the good things about this particular meteor hammer that Wang Zhu had was that it had an extendable chain that could shorten or lengthen to up to four metres instead of the conventional 3 metres. Wang Zhu''s body size and arm length certainly helped him to use the meteor hammer comfortably enough to force Ye Xiu to evade most of the attacks that came his way. Wang Zhu''s attacking frequency became higher as the speed of his rotations became faster since he had gotten into his battle tempo. Ye Xiu desperately wanted to use his whips to change the direction that the meteor hammer travelled but was still unsure whether he would be able to exert enough strength to stop the momentum. Deciding to do so anyway, he managed to use both whips to pull the chain which connected the two ends together and force Wang Zhu to get into close-quarters. Ye Xiu didn''t mind ditching the usage of his whips for the moment because he was going on the offensive with his body. He jabbed Wang Zhu multiple times in different parts of his body, mainly his joints using his training in Medical Arts to his advantage. Ye Xiu was using the same concept that Shang Yang uses for her own combat style by attacking the vital points of his opponent and trying to block his Qi pathways. Ye Xiu didn''t have the same finesse as Shang Yang but his training in the usage of Qi scalpels definitely helped him to cause physical damage whilst severing Wang Zhu''s Qi pathways. Ye Xiu didn''t completely sever off Wang Zhu''s Qi pathways because that would permanently cripple him if he had no access to high-grade pills or elixirs. This would allow Wang Zhu to still be able to train and cultivate but he would need to spend a few months to recover back to his original state. If Wang Zhu had the help of a Medical Master then he would recover much faster. Ye Xiu did this to teach him a lesson that people shouldn''t be provoked and that he should be more careful when he fights outside of the Academy. He wanted him to know that if he was a person with bad intentions, then he would''ve long died or become a cripple for life. Ye Xiu''s attacks disabled Wang Zhu''s limbs for the entire match and Ye Xiu waited for him to surrender as he had both his whips to bind him at the same time as an extra precaution. His whips had their Qi thorns draining his Qi as well just in case he didn''t manage to sever the Qi pathways correctly. Ye Xiu wanted to teach this method of fighting to Shang Yang but wanted her to see the effects of the fighting style for herself before she decided whether she wanted to apply it to her fighting style. Shang Yang''s own Qi blocking style was definitely an effective style but it would become a deadlier style with the addition of the Qi scalpels. The Qi scalpel idea had originally popped into his head when he watched his father form Qi arrows. He asked for help from his father and used that help to build his foundation for the Qi thorns and Qi scalpels. This style of fighting required excellent Qi control but he knew that Shang Yang would be able to master it if she wanted to learn it. Wang Zhu bit the inside of his right cheek, drawing blood. He gnashed his teeth together in rage before grunting out several unidentifiable sounds. The referee moved closer towards Wang Zhu so that he could make out the unintelligible sounds that he was making. Wang Zhu grunted, "I give up. Get someone to take me to the Medical Centre." The referee nodded shortly after he was able to digest Wang Zhu''s grunts. "Ye Xiu advances to the finals for the First years! Could we please get someone to help carry this young man to the Medical Centre?" A couple of friendly students that worked at the Medical Centre helped carry him off the Arena carefully and made their way to the Medical Centre. Ye Xiu followed their descent and disappeared into the crowd to watch the next match. He didn''t bother looking for the others because he had told them that he would stay here to watch the finals close up to see what other tricks Yan Guo had up his sleeve. Ye Xiu thought back to the fight just now and felt that he could improve his "Entangling Roots'' style to a much deadlier style than what it was like currently. He quickly categorized that thought into a section of his mind for later and observed the two foes that he could possibly fight in the finals. He wasn''t sure whether the buff twin would be able to defeat Yan Guo so he was careful to watch both of them with equal attention, committing their skills and techniques to mind. Ming Yu vs Yan Guo As the stronger twin stepped up to the Arena, he noticed that Yan Guo was already waiting with his weapons out. The twin frowned but still introduced himself to Yan Guo anyway. "My name is Ming Yu, may the stronger person win." He bowed in a traditional manner with his fist in his palm. Yan Guo didn''t bother gracing Ming Yu with a verbal answer but nodded his head slightly to show that he had heard and approved of the comment. The referee promptly started the match once the two were on the stage for a good few minutes and he arrived right as the five-minute waiting period was up. "On the count of three. One! Two! Three!" Ming Yu used his obviously bigger body to try and overwhelm Yan Guo. It was good for Ming Yu that he had fought his brother in the previous round because that meant that his skills and techniques weren''t shown too much because they both knew that if either one of them advanced, they would need that advantage. Ming Yu''s fighting style made liberal use of his body to it''s fullest extent without even leaving out the most obscure parts of the body to attack. Yan Guo was hard pressed to disappear suddenly because he knew that his technique didn''t work well with such a close exchange. With the circumstances in hand, Yan Guo was bound to make mistakes with his technique if he tried executing it at such a close-range. Yan Guo''s usage of daggers was limited due to their being very little space for him to manoeuvre the daggers to stab Ming Yu. He was constantly trying to retreat, so that he could get some distance between the two of them but was hard-pressed with Ming Yu constantly in his face with a brawler fighting style. Yan Guo''s fighting style mainly relied on his overwhelming speed with his movement technique but because of the suppression, he couldn''t do much. He was trained as an assassin so it was obvious that being in such an open field would lead to many disadvantages for him. Though this was the case, he bought enough time for himself as he was dodging the attacks to take out several items out of his breast pocket and throwing it down onto the ground. The arena was filled with black smoke instantly, showing the efficiency of the smoke pellet that he threw on the ground. Ming Yu was unable able to see in the smoke and was attacking wildly. Yan Guo was able to easily find Ming Yu with his observation technique that allowed him to see through the smoke. He quickly utilised his movement technique so he could attack Ming Yu. He stabbed his daggers in Ming Yu''s back but was surprised that his daggers were deflected off his body after giving minor scratches to him. The audience was unable to see into the smoke unless they had techniques to allow them to see. Ye Xiu and many others were able to see due to their techniques. Ye Xiu could see them by following the Qi pools in both Yan Guo and Ming Yu and it was easy to differentiate between the two because of Ming Yu''s smaller Qi reserves. He watched how Ming Yu''s back was flooded with Qi as Yan Guo approached him. It was extremely smart of Ming Yu to protect his back with his defensive technique to stop Yan Guo from being able to get a one-shot victory. It was obvious that Yan Guo had mainly relied on the same technique to achieve his results to get to where he was so it was simple for Ming Yu to come up with a plan even while being unable to see. Once Ming Yu had heard felt the dagger being deflected off his body, he quickly turned around with a reverse roundhouse kick towards Yan Guo''s body. Luckily, Yan Guo had moved back the moment his attack had failed and was safe from the attack. Ming Yu started to jump up and down on the spot and caused vibrations to be sent out through the ground. He was doing this to get rid of the smoke but it was futile because it barely lifted the heavy smoke. Ming Yu scrunched his eyebrows together when he realised that the smoke was too heavy to be moved by such a move. Unexpectedly, he took out two fans from his dimensional storage and used it to fan away the smoke. With his violent movements, the fans made quick work of the smoke. With the smoke gone, Ming Yu put his fans back into his dimensional storage and looked around for Yan Guo. Yan Guo was to the side of Ming Yu''s vision and was just barely outside of his peripheral vision. Yan Guo knew that if his normal attacks didn''t work then he would have to use Metal Qi to make his attacks more penetrating. He took out the same dagger that he had used against Shi Die and poured in a generous amount of Qi into the dagger. Ye Xiu was obviously surprised that Yan Guo was able to pour so much Qi into the dagger because most common materials couldn''t withstand holding so much Qi inside of them. If you placed too much then the material or object would be likely to break which is why there were specialised Smiths to make or handle these materials and it was why those types of weapons were the most expensive ones.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. Ye Xiu had noted from Shi Die''s fight that the dagger probably had some significance to Yan Guo but now that he saw him pouring so much Qi, he could see why he didn''t display the weapon until he realised that he could no longer win the fights with just his normal daggers. The dagger that he was using was probably a Qi Weapon and would cause envy to many students and it might even force them to forcibly claim it for themselves. The price of a Qi Weapon wasn''t cheap but it shouldn''t cause too much envy between the students because of the huge number of students that had the amount of money to throw around for a single weapon due to their families. The only reason why a student would possibly want to hide the usage of their Qi Weapon is if it was of high quality. The difference in the strength of a Qi Weapons depends on many factors. As far as Ye Xiu could tell from his knowledge from smithing was that the amount of Qi that was being poured into Yan Guo''s weapon definitely exceeded a Grade 1 Qi Weapon by a huge margin which was probably why Yan Guo was hiding the weapon in the first place. Ye Xiu wasn''t too concerned about the Qi Weapon because he was able to craft his own weapon which was actually much better compared to buying it from somebody else. It was due to the fact of the bond that he could possibly form with his weapon or that the weapon would be a much better suit to his tastes and style if he personally made it because he knew himself pretty well and would know if the weapon wasn''t right for him. Yan Guo finished pouring his Qi into the weapon and pounced at the opportunity to attack Ming Yu. He was going to pretend to assault him from the side before using his technique when he turns to get behind him and use his offensive technique. This offensive technique was sure to pierce Ming Yu''s defences in his eyes because he knew that he was able to pierce the defences of those at the 8th or 9th stages of the Qi Cleansing Realm with ease with the technique. He didn''t deliberately make his footsteps be heard because that would be too much of a giveaway to what his plan was and continued to run towards Ming Yu. Ming Yu who spotted him in his peripheral vision as he was slowly turning readied his Qi around the front of his body to protect himself. He kept some Qi to fuel his defensive technique at the back because it was always better to be cautious. Ming Yu''s caution was definitely well-deserved as Yan Guo executed his plan. Yan Guo vanished at a much faster speed than he usually did and attacked Ming Yu''s back the moment he was behind him. Yan Guo didn''t aim for the spine because that would cripple Ming Yu without the proper medical attention so he aimed for the paralysis spot on the back of the neck. Ming Yu turned to try and defend himself when he realised what Yan Guo''s plan was but was too late as Yan Guo''s weapon had already reached its destination. With that simple plan, Ming Yu lost the battle to Yan Guo''s offensive technique that pierced his defences easily. Ming Yu was obviously stunned that Yan Guo was able to pierce through his defences when he was able to easily deflect his earlier attacks with ease. He and his brother had focused on their body to be their main force of attacking and defence but Yan Guo had managed to pierce through their efforts with ease the moment he brought out his other weapon. He was obviously dissatisfied with the outcome of the fight and the way he had lost it but didn''t want to make it a big matter. He just sighed internally and vowed to be stronger than those who used weapons together with his twin. Both of the twins were great at fighting individually but their capability increased by multiple times when they worked together to fight opponents due to their synergy and knowledge of each other''s fighting style. Even though the twins looked like they had all the same abilities and techniques, they had reserved the most of them from the public''s eye because they had wanted to use it to their advantage to win the fights later on. Even though he lost this fight, he knew that he still had a few tricks up his sleeve as long as his opponent didn''t pierce his defences as Yan Guo did. He closed his eyes and waited for the referee to call the match as Yan Guo''s victory. "Yan Guo advances to the Finals for the First Years! The Finals for the First Years will start after the conclusion of the Semi-finals for the Second Years. There''s an hour break right now so take the chance to rest and do whatever you need before coming back!" The referee was announcing what was going to happen later on in the day and everybody was relieved that there was a resting period currently. Mainly the second years who were fighting were relieved because quite a few of them weren''t mentally prepared. Many of the second years had experience fighting against each other through the many spars in the Arena grounds through the year but were still unsure of other''s abilities because nobody would ever go full out in a public spar. As Yan Guo walked off the arena with all his weapons concealed or placed away, he looked in the direction of Ye Xiu and grinned. He started to mouth a few words towards Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu could barely make out the words from Yan Guo''s lips but was able to get the gist of it. "I hope you don''t disappoint me like your friends did. If you give me a good fight... well we''ll see." Ye Xiu watched as Yan Guo continued his way off the arena and into the crowd, he frowned at the words that Yan Guo had said to him. He had not thought for Yan Guo to be such a person to be directly mocking him in person. He hadn''t said any words at all to any other participants but he took the liberty this time to say something to him? It was extremely strange in his mind because as far as he was concerned, Yan Guo''s temperament wasn''t anything like this from what he had observed of his fights. Ye Xiu shook those thoughts out of his head and went to find his friends. Yan Guo vs Ye Xiu The one hour rest period allowed Ye Xiu to relax for a while. His nerves were making him extremely uncomfortable with the loud environment with everybody talking and cheering but seeing his friends calmed him down tremendously. Even though he told his friends he would be calm, it was hard to keep up a calm exterior and interior with this sort situation unless he was near emotionless or was unable to display emotion properly. When he saw his friends sitting in the stands eating food that Shi Die had probably cooked, he jogged over, carefully evading the many students sitting, standing or lounging around in the stands. He noticed that the stands were filled to the brim and there were few spaces left and luckily Shi Die and company saved him a spot. As he made his way there, his friends noticed a figure obviously trying to get closer to them and they noticed that it was Shi Die. Xiao Tu shouted Ye Xiu''s name to get his attention which promptly caused him to fall flat on his face because he wasn''t watching where he was going. He had tripped on a student''s foot and the said student just raised an eyebrow and shook with mirth when he looked over to where the voice had come from. The student jerked his head in the direction of Xiao Tu and it told Ye Xiu to continue on his way because the student didn''t hold a grudge for simply tripping on him. Ye Xiu sighed and thanked the student before continuing his way towards the others. He shook Xiao Tu violently when he had made it because he was obviously not pleased with him suddenly shouting his name. "Why did you randomly shout my name! Ahh... you made me fall by accident! That was so awkward when the student was looking at the both of us! You should be glad that the student wasn''t a mean student otherwise he would''ve made a big matter out of a small situation." Ye Xiu pouted when he thought of it. Xiao Tu poked Ye Xiu''s cheek as he pouted. "It was funny though! I can''t believe you actually fell when I shouted your name." He grinned as he continued his poking. Ye Xiu swatted away Xiao Tu''s hand. "It''s not funny and of course I would trip when somebody diverts my attention in a place with many people! I''d like you to try not to fall if someone suddenly called your name as you were making your way past a crowd of people." Annoyance and irritation could be heard in Ye Xiu''s voice. "Now now, There''s no need to be so angry with Xiao Tu. It was just a friendly prank to try and soothe your nerves wasn''t it, Xiao Tu?" Shang Yang glared at Xiao Tu with lethal intent promising pain if he didn''t go along with what she was silently communicating with her eyes. Xiao Tu hurriedly followed Shang Yang''s plan. "Yeah. I was just trying to soothe your nerves! Shi Die was sighing at the side before interrupting their conversation. "Ye Xiu, come over and have some food that I''ve made. It''s still nice and hot since I''ve kept it in dimensional storage for you. He handed over Ye Xiu''s packed food and gave back Shang Yang''s dimensional ring. Ye Xiu smiled with appreciation at Shi Die and took the packed food gently and sat down next to Shi Die. He placed the packed food gently on his lap and opened the towel that had been wrapped around it. A small container of food, still steaming hot. "Thanks, Shi Die. I hope those lessons I''ve given you have slightly improved the taste." Ye Xiu stuck his tongue out at Shi Die providing light banter. "Hmph, of course, the taste has improved with your instructions of different recipes, spice blends and whatnot." Shi Die spoke proudly. "It''s just as good as yours yet..." Shi Die spoke the last sentence much more quietly Xiao Tu started to speak with his mouth full of food. "I shaw yer fite. It wash veli good." The food blocked most of what he was trying to say but the group managed to comprehend what he was saying. "Don''t speak with your mouth full, that''s bad manners and I''m sure whatever you have to say can be said after we finish eating." Shang Yang poked Xiao Tu in the cheek making him nearly spit out the food that he was chewing. Xiao Tu continued to eat silently in a chastised manner. An hour had passed and the group was watching the second years fight. They were obviously impressed with the level of combat they were displaying. Compared to the first years, their fights were much more exciting because the usage of Qi techniques had increased leading to some flashier and cooler fights. They were much less cautious about their usage of Qi techniques and did not hesitate to use them even if it didn''t succeed as a successful attack. Ye Xiu was talking to his friends about the incoming tournament against the senior years and they were actually worried. "Don''t you think that the school has gone rather overboard by pitting the younger years against the senior years? If a single year difference between the first and second years is so large, I don''t even want to imagine the gap between us and those in the third year or higher!" "Remember what Sir told us though. He told us that we were definitely not expected to win fights against the older years especially when we''re freshmen. He said that this was a lesson for us to know that there''s always going to be somebody stronger than you out in the world. We''re just a frog in the well that hasn''t seen the entire world." Shang Yang wisely repeated San Guo''s words to stop Ye Xiu from making the matter any bigger.You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. Ye Xiu looked at the Arena and sighed. "I guess you''re right. I still don''t like how we''re forced to fight people way above our level. Just look at them throwing their techniques without a care in the world about their Qi reserves. It doesn''t even look like their Qi reserves are that much greater than ours! I don''t understand how it''s possible. What could they possibly;y teach to the second year students so that they can use Qi techniques with a higher frequency? Could it be that most of the techniques they use require less Qi? Or could it be that their Qi quality is so pure and dense that it requires less Qi to use a technique?" Xiao Tu and Shi Die were just blinking owlishly at Ye Xiu. "I don''t think there''s any need to take it to such lengths. Just keep it in mind, we''ll be able to use Qi techniques with no care in the world like they do once we get to the second year. No use crying about spilt milk now when we can reap the benefits later." Shang Yang patted and rubbed Ye Xiu''s hair affectionately. Xiao Tu''s eyes narrowed before going back to his smiling face. "Let''s just continue watching the fights." After the second year''s Semi-finals had finished, Ye Xiu was already making his way down to the Arena. There was not going to be a break this time and the fight between Ye Xiu and Yan Guo was going to start soon. Yan Guo spotted Ye Xiu from a distance and pulled him closer so that he could walk with him. Yan Guo had a weird smile on his face but continued to drag him towards the Arena. Ye Xiu was extremely confused and cautious at the same time because he had no idea what Yan Guo''s intentions for approaching him were. He didn''t bother struggling from Yan Guo''s grip because he hadn''t done anything suspicious yet. He allowed him to continue pulling him because it also needed less effort for him to get to the Arena. Yan Guo pulled him up to the Arena and let Ye Xiu go. He waited for Ye Xiu to stand opposite him and he was still grinning. Ye Xiu decided to sate his curiosity. "Why''d you pull me here? I didn''t see you acting so kind to other people." Ye Xiu''s tone was one of curiosity and also a tone of accusation. Yan Guo just smiled and stared at him for a few seconds before closing his eyes, still continuing the smile his foolish grin. Ye Xiu stopped trying to puzzle out what Yan Guo was trying to do and waited for the referee to announce the beginning of the match. The referee didn''t bother trying to make the event more exciting because it was only the Finals of the first years. He knew that it wouldn''t be exciting as the senior years and started the match to not waste any time. "On the count of three. One! Two! Three!" Ye Xiu only had a single whip out currently because he knew that he would need his spare hand to be free to retrieve his item from the dimensional storage. Of course, Ye Xiu had come up with some plans before and was planning to put them to use depending on how the fight played out. Ye Xiu knew that using his dual whip style would help him put pressure on Yan Guo but he was unsure whether he would be fast enough to dodge all the attacks. Deciding to be cautious, Ye Xiu used his lone whip to attack first. Using the same tactic of having the whip follow Yan Guo''s movements around the Arena, he held his position, waiting for Yan Guo to get closer to him. Yan Guo made a noise which alerted Ye Xiu that he seemed to be very displeased with his actions. Yan Guo didn''t bother trying to cut Ye Xiu''s whip because he had seen the outcomes of what that action would achieve. Unexpectedly, Yan Guo took out his Qi weapon extremely early and didn''t hold back any of his punches. Throwing another smoke bomb, he utilised the same method as he did with Ming Yu. Ye Xiu, who had already prepared for such a move took out his other whip and used both of them to get rid of the smoke. Yan Guo was directly above Ye Xiu as he was planning to stab downwards. Ye Xiu was unable to see Yan Guo around the arena and was extremely cautious. Yan Guo had used one of his tools to help him jump a high distance. When Ye Xiu noticed the glint of metal from above him, he quickly rolled backwards and let go of his whips. Yan Guo managed to get rid of Ye Xiu''s hold on the whips and placed his Qi weapon back and took out his other two daggers. Ye Xiu promptly took out his katana and used it to defend himself from Yan Guo''s attacks. Ye Xiu noticed that Yan Guo''s attacks were different from what he had seen before. He was using a much different style and instead of a single shot kill, his attacks were mainly to overwhelm Ye Xiu with his attacking speed. The style was very different to what Yan Guo had been displaying since this type of attacking required on fine movements to lure the opponent into making a mistake or having them being unable to defend himself. Of course, Ye Xiu''s reflexes allowed him to block the majority of the attacks with his katana but he was trying to make his way to one of his whips that had been dropped. Ye Xiu could not use his Qi technique to try to fight Yan Guo because the activation and charging time was still too long to be used in a fight appropriately. Once he realised that Yan Guo wouldn''t give him a chance to make it to his whips, he decided to go on the offensive. He knew that staying on the defensive would not help because he had no ideas on how long Yan Guo could keep up the assault. In a burst of speed, he managed to retreat from Yan Guo after kicking him with a back kick as turned. He sighed and knew that the movement technique ''Basilisk''s Gaze'' had definitely helped him catch his breath. Ye Xiu thought of what he was going to do as he caught his breath. ''If he''s going to keep assaulting me with a barrage of attacks then I''ll just pierce through those attacks and get through his defences. There''s only so much he will be able to do before he makes a mistake with his attacks.'' Ye Xiu had been dissecting Yan Guo''s style and noticed there were a few sets of movements and combos that he had been doing albeit at a fast pace. Once he had managed to ascertain that, he was looking for any weaknesses between the transitions of the movements and was going to pierce that weakness with the ''Piercing Fang of the Jade Dragon.'' He noticed that Yan Guo was only fast when he was using his movement technique to vanish and was much slower without it. With a plan in mind, Ye Xiu got back to dissecting Yan Guo''s style. Decision Ye Xiu managed to find the weaknesses in the style that Yan Guo was utilising. Ye Xiu was constantly dodging the attacks and any that were unable to be dodged was parried by his katana. Yan Guo obviously had no idea that his offensive style had been broken down to identify the weakness and was still attacking Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu was waiting for the opportune moment to do a decisive attack. He had noticed that the weakness of Yan Guo''s style was during the transition of the attacks but that small weakness had only a small window of opportunity for a person to attack. This meant that Ye Xiu had to time his attack exactly so that it would hit just as Yan Guo finished his last attack before the change. Ye Xiu had wanted to pull the trigger multiple times but his gut instinct had told him that the attack would fail. Ye Xiu was also thinking if it was possible for him to activate his Qi technique as he was moving. He knew that it was definitely possible for other Qi techniques so there was no reason for his not to be able to do the same. He was putting in as much Qi as he possibly could into his katana for ''Solitary Stand'', he knew that he probably only had a single chance to attack Yan Guo because he knew that he would probably exhausted from this attack. His katana was a Qi weapon given to him by his mother and could definitely hold in enough Qi for his attack to be fatal. As Yan Guo started his next movement, Ye Xiu had thrust the katana towards the weak spot as he utilised ''Basilisk''s Gaze'' to its current maximum potential. Yan Guo was obviously surprised by the attack but could do nothing as Ye Xiu''s speed was much too fast for him to react. With the attack instantly piercing through any defences Yan Guo had, Ye Xiu managed to injure Yan Guo heavily. He sent Yan Guo flying with the single attack and continued to advance, ready to attack once again. The referee stepped in immediately the moment he noticed Ye Xiu continuing to attack and stopped Ye Xiu from going any further. "That''s enough. He''s already unconscious from that attack that you just made." Ye Xiu was surprised that Yan Guo was actually knocked out from that single attack because he didn''t think that Yan Guo''s body would be so frail. Nodding, Ye Xiu put away his weapons and went towards Yan Guo. The referee was ready to intervene if Ye Xiu tried to kill Yan Guo, but all he did was ask for the referee to take him to the Medical Centre for healing. The referee agreed and Yan Guo was quickly taken away. Ye Xiu left the arena as the referee announced his victory. Ye Xiu made his way back to the stands to find his friends. Thoughts were swirling around in his mind as he made his mind up. He closed his eyes once he made it to where his friends were and asked them to wake him up from meditation once the tournament was over for the day. His friends shrugged at Ye Xiu''s odd behaviour and left him be, watching the second years'' final in enthusiasm as they discussed different things they saw and how they could possibly achieve those things to the same effect. Ye Xiu''s mind was thinking of things that had popped into his head suddenly after defeating Yan Guo. He had absolutely no idea why these thoughts had appeared in his mind but he was truly questioning what he had been doing since the time he had received the Locket until now. He was trying to calm himself before deciding anything and meditating was the best method for him to do it currently. Ye Xiu sorted out everything that had happened in the day before moving back to his thoughts. He didn''t want random thoughts to be interrupting his ruminations. ''Have I actually been wasting the potential of the Locket since I first inherited it? Xiao Bai hasn''t mentioned anything but his expression was always off when we talked about training.'' He sighed when he thought back to his training process. ''I''ve definitely put in a lot of effort with my training but is that enough? Did I put in more effort compared to those that have no resources? Shi Die had put in just as much effort as I did and still is putting in just as much effort into training as I am, but he''s not the one with the resources. I''m the one who has basically been spoonfed things since I started cultivation.'' Ye Xiu was conflicted about whether he had been sincerely committing himself in training for the right reasons as well. Yes, he had told himself that he didn''t want to be weaker than he was previously in his last life but then why didn''t he push himself further and use everything to his own advantage? He lied to himself continuously that he didn''t want to be overpowered compared to his friends, but was that genuinely the case? He thought not because he knew that inside his heart, he didn''t want to continue putting in the effort. Ye Xiu was still content on just being ''average'' with his friends. He knew that his selflessness was so that his friends would continue to stay with him. He did have genuine feelings for sharing his dimension with the others but at the same time, he gave himself a reason for why he stayed average. Wondering if he should continue to be selfless or be as selfish as possible to achieve what he had originally vowed to do, he opened his eyes whilst meditating to look at the backs of his friends. He closed his eyes once again as he tried to decide what path he would go on. ''It''s the choice between being mediocre and not being able to protect my loved ones or being strong to the point that nobody would dare to touch them in the first place.'' The choice was a simple one as he reaffirmed his decision to abuse what he had.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. He mentally spoke with Xiao Bai and asked him to come up with a training plan that abused the Dimension to it''s fullest capacity. He would stop his Alchemy training for now because he had no idea on how to continue advancing either way. He''d continue to go to his Smithing lessons because there shouldn''t be any reason for him to stop. Any other random things that needed to be done in the Dimension could be handled by Xiao Bai easily. He asked Xiao Bai to come up with a training plan for him purely because Xiao Bai had witnessed the previous owners of the Dimension train extremely efficiently and probably had more experience compared to anybody when it came to cultivation after existing for a long period of time. Even though he had laid dormant, he was still able to receive knowledge from the outside world which is why Xiao Bai knew of many of the changes in the world. Xiao Bai had ecstatically agreed to Ye Xiu''s request and was happy for more things to do because it got boring in the Dimension easily due to the accelerated time. Xiao Bai''s training plan was brutal but truly used the Dimension''s benefits to it''s fullest extent. Xiao Bai had not only come up with a plan for Ye Xiu but for all his friends as well. Xiao Bai had an inkling of what had changed within Ye Xiu to ask him a request like this. Ye Xiu gave a list of everything that he had learnt and still currently learning to Xiao Bai so that he could come up with a more efficient training scheme. Xiao Bai knowing most of the different tricks to improve at a faster speed for many of the techniques that his Master and Mistress had used or learnt was able to fit them into his training plan easily. Xiao Bai''s training plan wouldn''t just milk the benefits of the Dimension but would also milk all the benefits from everything that he had. He would use elixirs and pills to augment the training speed and the gravity rooms to improve the rate of improvement of his physical strength. Xiao Bai had said that the Dimension''s own gravity room would be unlocked once he reached Foundation Establishment so he would have to make do with the Academy''s gravity rooms. Ye Xiu was grateful for what Xiao Bai had done but had absolutely no idea how to break it to his friends. He decided to just have them start on Xiao Bai''s training regime once the tournament was over. There was still a long time before the tournament would be finished so Ye Xiu considered it to be their vacation time. He knew that he wouldn''t be as free compared to them because he would start the change of the training plan as soon as possible. Ye Xiu had to be careful with how hard he was training because he had no idea how hard San Guo would possibly push him during their private training but Xiao Bai waved away those concerns, saying that the spiritual liquid that he had been washing himself with would easily erase most of the injuries and pains from training. With his mind finally made up, he opened his eyes and stopped meditating. He told his friends that he would be going back to their room first. His friends had already noticed the abnormal behaviour but left him to be because if Ye Xiu had anything on his mind, he would usually tell them in time. There was no point in them pursuing after him if he had troubles because Ye Xiu wasn''t good at keeping secrets from them. Ye Xiu was going back to the room but decided to go to the Mess Hall to get some food. He was still feeling hungry even though had eaten some food prepared by Shi Die. His appetite had increased by a huge portion after his bloodline was awakened. It was probably to compensate for his growth speed. When he made it to the Mess hall, Ye Xiu was rather happy that he had absolutely no need to wait in a queue because everybody was at the Arena grounds watching the tournament. There were a few people lounging around in the Mess Hall but most of them had already gotten their food and were talking to each other. Ye Xiu bought his food and sat down on an empty table, enjoying his food. As he was eating, he was approached by a student that he had never seen who sat at his table with her food. Ye Xiu ignored the student and continued to eat his food because it was nice and warm since it was freshly cooked. The student looked at Ye Xiu before poking him in the forehead. "Aren''t you going to say hello?" Ye Xiu looked up to see a familiar face. His mind had blanked out because he was enjoying his food and he was trying to come up with a name for the face. "Uhhh..." The student facepalmed and sighed. "Did you really forget me that quickly? It''s me, Jing Hua Fei." She waved her hand in front of Ye Xiu''s face as he continued to have a blank stare. "Are you serious?" She pinched him on the arm, jolting him out of his trance. "Ah... sorry. My mind blanked out and I was trying to remember your name. Why are you here and not watching the tournament? The majority of the students are all watching it and aren''t you in the Top 10 as well? It would help if you watch the senior students fighting." She shrugged before taking a bite of her bread. "I prefer to train. It''ll be much beneficial anyway. A tiny bit of training helps because it adds up. The tournament is going to take a long time before we have to fight against the senior years anyway so I can still get a lot of practice in. I want to at least cover up some of the weaknesses that were easily exploited by you." She pointed her finger at him as she declared in a haughty tone. "I''ll make you submit under me." Ye Xiu started to look uncomfortable. "I was joking." Hua Fei laughed at Ye Xiu''s uncomfortableness. "Why aren''t you watching the tournament? I know you had your Semi-finals today." "I won my fights. Just felt hungry so I came here." Hua Fei looked at his face for any signs of him lying. She shrugged before letting go of the topic. "That''s good. I''ll be going now, I just came here to say hello anyway." Hua Fei picked up her food and started to make her way out of the Mess Hall. "I''ll see you next time!" "Goodbye!" Ye Xiu bid her farewell and returned to eating, after eating he went back to his room and entered the Dimension. Inciting Anger Ye Xiu had been training for the past 8 weeks, adhering to Xiao Bai''s training regime. He had asked for some extra training from San Guo who readily accepted and was happy that he could push Ye Xiu more than he had already been doing. Ye Xiu was curious that his progress was much faster compared to Shi Die who also had his bloodline awakened. "Sir, I have my bloodline awakened and Shi Die''s bloodline is also awakened, but why is it that he progresses at the same rate to the others when he trains just as much as them?" San Guo was obviously puzzled about that fact as well but came up with a logical explanation. "It might be because his bloodline has different conditions to become stronger. As far as I am concerned, bloodlines can have different conditions for unlocking the benefits. I know of a bloodline of a horse that required the person to ingest blood in order to receive the benefits. There are many strange things in the world so it should be possible that he needs a different set of conditions." When San Guo finished his own explanation, he felt like slapping himself on the face. ''If he has a different set of conditions to receive the benefits from his bloodline then how am I going to train him? I said that I''d force him to become faster because his bloodline is focused on speed but what if that training doesn''t work out?'' San Guo started to worry as his training plan had already fallen apart before he even started to put the person on the training plan. San Guo was thinking about what conditions would prompt Shi Die''s growth because it would be very detrimental for him if he didn''t gain the benefits that his bloodline should provide to him. Ye Xiu had abused the advantages of his Dimension heavily and his strength had increased at a pace that was inconceivable. His strength increased to the point that it would''ve taken him months of work if he continued with the same regime that he had been on. The Spiritual liquid that he bathed in truly was a wonder but even then Xiao Bai said that he couldn''t abuse it too much. Xiao Bai told him that the Spiritual liquid would only give him benefits twice a day so he would need to plan the usage exceedingly carefully. Even with that limitation, he substituted the Spiritual liquid''s benefits with the elixirs and pills that he had made. Though the benefits from the elixirs and pills weren''t even in the same league, it still sped up his cultivation however, he still had to be careful of toxicity but Xiao Bai had a simple plan to get rid of the toxicity inside of Ye Xiu''s body. Every time the toxicity reached a designated level, Ye Xiu was set to bathe in the Spiritual Liquid after exhausting himself in training. The tournament had finished and Ye Xiu and Shi Die only won a single match before they were paired up with against a student way above their level. Ye Xiu managed to beat a second-year student due to the student making a fatal mistake during one of their Qi techniques which gave Ye Xiu the opportunity to use his own finishing move. Whilst Shi Die defeated a first-year student that was also in the Top 10. The matches were randomly selected at the start, Shi Die was lucky to get an opponent in the same year as him. Their second match was lost easily as Ye Xiu was paired up against a fourth-year and Shi Die a fifth-year. They weren''t too disappointed with the result because they knew that their levels were nowhere close to the older students. Ye Xiu had prompted his friends to start on the training plans that Xiao Bai had prepared for them. Their training plan wasn''t as efficient as Ye Xiu simply due to the fact that Xiao Bai had less experience in their fighting styles whereas Ye Xiu mainly inherited his Master''s and Mistresses'' styles. Of course, the training plan was incomparable to what they were originally on. It was above what even Liu Fan or San Guo could come up for them, but they still learnt useful things from them because not even Xiao Bai knew everything. Xiao Bai mainly came up with training plans to build on what they had already learnt and focused on their strengths. Their weaknesses were covered up by what they learnt from each other and their teachers. San Guo and Liu Fan found their progress in strength strange because it was exceedingly fast. Shang Yang''s progress became on par with Ye Xiu''s once Xiao Bai managed to find an obscure book that was obtained by the former Mistress that expounded on the training methods of her Body Physique. Xiao Tu was obviously unpleased with the progress that he had been making in comparison to his friends and Xiao Bai was still looking for books to help Xiao Tu increase his speed of cultivation. Xiao Bai had been spending the majority of his time that wasn''t spent in the presence of the group to look for many different manuals and books that would help the group in their training.This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. Even though Xiao Tu was not pleased with his progress, he continued the training regime simply because it was better and yielded better results. Ye Xiu was fighting with Shi Die, trying to force out his transformation. San Guo had noticed the progress that Ye Xiu had made so he decided that instead of San Guo being the one forcing out the transformation, it''d be better for Ye Xiu to force it out. Ye Xiu decided that when he fought against Shi Die, he''d use his dominating strength against Shi Die to make him feel helpless. This was because Shi Die was the one in the group that was supposed to be the close-combat specialist. Ye Xiu also took it as training for him to control his strength. He had overwhelming strength but being able to use it efficiently was the question. Ye Xiu was training so that he would have no wasted movements that would consume energy as he fought. This was extremely hard with Ye Xiu since his movements were extremely fast so he had little time to restrain himself before making his move. Xiao Tu was bored as he couldn''t exactly fight with anybody else on fair terms because their training speed had accelerated to the point that he couldn''t catch up. He vented his frustration during his lessons with Liu Fan as he created his own things. He was getting to the point in Smithing that he''d be able to make an adequate Qi weapon for himself. Liu Fan held Xiao Tu from rushing into his Qi weapon creation because he wanted him to create the best possible weapon he could use for a long period of time. Liu Fan''s logic of using a weapon for a long period of time is so that you can familiarise yourself with the usage of the weapon and the bond you can build with the weapon. All Smiths had the basic knowledge that from the lowest grade Qi weapon to the highest grade Qi weapon, there was always a chance for the weapon to form sentience. The lower the grade, the lower the chance of sentience being formed but it was still there. The grade of weapon could always be upgraded through different materials and re-smelting. If a person particularly liked their Qi weapon they could always have it be bound to them and make it their growth weapon. The majority of the cultivator populace who had a growth weapon, always created or looked for the best possible weapon they could ever have before making it their growth weapon. Some people chose their growth weapon simply because it had a lot of sentimental value to them. Some of the growth weapons that grew with their owners since the very start have actually been known to be some of the strongest weapons that existed. Many stories that contained legendary weapons and their owners had a long-lasting bond with each other. Shang Yang wanted to spar against Xiao Tu to see how much she had improved in the past few weeks but Xiao Tu was declining her invitation to a spar. Shang Yang knew that the people she had the most trouble to fight against in the group were Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu so she also wanted to test if she could manage to fight them. Shang Yang argued with Xiao Tu that overwhelming strength doesn''t always win the fight unless the person is so above a person in cultivation that there wouldn''t be any hope of reaching their stage unless they cultivated for a long period of time. However, Xiao Tu was stubborn in his view and did not want to fight Shang Yang. Her anger was about to erupt, as Xiao Tu continued to reject her invitation and she was planning to slap him in the face to provoke him into fighting her. As she moved towards his general direction, Xiao Tu turned back to reject her once again just as her hand reached his face. An audible smack could be heard throughout the gravity room, but Shi DIe and Ye Xiu were too engrossed in their spar to notice what was happening. Shi Die could feel his senses becoming sharper so he didn''t want to stop his spar. Xiao Tu placed a hand on where Shang Yang had slapped him before narrowing his eyes in anger. He took out his spear from his dimensional storage abruptly and attacked her with several thrusts. Instead of using his quarterstaff, he used his spear purely for the fact that he wanted to cause injury to Shang Yang because he was not amused by her slap. Her slap had been infused with some of her Qi so it had definitely left a mark on him. Shang Yang grinned once she knew that she had caught Xiao Tu''s attention and beckoned him to fight her. "Fight me! You can''t complain about your weak strength if you can at least put up a good fight against me!" Shang Yang didn''t bother using her natural affinity for illusions to fight Xiao Tu because the battle would be over in less than a minute otherwise. She was here to test her combat abilities but without the usage of illusions to aid her. She threw multiple daggers at Xiao Tu and utilised a technique that Ye Xiu had given her inspiration when he had been helping with her Qi control. Each dagger that she had thrown had a Qi thread attached to it, and it wasn''t the flimsy types that would break in a single hit but a Qi thread that was strong enough to pull back her daggers with force. It was a way for her to mimic a flying dagger''s usage thought it wasn''t as versatile. Xiao Tu easily blocked the daggers with the shaft of the spear and he moved closer towards Shang Yang so that he could get into range so he could stab her with his spear. Shang Yang didn''t mind that Xiao Tu was closing the distance between them because she knew that she could also use it to her advantage by moving close enough so that he wouldn''t be able to use his spear effectively. Shang Yang decided to end the spar quickly so that she could have Xiao Tu calm down before fighting her again. Though her plan of inciting Xiao Tu''s anger had worked, she wanted to fight against a Xiao Tu who could at least think clearly as he fought instead of blindly charging at her. She struck his joints so that it would paralyse him for a short period of time, but long enough to calm him down. Once she finished paralysing him, she waited for him to get back to his normal state. Transformation Observation As Xiao Tu was paralysed, Shang Yang took her attention off of his body and sat on top of him whilst watching Shi Die and Ye Xiu''s spar. She could see that Shi Die was slowly easing into his transformation compared to his instant transformation that she had witnessed before. She had no idea what caused the difference in his transformation speed this time but different situations make different types of results to appear. Shi Die could feel his body burning once again but the pain did not throb like it did during his first transformation which he was glad for because he could still fight with a clear head. He believed that if he could control himself in the period that he transformed, he should be able to retain control over his mind and body as he is transformed instead of becoming the beast that had absolutely no control over his body. His senses were definitely getting sharper as he could smell Ye Xiu''s scent and he could hear the slight movements on the ground that Ye Xiu made as he attacked him with his bare body. He could react to Ye Xiu''s fast speed and the only visible sign that his transformation was even taking place was the marks that were slowly appearing over his body. He had taken off his shirt for the fight so that they could tell whether he would transform or not. With his reaction speed improving due to his improved senses and the faster speed that he was gaining due to his transformation, Shi Die started to go on the offensive instead of receiving all the attacks from Ye Xiu. Though he wasn''t at his fastest speed, Shi Die managed to attack Ye Xiu faster than he could react which was definitely surprising. "Your speed is much faster than when you were fighting Yan Guo and it doesn''t even seem like you''ve reached your maximum speed yet because you haven''t finished transforming yet." Ye Xiu commented as he tried to block the attacks. He retrieved his whip out from his dimensional storage and began to do a mock interpretation of his technique that he used during his dual wielding style. It only utilised a single whip but the whip was moving at a speed that many would be cautious to approach. Ye Xiu was doing this as a simple test to see just how fast Shi Die had become once he was transforming. He knew that ordinarily, Shi Die had no chance of getting past the speed of his whip but he wanted to see just how improved his senses and reaction speed was. His own linear speed definitely wasn''t enough to dodge the whip even if he was able to predict where the whip was going because Ye Xiu had managed to improve the speed that his whip moved at due to the improvement of his muscular strength. Ye Xiu wasn''t disappointed with the speed that Shi Die had displayed as he managed to slowly evade the attacks of the whip as he made his way towards Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu watched as each time he dodged the attack to move closer towards him, Shi Die managed to disappear from his line of sight for a split second before reappearing closer. It showed that Shi Die had enough speed to trick Ye Xiu''s eyes because his eyes weren''t fast enough to see how Shi Die was actually moving. Ye Xiu''s reflexes were certainly fast enough to block Shi Die''s hits currently but he had no idea if he would be able to continue to do so if he Shi Die was completely transformed. Shi Die''s body was still transforming and it seemed to Shang Yang that he was about to reach the full transformation that she had witnessed last time. All that needed to be visible were the claws that Shi Die was supposed to develop. Shi Die''s attacks were more vicious in nature and Ye Xiu could definitely feel the danger every time Shi Die got close enough to try to lunge and bite him. With Ye Xiu noticing how dangerous it would be for Shi Die to land a hit on him, he started to evade most of the attacks that Shi Die tried to land on him. Even though Ye Xiu''s maximum speed with the ''Swallow Mirage Steps'' wouldn''t be able to keep up with Shi Die''s increasing speed, his direction of movement was never given away to Shi Die which meant that he was able to easily confuse Shi Die. Though speed in a fight could determine a fight, especially with how fast Shi Die was, it depended heavily on how you used that speed. Shi Die didn''t have a firm grasp of control over his speed but could use it crudely to launch fast surprise attacks on his opponents. It meant that Shi Die would have to adapt to his new speed if he transformed because against Ye Xiu, he''d probably be dodged until Ye Xiu tired or if he managed to predict where Ye Xiu was moving. Shi Die felt claws forming on his transformed hands and knew that he had probably finished his transformation but he could still feel the burning sensation on his body and he was confused. He ignored it so that he could attack Ye Xiu because he knew that his speed was enough to get past Ye Xiu''s defence. In less than a second Shi Die managed to get close enough to Ye Xiu so he could use his claws to swipe Ye Xiu on the stomach.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. Shi Die wasn''t meaning to cause damage in the spar but he knew that even if they got injuries, as long as it wasn''t anything life-threatening, Ye Xiu''s and Shang Yang''s skills in the Medical Arts should be enough to patch the injuries up. If that wasn''t enough, they always had elixirs and pills that could help them recover from injuries, there was even the Spiritual liquid in the Locket Dimension that would greatly heal the injuries. For the group, this meant they could fight with more ferocity and to fight against each other with the intent to capture. As long as they managed to knock a person unconscious or to render them unable to move, then it would count as their win. It was harder to capture a person than it was to kill a person, that''s why they were willing to switch the winning conditions for their spars. Once Ye Xiu realised that Shi Die was able to get past his whip extremely easily, he abandoned his approach and took out his katana so that he could at least block Shi Die''s claw swipes. Ye Xiu had no idea how sharp or how durable Shi Die''s claws were so he decided that until he could assess the damage that Shi Die could inflict with his claws. The only way he could do this is to see the amount of damage he could inflict to the surroundings, this required Ye Xiu to continue dodging but even though he was dodging he still took the chance to attack Shi Die. Shi Die managed to block Ye Xiu''s attacks with ease even after failing his attack due to his fast reaction speed and the speed that he was able to move his body at. Ye Xiu examined the damage that Shi Die caused to the ground and noticed that it Shi Die''s claws were definitely strong enough to maul a person to death without even leaving a mark on the claws. Once Ye Xiu managed to affirm that, he simply took out his whip again and used it to bind Shi Die just as he dodged another one of his attacks. Once Shi Die was bound, Ye Xiu just took out his other whip and used it to add another insurance that Shi Die would have his movements restricted. Shi Die frowned before speaking. "I surrender, he knew that the spar could be won even without having their opponent knock them out because technically Ye Xiu had restricted his movements to the point that he could no longer move or do anything to help him ease the situation. Ye Xiu immediately removed the hold that his whips had on Shi Die because there was no point in continuing to drain his Qi if he had surrendered and it was just a spar either way. Ye Xiu looked over to see Shang Yang sitting on top of Xiao Tu and ignored it in favour to ask Shi Die how his transformation went. "What did you feel during your transformation this time? I noticed that the process of transformation wasn''t as fast as when you were fighting Yan Guo. Is there a difference if the change is instant or if it is gradual?" Ye Xiu was interested in the different ways that Shi Die transformed in. "I know that the transformation was definitely slower than what had happened during the fight against Yang, and it was probably due to what I was feeling during the battle. The emotions I was feeling during the spar wasn''t as strong compared to what happened the first time. I think that the speed of transformation is probably linked to the strength of the emotions I feel during the course of a battle." Shi Die put a finger underneath his chin as he continued to review what had happened during the battle. "I have to keep a firm grip on my mind during the process of transformation. If I let go of the control of my mind, I know that I''ll definitely be unable to control what is happening to my body as we fight. I think that it''s definitely better for me to gradually transform simply because it allows me to slowly adjust to the changes in my senses and speed that I can move." "It''s rather disorienting because of the changes. The instant transformation can be used for a quick surprise attack and if you have absolutely no need to adjust to whatever changes that would occur. I think I should be able to make my way up to the instant transformation, the more time I spend in the state of transformation. The increase in my senses'' sensitivity was pretty much the same as when I was fighting Yan Guo but the speed that I had was definitely improved from last time." Shi Die continued to explain what he felt during the spar. "Hmm... even after the transformation finished I still felt the burning sensation on my body as if like it still wanted me to continue transforming. I don''t know what''s actually happening but there''s a possibility that there are further stages to my transformation but until I have this stage mastered, I won''t try to go any further because I don''t know if there are any side-effects to going further than I already have." Ye Xiu nodded at the wiseness that Shi Die displayed. "I think that''s a smart decision, for now, there''s no point in charging into sometime that''s completely unknown to us even if it''s your bloodline ability." He looked once again to where Shang Yang and Xiao Tu before letting out an exasperated sigh. "What are you doing on top of him, Shang Yang? He''s probably going to be very angry with you once you get up from that position." Shang Yang nonchalantly replied. "I paralysed him so he won''t be getting up for quite a few minutes. If he''s angry then his anger shouldn''t blind him during our spar at least. I paralysed him to give him enough time to cool his hot head down until he can fight me properly. I don''t want to fight him when he isn''t at his strongest, he''s been sulking the past few weeks because of our progress, and I want to show him that his progress is just as great as ours even if it''s not in strength but in skill and technique." Ye Xiu nodded before gesturing to Shi Die. "Want to get some food for the others later with me?" "Sure." The two left the gravity room which they had no reason to be in because they were sparring at the normal gravity. A Year in the Academy Shang Yang continued to sit on Xiao Tu as she watched Ye Xiu and Shi Die walk out of the room. She could feel Xiao Tu starting to get restless and it felt like the paralysis was wearing off. Knowing that the break was about to finish, she got off from Xiao Tu and walked a few metres away from him and waited for him to get back on his feet. Xiao Tu shook his body multiple times to get rid of the numbness in his arms because his blood wasn''t able to flow easily due to the position he was in when he was paralysed. It didn''t help that Shang Yang had sat on him, making the blood flow become more constricted. Once he got rid of the numbness, he turned towards Shang Yang who was smiling brightly at him. Scowling, he placed his spear back into the dimensional storage and took out his quarterstaff. He decided that the quarterstaff would at least be less restrictive in what he could do with his attacks. Xiao Tu felt as if Shang Yang was taunting him by simply standing and smirking at him. He took in a deep breath because he knew that getting angry in a fight would do nothing but restrict his moves and be unable to think clearly. Once he felt that he was calm enough to fight Shang Yang, he thought of what he would first before attacking. In a single leap, Xiao Tu managed to gain enough speed to make Shang Yang be cautious of what he was going to do with all the momentum on his side. She was right to be cautious because he used that momentum to allow him to grasp his quarterstaff in two hands before swinging it sideways. It was a crude attack but an effective one because it was an attack one would simply not use because it was easy to dodge. Though the attack was known to be easy to dodge, the speed that Xiao Tu delivered the attack forced Shang Yang to duck and somersaulting backwards. Xiao Tu didn''t stop attacking and smoothly moved his quarterstaff downwards so he could strike her whilst she couldn''t move from her position easily. Shang Yang was able to stop the quarterstaff from going any further by having her two soles of her feet on each side of the quarterstaff. She was flexible enough to manoeuvre her legs around her body and pushed the quarterstaff higher into the air before letting it go and getting on her feet afterwards. As his quarterstaff was knocked up by her legs, Shang Yang took the chance to strike at his joints once again to paralyse him. Xiao Tu immediately moved back to avoid it and grabbed his quarterstaff by the end as he moved. Her glancing blows missed his body and he spun his quarterstaff around his body to confused Shang Yang. Shang Yang didn''t even bat an eyelid at his display and took out her daggers and threw it at him with her Qi threads attached to them once again. She brought back before they reached him as she was charging at him and tried an experimental move that she had adapted from Ye Xiu''s technique that he had been teaching her. She formed some Qi needles though quite a few dispersed as she threw them and some broke when they made contact with his body. She was trying her best to control the Qi needles as best as she can so that it wouldn''t break so easily. Her control wasn''t as good as Ye Xiu''s so she had many errors when it came to a fighting situation. In a calm situation where she didn''t have to hurry, it was possible for her to make multiple needles which wouldn''t break easily. Xiao Tu didn''t know what exactly she was doing but he saw the throwing motions on her hands and decided to dodge anyway. It was better to be safe than sorry. Shang Yang stopped throwing her needles since it wasn''t effective compared to what she thought it would be able to do because her Qi control just wasn''t good enough for the technique to be used in battle yet. She accidentally used illusions as she moved due to her natural affinity for illusions and it confused Xiao TU when she suddenly appeared in front of him, blocking off many of his Qi pathways as she attacked. Xiao Tu frowned and surrendered. "I surrender but why were you using illusions? You never use illusions in your battles." "I accidentally used illusions." She stuck her tongue out and walked out of the gravity room, leaving Xiao Tu to nurse his own injuries and to unblock his Qi pathways. He watched her as she left and sighed. ''There''s no use in complaining anymore. Once Xiao Bai manages to find something for me, I bet I''ll be able to catch up. Even if he doesn''t, I''ll just put more effort into my training!'' Xiao Tu smiled before leaving the gravity room as well - - - A year had passed since the group had first arrived at the Academy. They were much stronger than they were when they originally got here. They knew that this was the prime years of their life and it was going to be spent in the best ways they possibly could. They had met many people and learnt many things from different people. Their bonds as friends had strengthened as they all lived underneath the same roof.Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation. Even though it was only a single year since they had left the embrace of their parents, they had learnt independence even though they were still helped by their mentors in the Academy. They had discovered more about the world around them and that they were originally just a small frog stuck in a well. Discoveries about their strengths and weaknesses and having others to help them through those weaknesses led to the affirmation that friends always helped. After fights, they stayed as friends and even made new friends after fights. Many people thought fights were violent but bonds can be strengthened during those fights. You learn to understand how a person thinks and how they feel during a fight. You know that your problems can be solved easily after a fight and when they reconcile afterwards. But they also know that grudges can be formed after fights and that is something to be avoided. Ye Xiu looked at their room and sighed. "It''s been a year. Are we going to stay in the city until the next academic year begins? We still haven''t decided whether we wanted to go back to see our parents or not." He was already sure of his own decision but he had no idea what was in the minds of his friends. Shi Die shrugged as if it didn''t matter much to him. Shi Die''s stance on the topic was neutral because he didn''t mind whether he visited his friend''s families or whether he stayed in the same place. He didn''t exactly mind because it was truly his friend''s decisions on whether they felt homesick. ¡°It''s up to the two of you. I don''t think Ye Xiu and I mind whether we go back or not." Shang Yang looked over at Xiao Tu who was lying on his bed, bored out of his mind. "I still want to go back home, but if everyone else decides to stay here then I''ll stay as well. There''s no point in me going back by my lonesome because our families would just be confused about why we aren''t all together. It''d also be a bigger surprise if we returned with a new friend and when we are able to beat them. I theorize that when the proffered date that Ye Xiu suggested to us all, we''d be able to defeat our parents in a battle." Xiao Tu snorted in amusement when he heard Shang Yang''s words. "I really doubt that we''d be able to defeat them. Firstly, they''ve probably been holding back on his during training because they never look like they''ve had a workout after a long spar with us and they haven''t even used their Qi to fight or enhance their bodies during the fights." Xiao Tu languidly pointed his finger at Ye Xiu. "Ye Xiu would have noticed that." Shang Yang glared at Xiao Tu even though he had spoken the truth, sniffing slightly she spoke once again. "I guess we don''t need to care about Xiao Tu''s attitude on the topic. He seems to be very disinterested in what we are talking about anyway. Which means that the decision of the group is to stay in this city probably until we finish our third year." Ye Xiu nodded when Shang Yang declared the decision. "Then we''ll just have to worry about where we''re going to be living during the time that the Academy is closed. I sincerely doubt that we''d be allowed to stay here especially without supervision." Shi Die smiled slightly. "That can be solved easily. We can ask Sir about giving another accommodation in the Academy to use, can''t we? You''ve probably already noticed but he''s the Principal of the school and if he isn''t the Principal, he has a high position in the Academy. I''m sure he can arrange for us to stay here, I''d think that he would want to continue our training as well." Xiao Tu perked up when he heard that it would be possible for them to stay in the Academy during the holidays. "Does that mean I''ll still be able to eat delicious food?" Shang Yang walked over to Xiao Tu and pinched him on the cheeks. "Is food the only thing you think about with that brain of yours?" "I think about Ye Xiu and training too!" Xiao Tu pouted childishly as Shang Yang commented on his train of thought. Rolling her eyes, she mumbled, "That doesn''t make things any better." She was simply tired of hearing Xiao Tu thinking about food constantly because every time that he did think about food, he''d be voicing out those thoughts to everyone around him. At first, she wasn''t annoyed at it but the repetitiveness of the situation made her irritable whenever the topic came up. She didn''t mind Ye Xiu or Shi Die mentioning anything about food because when they talk about the food they have many different things to talk about instead of them just being hungry. She loved to listen to Shi Die and Ye Xiu talk about cooking even though she knew that she had absolutely no talent for cooking. They had both tried to help her to improve her skills in cooking but it still ended in disaster. Shi Die cleared his throat to get his friends'' attention that had wandered away from the original topic they were on. "Even if Sir is unable to find us a residence for us to occupy, I believe we can always ask Liu Fan or Jin Yuan to see if they could house us. Sir isn''t the only one who would want to continue our training during the holidays so I believe they would agree." Ye Xiu nodded to the points that Shi Die made. "We''ll ask them later if they can''t shelter us we''d still need a backup plan. It''s always best to be prepared but we can figure that out after we ask them." Ye Xiu hummed as he was thinking of what else they needed to do. "I believe that during the period of the holidays it would be wise for us to explore the city more. We barely saw much of it when we went to the Auction so it should provide us with valuable information about the city we live in." All the others agreed and they went to find their mentors. - - - What the group didn''t know was that they were being examined very closely by a secret group that they had no idea about. The group that was observing them kept watching over them. And they would continue to do so until the plan commenced. Groups Strength A group of four arrived back at the city that housed the Star Whale Academy, they walked through the main gates of the city and moved towards the area where many teenagers had gathered around. Children that hadn''t hit puberty to those that had, milled around the entrance to the Academy, waiting for someone to open the gates to allow them in. The group walked past the crowd and towards the front gate where they were promptly let in by the guards, with the gates closing behind them. Protests broke out as the crowd were irritable after spending hours of their time standing outside of the gate. The smarter ones had left to do other things, mainly to find things to entertain themselves with. The group walked through the Academy grounds, towards a lone building that was by far one of the most obscure buildings in the entire Academy. They walked in and handed in four badges to the person inside of the building''s office before exchanging some words and retrieving their badges back. They made their way to a building where they promptly re-registered their badges to a residence that they had been inhabiting for the past few years since they had asked for a place to stay after their first year had been finished. After doing that they left to the Mess Hall. The group continued on their way to the Mess Hall where several adults were talking outside and were walking inside the building. The teachers glanced at the group before returning back to their conversation, deeming them to be nobody of consequence and that they were allowed to be where they were at the current time. The majority of the adults in the school had an inkling of who they were since their reputation had risen to an admirable level after their second year in the Academy. Many students that saw them and knew of their reputation and what they had recently returned from, broke into gossip to talk about them. Their reputation had spread to all corners of the Academy and only those that were freshmen wouldn''t know of them. It brought them trouble because of countless students picking a fight with the group to prove their strength. Those groups that threatened them or had picked a fight with the group were beaten down mercilessly, making them regret their decisions. Once they had established their reputation as strong students, the established groups of the Academy tried to recruit them for their own gains. It failed and many of the leaders that led the groups weren''t pleased. The stronger leaders of the group didn''t have much time to care about it though since they left on Academy missions the majority of the time. The leader of the group looked around the room to spot an adult waving at them with childish glee. Sighing at his behaviour, they walked towards the man to exchange pleasantries. "Hello, Jin Yuan. Why are you waving at us with such enthusiasm today? Did you manage to make something new from the book I gave you? I''m honestly surprised you haven''t actually finished attempting every single one in that book." The girl in the group spoke. "I bet he''s trying to perfect each dish before he moves to the next one. Even though he doesn''t seem to be a perfectionist he seems to be very critical when it comes to new food that he''s learning to make." The man, Jin Yuan, scowled at her comment. "I like learning to make new food and I always want to taste the best before I move onto the next dish. It''s not like you can cook anyway." Another boy in the group laughed nervously as he watched his mentor argue with his friend as if they were two immature children in a fight. "Jin Yuan, I think you can tell us why you want us here. There''s no need to argue with Shang Yang, both of you are mature enough to act like an adult so do it. You''re an actual adult so I don''t see why you argue with her so often." Jin Yuan huffed before pouting, an expression that did not look cute on such an elderly person. "She keeps being critical about cooking when she can''t even cook." The boy quickly waved him off. "Let''s just forgive and forget shan''t we not?" The boy tried to divert the topic by ending it quickly. Jin Yuan nodded at the indiscreet diversion. "I have something you should try out. I''ve recently made a new dish that combines several dishes that I''ve made before into a singular one. It should be eaten in a particular order, but I''ll tell you when we get there. It should be nice that the four of you get to eat something so delicious the moment you get back from an Academy-sanctioned mission from the Vice-Principal." The last person in the group spoke up, stretching his arms up and placed them behind his head in a leisurely manner. "I''m surprised we were even given a mission this early. I''d have thought that the missions were primarily for those who were nearing the end of their Third Year to those of their Fifth Year." Jin Yuan wasn''t very surprised when they had been given their mission by the Vice-Principal. "Your strength is probably on par with those prodigies in the Fifth Year. I have no idea how the four of you managed to become such a terrifying group but your reputation as the strongest and youngest group is well-known throughout the Academy. Many influential people and families are interested in your rise in strength when the four of you were pretty much nameless when you first started out at the Academy."The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident. "I''m certain I could find information down to where you live and who your parents are in less than a few minutes of information retrieval. They''ve spent quite a lot of resources looking for information on the four of you and whether they can bribe you or not." Jin Yuan was leading them to his private kitchen as he was talking. The leader of the group, Ye Xiu, returned to the conversation after he finished quietly speaking to his friend, Shi Die. "No matter what they do, it''d be impossible to bribe us. We don''t have anything that we want or need currently." He spoke the truth as the group needed little because they could sustain themselves especially due to the fact that they all had a discipline that would easily earn them a lot of money. "Even if they tried, I''m pretty sure Sir would block any attempts of bribery in the first place." Jin Yuan nodded once again. "That''s true, the Principal certainly is a person that would do anything to protect his students. The four of you can be counted as his apprentices which means that he would protect the four of you to the best of his ability." Jin Yuan opened the door to his kitchen and sat down on a stool as he retrieved all the ingredients he needed from his dimensional storage. "I would do the same if the need arises and I''m sure Liu Fan would as well." "Thank you for telling us that Jin Yuan. I hope we can repay that favour one day." Shang Yang promised him solemnly. Though they looked like they had the worst relationship in the entire group, they were actually very good friends. It was their way for them to play around. The group stopped talking to Jin Yuan once he started to cook the dish he was going to serve them. They knew well that if they wanted to taste the best then they''d have to let him concentrate solely on what he was making. They conversed with each other quietly, light banter being exchanged between the four. They reviewed their mission since it was their first mission. It certainly wouldn''t be the last one and the next time they took on a mission, it''d probably be one of a higher difficulty. As they talked and watched Jin Yuan''s rapid yet careful movements, they could see his cooking process and it was truly a delight to watch a master at work. Though he wasn''t the highest rank at being a Spirit Cook, this didn''t matter in the face of pure cooking skill and taste. Being a high-rank Spirit Cook did help improve the taste greatly but Jin Yuan liked to strive for perfection in the normal taste before infusing Qi. Once Jin Yuan had finished his cooking process, he brought out four plates of his finished dishes. He started to explain the correct order that they should eat the dish in. "Each time you taste a different part of the dish the taste is enhanced so you must eat it till the end. Enjoy!" They were in bliss as they finished the food. They thanked Jin Yuan for the food and Shi Die told him that he''d be back for lessons after the little break that he was going to take. The mission had tired them all out and they were looking forward to going back to their residence to rest for the next few days. As the group went back to their residence for their break, they changed clothes into cleaner clothes. Though they had said that they were going to take a break for the next few days, there was never a true moment of rest for the group. They entered Ye Xiu''s Dimension and began doing their daily routine. This daily routine had been perfected by Xiao Bai after months of changing what was in the routine and how to maximise their gains and efforts in the allocated time. There was a very good reason why they had been assigned a mission this early in their Academy life and it was purely because they had trained with all their effort and combining that with their advantages, they easily became some of the strongest students in the entire Academy. Hordes of students rushed into the Academy to come for the entrance ceremony. Those that had good connections and had been to the entrance ceremony before didn''t go to them because they felt like it was a waste of time. They took that time to get registered for their rooms or residence. The entrance ceremony was slightly different this time as there was a big announcement that had to be made to all the students in the Academy. Those that had been privately trained by a staff member already knew what was going to come up in the entrance ceremony because they had been informed about it a long time ago. When all students were informed of the upcoming tournament, the entire student body was excited because of it. As the Vice-Principal introduced the tournament, several unknown adults walked into the hall where the Vice-Principal promptly introduced them as the Vice-Principals of the respective Academies that were participating in the tournament. There were over twenty different Vice-Principals but he mainly introduced those from Academies in the Top 20. Once the introductions were over, the Vice-Principal had announced that the Academies that were participating had brought their selected students that were going to participate in the tournament over to the Star Whale Academy. It was a publicly known fact that whoever hosted the tournament would require all their contestants to make the long travel over to the Academy to live for an entire year. Though San Guo complained about all the complications hosting the tournament brought, it also brought in a lot of benefits. The Academy that hosted the tournament would usually become stronger afterwards. It was due to the fact that their students would gain a lot of experience from sparring others and that would increase the average strength of the Academy. San Guo was still unpleased about hosting the tournament but couldn''t whine about it because the decision was already made and the respective Academies had already arrived. All he could do was hope for the best for their Academy as he looked out of his office''s window. Morning The group rose early, their daily routine calling for them to wake up at a time that others would be asleep at. It was midnight. What they would possibly be doing at that time was unknown to many but they could always be seen strolling towards the gravity building. Many assume they would be training which would be correct as they were always in the gravity building simply because training in there was beneficial. When the group came outside of the gravity building, the sun had already risen. They went towards the Mess Hall to get food to eat after a gruelling training session with their mentor, San Guo. San Guo didn''t mind training his students at such a late time because he could go without sleep for days and he only needed to meditate for a couple of hours before his whole body would be refreshed and filled with vigour. They came out together to look for Jin Yuan as they had an agreement with him that he would cook the dishes for their training regime and ti had stuck for over two years. Jin Yuan''s food was tasty and provided benefits which only improved the more dishes he learnt and perfected. Shi Die would take over Jin Yuan''s job once he managed to get to the same Spirit Cook ranking as Jin Yuan was because he would be able to make food and beverages at the same level Jin Yuan did. Walking into the Mess Hall was a surprise for them. Ye Xiu looked around the Mess Hall and realised that it was definitely more crowded than he had ever seen it before. Looking towards his mentor he asked, "Did so many freshmen join us this year? It''s rather crowded in here." San Guo smirked. "There''s a reason why you attend the Entrance Ceremony you know. A lot of announcements are made during the ceremony so you should''ve gone to it. I guess I can''t fault you for not going to the ceremony since you had only just returned from your mission. The Academies that are attending the tournament have already arrived for the year." "The tournament starts at the latter half of the year but they are here because it is a tradition for all to come to the hosting Academy from the start of an Academic Year." Xiao Tu snorted at San Guo''s words. "We were tired after our mission, at least give us a break about making us go to a ceremony. It''s not like we actually have to go anyway since you inform us of any events that will happen before or after the information is revealed, it doesn''t matter to us much anyway." Shi Die tilted his head slightly. "Do we have enough space to house all the extra students and adults that have come to the Academy? Last I''ve seen the Academy is already crowded enough as it is and that''s even without some of the fourth and fifth years that are out on their missions." "The Academy has plenty of room for the extra numbers. We have a huge amount of residences on the outer edges of the Academy that aren''t used by us. It was mainly made just in case we ever had to host a big tournament such as this. It hasn''t been used for a long time but we have cleaned it recently in preparation for their arrival." "I really didn''t expect the residences to be used so the refurbishing was rushed in preparation for the tournament so the residences aren''t at the best quality compared to where you are currently living at. It should satisfy them enough though because I know the residences they offer to us in the past tournaments and it was of similar quality." Shi Die asked more questions about how the Academy was coping with the crowding. "What about food and whatnot? Don''t the Spirit Cooks have to work for a longer period of time because there are so many people this time? Are you sure we can cope with the demand? Are they paying for the food or is it all free for them?" San Guo was amused at Shi Die firing questions at a rapid speed. "Calm down... I''ll answer those questions one by one. I''m surprised you are even so interested in the affairs in the Academy. I didn''t take you to be a person that would like to know so much about things like this." Shi Die rubbed the back of his neck. "It''s not that it''s interesting, it''s more the fact that it gives me something to take my mind off when I''m not thinking about things such as food or training." "That''s good at least, it gives you something else to take your mind off training. No people working in the Academy that deals with the food do have to work depending on how many people will actually go to the Mess Hall for their meals. Some of the residences have been equipped with a kitchen because I believe that some of the Academies always bring their own Spirit Cooks to feed their own staff and students." "Those that do use the Mess Hall have been forewarned that they will have to pay for the food that they buy and all Academies that have hosted the tournament have done the same." San Guo opened the door to Jin Yuan''s private kitchen. "Jin Yuan should be here soon so we''ll just wait here patiently. He''ll take longer to get here due to the influx of students but it shouldn''t be too bad because he can hand his duties over to those ranked lower than him anyway."The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. They continued to speak to each other about what was happening in the school, waiting for Jin Yuan to finish his duties so that they could get receive their food. San Guo had started to use Jin Yuan as his personal cook simply because he was the best person that could cook the most beneficial food in the entire city. He only started to have him as his personal cook because he had started to learn different dishes that pleased his palate. Jin Yuan walked in, looking flustered and out of breath and quickly took out the ingredients that he would need for his cooking and asked Shi Die to help him out with the ingredient preparation and whispered his instructions to him. Shi Die gestured to Ye Xiu to help out since it was a huge amount of preparation that they had to do as Jin Yuan was cooking. Ye Xiu washed his hands and quickly started to help with the preparation. Shi Die told him what to do and their synchronisation was flawless as they completed each of their tasks and handed each other what they would need at the correct moment. With the two working together flawlessly, they finished the preparations that Jin Yuan needed in record time and washed their hands and sat back down. Once all the preparations were finished, Jin Yuan managed to finish what he wanted to make before leaving the room. He didn''t bother leaving any instructions on how to eat the dish and hurried out of the kitchen as he was probably busy helping with the demand that the influx of students had caused. The group ate in silence as Ye Xiu and Shi Die pored over the original of the cooking book that they had borrowed Jin Yuan and looked for what the dish actually was. They managed to find the page on the dish that had looked similar to what Jin Yuan had made and told the others the correct method of eating the dish. Once Xiao Tu had heard of the correct way of eating the dish, he devoured it in an instant, not caring too much about looking barbaric. They left the private kitchen, locking it behind them with the Principal''s card before going their separate ways. San Guo went back to his office to complete all the paperwork that had piled up for him due to the arrangements of the Tournament that he had to complete. Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu went to Liu Fan''s residence so they could continue their Smithing. Xiao Tu was about to make his own Qi weapon because Liu Fan had finally deemed his skills better than his own. It was surprising, to say the least for Liu Fan to see the progress of Xiao Tu''s skill in Smithing but once he remembered that Xiao Tu possessed the "Smith''s Masterpiece" body physique, he wasn''t as surprised as before. He had heard of the legends surrounding those that possess the physique and those that did possess it, came to be known as some of the greatest Smiths of all time. They might not be the best but many of those that had led new and important discoveries or had made a revolution in the Smithing community were those who possessed the physique. It was known to appear once every few centuries. Xiao Tu was extremely happy with the knowledge that he was going to make his own Qi weapon because his own quarterstaff and spear were not up to par for what he had in mind. Xiao Tu''s techniques that he had been learning didn''t need Qi to work but many of them that he had learnt used Qi to bolster the strength of his technique to higher levels. He was only able to move to a higher level when Liu Fan allowed him to borrow some spears that he had made to practice with. They were going to be returned to Liu Fan once he managed to make his own Qi weapon. Ye Xiu''s progress was much slower so he was still learning the ropes, being stuck at the 2nd rank. He didn''t mind because he didn''t put as much emphasis on training his Smithing skills because he could only practice in one place and that was where Liu Fan''s residence was. Whereas with Alchemy he could practice anywhere. Even though he no longer had to learn from Lao Lan or Lao Xiu, he still asked them for advice on obscure things simply because they had such experience with the discipline, they knew a lot. He was one of two Rank 4 Alchemists in the entire city and the other Rank 4 Alchemist rarely appeared unless there was a massive auction. Due to this, Ye Xiu could make a few Grade 4 pills and elixirs and sell them at an absurd price but nobody would be able to contest his pricing simply because he was the only person that would sell them. He watched Xiao Tu forge his own weapon because Liu Fan said that it would be a valuable experience to watch another make their own weapon and it should give inspiration on what he would want to do in the future. As they were doing that, Shang Yang and Shi Die had walked out of the Academy grounds and into the bustling city. Nobody stopped them going out since they were recognised as people that had explicit permission to leave the grounds at any time simply because they were strong and they had been given by San Guo that they could do anything they want. They were roaming the streets to see if they could find another they would need for their next mission as San Guo had hinted to them that there was going to be an upcoming mission that he was going to hand over to them when they were reporting the results of their previous mission. Knowing this, Shang Yang and Shi Die liked to be prepared and they weren''t hesitant about their purchases since they had so much money to spend. The pair was being watched closely by multiple figures that had mastered the art of stalking. They weren''t noticed by the two as they had blended in with the crowd smoothly and it looked like they were minding their own business. These figures didn''t dare to step into the Academy simply because of the strength that they held within. Rematch Ye Xiu was watching over Xiao Tu''s forging of his two Qi weapons and it had been over half a day since he had started and it looked like he had no intention of stopping. He looked over to Liu Fan to see if he could stop Xiao Tu but he shook his head. "Leave him be, the construction of a weapon is best made in a singular session. It doesn''t seem like he''s done with even his first weapon so you can leave first. I''ll keep watch over him." Ye Xiu hesitated but Liu Fan was pushing him out of the door, "Go do what you have to do. I don''t need to sleep for a while anyway." With that, Ye Xiu left Liu Fan''s residence and went to look for Shang Yang and Shi Die. He had no idea what they had been doing the entire day but thought that they would most likely be at the Mess Hall, in Jin Yuan''s private kitchen. Thinking this, Ye Xiu made his way through the Academy grounds at a leisurely pace because he knew that the current time was close to when Jin Yuan would usually arrive to cook. As expected, Ye Xiu made it to Jin Yuan''s private kitchen in time. Shang Yang and Shi Die greeted him as his arrival was made known but Shi Die made queries to where Xiao Tu was. When Ye Xiu explained what had happened, they nodded to show their understanding and talked about what they had managed to buy in the city. "Shi Die and I managed to buy quite a few supplies for our next mission, I''m not quite sure whether we''ve bought everything that we might possibly need but I''ll just check with you anyway." They didn''t mind talking as Jin Yuan was cooking since he was looking just as frazzled as he was this morning. Shi Die stood up to help Jin Yuan to prepare the ingredients once again when he managed to deduce what dish he was planning to make. With Shi Die''s help, Jin Yuan let out an appreciative smile and finished the dishes before sinking down onto a chair nearby the kitchen counter. "You look exhausted. Is the influx of students and staff actually that crazy? I haven''t actually seen how many people have arrived at the Academy." Shang Yang whispered to Jin Yuan as he closed his eyes to rest them for a moment. "Each Academy has probably brought around about sixty students and a dozen staff. You can imagine just how many people who we are cooking for from just those numbers. To be honest, I''m actually surprised that so many Academies aren''t using their own staff to cook their food for them. Maybe it''s only for their elite students and staff but it certainly feels like everyone is coming to the Mess Hall to get their food." Ye Xiu voiced out something that he had been thinking about since he had seen Jin Yuan''s exhausted appearance. "Why didn''t the Vice-Principal or Sir hire more Spirit Cooks before the start of the year if he knew that so many people would be coming?" Jin Yuan didn''t open his eyes but was still talking. "It''s hard to find a decent Spirit Cook in the city when most of them are already hired. The Academy''s budget was probably strained from the construction it had to do. The Academy has a set budget for a year and they only take out extras during an emergency or if a catastrophe strikes the Academy." Ye Xiu nodded but didn''t speak. They thanked him for the meal and left him there to rest quietly by himself. They talked to each other and decided on where to go next. They went to the Arena grounds simply because they wanted to see if they could get a good spar in. They were one of the stronger people that were in the Academy but those from different Academies didn''t know that. The group was counting on that fact to find a match that they could fight since fighting each other had become boring after they knew each other''s techniques too well. When they had arrived at the training grounds, they were surprised to see that it was certainly more crowded than what they had been used to. They were doubly more surprised since they knew that few people would be in the Arena grounds at such a time but it seemed to them that the majority of the people that they could see were those from other Academies. Knowing that they could probably find a match to fight, they continued walking around to see if there were any willing to fight. Shang Yang was talking with Shi Die as Ye Xiu looked for an opponent to fight, alas he was unlucky as most of the people that he had seen wouldn''t have provided a challenge for him. He decided to just go back to their room when he felt somebody tapping on his shoulder. He turned around to see a face that he hadn''t seen for a while. He opened his mouth before closing it once again without uttering a word. The girl let out an exasperated sigh when she saw Ye Xiu''s reaction. "Did you forget who I am again?" She placed her hands on her hips and spoke in an admonishing tone. "This is the second time you''ve forgotten my name! Think back and try to recall my name. If you don''t manage to, I''ll make sure to spank your buttocks when we spar!" The girl grinned at Ye Xiu as he put on a thoughtful expression. He tapped his chin with his finger for several moments until he scratched the side of his head in embarrassment. "I''ve forgotten your name again." He started to laugh nervously as the girl looked at him for a few more seconds with a piercing gaze. She laughed sadistically as she thought of ways to hurt Ye Xiu.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more. "Since you''ve so kindly forgotten my name, I''ll kindly remind you. My name is Jing Hua Fei. Please try not to forget it this time." She smiled as she started to pull him up onto an open arena that was free of people. "Tournament rules. Have one of your friends to referee the match since I know they''re around. I saw them earlier so it should be fine if you drag one of them up here." Ye Xiu shouted for Shi Die to come up onto the arena so that he could referee the match. Shi Die made it there quickly and had them begin the match. Ye Xiu was much more cautious compared to when he was fighting two years ago. He had developed the habit of watching the enemy''s behaviour before attacking. He knew that he hadn''t seen Hua Fei anywhere in the Academy for the past two years which was surprising, to say the least, because she had potential to become a strong fighter when he had last met her in the Mess Hall. She had changed, she had gotten stronger and she moved in a graceful yet agile manner. Ye Xiu never underestimated an enemy, no matter what they looked like they were all placed under Ye Xiu''s scrutiny. He had developed a new observation technique that used the previous technique as the base of the ability. The technique now improved how fast he could see. He had this technique purely because of the speed that Shi Die was now able to move at and even then he was barely able to see him with the technique. He knew that Shi Die''s speed was definitely one that was rare because even San Guo had told them that he had only seen those of high cultivation move at that speed. San Guo had told them all that the majority of the staff in every Academy had their cultivation level suppressed because a cultivator never showed their true ability unless they were extremely powerful. The only way for a person to see past their suppression is to have a powerful observation technique which Ye Xiu was slowly making his way towards. He watched Hua Fei shoot Qi arrows at him which wasn''t surprising since his father was able to do the same. Now that he knew that Hua Fei could potentially use Qi arrows to severely change how the fight went, he took out the katana that he had borrowed from Liu Fan. The katana was a Grade 1 Qi weapon, nothing of consequence but it was enough for Ye Xiu to use in a fight as a substitute to his own weapon that he would forge in the future. He had no idea just how great Hua Fei''s grasp on Qi arrows was because there were different levels of mastery and different techniques for making Qi arrows. This had him using a technique that he had learnt from San Guo after torturous training of being battered by Qi attacks from him. When it came to Qi expenditure, the technique was costly but with his Qi control, he was able to reduce the amount of Qi needed to the minimum. The katana cut the Qi arrows in half and any that had special properties to them were blocked by the fortified katana and the technique that he had learnt. San Guo had never given him the actual name of the technique and only told him that to be considered a master of the technique is when he is able to block a strong attack with a single swipe of his fingers. Hua Fei watched her Qi arrows getting destroyed or blocked by Ye Xiu and she frowned. Since he wasn''t using his whip currently, she started to run towards Ye Xiu and attacked with her fists and feet. Each of her attacks was imbued with fire Qi and it was clearly seen as they were alight with flames. Ye Xiu wasn''t too worried about the flames as he blocked them with his bare hands. The benefits that he received from his bloodline included strong fire resistance. His body could resist heats that would roast a person alive and he was perfectly fine even after the attacks. When Hua Fei noticed her flame attacks failed, she switched to the other element that she could use. Using metal Qi to harden her attacks, Ye Xiu could feel the weight between each of her attacks yet once again he shrugged it off. His body strength had increased to the point that unless you were a body cultivation prodigy, had a body physique for strength or a bloodline that would help increase their strength then they would have no chance against Ye Xiu. Hua Fei was obviously not happy with the way the battle was turning out since it seemed as if Ye Xiu was able to counter everything she had with just his bare body and his katana. Sighing, she used the rest of her Qi reserves to constantly shoot arrows at Ye Xiu. Quite a few escaped his attention since he was unable to see them and directly hit him on his body. Puzzled by the attacks that hit him, he tried to see what was happening. Hua Fei smiled when she realised what kind of arrows Ye Xiu wasn''t able to be seen and only shot a single type of Qi arrow at him. The Qi arrow''s presence was completely concealed from Ye Xiu''s observation technique, forcing him on the defensive. Ye Xiu took out his two whips once he noticed what was happening and used it to try and deflect all the arrows. The tactic worked easily and Hua Fei was simply waiting for the single opportunity that she had to win. She had discretely shot several hidden arrows that were around Ye Xiu and were primed to explode at her command. Each of the arrows had a corrosive effect when it exploded and she managed to make this through knowledge of the Medical Arts. Though she couldn''t practice the Medical Arts, she could certainly use some aspects from a branch of the Medical Arts to her advantage. She exploded them just as Ye Xiu stopped his blocks and ran towards him. She shot several more arrows to the ground and exploded them once again. Ye Xiu had nowhere to go since the entire arena ground was being corroded and he simply jumped towards Hua Fei using ''Basilisk''s Gaze.'' He poured in half of his remaining Qi reserves into the technique, boosting his speed to one similar to Shi Die''s own speed and immediately activated ''Solitary Stand'' and the activation time was nearly nil and he attacked her with the finishing move. She defended herself with her own defensive technique but was broken through cleanly since she didn''t have much Qi left. "Why does this always happen." She sighed and surrendered. "You win once again. Next time I''ll beat you! I still don''t get how you got so powerful. Your body wasn''t this strong when I last fought you." She pouted and stroked his muscles on his chest. Ye Xiu jumped back in surprise before running away blushing. Shi Die started laughing boisterously as he jumped off the arena to tell Shang Yang what had just happened. Weapon Ye Xiu ran through the Academy grounds in a blinding speed and several teachers wanted to stop him from running at such a speed, afraid for the safety of the other students, but they let it go when they realised that he was avoiding contact with everybody whilst he ran. He was confused with the way he reacted towards the touching that Hua Fei had instigated but didn''t know why he had reacted so fiercely. He''d been touched by Shang Yang the same way but he had never had an outburst that shocked himself. He had no idea whether it was being touched by a stranger or being touched in that manner that had made him run. His emotions were wild as he made it back to the residence in record time. He shut the door and sat in front of, taking deep breaths to calm himself. Ye Xiu thought that the most likely reason why he had reacted at all was due to the hormones in his body. Puberty had caused him to be an active little bugger and though he rarely thought of things relating to sex, he had woken up with a morning wood several times. He had gone through these changes himself in his previous life but it never seemed to be that big of a deal but how wrong he was. The only reason why he felt that it wasn''t such a big deal was that he rarely had any interaction with people. He was an introvert through and through and it made sense for him to never develop the social awareness during puberty or adulthood. He was thinking of how to say sorry to Hua Fei for suddenly running out on her but failed to think of a response that wouldn''t result in him being slapped by the girl. He placed his head down onto his hands and let himself calm down. Once he managed to calm himself down, he was thinking of what happened logically but dismissed it after not being able to understand it. After a couple of minutes, he heard someone knocking on the door of the residence. "Ye Xiu, open the door. I''ve access to the residence but I''m very sure you''re sitting behind the door so that we can''t get it." He could hear Shang Yang''s voice as she persuaded him to stop blocking the door entrance. He stood up and quickly let them in and they looked at his flustered appearance that hadn''t gone away even though he had calmed down. "Shi Die told me what happened. You seem surprised by your reaction, have you never had the talk with your parents? They should''ve explained what happens when you start to mature and hit your growth spurt." Ye Xiu shook his head. "I''ve read about it." Shang Yang shook her head as she smiled fondly at Ye Xiu''s bookworm attitude to things that he didn''t know about. "Maybe that''s why you had such a reaction." She started to pat his head to soothe his nerves just like she always did to Shi Die and Xiao Tu when they were close to her or if they were asleep. "You don''t find me as anything beyond a friend so it makes sense that you wouldn''t react to me touching you in that provocative manner." She smiled bitterly because she had given up on Ye Xiu after the second year when he didn''t even react to her flirts. Subtle or obvious flirts, she tried all and he didn''t react. She looked at Ye Xiu who had closed his eyes in response to Shang Yang''s patting when Shi Die walked into the room when he thought that Shang Yang had sufficient time to talk to Ye Xiu. "He seems to be asleep?" Shi Die rolled his eyes at Shang Yang''s attempt at an innocent face. "It seems to me that your patting and hair stroking technique is able to make anybody fall asleep easily." Shi Die spoke from experience. He enjoyed Shang Yang''s pats and rubs and he didn''t do anything to hide it. He was proud to enjoy her pats and rubs and it seemed like he wasn''t the only one. "It doesn''t make Xiao Tu fall asleep." Shang Yang pouted when she thought about the only person who she was unable to make fall asleep with her pats. "Though my illusions can easily make him fall asleep." She smirked suddenly as she thought about all the pranks that she had played on Xiao Tu. "If Xiao Tu gets the chance to play a prank on you, he will. That I am certain about." Ever since Shang Yang and Xiao Tu had started their prank war, they had started to prank everyone that they had met. It was annoying to many of those that they had pranked, including San Guo who had handed out severe punishments to them when they had played a chain of pranks on him. To Ye Xiu and Shi Die, however, it was part of their daily life and they would miss the laughter that would come with the pranks. They continued to talk to each other quietly as Shang Yang continued to stroke Ye Xiu''s head and they fell asleep on the ground for several hours when they were woken up by loud banging noises from the outside of their residence. "Oof!" A male grunting in pain could be heard and they could also hear the sound of metal clattering to the ground.Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation. Shi Die stood up to open the door as he was the fastest one out of everyone that could get to the door and saw Xiao Tu on the floor with a single distinct weapon on the ground with him. He blinked. He blinked once again. "Did you just try to enter the room with your spear? When the spear is longer in length than the door height?" He was amused at Xiao Tu''s stupidity but was curious to see why Xiao Tu had brought the weapon without placing it in his dimensional storage. "Well, come on in then. You shouldn''t tarry now." Shi Die held out a helping hand to Xiao Tu who grasped it firmly and pulled himself up. He picked up his weapon and turned it by the side before bringing it in with enthusiasm. Ye Xiu and Shang Yang were still groggy from falling asleep on the floor and were stretching as they watched Xiao Tu walk in. "Ye Xiu, look! I''ve made my weapon." Xiao Tu was showing off his masterpiece that he had managed to make in the time period that Ye Xiu had left the residence. Ye Xiu ignored him and walked to the bathroom, washing his face to wake himself up fully. He walked back out of the bathroom, cleaning himself with a towel before hanging it up to dry on a rack as he faced Xiao Tu, who was still beaming with excitement. "How''d you manage to complete them so quickly? You were only at the preparation stage for the f weapon so how on earth did you make the weapon so quickly?" He was puzzled because it should''ve taken him a long period of time to finish the forging of a weapon Xiao Tu smirked. "If you stayed, you would''ve seen what happened! Liu Fan said what I had done was extraordinary without sufficient experience and skill but I managed to do it!" Xiao Tu boasted about his achievement, trying to gain Ye Xiu''s interest. "Hmm? Is that so?" Ye Xiu feigned disinterest but he was actually surprised with what Xiao Tu had told him. ''If what Xiao Tu said was true then maybe his body physique played a part in helping him craft his weapon. There''s no point in overthinking it, let''s just hope he can replicate it in the future if he ever needs to make new weapons.'' Ye Xiu dismissed his train of thought and decided to wait for Xiao Tu''s reaction. "How aren''t you interested? Ugh... fine... I''ll just leave what happened for next time. Do you want to see my weapon anyway? You won''t be disappointed in what you see!" Xiao Tu spoke like a merchant selling his wares as he was showing off his weapon. Ye Xiu grabbed ahold of it as Xiao Tu watched him intently as if he was gauging Ye Xiu''s future response. Ye Xiu started to pour in his Qi into the weapon and was surprised to meet a very strong resistance blocking the Qi''s path. Furrowing his eyebrows, he pushed his Qi in a more brutal way and it met with an even stronger resistance. Stopping himself from pouring anymore Qi in, he used his observation technique to see if anything curious was hiding inside of the weapon. Seeing nothing, he handed the spear back to Xiao Tu and asked him to pour his own Qi in. He saw that Xiao Tu''s Qi had absolutely no problems being poured in the spear and realised that whatever Xiao Tu had done during the forging of his spear, it had probably resulted in the spear''s true potential to only be unleashed when it was in the hands of Xiao Tu. The spear had probably been attuned to Xiao Tu''s Qi signature and only his. Xiao Tu poked Ye Xiu as he was stuck in his own little bubble as he was thinking about Xiao Tu''s weapon. "I have something else to show you." He continued to pour Qi into the weapon and it was changing into a quarterstaff. "See! I can change to any weapon at any time I want to!" He made the weapon change back into a spear. Ye Xiu was impressed with what Xiao Tu had managed to make and wanted to study the weapon for a longer period of time. Ye Xiu thought of something important that Xiao Tu should''ve done after he knew of what the weapon was capable of. "Xiao Tu, I think you should bond with the weapon and make it your growth weapon. With what I''ve heard and seen already, it''s definitely enough to be made into your growth weapon. I don''t doubt your skill to make other weapons which would make people fear you but I think you should have a gut instinct that the weapon is going to be the weapon that accompanies you for a long time." Xiao Tu nodded. "I was planning to bond with the weapon after I showed it to you all. I have had the feeling since I started the forging. It felt like it was directing my forging process which is why I''m so ecstatic as well." Ye Xiu also nodded because from what he had heard from Liu Fan, the bonding process was a long one and it should be done without any interruptions. "Do you want to go into the Dimension to bond with your weapon? There won''t be anybody or anything to interrupt you there, I''ll make sure to tell Xiao Bai to leave you alone." Ye Xiu was offering a private space for Xiao Tu to bond with his weapon. Xiao Tu looked at him and widened his mouth to say thanks but stopped short and hugged him with the weapon in between them. "Not that I don''t like your hugs or anything, but your weapon is making the hug uncomfortable." Xiao Tu let go of Ye Xiu and smiled wryly. "Thanks for the offer, I''ll take you up on it." Xiao Tu took ahold of Ye Xiu''s hands before vanishing into thin air. "Well, that''s done." Ye Xiu dusted his hands off and placed them on his hips before he remembered something he should''ve said to Xiao Tu. "I forgot to remind him that he would need to come up with a name for his weapon." He sighed at his forgetfulness but had hope that Xiao Tu wasn''t foolish enough to complete the bonding without a name to the weapon. He looked at the other two. "What shall we do now?" Long Hua It was nearly an hour since Xiao Tu had entered the Dimension to start his bonding with his weapon when Ye Xiu was in the residence''s bathroom taking a dump. It was surprising for Ye Xiu when Xiao Tu suddenly appeared next to him as he was taking a dump, making him surprised but other than the small surprise on his face, he didn''t make any other movements. He glared at Xiao Tu. "I can''t believe you came out at this point of time. It hasn''t even been an hour since you''ve gone in but you''ve already come out." Xiao Tu was the most surprised one in the bathroom with his face showing disgust and a teasing smirk at the same time. "Ugh... couldn''t you have waited till later to take a dump when you knew that I would be coming out of the Dimension soon? At least I get to see you doing one of the most private things you could possibly do." He poked Ye Xiu''s cheek as he couldn''t move from his position. "Well, I would''ve finished by the time your time quota in the Dimension was spent. I''m nearly done anyway. Look away." He pushed Xiao Tu with as much strength as he could from his position so that he wouldn''t continue looking at Ye Xiu which had been making him uncomfortable. As he finished cleaning himself up from his business, he stood up and pushed Xiao Tu out of the bathroom and closed the door behind him. "I''ll be coming out in a few seconds. I still have to wash my hands." Xiao Tu stood outside the door, looking to see if anybody was at home and spotted Shi Die looking at him from the stairs where he had been reading a book. "You already finished bonding with your weapon? I don''t know how long it should take but I have to admit that it took a while in my opinion." He went back to his book and only glanced towards the bathroom door when he noticed Ye Xiu quietly enter the room. Ye Xiu jumped onto Xiao Tu''s back pulling him down to the floor as he moved his body so that he could comfortably sit on him. "What is it with you and Shang Yang and sitting on people?!?" Xiao Tu whined. He had been subjected to Shang Yang''s and Ye Xiu''s punishments mainly consisting of them paralysing him before sitting on top of him or withholding food from him. It had annoyed him on end since they had developed quite a bit of their skills from practising them on him, though Ye Xiu didn''t bother paralysing him just now so he tried his best to get up which made Ye Xiu fall off promptly. They both got up and Ye Xiu grinned smugly at him. "That''s your punishment for coming at such an inconvenient time." Xiao Tu rolled his eyes before taking out his weapon, not from his dimensional storage but from a place that only those that had bonded with their weapons or had knowledge of how bonds work would know about. "I see you managed to successfully bond with your weapon if I can only detect the slight usage of Qi to release it from your soul space instead of your dimensional storage." Ye Xiu spoke in a thoughtful manner as he asked Xiao Tu to repeat the releasing process again. Xiao Tu showed his weapon to the others and Ye Xiu noticed that the appearance of the weapon had slightly changed after the bond with Xiao Tu. Ye Xiu knew that such a change was within the limits of a normal bonding so he let it go knowing that it wouldn''t change much with the weapon. "What did you name your weapon?" He looked at Xiao Tu with a glare as he noticed that he hadn''t told him the name of the weapon. Xiao Tu scratched his head. "I couldn''t come up with a name for the weapon for the better part of the bonding but when it came to the final stage, I managed to find a name that I thought was suitable for it." Ye Xiu raised an eyebrow, waiting for Xiao Tu to announce the name, hoping it wasn''t ridiculous because he wouldn''t want to be near the vicinity if he ever brought out his weapon and shouted the name of the weapon. "I named my weapon, Long Hua." Ye Xiu was surprised at the name because it sounded reasonably well thought of but asked him for the reasoning on why he would name his weapon with that specific name. "Why would you name your weapon that? Does it have anything to do with dragons or flowers?" Ye Xiu questioned Xiao Tu because he had no idea what went on inside of his head sometimes. Xiao Tu was sweating internally when Ye Xiu questioned him about his naming sense and the reasons behind the name because he had specifically named it Long Hua because of Ye Xiu. His personality was beautiful and he was just like a flower in appearance, in his eyes whilst his bloodline made him a fierce and strong person at the same time. It was closely linked with Ye Xiu and Xiao Tu didn''t want to reveal that so he was trying to come up with a believable excuse. "When I was crafting my weapon, I had an image of dragons as inspiration for the design of the weapon. I know that after I finished the forging, I noticed that it didn''t have any markings, engravings or anything that would resemble a dragon but after I started to bond with the weapon, a dragon was slowly etched into the pole of the weapon."Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. He showed the dragon engraving that encompassed the entire length of the pole where the head of the dragon ended with it being the head of the spear where the pointy bits of the spear would come out from and he transformed it into the quarterstaff and it showed a different style of design on it. "I can see why you named it that since both of them have something to do with dragons. I like it." Ye Xiu smiled because he knew that his friend had finally done something he could truly be proud of. Shi Die decided to insert himself into the ongoing conversation. "Are you going to test out your weapon or not? It would be stupid of you not to be familiar with your weapon simply because you forgot to use it in a battle." Shi Die was prompting Xiao Tu into a fight with him because he was slightly bored of sitting around the residence and he had been unable to find a match in the Arena grounds which meant his desire for a battle hadn''t been sated yet. Xiao Tu looked at Shi Die''s eager facial expression and reluctantly agreed to the proposal that he was making because he knew that if Shi Die didn''t get his daily fix of fighting, he would be extremely irritable for days to come. It had developed after he had started to master his transformation. His transformation had prompted a habit of Shi Die picking fights with others when he hadn''t gotten his daily fix. Once he did get his daily fix, he acted as normal and was just as harmless as a butterfly unless you picked a fight with him. With a satisfied expression on his face, Shi Die dragged Xiao Tu out to the training ground through the back door. The residence was apparently a benefit for being some of the highest rankers in the Academy so they got a lot more benefits compared to those who had low or no rank. Shi Die took off his shirt to reveal his toned body, he didn''t want to get his shirt dirty because he was going to wear the same one when he left the residence later on today. He gestured for Xiao Tu to begin the battle at any time, with Ye Xiu watching over the match as a referee. Shang Yang came out of the house hearing doors slamming and opening, she was intrigued to see Xiao Tu''s weapon and whistled in appreciation of the design of his weapon. Xiao Tu didn''t hesitate to turn his weapon into its spear form and thrusting it towards Shi Die when he started to run at him, Shi Die''s marks started to appear on his body as the battle began. Shi Die managed to easily dodge the thrust with his superior speed and got into punching distance. Punching Xiao Tu multiple times before he could pull back his spear, he did a singular roundhouse kick to Xiao Tu''s side so that he couldn''t attack or block. Xiao Tu was ready for the fast attacks simply because he had seen Shi Die attempt the same things on himself and others multiple times. The only time Xiao Tu was really worried about fighting Shi Die was when he started to fight purely based on his instincts. Shi Die''s fighting style was erratic and made predictions hard. He held his ground by using a combination of metal Qi and the reinforcement technique that they had learnt from San Guo. What they had learnt with the reinforcement technique was that it didn''t necessarily have to be used on a solid object but could also be used to strengthen the properties of a type of Qi and grant it defensive properties as well. With that, Xiao Tu managed to stand his ground and turned his weapon into a quarterstaff. Being something made of pure metal, the amount of damage that it would cause on a body was substantial and that was certainly the case for the agile Shi Die. Though his body was strong, Xiao Tu''s body physique had also enhanced his body and muscular strength to insane levels though not to the extent of Ye Xiu''s bloodline benefits. Shi Die was winded by the attack and was sent flying in mid-air for a couple of metres. Xiao Tu poured in fire Qi into his weapon and utilised an attack that he had been waiting forever to test out in a combat situation. The fire Qi travelled through the weapon and when he started to spin it, flames could be seen spewing out of the weapon. Xiao Tu''s body was able to withstand the heat after long hours spent being close to the forge and his body physique granting him fire resistance as well. ''Flame Tiger Staff Arts: Flaming Tornado,'' Xiao Tu called out his techniques name in his head and a vortex of flames could be seen approaching Shi Die as he was still in mid-air. Xiao Tu continued to spin his staff before stopping after a few seconds of having the technique activated. His weapon had enhanced the effects of his flame attack and had astounded him with the results as he could see that he had used less Qi for a better result. Shi Die, stuck in mid-air was able to utilise his agility to his advantage, finishing his first stage of transformation, his speed was increased as he spun in the air multiple times before touching the ground and disappearing. The vortex barely missed him as he managed to disappear before they reached him. Shi Die reappeared behind Xiao Tu and using wind and metal Qi together, the technique that was released from his claws caused Xiao Tu to be scratched on the back severely. The technique was able to shred Xiao Tu''s defence easily as he continued to dance around the training ground with his speed, reappearing close to Xiao Tu at random moments to attack him with his claws, teeth or feet. Xiao Tu waited for Shi Die to keep on attacking him in this manner because he knew that every time that Xiao Tu used his Qi combination together with his technique, it consumed a huge amount of Qi since he hadn''t mastered it properly. Xiao Tu did his best to defend with his quarterstaff when a loud shout could be heard outside of their residence. "Ye Xiu! Are you in there?" Xiao Tu ignored the shout and continued the fight with Shi Die as Ye Xiu and Shang Yang walked back into the residence to get to the front door to see who would be calling for him. He opened the door to see Hua Fei. Team? Seeing Hua Fei at his residence was rather surprising since he hadn''t told anybody where exactly in the Academy he lived. He had no idea how she had managed to find the location but she had. She opened her mouth to speak when she noticed Shang Yang behind Ye Xiu and closed her mouth once again. Shang Yang raised her eyebrow when she noticed who had come to their residence. "How''d you find out where we live?" The question was asked in an accusing tone because she liked her privacy. Hua Fei shrank back from her confident stance slightly before regaining it when she heard the tone that Shang Yang was speaking in. "I don''t like the tone you''re talking to me with, and if you have to know, I got the information from a teacher that kindly told me where you are living." Shang Yang''s eyebrows rose even higher when Hua Fei bit back with snark. "I sincerely doubt that teachers would randomly give away information on other students that easily and not many teachers even know where we''re living." She knew this very well since San Guo liked to keep information of the students that he was training private simply because he didn''t like people badgering them or him especially when they were supposed to be training. "Just tell us why you''re here." She sighed when she knew that Hua Fei was probably not going to leave until her business was done. "I''m here to apologise to Ye Xiu, not you, so move out of the way." Shang Yang was taken aback by the attitude that she was displaying but didn''t display her emotions outwardly as she left the entrance of the doorway to get back to where Xiao Tu and Shi Die were sparring. "Now that she''s gone, I''d like to say sorry about what happened earlier." Ye Xiu narrowed his eyes. "I accept your apology but I don''t see why you would suddenly touch me in such a manner when we''ve only seen each other for a total of three times, well four now. We haven''t exactly developed a relationship, we''re just acquaintances right now. Please, give me a good reason to why you would touch me." Ye Xiu closed his eyes as he tried to calm himself down. He waited for Hua Fei''s answer but none came. "Well? Are you going to tell me or not?" He questioned her once again since he wanted to know the answer to his question. If it was merely a joke then he could accept it but if it was something more than that, he would have to think about it. Hua Fei''s prepared words for her apology stopped short of her throat when Ye Xiu asked her a question that she had not been expecting to hear from Ye Xiu, a person that she knew was a very inexperienced person when it came to romantic affairs. She decided to lie to him because she didn''t want to lose the relationship that she felt that they had developed. "I just want to be friends with you. It''s how I show friendly affection to others." "Just don''t touch me like that again, and we can see if we will be friends in the future." Ye Xiu accepted the answer as it was since he didn''t have much experience with romance and was easily lied to since he couldn''t tell whether she was lying or not. He wasn''t able to read her body movement and the way her body had tensed when he had answered the question, or the way it had untensed when he had accepted her answer. Ye Xiu closed the door on her, not bothered to say goodbye to since he wasn''t bothered to be a gentleman to a person that had disrupted his entire day''s schedule due to her actions. Hua Fei narrowed her eyes at the door that had been closed on her, thoughts running wildly around her mind. ''I''ll get you one day... just you wait. You''ll be mine and nobody will be there to stop me.'' She turned her heel away from the residence and made her way back to her mentor''s residence to talk about what had happened. Whilst she was walking back, Ye Xiu took his time to get back to the training grounds where he noticed that Shi Die had already started his second stage of transformation. Shi Die''s control in this stage of his transformation wasn''t perfect but it was definitely enough for him to spar in a controlled environment. Xiao Tu was unable to keep up with Shi Die''s speed and he could be seen being battered around the entire training ground as he had no chance to defend against Shi Die''s claws. The claws didn''t hurt him much because of his strong body, but numerous injuries slowly added up and Shi Die was going for the victory through blood loss. Xiao Tu''s body prevented him from losing much blood which definitely helped him stay in the fight much longer than he should''ve been able to. Ye Xiu looked at Shang Yang and asked her how long this had been going on for. "How long has Shi Die been attacking Xiao Tu at such a relentless speed?" "When I left you to talk to that rude girl, Hua Fei, I had come back to this scene and I think it probably had been going on since we left the training grounds to answer the front door."If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. Ye Xiu watched Xiao Tu trying his best to defend against the attacks and he could only block a few attacks. Shi Die''s claws were definitely sharp but Xiao Tu''s body held up against it and only the claw swipes that held most of Shi Die''s strength in it had caused small cuts to appear. He knew that though Shi Die was extremely fast with his transformation, the transformation itself took a huge amount of energy to maintain so Shi Die should''ve ended the fight as quickly as possible. Though against Xiao Tu, it proved to be hard to end it quickly since his defence was strong enough to withstand most of Shi Die''s attacks unless he used more strength which would tire him out at an even faster pace. Ye Xiu saw that Shi Die was starting to slow down and was reverting his transformation from the second stage to the first stage to conserve energy. Xiao Tu knew that he should start going on the offensive once Shi Die started to slow down because if he gave Shi Die time to recover then he would lose because of his injuries. Xiao Tu used another fire technique that he had been practising as he transformed his weapon into its spear form, a mini-flame dragon was conjured around the engraving of the weapon. As Shi Die moved towards Xiao Tu for a final attack as he changed back into his second stage of transformation, Xiao Tu suddenly disappeared from his spot and arrived directly in front of Shi Die with his spear being thrust forward towards Shi Die''s chest before it stopped, barely a centimetre away from hitting him. Shi Die sighed as he reverted back to his normal appearance as he knew that had lost the fight because that attack would''ve killed him if Xiao Tu hadn''t stopped himself. "Good fight. You''ve definitely improved once you obtained your new weapon. You used attacks that you never used before in that fight that caught me off-guard. I definitely have to improve in the efficiency of my Qi combination because it takes too much out of me to use it repetitively." Xiao Tu put his weapon back into his soul space before grinning. "That was an amazing fight." He hugged Shi Die even with blood running down his body. "Ahhh! Don''t hug me, you''re dirty right now!" Shi Die started to whine as Xiao Tu squeezed even harder, with little intention of releasing him from his hold. When Xiao Tu let go of Shi Die, he spluttered in incoherence as he tried to wipe off all the dirt and blood that had stuck to him from Xiao Tu''s hug. He clicked his tongue in annoyance before walking into the residence to clean himself up. Xiao Tu put on a thoughtful face after Shi Die left and started to analyse his improvement in the fight that had just finished with Ye Xiu. "The weapon enhanced the strength of my fire attacks, I''m not quite sure if it''ll help me with my metal Qi attacks but I have a sneaking suspicion that it should enhance it as well. I need to get faster so that I can react and fight against those who move at the same speed as Shi Die, but it''ll take a while for me to develop that speed." Ye Xiu flicked Xiao Tu on the forehead as he noticed him trying to hug him from behind. "Nice try. Anyway, with Long Hua, you should be able to keep up with all of us in the fights now. I bet that if you fought against Shang Yang, she''d definitely have no chance against your flames." He stopped himself there. "Nevermind, she can probably defend against your flames with her own flames. At least you can fight her if your metal Qi attacks are enhanced by your weapon!" They walked inside of the house when a letter was shoved underneath their door. Knowing the only person who would shove letters or notes underneath the door, he quickly opened it and called out to his other friends. He waited for Shi Die to finish his shower before reading the letter because he didn''t know if it was important or not so it was best for them to wait for everyone to be present before reading the letter. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu were watching Ye Xiu make some sandwiches for them as Shi Die came down. "What''d you call me down for?"He was drying his hair with a towel as he sat down on one of the chairs in the living room. "Sir sent us a letter, you know I always wait for everyone to be here before we look at his letters." He read out what the letter contained. "Dear my favourite students, I would like to inform you that the tournament that is going to be hosted in the latter part of the academic year has fights that are participated individually, in a pair or in a team of five." "I want for the four of you to participate in each category because it would give you plenty of experience. I would suggest you find a suitable candidate for your team of five that will participate with you and have him train with the four of you. I do not mind personally training the candidate you select when you choose to train as a team but make sure that he doesn''t have any other commitments that require them to attend." Ye Xiu finished reading out the letter and they sat on the chairs bewildered. Shang Yang was the first to break the silence that was present in the room. "So... he wants us to fight in every single category? I don''t mind but who are we going to ask to be the fifth person on the team? We should also decide who is going to be with who in the paired fights." Shi Die tilted his head. "I can go with Ye Xiu and the two of you can pair together. I don''t fight with Ye Xiu together enough and the same can be said for the two of you as well. Sir did say that this was for experience so it should be better for the two of you to go together." Xiao Tu pouted but nodded his head in acceptance. "Does anybody know anyone trustworthy and strong enough to be in our team?" Xiao Tu asked since that was their biggest concern currently. "I know of a person that might be willing." Ye Xiu provided an answer. "You all know him, it''s Yan Guo. I think that he''d be perfect for our group." Ye Xiu looked at his friends to see if they would accept his suggestion. Shi Die bit his lip before nodding. "He''s definitely strong, I''ll give him that. Accept him on a trial basis and we''ll see how well he works with the rest of us." Ye Xiu grinned as he knew that his suggestion wasn''t refused. "That''s great. I''ll talk to him tomorrow. Now we should just clean up and meditate." Yan Shen Ye Xiu was tasked to be the one to look for Yan Guo to ask him whether he could join them and fight as a team in the tournament. It wasn''t going so well for him because Ye Xiu forgot that Yan Guo was one of the people in the Academy that were rarely seen in public. He started to scratch his head and walked to San Guo''s office to ask him if he could give him the details about where Yan Guo lived. He knew that this was an invasion of privacy technically and he was doing the same thing that Hua Fei had done yesterday and he hoped that Yan Guo wouldn''t take it the wrong way if he managed to find him at his residence. Arriving at San Guo''s office, he knocked on the office door and waited for San Guo to call him in. "Come in." San Guo saw Ye Xiu and continued his paperwork as he gestured for Ye Xiu to ask whatever he needed. "Sir, do you mind giving me the information on where a student named Yan Guo lives?" He was blunt with his question knowing that he shouldn''t waste too much of his mentor''s time. San Guo''s writing paused for a couple of seconds. "I can''t just give away a student''s information like that. I''ll help you contact the person who is mentoring Yan Guo. I know who you''re talking about so just stay here and train. I should get a message back from his mentor in a few hours at the maximum." "Thank you, Sir." Ye Xiu nodded and went to San Guo''s training grounds to practice using the bloodline technique that San Guo had taught him. He had mastered the previous technique''s first stage and had moved on to the current technique because he wasn''t able to continue advancing to the next stage of the previous technique. Two hours had barely passed when San Guo came out of his residence and out into the training grounds to inform Ye Xiu of where to find Yan Guo. "I''ve told you where he lives but please make sure that you don''t spread the information around unless you get permission from either his mentor or Yan Guo himself.¡° Ye Xiu nodded to San Guo''s advice and left the training grounds to go find Yan Guo immediately. Though the tournament wasn''t anything urgent currently, Ye Xiu found it prudent to always be prepared as early as possible because even an extra day can do wonders for training. In a few minutes, he had arrived at Yan Guo''s residence. It was surprisingly close to San Guo''s residence and there were barely any other buildings there so it was relatively easy to find. He steeled himself and knocked on the front door, waiting for someone to answer it. He could hear someone stumbling down the stairs with his sharp ears and knew that somebody was already coming to open the door. The door opened and he was met with the image of the Vice-Principal. The Vice-Principal looked at him and raised his eyebrows. "Are you the person who is looking for my son?" Ye Xiu had not expected to meet the Vice-Principal in such a way, he forgot to answer the Vice-Principal as he stared at him with his mouth closing and opening in shock like a fish. He pointed his finger directly at the Vice-Principal before putting it back down quickly when he realised that he was being rude. "I''m sorry for being rude, it was just unexpected to meet you here." He bowed to show his sincerity in his apology. The Vice-Principal raised his eyebrows in amusement as he watched the kid change through a variety of emotions in less than a few seconds. "It''s no problem, many people that meet me are often shocked." His voice was a deep baritone that pleased Ye Xiu''s ears as he purred in delight as the man continued to speak. "Come on in. I''ll call my son to stop training to meet you." The man gestured for Ye Xiu to enter the house as he closed the door behind, before moving towards the residence''s training grounds to ask for his son to come in to greet Ye Xiu. Yan Guo was obviously surprised to be interrupted during his training because only his father would do such a thing and he would only do such a thing if something important was up. It was rare for something to be important enough for his father to interrupt him so he made no complaint as he followed his father back inside the residence as he wiped his sweat with a towel that he had set aside for later. As he was led into the living room, Yan Guo spotted who was sitting on one of the chairs before Ye Xiu spotted him. He bounded across the room in skips as he made it to Ye Xiu safely, poking him multiple times on the cheek. Ye Xiu was flustered from the contact since he was hoping that besides his friends or mentors, that nobody else would touch him. Surprisingly, Yan Guo''s touch didn''t make Ye Xiu feel insecure or uncomfortable, it felt like he was simply one of his friends that had been with him for a long time.If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. Yan Guo continued to poke Ye Xiu''s cheek until his father cut through the silence with his voice. "Yan Guo, stop poking our guest. At least greet him." Yan Guo pouted before greeting Ye Xiu easily. "Hello Ye Xiu, it''s been a while since we''ve seen each other. How are you doing?" Yan Guo tilted his head slightly as he stared at Ye Xiu''s face with an easygoing smile that calmed Ye Xiu''s nerves down. Yan Guo''s father was watching the interaction closely because Yan Guo rarely interacted with others his age and he rarely came out of the residence unless he had to get food or go to big events such as tournaments or fights. "Uh... I''m good. I came here to ask you if you would mind joining my team in the upcoming inter-school competition that will happen in the latter portion of the academic year?" Ye Xiu was being straightforward because he didn''t want to waste time and he was slightly uncomfortable with the way the Vice-Principal was staring at him with an amused smile. Yan Guo thought for a few seconds before nodding his acceptance to Ye Xiu''s offer. Ye Xiu sighed in relief as he knew that Yan Guo would definitely be a good addition to the group as he had watched a few of his fights discretely so that he could keep track of Yan Guo''s progress. Ye Xiu started to get up from his sitting position. "I should be going now." As he made his way to the door, he was distracted from his action when the baritone voice of Yan Guo''s father sounded out through the room. "There''s no need to leave in such a hurry, why don''t you stay and have some food with us? We were just about to eat lunch." The Vice-Principal smiled in a way that conveyed a message to Ye Xiu. ''If you try to deny the invitation, I¡®ll make sure to make your life a living hell.'' With Ye Xiu being able to interpret the message he was sending easily, he had no choice but to accept. The Vice-Principal smiled in a victorious manner as he knew he had won this little battle. Ye Xiu walked back to the chair he had been previously sitting on and sighed. Yan Guo had gone upstairs to freshen himself up before they ate. Yan Guo''s father smiled at him mischievously. "I heard that you are good at cooking, mind helping me cook some food for lunch?" Ye Xiu once again couldn''t deny the Vice-Principal with that smirking face still stuck on his face that promised pain if he denied him. Ye Xiu cleaned his hands and started to help Yan Guo''s father with the cooking. The man was an easygoing person who liked to talk a lot which surprised Ye Xiu since his first assumption of the man was to be of a stern person. He didn''t dismiss the idea that he wasn''t a stern person especially since he was able to send so many different danger signals with a single smile when he looked at Ye Xiu. "My name is Mu Yan Shen, just call me Yan Shen. There''s no need for you to be polite to me since you''re already too polite to that old codger, San Guo." Yan Shen politely mocked San Guo behind his back and Ye Xiu had nothing to say because San Guo was his mentor and it wasn''t polite to talk behind people''s back. "My son doesn''t display emotion often and it''s a wonder that you can evoke such feelings in him. I wonder what he sees in you to display so many emotions that I don''t see often." Yan Shen commented lightly which sent shivers down Ye Xiu''s spine as he didn''t know what Yan Shen was implying with that sentence. Yan Shen didn''t say anything else. It wasn''t until a few minutes passed in silence that Ye Xiu remembered that he hadn''t even introduced himself to Yan Shen. Knowing that it was slightly impolite for him to take so long to introduce himself, he quickly broke the silence that had been formed as they were cooking. Once he introduced himself, the silence had come back once again with a vengeance as the two just stared whenever they met each other''s eyes. Luckily, Yan Guo came down after finishing his shower, breaking the silence easily with his upbeat personality. "Ye Xiu when do you want me to meet with your other team members? Is it urgent for me to meet them as soon as possible or did you make the team just for fun? Why''d you choose me to join your team?" Yan Guo''s sparkling eyes combined with his barrage of questions left Ye Xiu slightly speechless as he tried to digest what Yan Guo had just asked him before responding in a slow and calm manner. "It''d be best to meet them as soon as possible and it seems that you have free time today, so it might be best for you to just follow me so we can meet up with the others after we finish lunch." At that, Yan Guo looked at his father who merely nodded his head. Yan Guo looked back and smiled. Ye Xiu got the message easily. "The team is supposed to be a team that aims for total victory. We want to win the tournament and we want to do it spectacularly." "The team was made because my mentor decided that my friends and I should get more experience in fighting as a team since we don''t do it enough. We decided to choose you because you had the best qualities and skills that we knew of, and well... we don''t know too many students well enough to ask them to fight with us?" Ye Xiu ended his sentence in a questioning tone as if he was unsure whether he should''ve said what he had said or not. Yan Guo accepted Ye Xiu''s answers without even questioning them and continued to babble randomly about normal things in his life that made Ye Xiu convinced that either Yan Guo truly had no experience with speaking with others or that his personality was just bright and bubbly. Though from what Yan Shen had told him, it was highly likely it was the former so he let Yan Guo continue to speak without interruptions as Yan Shen watched his son in a fond manner. They were eating at the dining table when Ye Xiu decided to say something that had come up when he was thinking about their appearances. He looked at Yan Shen and then looked at Yan Guo, then flicked his head back and forth to look at the two before commenting. "The differences in appearance are so drastic." Yan Shen laughed before replying to the comment. Meeting the Crew "Yan Guo inherited most of his looks from his mother." Yan Shen stopped speaking there and the silence pervaded the entire room like a stench with a vengeance. Yan Shen cut through the awkward silence and moved to another topic. "How long have you been training under San Guo? It must be tiring to see that old man''s face so often." He joked casually as if he wasn''t afraid of offending San Guo. Ye Xiu decided to answer his question and approached the subject with caution as he spoke carefully. "Sir is a wonderful mentor and I have learnt numerous things underneath his tutelage." Ye Xiu''s answer was very neutral and only stated the good things about San Guo without even giving a chance for Yan Shen to say anything rude about his mentor. Yan Shen nodded with a satisfied smile on his face when he heard the answer that he had been looking for. "If you don''t mind me asking, how often will you be taking my son away for training? I do hope that whatever training your team is doing together will be beneficial for my son because I don''t want him wasting his time on pointless endeavours. Yan Guo looked horrified when he heard his father speaking in such a depreciating tone to his friend but said nothing since his father did not like being interrupted. Ye Xiu had suspicions that such a topic would come up eventually so he was well prepared with what he had to say to pacify the man''s curiosity. "We haven''t decided a schedule since we wanted to see Yan Guo''s schedule so that we could plan accordingly so that nobody''s priorities would clash with each others''. Our training shouldn''t be pointless because we have our mentor helping us during those training sessions so you don''t have to worry about it wasting Yan Guo''s time." With that being said, Yan Shen stopped asking Ye Xiu questions and continued to eat the prepared lunch that was slowly starting to cool down. The lunch ended in a peaceful manner without Yan Shen asking any more questions and he bid them farewell as they left the residence. Once they had left the general area and were heading back to Ye Xiu''s residence, Ye Xiu sighed because he had finally left the house where he felt very stiff in his actions. Yan Guo simply laughed at his friend''s reactions. "Don''t worry about my dad, he''s really strict but once you get to know him, he''s actually a big softie on the inside." Ye Xiu watched Yan Guo closely, he watched his actions and what he said carefully to try and see what Yan Guo saw in him to be so carefree in front of him. Yan Shen''s words had remained stuck in his head when he talked about Yan Guo and was failing to see what he had to make somebody so relaxed in front of him. The journey to Ye Xiu''s residence seemed short to the pair as Ye Xiu was listening to Yan Guo talk about random things which amused him greatly. Ye Xiu opened the door to his residence and allowed Yan Guo in. Yan Guo was greeted by a flying body that pounced on him, knocking him to the floor. "You''re not Ye Xiu." The body quickly got up from the ground and pouted. Ye Xiu closed the door behind him as he looked at the pouting person. "Xiao Tu, you should be lucky that wasn''t me that you jumped on. I''m not sure how Yan Guo will react to you now that you''ve managed to botch your first impression in barely a second of meeting him." Ye Xiu raised his eyebrows in a bemused manner as Xiao Tu shrunk down on himself to look younger than he actually was. As he was berating Xiao Tu, Yan Guo had already taken the time to push himself off the floor before falling back down laughing like a maniac. He found the situation that he got hurled into and the small skit that had apparently been in play between Xiao Tu and Ye Xiu extremely funny. Ye Xiu simply looked at Yan Guo rolling on the floor as he continued to laugh for a few minutes. Shi Die came down from upstairs when he finally noticed the noise that had reached a high level as Xiao Tu had joined in the laughter with Yan Guo. The two made enough racket to make Shi Die irritable as he noticed Ye Xiu watching with an exasperated expression. "What happened to Xiao Tu and who is that other person laughing with him?" Ye Xiu simply stepped over the two bodies and approached Shi Die who was still confused about why they were laughing. He was irritated that the noise was loud enough to disturb him when he was reading but his irritation didn''t last long as he continued to watch the two rolling messes that were on the floor. ¡°They were just being stupid and now they are laughing to the point that I think that we should just leave them here until they manage to stop their incessant noise." The moment Ye Xiu said that the two stopped their laughter and stood up straight as if they were never laughing in the first place. Shi Die was amused and let out a light chuckle as he gestured for Ye Xiu to follow him into the kitchen.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. "Is that Yan Guo?" Shi Die whispered furiously into Ye Xiu''s ears the moment he managed to drag him away from the living room. Ye Xiu was confused with his friend''s strange behaviour and was trying his best not to ask what was plaguing his mind. "Yes, that''s Yan Guo. Why do you ask?" Ye Xiu asked since he was concerned that Shi Die had a problem with Yan Guo. Shi Die simply blushed for a moment. "No reason. I was just wondering who it was." Ye Xiu dropped the matter as there was no point in pursuing it any further since Shi Die had given a satisfactory answer. Shi Die whistled to get the attention of the two boys in the kitchen, beckoning them into the kitchen. "You haven''t eaten, right? I''ll make some lunch right now." Yan Guo was about to protest but stopped when he realised that Shi Die would probably ignore him as he moved into his own personal bubble as he cooked. As Shi Die was cooking, Ye Xiu was dragged into helping him with the cooking as well simply because Shi Die didn''t feel like cooking alone. Whilst they were busy cooking, Xiao Tu had taken Yan Guo out into the training grounds where Shang Yang was slowly moving through the katas of her fighting style. They didn''t disturb her as her eyes were still closed and it looked like she was concentrating deeply. Xiao Tu whispered to Yan Guo since he knew bits and pieces of his previous abilities from the fights that he had watched years ago. "Let''s try to fight as quietly as we possibly can since you move like an assassin with absolute silence it should be simple for you. I''m going to try to learn how to move silently with my weapons since both of them cause too much wind to be generated every time I swing them." Yan Guo nodded since silence was something he had learnt from the very beginning before he even started cultivation. He would give tips to the boy since they were likely going to be a team from what Ye Xiu had told him. He had guessed from the number of people he had seen in the residence, they were most likely his team members. It would do good for him to get along with those that he would have to fight together with in the future. Though Yan Guo was not as talkative with Xiao Tu, he still made an effort to speak up to correct Xiao Tu''s movements so that he could improve. Xiao Tu noticed that Yan Guo was not as talkative as before and reasoned that it was simply because they were concentrating on silence so he was also trying his best to keep down his urge to speak. This continued on for thirty minutes until Xiao Tu was tired from his efforts of trying to stay quiet as he motioned to Yan Guo to stop what they were doing. They were walking back into the house when Shang Yang opened her eyes to see the pair. She ignored the pair and continued with what she was doing. The pair was greeted with scents that lured them closer towards the kitchen. They sat down close to the kitchen table to watch the pair make their finishing touches on the food that they had prepared. Yan Guo rubbed his stomach and was surprised that he was so hungry when he had barely eaten an hour ago. Ye Xiu noticed the movement and smirked. ''Anyone who joins us literally becomes a glutton even if they don''t show it.'' That statement was very true as even San Guo and Liu Fan was affected by their huge appetite and they had learnt to roll with it as their own appetite grew. Qi infused foods and beverage usually could sate the appetite of a cultivator easily but it seemed as if long-term interaction with the group produced cultivators with stomachs that were essentially black holes that consumed food with no intention of stopping. It was by coincidence that four stomachs rumbling at the same time could be heard. Yan Guo was bewildered since it was simply night impossible for something like that to happen. "That''s like a one in an impossibility chance for that to happen!" Yan Guo shouted out in disbelief. The other three snickered at his reaction. Ye Xiu coughed lightly to stop the snickering. "Don''t worry about it, it happens often to us. If you have meals with us, sooner or later you''ll get used to the number of times our stomachs growl at the same time when the food is finished." Yan Guo seemed slight miffed at the fact but left the matter as it was since it wasn''t a big deal. They started to gorge themselves on the food that had been made, and to Yan Guo''s wonder, Ye Xiu and Shi Die had managed to produce enough food dozens of people in less than thirty minutes. It was surprising since he had definitely never seen anybody do that before. Their food devouring stopped for a moment as they saw Shang Yang walk in on them. She simply raised an eyebrow before leaving a few words. "Leave some food for me. I need to wash myself up before I indulge myself on food." Xiao Tu grinned mischievously as she turned her back to head upstairs. "How much food do you think we should leave her?" He spoke to Xiao Tu in a stage whisper. He was whacked on the head with a wooden spoon which left him rubbing the sore spot in a mock disgruntled manner. "That''s not a nice way to treat Shang Yang. I know you love your pranks and tricks but food is food. Don''t mess with each other when it comes to food. How would you like it if I messed with your food?" Ye Xiu berated Xiao Tu once again though Xiao Tu didn''t look very chastised as he was still grinning his face off. Yan Guo continued to eat without caring about much else as he savoured the tastes. The food that the Mess Hall usually made definitely wasn''t as exquisite as this. He had tasted Uncle Jin Yuan''s food and though the taste of the food now was slightly below what he could make it didn''t matter much to him. They passed the time talking about training and other miscellaneous things, waiting for Shang Yang to come down before they started to talk about anything to do with plans that concerned the team that they were forming. Yan Guos Inner Worries After the five were finished eating, they lounged around the living room. They were slightly lazy to move after they had eaten but Ye Xiu decided to talk to the Shang Yang, Shi Die and Xiao Tu privately. He didn''t mean to exclude Yan Guo but the matter that they were about to talk about was highly personal and was a big secret. Yan Guo didn''t mind since he didn''t know them that well so his feelings weren''t hurt from being excluded from their secret discussion. The four huddled around upstairs before Ye Xiu quickly pulled them into his Dimension. "Ok... now that I''m sure he can''t hear us. Do you think we should tell him about the Dimension?" The others quickly shook their heads to deny Ye Xiu''s proposal since it was a stupid one because they had no idea how trustworthy Yan Guo actually was and they had barely known him for a few hours so it was foolish of Ye Xiu to even consider about telling Yan Guo such a big secret. The vehemence of Shang Yang''s refusal could clearly be heard when she shouted loudly and shook Ye Xiu like a ragdoll. "I really don''t think you should just randomly consider about telling him about the Dimension! We haven''t even told our mentors and we''ve known them for years, and you think that it''s wise to tell such a big secret to someone you just met? I know it''s your Dimension but please think about it logically!" She ranted on and on until she calmed down. Xiao Bai was lingering around them for a while, taking in the situation with amusement. "Master, there''s a way to have him use the benefits of the Dimension but it requires a lot of investment on your part. If you pour your Qi into this stone right here," Xiao Bai held out a stone in his hand as he continued to float, "then after two months of your effort of pouring Qi here would allow everyone to use the benefits of the Dimension for a single week. That''s with your current strength right now, when you get stronger, the time it takes for you to charge the stone up decreases." Ye Xiu''s eyes lit up when the information registered in his mind. It not only meant that they would get more time to use the benefits in the Dimension but it would also mean that others could use it without anybody knowing about the Dimension itself. Xiao Bai saw Ye Xiu''s enthusiasm so he continued his explanation of the stone. "The stone can only be recharged by the Qi of the owner of the Dimension, which is you." Though Ye Xiu''s enthusiasm was slightly deflated by that, he was still happy that it could be used. He decided to ask a question that had been bugging him. "Why didn''t you tell me about the stone earlier?" His tone wasn''t accusing since he knew that Xiao Bai would never do anything to harm his Master. "There was simply no point in telling you about it since you can use the Dimension efficiently already, I was going to tell you about the stone once you got strong enough to refill the stone in a single month but circumstances rose and I decided to tell you about it earlier." Xiao Bai was giving his reasons for not telling Ye Xiu about such an important item since he didn''t want his Master to hate him. Ye Xiu nodded, satisfied with the explanation. "Thank you, Xiao Bai. The stone will definitely help us in the future and I won''t have to tell Yan Guo about my Dimension." Ye Xiu smiled as he palmed the rock before placing it into his pocket. Xiao Bai remembered to remind his master. "Please don''t lose the stone. It takes a thousand years in the Dimension for a stone to be replaced. It''s very valuable!" Ye Xiu waved his hand to signal Xiao Bai that he heard what he said. They left the Dimension quickly in hopes that Yan Guo hadn''t noticed that they had vanished from the house. They walked back downstairs, noticing Yan Guo taking food from the counter as he froze like a deer caught in the headlights. They simply laughed at his reaction as he sulked on the way back to the living room. "What days are you free, Yan Guo? The four of us have the same schedule so it''ll be easier for you to tell us when you are free so that we can make the plan for our training." Ye Xiu asked Yan Guo as he tilted his head in thought, trying to recall his own schedule. "I''m pretty much free on a Tuesday and Friday. Other days, I have other commitments that I have to go to." Ye Xiu nodded. "That''s acceptable. From next week onwards, come to the residence during mid-day and we''ll be here to start the training." He got up to show Yan Guo out of the house. Yan Guo waved goodbye to the group as he walked back to his own residence. Ye Xiu turned back to see Shang Yang and Xiao Tu staring at each other. He shook his head in amusement since the two provided the comedic relief in the group when it was needed and unneeded. Without the comedic relief, Ye Xiu was sure that the group would probably too serious for their age.The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation. Shi Die caught him smiling and gave a smile back as he could tell what was on his friend''s mind easily. Ye Xiu walked back upstairs so he could change since he was going to leave the Academy grounds for a couple of hours to get some things that he was going to need for preparation. He left the house as Shang Yang and Xiao Tu was still in their intense staring match and walked out into the city to get his ingredients for Alchemy. Ye Xiu was going to buy ingredients for Grade 3 pills and elixirs because he knew that he would need the extra supplies if Yan Guo was going to be joining them for their group training. He didn''t want to worry Yan Guo about not having supplies because it looked like he was worried enough about his own life. Ye Xiu also bought materials for some Grade 4 pills that he was learning to make. He had noticed that the difficulty for Alchemy had definitely risen to whole another level once he managed to get past the third rank. He could see why Lao Xiu and Lao Lan and many other Alchemy practitioners were stuck at the third rank. The same could be said for cultivation since they had reached Foundation Establishment. Ye Xiu wanted to desperately ask San Guo why the average cultivation level of the teachers was stuck at Foundation Establishment. He knew that it wasn''t possible for the teachers to be at such a low cultivation level if the majority of the older students were in that same realm. He also bought different ingredients for food that he was going to use later on since they were running out of ingredients to cook. Even though Shi Die had plenty of ingredients that he had planted in the Dimension, Ye Xiu preferred to use different types of ingredients to broaden his horizons on the tastes and to improve his cooking level. Shi Die appreciated that and did the same as Ye Xiu thought not as frequently. After managing to buy a few of his needed ingredients, he went to the Alchemist Association building in the city to collect some rarer materials that he had ordered and needed to buy. He was also going to sell some the leftover Grade 3 pills that the group no longer had any more use since they had long outlived the effects for those pills since they could only restore their Qi pool and no longer aid them in their cultivation. They obviously kept quite a few of the said pills but not that many since Qi restoration pills simply did a better job than those that improved their cultivation since it only restored a certain amount of their Qi whilst Qi restoration pills could restore a certain percentage of any body''s Qi pool. He left the Alchemist Association Building after getting what he needed. He had finished buying the materials he needed and was heading home so that he could enter his Dimension to see how many of his plants and herbs were ready for harvesting. He didn''t notice the people following him until his gut instinct told him that danger was nearby. He simply looked around as if he wasn''t disturbed as he continued to walk but he was trying his best to see who would possibly follow him. Thinking that it was probably just thieves that thought that he was extremely rich and wanted to rob him, he continued on his way back to the Academy. The figures had simply slipped out of his view once they noticed his casual glances to try and spot them. His stalkers were confused as to how Ye Xiu managed to even notice them stalking him but filed it away for later to report to their superiors. Yan Guo arrived back at his home to see his father already waiting for him. He knew what his father was going to ask and he didn''t like the reasons for why he was going to ask him how the meeting went. His father simply raised an eyebrow as he bowed respectfully to his father. "I''m back." Yan Shen nodded and led him into the house. "What are your thoughts on the group that you just met? Don''t leave anything out in your findings since I want to know everything that happened." Yan Shen quietly demanded his son for his observations and Yan Guo complied as he had no other choice. Yan Guo kept the bitterness out of his tone since he knew that he would probably be punished if he dared to be disrespectful towards his father. "The four of them are all powerful, each of them has their own personalities and from what I have seen, I can guess that they are reasonably strong especially since they are some of the higher-ranked students in the academy. They probably have extremely strong bonds with each other since they seem to know what each others'' thoughts like their own at certain times." Yan Guo had nothing else to say since he was having fun with the rest and just wasn''t bothered to observe them. "They sound like competent people, I''ll allow you to continue to interact with them. Don''t slack with your training when you hang out with them because if you fall behind the schedule that I have set for you then there will be consequences for you." His father dismissed him after he said his piece and left the living room to go to his office. Yan Guo sighed once Yan Shen was out of earshot and jumped lazily onto the sofa. He hated how his father liked to control a huge portion of his life and it rarely gave him any room to breathe. His father demanded high expectations from him ever since his mother had died. His father didn''t like him making friends with anyone that didn''t have enough potential in his eyes which made him act like an introvert. It was unknown to him why he was able to act and talk so casually in front of Ye Xiu and his friends though, it was confusing to him. He hadn''t been able to act so freely after his mother''s death. When he first saw Ye Xiu, it was a breath of fresh air that came into his life and he didn''t know if it was a bad thing. He stayed on the sofa, daydreaming about hanging around with the group, ignoring his father''s complaints and becoming free from his control. He fell asleep after a few minutes. Watching San Guo watched his students try their best to overwhelm him with their teamwork and surprisingly San Guo managed to keep up with all five of them easily. The difference in their battle experience played a huge part in the spar since San Guo knew how to position himself correctly so that he wouldn''t be bombarded with attacks from several people at the same time. Ye Xiu''s question on why teachers cultivation level was stuck was answered during one of their training sessions when San Guo told them that it was simply to not overwhelm the students with their strength. Once you managed to break past the Foundation Establishment Realm, the strength of your Qi can physically affect those around them, thus they must learn how to either suppress their cultivation base or be able to control your aura to the point that it stays inside of your body. Most people simply choose to suppress their cultivation base since it''s an easier method to learn and you also hide your cultivation base from those stronger than you unless they have their own techniques to see past that suppression. Due to this, the majority of the cultivators in the Fourth realm and higher suppress the aura. It serves as a basic training tool as well because you learn to fight with techniques and skill instead of raw power. San Guo had informed them that it was a shame that most people learnt the suppression method simply because it was easier and never bothered to learn how to control their own aura. The aura is extremely useful for intimidation and in higher stages of cultivation it can be used for numerous other things but that can only happen if their control over their aura was exceptional just as it should be for Qi. San Guo had his cultivation base suppressed to Ye Xiu''s own cultivation level to show the group that having a high cultivation doesn''t always assure you victory. He wanted to show them that experience, skills, technique and planning can win a weaker opponent a fight against a stronger opponent. He was beating the lesson into them since their planning skills were extremely linear and any experienced fighter would be able to see the flaws of the plans that they made. It didn''t help the group that their coordination with Yan Guo wasn''t smooth and it could be seen when they interrupt each other''s attacks by accident due to communicative errors. When it came to paired fights, the teamwork of the four was near flawless since the pairs knew each other extremely well and they were able to perform at a much higher level. All it meant to San Guo was that he would have to keep fighting the group until they were able to read each other''s actions and act accordingly if the situation requires it. San Guo wasn''t the only person sparring them, but also had Liu Fan, Jin Yuan and Yan Shen to join in the training sessions so that the group would never be comfortable with fighting only one person. Progress was much slower than expected since each individual person had to adapt not just a singular person. To speed it up, they had them go off into pairs and have them fight to learn each other''s quirks and abilities. This definitely sped up the speed their training went and it slowly improved the relationships and bonds that formed between the friends. After the sparring session was finished, they left to do their respective training regimes. Yan Shen had taken the time and opportunity to watch every single training session that Yan Guo attended since San Guo had invited him to join in. Yan Shen jumped at the opportunity since he wanted to assess the friends that Yan Guo had made and whether Yan Guo had lied to him during his report on the four. Yan Shen wasn''t actually this strict when his wife was still alive but after being murdered in cold blood by their enemies, Yan Shen had placed a huge portion of his attention on Yan Guo''s training since it was his way of coping with his grief. Eventually, his coping mechanism became a habit and it continued to stick with him for years on end. Yan Guo always watched Yan Shen carefully himself to make sure that he never stepped on his father''s toes. He wanted to find somebody that would be able to lighten the burden in his father''s heart because he was able to recognise the same grief that he had experienced when his mother died but on a deeper level. Yan Guo wasn''t afraid of the corporal punishment that his father dished out since it wasn''t anything compared to what he faced during his training. Though his body wasn''t the strongest for his level, his pain tolerance was one that could only be forged from years of torturous training. Yan Guo took the punishments from his father as if it was simply training to him. He didn''t exactly hate his father, he simply wanted to have more freedom in his choices. As they continued to train by themselves, San Guo walked over to Yan Shen who was actually watching from a distance, standing atop one of the trees that was surrounding the training grounds. "I see that you still have an obsession over your son''s life. You should really give him more freedom, he''s a cultivator and sooner or later, he''s going to go out by his lonesome and he''ll want that freedom now so that he gets the experience he needs."The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Yan Shen snorted at San Guo''s words. "He''s not strong enough for me to even let him go out into the world. He''s weak and I''ll make sure that he''s stronger than even your students." San Guo shook his head as he watched his students train. "I can tell you this much, my students will always be stronger than your son because I''ve given them so much freedom in their choices. They are independent and don''t rely on someone to motivate them properly to become stronger. They help each other and that''s what helps them improve so quickly. Let your son have them as friends, and you''ll see a faster increase in his progress than your own training." "We''ll see if his friends meet up to my expectations. So far, all I can say is that they are definitely good rivals for him and it should spark some motivation in him. I don''t know about any of the personalities of your students but I can infer from what I''ve heard and seen, and all I can say is that only Ye Xiu has displayed anything that I deem him worthy to be my son''s friend. I still have no idea what my son sees in the kid to make him act differently around him." Yan Shen narrowed his eyes as he watched his son joke around with Ye Xiu as they took a break to quench their thirst. "Maybe it''s Ye Xiu''s charismatic nature that brings people in. I''ve seen many people hanging around Ye Xiu and they always seem to be much more joyful around him." San Guo stroked his chin whilst smirking because he knew that Yan Shen couldn''t say anything back. "Learn to let go of your grief, Yan Shen. It''s been years since that disaster, I suffered losses back then as well and I''ve learnt to let go of my grief as well. It should be time for you to do the same, there''s no need to subject your son to your controlling behaviour." Yan Shen simply listened to his old friend giving him advice, not saying anything on his mind about the matter. Seeing Yan Shen not reacting to anything he said, he sighed. "I''ll see you later." He jumped down from the tree and headed to where his students were. He motioned for them to stop their training so that they could discuss the observations he and his students had during the sparring session. "Ye Xiu, since your friends seem to defer to you when it comes to plans, you can start off with your observations on the fight we just had." San Guo pointed his cane at Ye Xiu to make him start speaking. Ye Xiu cleared his throat. "When it comes to our positioning, we positioned ourselves well in the fight since it was against a singular person and we covered the majority of your escape routes however we weren''t able to capitalise on the fact that we had you cornered at one point with my whips." Yan Guo and Shi Die both smiled at each other with a matching grin because they managed to run into each other as they were trying to attack San Guo. "I should''ve been covering Xiao Tu when he was using his weapon to force you into a corner but when Shang Yang entered from behind you and tried to paralyse your joints, you were able to effectively block her attacks whilst dodging the spear attacks and grabbing ahold of my whip after the fact that I noticed that you had dodged their attacks." San Guo nodded since he wouldn''t have had the chance to dodge if Ye Xiu had distracted him with his attacks along with Xiao Tu. "I think that everyone in the team has to develop a better sense of their surroundings since we can''t coordinate that well yet so we need to be aware of what everyone is doing at the same time so that we can work together properly." Ye Xiu addressed the main issue of the team directly since it was very important for them to develop it. "Very good. There''ll be a separate training for that specific purpose so you don''t need to worry your heads over it. You have to come up with combination techniques as a team because just having singular attacks may be good but having combination attacks is what makes a team strong in the first place. You add to your individual strengths by supporting each other." "For instance, Shi Die and Yan Guo have an inkling of what I''m talking about and they tried their best to combine their attacks together but because they ran into together, it ruined it completely. You''ll need to come up and practice new moves so that everybody knows what it does, how it works and what to do in order to set up the perfect conditions for those combination attacks to shine to their fullest potential." San Guo was in his lecturing mode. "I''ll show you an example of a combination attack. I can control wire and wind Qi pretty well. wind Qi is not part of the five main elements of Qi but is considered as a subset similar to lightning Qi and ice Qi. This is what happens when I combine two attacks." He first formed a mini flame tornado before adding one of his wind Qi attacks that made the flame tornado much bigger than it was supposed to be whilst slicing any solid object that it touched. "If you manage to find attacks that work well together, you can combine their strengths. Combination attacks are actually mostly found through experimentation and I''d suggest you experiment together during your free time because they''re definitely handy, not just for your team fights but individually as well. The session''s over. Get some food before thinking about what I said." San Guo dismissed them as he walked back into the residence. The group followed him in whilst Yan Shen watched their backs as they entered the house. Yan Shen couldn''t deny that San Guo''s training was effective because he knew how to cut to important points and fix their strengths and weaknesses easily. When he heard about the training, he was sceptical at first but when he heard that San Guo would help as well... he knew that the training would end excellently no matter what." He waited for Yan Guo to enter San Guo''s residence before jumping off the tree and heading back to his residence before his son made it back from whatever they were going to do next. Experimentation Ye Xiu was watching his friends in the training grounds trying their best to come up with combination attacks but was failing. They had managed to come up with idea that they were currently testing and they were still in the process of thinking about new combination attacks. Ye Xiu decided to take a break so he could watch his friends have their failures explode in their face. Literally. Many of their attempts, especially Shang Yang''s and Xiao Tu''s attempts had ended in explosions due to the fire Qi that they were using. Shi Die and Yan Guo had failures but none as explosive as theirs and their failures'' reactions were much milder in comparison. Ye Xiu chalked it up to their combination attack chemistry being much closer to success compared to theirs. Ye Xiu''s own attempts for an attack had ended spectacularly disastrously when Xiao Tu''s fire dragon managed to explode the moment Ye Xiu added his own attack to the mix. Ye Xiu had no idea why it happened but put it off as a failure and decided to stop that particular experiment. Ye Xiu had an idea that he had thought up as he was watching his friends and wanted to test it out. San Guo never said that a combination attack required for a person to add their own attacks to the mix so why couldn''t they just do separate attacks or have multiple people using the same attack to create a single massive attack? What was sad for Ye Xiu was that he had no actual techniques that could be used consecutively or those that could, were those that he considered his finishing moves. He knew that his own repertoire of moves was definitely incomparable to those of his friends because he had placed his focus on his learnt techniques and refined them. This meant that compared to the others who could use multiple techniques to experiment with, he had very little to work with. It''s not like he didn''t have anything to work with but it definitely wasn''t anything he could boast about. He was tapping his fingers on the side of the door when he thought of something that he could try. ''It''s an insane idea but I think it could work if we put effort into it.'' He rushed over to where Shang Yang and Xiao Tu were busy making his fire dragon into looking life-like. They hadn''t seen an actual dragon but were basing it on the illustrations that they found in books, murals and paintings. Ye Xiu could see that instead of it looking like a western dragon, it was more of an eastern dragon look. It didn''t surprise him since nearly everything in the world was of an eastern culture from his previous world. The life-like dragon abruptly disappeared when Shang Yang fell down to the floor huffing and puffing. Ye Xiu had no idea why she was looking so tired but decided to approach her anyway. "Why do you look like you''re about to keel over and faint?" She continued to lay down on the floor with her arms outstretched to the sides. "Making such a complex illusion such as that is tiring, coming up and adding on the details to the illusion is much harder than I expected." Ye Xiu could see the exhaustion on her face but it seemed like she was cheering up very quickly. "I just have to train more! My illusions will be able to fool people easily!" Ye Xiu simply smiled at her declaration. "I think there''s a simpler way for you to use your illusions instead of having them so perfect. Currently, from what I''ve seen and what you''ve said, your illusions contain too much detail. Think about it realistically, in a battle situation who would give you the time to form your illusions? You need to be able to form your illusions quickly at the same speed Xiao Tu''s flame dragon appears." "By adding so much detail one by one, it''s easy for you to miss a detail or the whole illusion might fail because you are focused on adding the details and your Qi control falters. You can add realistic illusions once you are good at them to the point that you can fool somebody but that''ll take too long and I don''t think you would make it in time for the tournaments so I just suggest you to generalise your illusions." Shang Yang was listening with rapt attention, burning the information into her brain. "Focus on the main features of whatever you are featuring and make it look believable. As long as you can do that, few enemies would pay attention to it too closely when they need to focus on us. Also instead of adding physical detail you can also things such as sound, touch and smell to your illusion. The purpose of illusions is to trick your opponent so you could also trick your opponent into feeling like they''ve been hurt by an attack or whatever." Shang Yang nodded. "I guess that means I''ll have to actually study what I make as an illusion before I use it in a combat situation so that I know what it would act or feel like. I''ll also need to practise my illusions on the group if I''m going to add pain to my illusions." Ye Xiu shrugged because he knew that everyone would accept to be her training partner anyway since nobody really minded the pain as long as they got some sort of benefit out of it.Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Ye Xiu continued to give advice to Shang Yang. "Your illusions could very well be what would win us our fights because not many people fight illusions and even less have the control needed to use illusions during combat but I think you can do it. Search for other methods of using illusions as well, don''t just rely on a single method of enforcing your illusions onto an opponent because if someone manages to figure out how to counter it, then the illusion would be pointless in the first place." Shang Yang had been considering to learn different illusion techniques because she knew that she learnt them extremely easily, her current technique was one that she had learnt from the book that Xiao Bai had managed to teach her how to train with her Body Physique. "Thanks, Ye Xiu, you helped me a lot." Ye Xiu smiled, "I didn''t do it for free. I came here to ask you a question actually." "Oh? What is it?" She was surprised since Ye Xiu didn''t ask her questions often. "Your skill with illusions... does it heighten your affinity for water Qi?" Shang Yang was puzzled by the question but answered it nonetheless. "Yes it does, my affinity for water is quite high now because of my Body Physique. Why do you need to know?" "I have an idea that would work for the both of us, not just me, but it can be considered as a combination attack. Since the both of us have a high affinity for wood Qi, why don''t we use the fact that water and wood Qi work extremely well together? We can grow plants for combat and we can also use it for utility such as speeding up the growth of our own plants. What do you say? Would you like to hear about how we would go about doing this?" Shang Yang accepted and was ready to listen to his idea. "Sure, it sounds interesting and it would definitely help if it means we can catch our opponents off-guard." He presented his idea. "So what I had first intended was that during a battle, and I''m swinging my whip and it strikes a solid object, I can essentially leave a Qi imprint that I can explode when I want it to. I''m not sure how long the imprint would last because I haven''t tested it but that imprint, when exploded, would contain the seed of a plant and wood Qi to accelerate the growth of the seed and your water Qi would help to increase the speed that it grows." "We can trap our enemies with it if we grow plants and move it accordingly because the plant would be grown with my Qi and I''d be able to control how it moves as long as it''s not dead." Ye Xiu concluded his explanation as he looked to Shang Yang who was completely dazzled by his explanation. "That''s elaborate, but I think it''s a good plan. Though don''t you think that it would be highly obvious to anyone who has an observation technique that''s able to see Qi?" Shang Yang was starting to poke holes into his plan once she digested everything. "Also, how am I supposed to get my water Qi to where the imprints are placed? I don''t have any long ranged abilities that are discreet." Ye Xiu flicked her on the forehead. "I taught you how to use Qi Scalpels and you learnt how to make Qi needles. Are you really joking with me that you can''t put water Qi into your needle than have it released when the needle''s form is released?" "I was trying to be helpful." She kicked the ground when Ye Xiu shot down her question immediately." Ye Xiu continued to speak because he knew that Shang Yang would continue to listen to whatever he had to say and that she would offer useful inputs at random times. "I''ve thought about that particular problem about being sensed immediately, and I''ve come up with a solution. We don''t always have to utilise this combination but whenever we do, we set it up by having you make a large-scale illusion, this way the area we fight around is saturated by your Qi so it''ll be much harder for people to notice my imprint." "I''ll also learn how to conceal the imprints from their notice as well so you won''t be the only person doing the work." Ye Xiu promised Shang Yang just in case she would put off the idea because of all the work they would have to do in order to set up the proper conditions for their combination to be used. His worries were for nought, however. "Alright, your idea is sound but we''ll have to practise it later. Just give me some time to get my illusions down first and we''ll see what else we can add on to your idea once I manage that." Ye Xiu nodded before going back to leaning on the door into the residence as he watched everybody else continued their efforts on coming up with a new attack. Ye Xiu wasn''t idle because he was also coming up with new ideas. San Guo''s words and demonstration had set off a whole onslaught of ideas in the group and it was unlikely that their enthusiasm and determination to experiment and come up with new techniques would subside any time soon. He started to put his idea into practice and started to place Qi imprints on a solid object and observed the effects and duration of his imprint before changing what it did so that it would fit his specifications. Whilst they were all busy playing around with their ideas, a certain girl was staring intently at the front of their residence. "Why didn''t you invite me to your team? I thought you had no other friends, Ye Xiu... I feel betrayed. It won''t matter in the end, because you''ll be mine anyway." She licked her lips in anticipation. "I''ll meet you in the competition and I''ll have you subdued. Once that happens..." The girl started to cackle. "you''ll never leave my side again. You''ll never look at anybody else with emotions besides me. If I can''t have you... I''ll just have to settle for your corpse." The girl left the vicinity of the area but not before blowing a kiss towards the residence which Ye Xiu resided in. Experimentation Part Two Shi Die and Yan Guo were sitting on top of a big rock that was in the training grounds. They were lounging around because they were taking a break from their experimenting session. They noticed that out of everyone on their team, they were the closest to achieving a complete combination attack. It was because their combination attack didn''t need any complicated moves but relied on several individual attacks before merging into a single attack which they would use to strike together. Shi Die was telling Yan Guo about the benefits that he would receive from training with the others because of the stone that they had. Yan Guo was interested in the stone that Ye Xiu had and was curious about how it worked. The group had agreed that they would only tell Yan Guo about the stone and if they felt he was trustworthy enough, he''d be allowed to know about the Dimension. Though Ye Xiu knew that if Yan Guo found about the Dimension before they told him then it''d be disastrous so they had to tell him about the stone so that he wouldn''t have any suspicions. They had decided that they would decrease the time needed to charge the stone by charging it in the Dimension since time moved faster and he was able to regain his Qi at a faster pace in the higher Qi density environment. As Shi Die told him about the stone, he was observing the facial expressions and body movements that he would make to see whether he could be trusted since Shi Die was the best at reading people''s emotions and mood especially with his heightened senses helping him smell the changes in emotions of a person. Yan Guo''s expression didn''t even waver from his surprised and shocked face. Shi Die could sense no greed from him and he was relieved that he could be trusted for now. They continued to speak about the situation that they would have to set up in order for them to use their combination attack and how they would go about practising the technique since they had no visual representation on how powerful a technique could be. A visual representation was hard since they could only count on physical destruction of objects to see the damage done. As they continued to speak, Yan Guo was in deep thought. Shi Die was surprised to see Yan Guo suddenly stand up from his sitting position on the rock and walked towards the door where Ye Xiu was. He watched Yan Guo walk up and speak to Ye Xiu and he could see the stunned expression on Ye Xiu''s face. Ye Xiu''s stunned expression didn''t last for long as he quickly tried to ask what was going on. "I, Yan Guo, swear on the heavens that I won''t betray the secrets of my friend, Ye Xiu, I also shall not harm him with any dubious intentions, lest the heavens smite me with lightning to destroy my soul." Yan Guo spoke in a solemn tone and it could be clearly seen that Yan Guo was extremely exhausted after he made the oath. Every ounce of his Qi pool was used to enforce the oath and he would need to rest for his Qi to recover. Ye Xiu stood there dumbstruck, waving his hands in shock. "Uh... why''d you suddenly swear an oath?!? Don''t you know how serious that oath is?!? If you ever let anything that I don''t want others to know by accident, your soul will be destroyed in an instant!" Ye Xiu was upset because he hadn''t wanted such an oath to be sworn to him for no reason at all. Everybody in the training grounds could start to hear Ye Xiu''s shouting, they moved closer towards them to see what was happening and they couldn''t believe their ears. "There was no need for you to swear an oath in the first place! I know Shi Die was supposed to tell you about the stone but there''s no need to swear an oath because it''s not that important!" Ye Xiu tried to pass of the stone as something not of importance to find out the actual reasoning for Yan Guo''s actions. Shang Yang, Shi Die and Xiao Tu were standing there with amused expressions because Ye Xiu''s reactions were understandable but they liked to see their friend distressed at times because Ye Xiu was the calmest out of everybody in the group. They were listening closely and even they were shocked by what Yan Guo did. They personally didn''t swear such a solemn oath to Ye Xiu because they all knew that nobody would ever break the oaths they made. They had only made the oath after knowing each other for a long period of time but Yan Guo barely even knew them after a few meetings and training sessions. Yan Guo didn''t look repentant even after what he had just done and was even smiling at the shocked faces. He shook his head as he spoke. "I know exactly what I''ve done. You are my only friends and I don''t want to lose your trust. You might think such a stone of yours is inconsequential but it''s worth more than what multiple countries could possibly put together. If others knew about it, I believe wars would break out just to get it."You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version. Ye Xiu looked at Shi Die. "I forgot to mention that only you could use it?" Shi Die had a sheepish smile on his face as he hesitantly spoke up. Ye Xiu sighed. "Only I can use the stone so you shouldn''t worry about it. Since you''ve sworn an oath to me, you might as swear oaths to the others since we''ll be doing the same for you later." Ye Xiu''s tone was grave and he wore an expression that dared him to decline his suggestion. "B-b-b-but!" Yan Guo started to protest but stopped instantly once Ye Xiu raised an eyebrow at him. "Fine... I guess I''m not getting away with it then." He pouted but complied with what Ye Xiu had asked him to do. "Hold on. Repeat these words instead of the oath you just used since it''s too severe. There''s no need for you to have such a severe oath anyway. We''ll also swear a similar oath to the one you just did so we will be fair." Yan Guo himself was about to protest but once again his protests died in his throat with the glares that everyone seemed to be shooting him. The affair was quickly resolved as they all swore oaths to each other. Unknowingly, the group that was supposed to stay as a four was altered into a team of five. The paths of destiny were changed but those paths could still be changed depending on their actions. Ye Xiu beckoned for everyone to enter the house and asked them all to hold his hands. Those that knew about his Dimension did it without complaint and though Yan Guo was confused with the order he complied with Ye Xiu''s wishes. They were pulled into the Dimension quickly. "The stone still has to be used either way since it increases the time we have so we can use the benefits from the Dimension." Xiao Tu quickly spoke, just in case the group changed their mind about using the stone. "Don''t worry Xiao Tu. Now I''ll have to explain what is going on to Yan Guo since he has no clue to what is going on and he''s sworn an oath to all of us. I''m surprised that you actually did such a thing but what''s done is done. At least we don''t have to keep secrets from you anymore." Shang Yang and Shi Die chuckled since they knew that Ye Xiu was very conflicted about keeping secrets from his best friends. Yan Guo was looking around the Dimension like a confused puppy and his expression was extremely cute to Shang Yang. She walked up, pinched and stretched his cheeks. She let go of his cheeks after twenty seconds and his cheeks were reasonably red. "Anyway, this is the Dimension. It''s a pocket dimension that I own and everybody that knows about it has to swear an oath to use the benefits of the Dimension. Since you unknowingly swore an oath to me, you can now reap the benefits. I originally wanted to tell you about the Dimension but uh... we didn''t trust you enough and we weren''t sure whether you would knowingly swear an oath to me if I told you about the Dimension." Yan Guo just nodded with a stunned expression on his face as he looked around the Dimension. "I understand, if I had such a big secret as well, I''d be cautious too. Your stone itself, even if others can''t use it, would still cause fights to break out just to retrieve it if they knew what it could do. They''d probably just capture you and force you to charge it for them for as long as you can. A dimension such as this? I shudder when I think about the consequences if a secret like this got out." Ye Xiu was happy that his friend didn''t hold anything against him for holding back a secret such as this from him and was even happier that he understood the reasoning behind their secrecy. They quickly explained the benefits and how the dimension functioned so that he would be able to use it with confidence. Ye Xiu was sad because compared to the others that could use the dimension more often than Yan Guo, he could only use it when he actually came over their training session because Yan Shen had Yan Guo tied down to his schedule and he wasn''t allowed to miss anything in that schedule. Yan Guo had told them that it would be possible for him to sneak away from his house every day since their houses were relatively close together and it wouldn''t take long for him to get to where they are. They agreed to his plan and hoped that he wasn''t caught by his father. Yan Guo looked at his friends with tears in his eyes as he realised that he finally had true friends and he hoped that his father wouldn''t chase them away like he did to the numerous other people he tried to be friends with. They showed Yan Guo around the dimension and Xiao Bai was quickly introduced to him. Xiao Bai simply looked at Yan Guo before flying off with a smirk on his face, silently snickering. Yan Guo was allowed into the barriers that surrounded the house and they helped him familiarize with the entire dimension. He was awestruck with how much the dimension contained and when he saw the library he whistled. Xiao Bai came back to where the group was and led them towards the training grounds of the dimension. Yan Guo was promptly asked by Xiao Bai to display his skills and techniques for him to see. "Display everything you know. Fight against Ye Xiu! I want to see what you can do." Yan Guo and Ye Xiu jumped into action and Xiao Bai observed what Yan Guo could do. He nodded a few more times before taking out an elixir and handed it over to him. "Drink this." Yan Guo drank the potion as he was ordered and Xiao Bai simply looked at something invisible to everyone before leaving. "Thank you. You may go do whatever you have to do now." They used up the time that they had in the Dimension before sending Yan Guo back off to his home. Yan Shen watched his son walk into the house and he could see that Yan Guo''s mood was definitely good. He decided to destroy the good mood that he had since he had a bad day due to a meeting between several important people from the Academies. Yan Guo''s smile wasn''t even wiped off his face as he faced the rigorous training that his father had him do. Whisked Away Ye Xiu opened his eyes to find himself looking up at the sky in his Dimension. He was confused because he knew that he definitely not entered the Dimension at all. He stood up from where he laid and looked around to see that nobody was there. He called for Xiao Bai since he was the spirit of the Dimension so he should know what''s going on. "Hey, Xiao Bai! What''s going on? Why am I inside the Dimension?" Xiao Bai flew out of the house in the Dimension and looked at his master with an unreadable expression. "It seems like the Dimension has deemed it to be time." He patted his master on the head before speaking. "The Dimension has a room that determines whether you are strong enough to continue to be its master. If you don''t pass the test, you will have limited access to the Dimension and it is unsure whether you''ll continue to be the owner of the Dimension." "The previous master set this up to make sure that anyone who inherits his will would never be complacent and to make sure that the inheritor isn''t simply squandering the advantages that they have. The test tests your strength, technique and your mind. You have to be strong, skilful and smart in order to pass the test so I wish you luck. The Dimension should automatically pull you into the room in a short amount of time to begin the test." "If you do manage to pass the test, you''ll unlock more things in the Dimension so please don''t fail!" Xiao Bai started to float back towards the house and wished Ye Xiu good luck because he knew just how insane the test was. His previous master really had no sense of how strong a person should be at their realm of cultivation due to how he was raised up. Xiao Bai moved to the Master''s office and shook his head slightly. ''I really hope you don''t die during the test.'' After Xiao Bai said his piece, Ye Xiu was transported into a dark room that was massive. He had no idea where the room actually was in the Dimension but it certainly looked impressive even without any light to brighten up the room. As he thought that, the room was quickly lit alight by several torches that were on the sides of the room and Qi stones that were embedded into the ceiling of the room. Ye Xiu started to walk around the grand room looking at the decorations that were in place. He waited for several minutes afterwards, waiting for any instructions to be given to him so that he would know what to do in the test. He was confused after waiting for several minutes because it seemed like no instructions were going to be given to him. He continued to be patient for another hour inside the room and he wondered if he was going to be kicked out of the Dimension if he didn''t finish the test in time. What he didn''t know was that the room that he was in had a time dilation a hundred times faster than the one that they normally had when they were training. That meant that he could stay inside the room for a hundred hours and not even a single hour would''ve passed in the dimension. Sadly, he had no idea about that. He started to pace around the massive room, looking for clues to what he was supposed to be doing. He utilised his observation technique and could see that the entire room was saturated with Qi. He guessed that this was probably the first stage of the test that he had to pass. He took his time to look past the dense Qi that surrounded the entire room to see if there were any clues to help him solve his problem. After several hours of searching the entire room, he noticed that there seemed to be clues all around the room and that he just hadn''t put the clues together figure out what he was supposed to do. When he put all the clues together and placed them in order, he noticed that it formed two long paragraphs for him to read. "The first stage of the test is designed to test the initiative and observational skills of the examinee, it is passed when all the appropriate clues are gathered up and ordered so that the answer to begin the second stage is given. The first stage will end after forty-eight hours and if the examinee has not managed to pass the first stage when twenty-four hours have run out, he will be shortly punished for six hours straight after he has completed the stage before entering the second stage. If not, he''ll be kicked out." After reading the first paragraph, chills were sent down his spine and he was dreading just what kind of punishment he would''ve faced if he had not managed to pass the first stage in time. From what he had taken from Xiao Bai''s sad expression, he knew that the test he was taking was probably going to be a painful one. He shook his head to clear himself of those morbid thoughts and continued to read the second paragraph. "To start the second stage, the examinee must drip a single drop of a dragon''s blood essence on the floor of the room. The blood will initiate the second stage. Instructions for the second stage will be given after the stage has begun. Prepare yourself for the second stage and rest before you begin because the second stage will not be as easy as the first."The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. Ye Xiu read the second paragraph with a glum look. He laughed in a depreciative tone. ''At least Master left a warning for those that would take part in the test.'' He sighed as he sat down to meditate before he rushed headfirst into an unknown situation just as the instructions had advised him to do. He started to meditate as he started to think about other things. He was glad that his multi-tasking skill had finally allowed him to focus on three different things at the same time. ''It''s weird that Xiao Bai would tell me of the test only when I was just about to enter. Shouldn''t he have told me earlier? It''s also strange that the entire thing was so sudden but maybe the sudden transportation was to do with how I would react to unknown situations?'' He tried to come up with reasons and was doing fairly well in convincing himself. ''How am I going to explain my disappearance to the others later on? Nah, it should be okay if I tell them the truth. They''ll probably be surprised and they would be worried afterwards.'' Ye Xiu knew his friends too intimately to the point that he could probably guess their reactions. ''Xiao Tu would probably be the only one who wouldn''t be too worried since he knows I can take care of myself. He''s more likely to ask about what tests had come up.'' Ye Xiu shooked his head fondly as he focused his attention back to meditating. After he had felt that he had rested enough, he got up and stretched his muscles after the long period of inactivity. He was preparing himself mentally and physically to begin the second stage because he had no idea what it would bring. Once he had finished preparing himself, he took out a dagger that Yan Guo had given to everyone in the group. It was a gift and it was extremely sharp. The dagger was sharp enough especially after Ye Xiu injected a tiny bit of metal Qi into the dagger to make it even sharper. It managed to pierce his palm after little effort and after pushing out the blood essence that he had stored up for an occasion such as this, the wound sealed itself quickly. Ye Xiu had to thank Yan Guo for such a useful dagger because it was used for ceremonial purposes that required blood but you didn''t want to leave a wound open. It had runes engraved on the blade to make sure that the wound would seal, Yan Guo had several of these daggers simply because it was useful for torture. Why he would think that it was useful for torture was because he had training from his father on using it for torture and had it used on him multiple times before. Yan Guo''s training was truly brutal and it covered many areas that most people wouldn''t even touch. Even Ye Xiu and the others were grossed out when they heard about the training but they were also mad at their friend because he was forced into the training. Though Yan Guo said it was fine since it helped him get strong, everyone looked at him as if he was a strange monster. When the single drop of blood essence landed on the floor, it was quickly devoured by the floor and it disappeared from sight. The room started to distort and Ye Xiu quickly found himself on a cliff that overlooked a valley that teemed with life. Ye Xiu was shocked that there were so many living beings in the valley when instructions started to appear in front of his face. Reading them out loud, his tone took on the impersonation of a strangled chicken. "Kill everything in the valley. The time limit for the test is a single month and rewards will be given dependent on how fast each checkpoint for the test is completed. The checkpoints consist of killing: 1000 Grade 2 Qi Beasts, 100 Grade 3 Qi Beasts, 1 Grade 4 Qi Beast." His facial expression was one to admire since he felt like drowning himself once he read what he had to do. "The valley is separated into three portions. The first portion mainly consists of Grade 2 Qi Beasts and a single Grade 3 Qi Beast, the second portion consists of the majority of the Grade 3 Qi Beasts and the final portion consists of 3 Grade Qi Beasts and a singular Grade 4 Qi Beast. Good luck and remember to use your brain when you fight the Qi Beasts!" Ye Xiu stomped his feet in irritation once he finished reading everything. He sat down on the floor since he didn''t have to start the task immediately. At least his Master was kind enough to set up the stage area in portions because if it was arranged randomly, he was sure that he would''ve died the moment he stepped into the valley because he would have no idea how to tell the differences between the Qi Beasts'' grades. Sure, he could recognise different Qi Beasts but he would never be able to recognise the amount of Qi that a Qi Beast would contain to be considered a certain grade. Qi Beasts'' grades never stayed stagnant and continued to grow the older they are which meant that he would need to fight multiple battles before he would be able to outline a border for how strong a Qi Beast in their respective grades should be. He was sure that he would be able to take care of the Grade 2 Qi Beasts without a problem individually, however, he had no idea how the valley hierarchy worked and had to be careful if multiple Qi Beasts formed a group and decide to hunt him down. He would also have to be careful with what he ate and drank because he was sure that the Master would''ve set up the test to also assess his survival skills. He had food in his dimensional storage but he only had so much that would last him that long. He looked for a stick so that he could write down his plan on what to do. He liked to have things visualised so that it would be easier to remember. Eidetic memory was great for sure but remembering a picture was much faster than remembering individual words. Stalking Prey Ye Xiu stalked a black feline that was focused on catching fish from the river that ran through the entire valley. Ye Xiu had learnt after several hours of failing to catch his prey, that their instincts were much sharper compared to his friend''s own instincts. It was probably also due to the fact that the majority of the Qi Beasts that he was hunting had more experience than him when it came to hunting. It didn''t help that he was unable to conceal his smell and movements. After immediately removing his scent using an elixir that he had spread all over his body. Though he couldn''t learn how to conceal his movements and the sounds that he made when he adjusted body as he hid, he was able to conceal his presence immediately. He was lucky that he had learnt how to conceal his presence after several gruelling sessions with Shi Die and Yan Guo. Shi Die''s sharp senses didn''t help that he was noticed in a matter of minutes when he was trying to hide from him and it was the same with Yan Guo with his skill in sensing opponents in an area, it required him to learn how to conceal his presence quickly. The black feline was getting ready to leave after it had finished catching all the fish that it required. Ye Xiu planned to stalk it until it reached its habitat. Ye Xiu required a space to live in whilst he was stuck in the valley, he could certainly live up on the cliff but he wanted to be sheltered from anything that could see him even though he had a tent that could certainly allow him to live on the cliff. He utilised his ''Swallow Mirage Steps'' to keep up with the movements that the feline made to journey across the dense forest that surrounded the valley and river. He didn''t have to worry too much about concealing the sounds of his movements during this period because the feline made enough noise to mask his own and all he had to do was match his movements in time with the feline''s to prevent discovery. In a matter of minutes, they made it to a small cave that was hidden from view by dense vegetation and vines over the opening of the cave. He looked at the cave to spot if any other living beings were inside but could see no other Qi signatures. Seeing that it was safe, he entered with the feline before activating ''Solitary Stand'' and cutting off the head of the feline in a single motion. It was a smooth kill, the feline never even noticed that Ye Xiu was going to kill it. The Qi Beast''s danger instinct didn''t even have time to give a warning to the beast before he had cut off the head. Ye Xiu''s hands and body were covered in blood whilst his katana was completely clean due to the inscriptions that it held. Ye Xiu was glad that he had taken off his clothes and went bare-naked when he had started to hunt for Qi Beasts. He knew that he had to eventually kill so he didn''t want to dirty his clothes because it was hard to wash the blood off of clothing. He started to skin the feline, his lessons of survival training under his father certainly came in useful. His father mainly taught him how to skin an animal and how to survive on only fruits and water. He felt a stab of emotion after the kill but he knew that he had to come to terms with himself when it came to killing. He always wondered why his father never tried to desensitize him to killing and bloodshed but guessed that it probably never came up in his father''s mind. He knew that Shang Yang, Xiao Tu, Yan Guo and Shi Die all had experience when it came to killing and he was actually the greenhorn in the group. They had all given him advice on how to deal with his first kill even if it wasn''t human. He was lucky that the mindset that he had when it came to killing would probably stay the same until a big event occurred to change his mentality. The unrest in his mind was quickly quelled by the efficient reasoning that all living things died eventually and that it was the survival of the fittest. The advice from Shi Die was extremely helpful since he was the only person who survived for years on end in the wilderness. Ye Xiu appreciated nature in general and he did feel regret when he killed the beast. Shi Die told him that if he wanted to feel regret, he could always do it after the matter happened but never to think about it afterwards. After easing whatever turmoil was going on in his mind, he started to gather up some firewood so that he could get some heat into the cold cave. The cave was bare which wasn''t surprising, he lit up a fire with his Qi before starting to set up his tent. Once he managed to get everything sorted out, he started to cook a portion of the meat that he had skinned. He took out a few of the spice bottles that he had in his dimensional storage.You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. He was happy that he was prepared when it came to cooking and always had the tools needed for him to survive in the wilderness. The spices and herbs that he had in his dimensional storage added flavour to the meat that was slowly being smoked. He was smoking the meat because it would last longer than if it was cooked in a different way and he wanted to test out a recipe that he had learnt about. Ye Xiu didn''t bother infusing the food with his Qi because he wanted to save it up for any other hunts that he was going to eventually do later on in the day. He had learnt the very basics of Qi infusion and easily learnt it due to the similarities with the Medical Arts. After smoking the meat and hanging it out to dry in a secure spot where he knew that only the smoke would affect the flavour of the meat and that no pests would contaminate the food. He had made sure to cover the entrance to the cave so that the smell would not leave the cave. It was dangerous for him to be cooking because of all the beasts that lurked around in the valley but he was cooking at the very back of the cave so as long as he covered the entrance, he should be safe. He was also glad that the cloth that he used to cover the cave was one that the group used for their missions when they wanted to be discreet and not give off the smell of cooked food or smoke from the fire. He walked up to the entrance of the cave, used Qi to move the cloth that he used to cover the entrance, walked out before sealing it with his Qi once again. The cloth naturally camouflaged with the vegetation, giving no sign that there was even an entrance to a cave in the first place. Once he made sure that he had left a Qi imprint on the cloth so that he could find it again, he started to make his way to look for his next hunting prey. The sun had already set but Ye Xiu was willing to move about in the dense forest because he knew that he would have to learn how to hunt and fight in poor conditions such as this one. He took out the dagger that Yan Guo had given him and palmed a few seeds that had been infused with Shang Yang''s water Qi before setting off on his hunt. He had his observation technique on since the poor visibility during the night didn''t help him with finding anything. The observation technique didn''t help with night vision but it was enough for him to be able to sense the Qi inside the Qi Beasts and some of the herbs and plants that also contained Qi inside of them. As he was looking around the forest, he noticed that he had forgotten something very important that he would have to remember in the future. ''If I see any Grade 3 or higher Qi Beasts, I must remember to not only take their carcass but the Beast Core inside of them as well.'' He trekked the forest floor extremely carefully since he had to be wary of tripping on any branches, roots or vines. He was planning to go towards a portion of the river where he could refill his waterskins without being disturbed. He also knew that the river was also going to be one of the most populated areas during the night since many of the beasts would need to drink. Managing to get to the river without any incident, he refilled his waterskin before climbing a tree so that he could wait for anything to come over to take a drink. The place he had refilled his waterskin was a relatively safe area that was surrounded by trees and if you managed to get to the area it was either through luck or that they knew the area already. He knew that many of the beasts would come through here because he had spotted many different tracks of different animals on the ground. He set himself up to be right above the area where the Qi Beasts would have to drink. It took over half an hour before anything started to approach the area. It was a bear-like figure and was relatively massive compared to him. The bear-like figure started to drink water from the river and Ye Xiu readied himself to kill the beast. Ye Xiu wasn''t worried about the beast having a thick skin simply due to the fact that his katana infused with his metal Qi and together with ''Solitary Stand'' would be able to take down most. After jumping down from the tree that he was on, he immediately went for the neck since he wanted a quick and clean kill. It was obviously much harder than he expected since the beast was much bigger than he was and that being in mid-air made it harder to move around. The attack was a clean slashing motion and it died instantly. Ye Xiu knew that he was obviously lucky that he had surprise on his side for both his kills and that every kill wouldn''t always go like this. After placing the body into his dimensional storage, he started to wash in the river. He had no qualms about being dirty from mud and dirt but he disliked killing and he disliked the smell of blood even more. To him, the smell of blood ruins his appetite. It doesn''t make his queasy but it ruins the taste of the food whenever he eats which is why he always makes sure to wash if there was any blood splattered on him. He immediately started to make his way back to the cave. It took him a substantial amount of effort to make it back since he had to avoid the detection of multiple beasts that were heading in the direction of the river. It didn''t exactly help that it was dark and though he could remember the route he took easily, he had to change where he went simply because of how many beasts actually roamed the forest at night. He found his cave after a relatively short time even though he complained about the many branches that smacked him on the face. He let himself into the cave before sealing it once again. He wasn''t afraid of suffocating inside of the cave because the cloth lets in fresh air into the cave courtesy of a few inscriptions on the cloth that removed any poison in the air. He sat down to meditate because it was too late for him to eat anything else and he was rather tired. Transforming Monkey Twenty days had passed since Ye Xiu had managed to net his first two kills for the test that he was in the progress of completing. He was currently skinning a Grade 3 Qi Beast that he had recently killed and was busy extracting the Beast Core from the beast. The Beast Core from the Qi Beasts was in a different place on the body depending on the species of the beast. After several days of hunting Qi Beasts, Ye Xiu had quickly noticed that there never was the same Qi Beast species in the forest which was surprising to him because he had never seen so many different types of Qi Beasts until then. His skill in handling the carcasses had improved to the point that he could skillfully strip it down in minutes. The process was a tiring one but he felt that it was a rewarding task every time he completed his skinning. He was moving towards the final portion of the valley that he hadn''t dared to venture in before. Every single Qi Beast that he could possibly kill in the first two portions had been sought after and killed. Ye Xiu was glad that he had an eidetic memory to remember how many kills he had achieved because there was no indicator for how many Qi Beasts he would''ve had killed. He would''ve wasted days of time trying to scour the two portions by himself to make sure that everything was dead. He had learnt a lot in the twenty days that he was stuck in the second stage of the test. He not only learnt how to track the Qi Beasts but he had also refined his skills on avoiding detection. He was glad that he had the opportunity to refine his skills in a somewhat controlled environment. Now that he was moving towards the final portion, he was becoming extremely wary. The final portion of the valley was actually the smallest area out of every other place. This meant that there was very little that he could do to avoid the four Qi Beasts that inhabited the area. He had to be careful when he was drawing their attention to him because he had absolutely no reason to fight against multiple higher grade Qi Beasts at the same time. He already had a hard time fighting two Grade 3 Qi Beasts at the same time and he had a gut feeling that the three Grade 3 Qi Beasts were much stronger. When he entered the final area he could immediately sense the difference in the atmosphere. There were no birds chirping or insects making a cacophony but it was just dead silence. It was strange since it was a forested area but it made him even more cautious of the final area. He climbed the trees so that he would have a better vantage point, he immediately spotted two Qi Beasts relatively far apart from each other and the last two sleeping together. Ye Xiu could see that their Qi pools were definitely larger than his. He narrowed his eyes when he saw the Grade 4 Qi Beast''s Qi pool because he had a feeling that the fight with the particular beast would not go down very smoothly. Ye Xiu went back to the entrance of the final area and into the second portion so he could set up camp. He didn''t want to set up camp anywhere near the Beasts so he placed it right outside of the area, knowing that the beasts would not be able to leave the area. He had tested that particular tidbit when he was chased by a group of five Grade 3 Qi Beasts when he first entered the second area. He wandered back into the third area once he finished setting it up. He was going to look around the area discreetly to see if there were any appropriate places for him to fight the beasts in. He knew that he was at a disadvantage when it came to these particular beasts. He had seen their Qi Beast profiles in one of the compendiums that he had read up during his time in the Dimension''s library. They outclassed him in physical strength and cultivation which meant that he couldn''t have a direct confrontation because he would be overpowered too easily. They had years of growth ahead of him so he wasn''t surprised by the physical strength being higher than his even if he could supplement his training with elixirs and pills. The only advantage he could see was that two of the Qi Beasts that he had seen were bigger than him which meant he could use his speed to fight. The disparity of strength was daunting and he was starting to curse his Master silently. ''Who expects somebody at the third realm of cultivation to be able to fight a Grade 4 Qi Beast?'' The Qi Beast probably is one that recently broke through so it should mean that he had a slight chance to win. He didn''t want to think about what would happen if he was fighting against a Grade 4 Qi Beast that was accustomed to their strength. He had managed to find a few areas that would be appropriate for him to fight against the two bigger Qi Beasts but he was looking for other areas that would allow him a bigger range of motion because fighting in a forested area would be disadvantageous to him since one of the other two was the same size as him and the other was the size of a weasel. He knew that the weasel would give him the most trouble because it was the Grade 4 Qi Beast.Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Ye Xiu was surprised that the weasel-sized Qi Beast was the strongest one but he knew that he shouldn''t count on appearances because even the cutest thing could be the cause of his death in the future. He had improved his ability to use the second move in the ''Lonely Peak of Thirteen Dragons,'' and he was confident enough that he could use it reliably in a combat situation. It didn''t cost too much of his Qi pool since by all means he should''ve finished mastering the move a year ago but hadn''t put his focus on it. He knew that the weasel-sized beast had fangs that could bite through solid objects like they were nothing and was preparing himself for that particular battle. He had over a week until the second stage ended and he was coming up with appropriate plans to deal with each of the beasts separately. He was hoping that his ''Tyrant''s Physique'' would be able to protect him after he had advanced to the third stage of the technique. Luckily the technique corresponded with the strength of his body so it was fairly easy for him to move up the different stages of the technique. After a day of scouting out the area, he decided to go back to his camp so that he could rest so that he would be ready for the day tomorrow where he would kill at least one of the beasts. He was hoping that he would be able to get all three of the Grade 3 Qi Beasts in a single day but he was being vigilant of his own strength and it would be foolhardy for him to take on a such a hopeless task. He had managed to eat many different types of rare Qi Beast meat after hunting them and was glad that he got the opportunity to eat the carcasses. He still had over a thousand carcasses in his dimensional rings that he was planning to sell later on. He knew that they would fetch a handsome price due to the number of bodies there were. They were relatively intact as well and his skinning was flawless after several botched attempts on the ones that he had eaten. He was thinking of what other possible tests would await him after he finished the stage and at the same time he was thinking about his friends. Though time had barely passed for those outside of the Dimension, he still thought about them because he hadn''t seen them for a long period of time. He didn''t know that time passed at a much faster pace inside the testing area so he was alone in his thoughts whilst his friends were all busy sleeping. It was the middle of the night when he heard growls outside of his camp and he left his camping area to check the entrance to the final area. He saw a single Qi Beast looking at him and it was the human-sized beast. It had probably smelled the food that was cooking but was unable to leave his own area which was why it was busy stalking the entrance. Ye Xiu knew that this was a chance that he shouldn''t squander so he quickly took out his katana and engaged the beast. Ye Xiu knew that he could''ve taken advantage of the fact that he could kill the beast by simply staying in the second area but he wanted to test his own strength for now, not by using tricks to win the battle. He had his own thoughts about how he would go about fighting. He had told himself that he wouldn''t abuse the area constriction on the Qi Beasts on any of the beasts besides the Grade 4 Qi Beast and that was only if he had no chance of killing it in the first place. He believed that it would be better for him to test out his strength first before using such means to win because he wouldn''t get stronger in his fighting ability that way. The beast jumped away as it noticed Ye Xiu approaching it and Ye Xiu could see that the beast was definitely cute. It was a monkey, a relatively big monkey but a monkey nonetheless. It looked extremely innocent and was unlike those ferocious species that he had seen before. After ascertaining what was happening, the monkey started to use the trees to its advantages and attacked him. Though the monkey was relatively fast by using the branches to swing, Ye Xiu was able to predict its movements due to it being in mid-air. He attacked every time the monkey was in mid-air and retreated once it tried to attack him. Ye Xiu was surprised by the stupidity of the Qi Beast because it continued to do the same thing over and over again until it was bleeding from all the injuries that it accumulated. Ye Xiu wanted to finish it quickly because the blood was likely to attract the other Qi Beasts, he tried to cut off the head of the monkey but it was able to dodge his attack. The monkey started to become bigger until it looked like a gorilla. Ye Xiu nearly crapped himself when he looked into the bloodshot eyes of the monkey. He had known that this particular species had a different racial ability so he was surprised that it hadn''t used it in the entire fight. He narrowed his eyes. ''Could this monkey be a different species or has it mutated in its own way so that it has a different racial ability?'' He had no time to continue thinking when a massive fist flew at him. The fist left a huge hole on the ground and Ye Xiu was slightly threatened. ''That was the strength of the monkey even without using any Qi?'' Ye Xiu started to utilise his ''Swallow Mirage Steps'' to its full capability and started to dodge the attacks of the monkey. Though the monkey had now grown to a bigger size, it looked like it didn''t affect its speed, in fact, it was even faster than it had been when it was moving around the trees. Ye Xiu realised what Qi Beast it was after it displayed its capabilities and was trying to come up with an appropriate plan. He took out some of the remaining seeds that he had and threw them around the area as he dodged. ''I hope this works.'' He thought. Seeing that Satyr Ye Xiu had placed Qi imprints on each of the seeds that he had thrown out together. He was waiting for an opportune time for him to use them so he continued to dodge the attacks that the beast threw at him. He had tried to catch one of the punches that the monkey had thrown at him and he noticed that the punch wasn''t as heavy as he thought it would be thought it still certainly strained him to block it. Once he figured out that he could block the attacks albeit with effort, he was quick to monopolize on the fact that the monkey''s body was massive and that it would be hard for it to be able to move its body faster than he could strike it. The monkey''s skin was relatively tough and he could see that his attacks were barely making substantial injuries. Ye Xiu could smell the blood which also meant that it was possible for the other Qi Beasts to smell it. He knew that if the smell of blood travelled then he would have multiple Qi Beasts against him. Knowing this, he started to use his ''Mirage Swallow Steps'' solely to help retreat after making an attack whilst using ''Basilisk''s Gaze'' to close the distance quickly. This used his Qi pool at a reasonable rate. He knew that he wouldn''t be able to keep this up and the only attacks that he knew would work against the monkey were those that were directed to its eyes and head. With ''Basilisk''s Gaze'' helping him, it was easy for him to aim for the eyes but Qi Beasts were smart and doing the same thing over and over again was bound to have the monkey be able to predict his movements eventually. As predicted, the monkey had caught on to what Ye Xiu was doing which made things much harder for him. He looked around the area as he continued to dodge, he saw that there was a particular area that was a forest of vines. If the weasel-sized Qi Beast was here, it could possibly get through the area but with Ye Xiu''s and the monkey''s sizes, it would be impossible without being trapped by the vines. He threw the last of the seeds that he had and continued to dodge as he made his way towards the area that he had seen. It didn''t take long since both he and the monkey were moving at relatively fast speeds even with all the obstacles on the forest floor. Whilst Ye Xiu could smoothly move past the obstacles due to his smaller size, the monkey broke through every single obstacle through brute force. It ran through everything and it seemed like it was using Qi to clear the path for it. Ye Xiu''s observations didn''t affect his combat state due to how efficient he was when he was multi-tasking. To him, fighting whilst thinking of things completely irrelevant to what he was supposed to be thinking of was easy since he was able to practise alchemy whilst being attacked. He managed to do this because he had wanted to practise multi-tasking and his friends found it amusing every time his failures exploded in his face as he dodged. Once the monkey was led close enough to the area, he sent multiple Qi needles to the spots where his imprints were so that it would explode. The reason to why he used Qi needles was due to the fact that he hadn''t mastered the remote detonation, apparently, the technique for the remote detonation required more refining since it took too long for Ye Xiu to gather up the Qi and send it to the imprints. Due to this, he used the method that he had suggested to Shang Yang to use so that she could detonate the imprints. The seeds that Ye Xiu had thrown were infused with Shang Yang''s Qi in a way that would make sure that it wouldn''t escape until it was exploded, it took several trials before they managed to accomplish it and they were proud with what they had accomplished. Though what was hardest during the infusion was to get the correct ratio of wood Qi and water Qi to mix together so that the seed wouldn''t explode. Each type of seed had a different ratio and it took two weeks of tests for them to find the ratios for several types. Ye Xiu had practised controlling the plants but he could only do it if they acted similarly hive mind which meant that the only thing he had to do was control all the plants at the same time and have them do one thing and every single one of them would do it. He had to do this because controlling every single individual plant was ridiculously impossible because no matter how good you are at multi-tasking unless you are solely concentrating on moving the plants and not moving, it would be hard for you to be aware of anything at all in a battle. He started the acceleration of growth on the seeds and they promptly started to grow rapidly. They were vine seeds because Ye Xiu and Shang Yang had taken the time to infuse the vine seeds because they were more likely to use them for constriction or immobilisation purposes instead of having plants to attack.This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. Ye Xiu had used up his other types of plants when he immobilised groups of Qi Beasts by using a variety of plants that could paralyse through their spores or through the poisonous gas that they release. He would''ve kept a few for this occasion but that particular incident was a one-off chance for him to kill huge groups of Qi Beasts in a single go. He kept the rapidly grown vines stationary so that the monkey wouldn''t realise anything was wrong as he tried to lure the monkey into the jungle of vines. The monkey was obviously smart as it hung around the outside of the area, swinging its way through the vines, doing it''s best to try and destroy the obstacles. Ye Xiu had cut himself a path but it wasn''t big enough for the monkey which meant that as the monkey itself was attacking the vines, he was attacking it where it wasn''t protected. The vines that were previously stationary were now tangled around the monkey''s entire leg and had a firm hold on it. They had chosen this particular vine for its ability to withstand huge amounts of force and had strong gripping power. The vines were sentient when fully grown but because it was grown using a portion of his own Qi, he could control the plant by using a technique that was similar to one that puppet masters used though the technique was nowhere as complex. Ye Xiu was lucky that he had only seen the monkey use metal Qi, this meant that it would either strengthen his attacks or body but it wouldn''t do anything to help him get rid of the vines that were binding him. If the monkey was able to use fire Qi, the entire plan would''ve been blown into pieces. The monkey was stopping its futile attacks on the vines in front of him and instead concentrated his efforts on getting rid of the vines that were holding him in place. Ye Xiu didn''t give the monkey the chance to continue doing so because he wanted to end the fight quickly. He had heard the sounds of the other Qi Beasts searching the forest and he knew that they were getting close. Since only the monkey had sustained injuries, he was sure that he could fight a second Qi Beast afterwards because he hadn''t used up too much Qi in the battle so far. Whilst the monkey was distracted by the vines, he activated the second movement of "Lonely Peak of Thirteen Dragons.'' The name of the move was "Despairing Roar'' because of the sound it made when it was being activated and as it was used. The move itself was definitely not a move for assassinations due to all the noise that it made but the strength behind the attack was much stronger due to the multiplicative effect. The katana managed to strike the unprotected neck of the monkey and though the muscle was slightly hindering the katana''s movement, it was still able to cut off the head in one fell swoop. Ye Xiu knew that he had no time to waste and quickly placed the body into his inventory, forgetting about the head because it had rolled too far away. He had blood splattered over him and the exit for the final area was now relatively far away since Ye Xiu and the monkey had been moving around from their original position to get to where they were. He sprinted through the forest with his katana cutting the obstacles in his way when he managed to get to the exit. The exit was blocked by a single Grade 3 Qi Beast and it was a beast that he was made familiar with after his father warned him of the dangers of facing the beast. This particular Qi Beast could be considered to be a Grade 4 Qi Beast due to its abilities and the intelligence that is displayed. This particular Qi Beast was of the same species that had kidnapped him when he was younger. Ye Xiu had been taught to recognise it instantly because he never wanted to be fooled again. The Man-eating satyr was definitely going to be a tough fight for him, probably harder than the Grade 4 Qi Beast because it didn''t have that many abilities. The Man-eating satyr wasn''t a natural existence but one that was actually born using the grief, deceit and anger from sentient lifeforms. This meant that it could take up to hundreds of years for it to form or it could form in a matter of years. Its normal ranking was considered to be a Grade 3 Qi Beast but it could definitely evolve if it continued to absorb the emotions in an area. The higher the grade the Qi Beast is, the bigger the area that it could take in the emotions. Ye Xiu was definitely wary of the satyr and wanted to get out of the area immediately. He knew that the two other Qi Beasts were probably on his tail which meant that he had no time for another fight. Ye Xiu prepared himself to use all of his Qi for a single instantaneous burst of speed using ''Tyrant''s Physique'' and ''Basilisk''s Gaze.'' He was betting his luck that he could move faster than satyr could teleport and attack but he held no expectations. He was also hoping that whatever kept the Qi Beasts in their particular portion of the valley would keep the satyr from teleporting outside as well. He tensed his leg muscles and sprinted past the satyr. The satyr was able to attack him just as he moved past because it had started its attack just as he had started his sprint. It was a shallow cut on the side of his thigh and Ye Xiu knew that he would have to continue running and not look back. He made it past the boundary line that defined the two regions and he could see the satyr''s miasma around it as it stared at him. He sighed in relief and went back to his camp so that he could tend to the injury with a pill. He was lucky that the valley was abundant with herbs, plants and rare materials but was sad because he didn''t have enough time to harvest everything. He sat down and took the time to think of a plan so that he could fight the satyr. He looked up into the night sky in the Dimension and hoped for the best. ''I still have ten days. I should be fine.'' He comforted himself before setting himself up in a meditative trance. That Snake was easy He was cursing up a storm when he realised when he realised what exactly he was fighting up against. He hadn''t planned for this to happen but he guessed that he had to roll with it. This was the only Qi Beast that stayed behind whenever the other two went out to catch their food or drink water from the river. It usually just hung around in the open area, sunbathing its entire body. Ye Xiu never realised what it actually was because it never moved and it had always been coiled up. Ye Xiu continued to watch as a massive snake slithered on the floor as he disturbed its sleep by moving closer towards it. He realised that when the snake was coiled up it did not do justice on what its actual size and length it was. Ye Xiu wasn''t scared of snakes in general but he was certainly surprised and shocked by the size of the snake. Even if he had watched numerous videos on the largest snakes in his previous world, it definitely had nothing on the size that this snake had on them. He tried to compare the sizes but it seemed that this was going to be the largest snake that he had ever seen. He had no idea on how to fight this particular Qi Beast and felt that the best possible solution to the problem was to kill it with fire. He literally set his hand on flames using fire Qi and looked at it. He was having second thoughts. ''For some reason, this doesn''t feel like a smart idea.'' He had a feeling that doing something as foolish as lighting the snake on fire would not go well for him. He cut off the Qi supply to his hand and the flames vanished. He stood there thinking about what he should do to try and kill the massive behemoth of a snake. He knew that he probably had around about an entire hour before the other two Qi Beasts came back since it usually takes them an hour and a half before they get back. Ye Xiu had plenty of time to kill the snake if he knew how to deal with it. He mulled over the species of the snake before being able to conclude which particular snake species it was. ''This snake is usually a Grade 1 Qi Beast so it has to be strong in order for it to become a Grade 3 Qi Beast. The species doesn''t really have much going for them besides having a poison that is generated naturally in their body and a poisonous gas that they could release to incapacitate enemies. Besides that, the majority of the species had high affinity to only wood QI but variations and mutations do occur so I wouldn''t bet on that.'' He knew that the poison would probably be a problem for him since he had no way to tell what kind of poison that it would generate since it had become a Grade 3 Qi Beast. He could only hope that the pills and elixirs that he had would counteract the poison. He did have high hopes for his pills and elixirs to counter the poison since it would be able to neutralise poisons underneath the 4th Grade. Ye Xiu no longer had no many seeds so he wouldn''t be able to restrain the snake though that would''ve been a futile effort since the snake''s size meant that it was powerful and would be able to break through the vines easily. He knew how strong his vines could be and it definitely wouldn''t be able to handle something that looked to be over twenty metres long. He circled around the area that the snake was still sleeping in. He wasn''t sure if the snake was actually taking a nap or whether it was just sunbathing. He set up a few traps that could possibly come in handy for a later fight. He might as well do something if he wasn''t going to engage the snake immediately. Once he managed to set up some rudimentary traps that were unlikely to do anything but annoy and slow down the Qi Beasts. If it were for the two other QI Beasts it would only slow them but Ye Xiu believed that because the snake was so big, it could only move at a fast speed during the first attack. Most big snakes had that problem and most of their faster attacks were from surprise attacks. If it wasn''t a surprise attack they usually used their entire body to constrict their prey to death before devouring it. Ye Xiu was definitely not planning to be constricted so his multiple traps focused on having the snake having to manoeuvre its entire body to get to him. The snake was relatively thick as well so it wouldn''t be able to pass through certain areas and would make it difficult for the snake to even leave after it gets trapped. He stood atop of a tree branch and noticed that his time had dwindled down to less than thirty minutes. He took out a bottle from his dimensional storage and his katana before jumping down. Ye Xiu landed on the ground quietly since he had learnt how to keep silent after needing to hide from the numerous Qi Beasts that roamed around the forest before. Though he landed on the ground silently, the snake started to stir from its position and its large forked tongue could be seen flickering out of its mouth. When Ye Xiu saw the tongue flickering out, he already knew that the snake had already noticed him since it had never tasted his scent before. He quickly moved with his katana in hand and jumped in the air to try to attack the coiled body. He wasn''t directly attacking the head because he knew that the snake would immediately lunge and Ye Xiu didn''t think that he would like to fight against the snake''s fangs.You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author. The katana sliced into the snake''s body easily due to his combination of fire and metal Qi. He pulled the blade out immediately and jumped away as the snake''s head moved towards his direction. His attack had immediately cauterized the wound since the snake could release poisonous gas from anyway on its body as long as its mouth was open or if it had any open wounds which would passively release the gas. What he was trying to currently do was make the snake become angry enough so that he could start to bait it towards his traps. If at any moment of the battle, the snake opens its mouth to try and bite him he would immediately throw a little surprise into its waiting mouth. His little surprise comprised of a seed of a plant that they had managed to stumble across during one of the annual auctions that they had in the city and another plant that had an effect that they wanted. They got the first seed for a reasonable price since it was only the seeds of a plant. They had only managed to successfully create a single seed that was prepared to be used in a battle whilst the other seeds that they had bought had been placed into the Dimension for it to grow. The second plant was one that they had managed to find in the wilderness during their first mission. With Shang Yang''s and Ye Xiu''s effort, they had managed to successfully combine the two plants'' effects into one so that they would have both the effects. They named the plant ''Silverthorn Rose.'' They named it for the appearance that it took when it was fully grown but the name itself didn''t reveal what it was able to do. They had registered the new plant at one of the Herbalist Greenhouses where it was then added to the plant compendium. The Herbalist Greenhouse that they registered the new plant it wasn''t even surprised by the registration since numerous plants were registered often. People often experimented so it wasn''t unknown for the same plants to have the same name. Since the list of plants and herb was updated so often, many of those in the occupations that require the knowledge had to keep up to date so that they know of the new species and to be aware that it existed. The registration of the plant required the bare minimum of the appearance of the plant and then the name. No further information was required since it was up to the discretion of the finder to reveal what they had. The cultivator world was harsh and not everybody would give up their secrets that easily. When the ''Silverthorn Rose'' is fully grown, blade-like thorns grow all over the petals and stem, slicing anybody''s hands up if they dared to touch it. If enough fire Qi is inserted into the plant, it explodes and sends the thorns as an omnidirectional attack. Ye Xiu had the inspiration to try and create this particular plant was due to the bombs that contained shrapnel in his previous world. They caused huge amounts of damage to the surrounding and that was what the plant was designed for besides for defensive purposes. He was going to have the seed grown into maturity before throwing it into the snake''s mouth together with a Qi needle infused with fire Qi that would insert the fire Qi into the plant before exploding. The rose itself when combined with numerous others could become a ''Silverthorn Rose Bush'' but Ye Xiu didn''t have the time or materials necessary for that. Ye Xiu had a way to prevent the rose from injuring him and it was what he was counting on so he could hold it and throw it. Ye Xiu knew that throwing a plant would barely work since air resistance would work against it and it would probably fall down to the ground due to the wind currents and gravity which was why the needle was there to push it into the snake''s mouth. It would require elaborate timing so that the snake wouldn''t close its jaw in time. The snake had started to follow Ye Xiu into the forested area where he had his traps set up. They weren''t much but with a huge amount of vines barring the way of the thick snake that had no other way to get past the obstacle than to open its jaw to bite its way through the obstacle. Ye Xiu was waiting for that exact moment to send the rose together with his needle. Ye Xiu didn''t mind ruining the snake''s body because it would only be a portion of the body. He was going to simply sell it in an auction since he thought that the massive body would fetch a huge price. Surprisingly, the snake didn''t even use Qi to remove obstacles in the entire fight which made Ye Xiu''s job much easier than he had expected. Ye Xiu attested the lack of Qi usage to the snake not being warm enough. Since it was a cold-blooded creature it would move slower and react slower which is why it probably didn''t use Qi consciously and instead used it to enhance the poison that is housed inside of the body. After the rose was inside the snake, the snake started to release as much poisonous gas as it could into the surroundings whilst it did something that was intriguing and disgusting to Ye Xiu. The snake was inhaling the poisonous gas that was emitted into itself and Ye Xiu was watching the situation within the beast since the poisonous gas itself contained Qi. Ye Xiu guessed that the snake was trying its best to remove the rose but it was already too late. The snake stopped moving entirely after the thorns were sent everywhere inside of its body. Multiple thorns had actually penetrated the snake''s brain. Ye Xiu was actually doubting whether his dimensional storage rings could handle the size of the snake but remembered that Shang Yang had gifted him a pendant that had a much bigger space than the rings he had. Immediately using the pendant to store the body, he ran out of the area like a startled deer and returning to his camp. ''Two more. Just two more to go.'' He sat down and took out the snake''s body so he could remove the thorns from it. He was actually going to open the snake''s jaw and climb inside of it to remove them. He had a bunch of neutralisation elixirs so he felt that he was safe. A Cheeky Weasel Ye Xiu wasn''t very happy. No, he wasn''t happy. Maybe it had to do with the fact that he was being bitten by a Qi Beast that seemed to be playing around with him. It also didn''t help that the Qi Beast that was harassing him seemed to be laughing. Ye Xiu had been trapped in this particular debacle for the past hour. He hadn''t even seen a single hair out of place when he first arrived at the open area that the two remaining Qi Beasts resided in when he was ambushed by a white flying weasel. He had identified that the weasel-like Qi Beast was an actual weasel. The satyr wasn''t at the open area and Ye Xiu had guessed that it was the one hunting for the food and left the weasel here alone so that it could take care of any intruders. The weasel had started to attack him with fervour, and due to him being caught off-guard by the creature, he could only dodge whilst trying to get his whip out of his dimensional storage. Why he took out a whip instead of his katana, that was a question that would be easily answered. The reasoning was simple, using a katana to hit such a small Qi Beast wasn''t beneath Ye Xiu''s skills but hitting such a small Qi Beast that moved faster than he could see... it was currently out of his realm of skill and using a whip to attack was always easier anyway. Ye Xiu had been forced out of the open area and into the forested areas where he was at a disadvantage. He managed to hold his ground in a fairly spacious area where he had enough space for him to swing his whip around comfortably. The forest was definitely an advantageous area for the weasel but Ye Xiu could do nothing to change that or get away from the area since the weasel would immediately block his efforts. The area that they were stuck inside wasn''t completely disadvantageous to Ye Xiu since it also meant that the weasel didn''t have too much space to dodge his whip attacks. Ye Xiu was hesitant to take out his second whip since he was already having a hard time to keep an eye on the weasel. He knew that using his dual whip style for this situation would be advantageous but he hadn''t even seen the weasel using any Qi attacks on him yet. Ye Xiu''s only consolation in the fight was that he could sense the weasel''s body since he had his Qi imprint on the weasel''s body. How he managed to do that was simple. He had tagged the weasel just as it slammed into his body and the weasel hadn''t even noticed that he had done anything to him. Due to being able to sense the weasel, he could at least attack with his whip which counted as his only offensive attack in the entire fight. He knew that his Qi thorns weren''t even penetrating past the weasel''s fur so he was simply trying to bat the weasel away so he could move away from the area. The battle was relatively silent besides the sounds of the weasel laughing and the sounds that the whip made when it hit a solid object or when it generated enough wind to cause it to be heard. Though it looked like the battle was in a stalemate, Ye Xiu was definitely the one that looked far worse off. After a few moments of silence, Ye Xiu was sighing because he had a moment of relief. The two combatants stared at each other as if they were speaking silently with just their stares. The silence was broken by a deep voice that Ye Xiu had never heard before. "I''m surprised a kid like you is able to keep up with me albeit you are doing poorly." The source of the voice sounded amused and Ye Xiu quickly found where the voice was coming from. Ye Xiu was surprised that the weasel had developed the skill to speak in a human tongue but the surprised faded when he remembered what the weasel''s species was and that it was of a relatively high rank already. The deep voice spoke again. "If you managed to get this far in the test then I guess that you would be able to defeat me. You''ve already defeated the monkey and snake in a short amount of time and that''s no small feat." "I was surprised that the only traces of the battles that you had with the monkey and snakes were the traps that you had so kindly led them into. This showed that you were smart and it was also the reason why I stayed behind in the area today. The satyr is much stronger than me even though it is of a lower rank than me." The weasel was informing Ye Xiu of the strength that the satyr actually held. "Why are you even telling me this? I don''t see any reason why you would help me out since we''re enemies after all." He was suspicious of what the weasel was planning to do because he really doubted that the weasel would''ve survived to become a Grade 4 Qi Beast by not being devious.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. The weasel didn''t reply for several moments before it cleared its throat. Ye Xiu realised that he couldn''t simply just call Qi Beasts as ''beasts'' since it doesn''t do justice to their intelligence. "I would like to offer you something that would technically bend the rules of the test that you are taking. How I know about the rules is a secret." Ye Xiu swore that he saw the weasel wink at him conspiratorily. Ye Xiu was hesitating because he had no idea whether to accept his offer or not. It was a risky endeavour but in the end, he decided to hear the weasel out. "I''ll listen to your offer before I decide anything." He leaned on a tree that was nearby so that he could at least rest himself if whatever offer the weasel had was not to his liking and they had to go back to fighting. The weasel seemed to perk up when he heard that Ye Xiu would hear him out. "The offer is simple, I am to be bonded with you as a familiar and the rules that state for you to kill a Grade 4 Qi Beast will be null and a new one will be put in place." When Ye Xiu heard of the offer he narrowed his eyes. "I can only have a maximum of seven familiars in my entire life with the cultivation technique that I am using. What makes you think you are worthy enough to be my familiar? Why would such a rule exist in the test anyway, I sincerely doubt that the person who designed the test would leave such a loophole." Ye Xiu crossed his arms as he stared at the weasel who looked very smug as Ye Xiu questioned him. The weasel seemed to puff up in pride as he spoke. "I happen to be the youngest Qi Beast that was in the entire valley. I know this since whoever is the strongest in the valley gets information privy only to those that hold the position. I have had predecessors before me that have held the same position but they are transported to another place after they are stronger than a set level." Ye Xiu raised his eyebrow at the information because the weasel had contradicted himself when he told him the information that he had politely asked him not to ask about. "The majority of the Qi Beasts that you''ve seen here have little to no potential besides those in the second area and the final area. The information I gain gives the strongest Qi Beast a chance to bond with whatever participant enters the test if they don''t wish to die." Ye Xiu was weighing the pros and cons of what the weasel was offering him. ''I don''t even know if he''s telling the truth but it would be good to have a familiar.'' He decided to postpone whatever decision he was going to make. "Give me some time to think about your deal. Let me deal with the satyr first before I decide what I do." The weasel seemed to be nodding his head. "Just scream my name whenever you want to speak to me. My name is Bai Tian." The weasel left without a trace after giving its name. ''He said that the Qi Beasts disappear when they reach a certain strength. Does that mean that they no longer reside in the valley and is somewhere else in the Dimension? Master truly outdid himself when he made the Dimension. He even made sure to have a contingency plan in case the Qi Beasts here became too strong for the test.'' Ye Xiu had a lot to think about after the information had been revealed to him by the weasel. He was actually doubting the weasel''s words but he had no actual reason to because, for all he knew, the weasel was telling the truth. His offer wasn''t detrimental to Ye Xiu in any way so it should''ve been an easy decision but with the limit of how many familiars he could have, he was hesitating slightly. He liked the idea that he would get a familiar and was turning the thought over and over again. He decided to talk to the weasel for a few more days after he killed the satyr because he wanted to get to know the weasel first. He wanted to see if he liked the weasel''s personality and if he did, he would definitely accept the offer because having a familiar would certainly boost his combat strength. There were cons to having a familiar but Ye Xiu dismissed the cons as something negligible because he believed he could find a solution to the cons so that they wouldn''t affect him at all. The best way to learn about someone is to fight them so he was going to finish killing the satyr and have the weasel fight him so that he can figure out what the weasel''s personality was like. He was certain that the weasel was a cheeky one due to the laughter that he had heard. The time he had now was best used in coming up with a plan to kill the satyr. The abilities of the satyr were troublesome and he knew that the only way for him to prevent the satyr from getting an upper hand was to avoid all of its attacks so its teleportation ability would not be able to be used. He had the miasma covered since he could use his fire Qi attacks to remove it from the battle. He had no idea if it would be enough but he could only hope. He went into his meditative trance with his high hopes. Ye Xiu was actually happy to kill the satyr and he would do it with a smile on his face. He hated what the satyr embodied and what conditions had to be met for it to be born. He hated what the satyr did to sate its desires. He hated. No, he despised. He despised the species as a whole, especially after the kidnapping incident. His father had told him about the entire incident and he knew everything. Ye Xiu calmed himself of his emotions and tried to cleanse himself of the thoughts. He never thought of things such as hate with such vehemence and he didn''t want to indulge himself. He would get rid of that hate after he killed the satyr and let things lie as they are. He knew that pursuing such a train of thought was dangerous and he would do anything to remove those thoughts if he ever started to think about them. He started the Phoenix''s cultivation technique and he quickly lost all thoughts besides focusing on his entire body. Messing Around Ye Xiu had forgotten the little tidbit that the satyr didn''t actually require its miasma in order for it to use its illusions. It only meant that the strength of its illusions wasn''t as strong as they were supposed to be. He was caught in an illusion that he didn''t even realise until he spotted discrepancies in the Qi flow around the area. He had realised that he had been attacking an illusion for the past five minutes and he was certainly furious. He managed to dispel the illusion by disrupting the flow of Qi that the illusion was relying on to fool him. He had learnt how to dispel illusions at the drop of a hat together with everyone else since they had to make sure that they didn''t get caught by Shang Yang''s illusions. They learnt the telltale signs of her illusions Since he had learnt the telltale signs, he was able to recognise the similarities in the Qi flow around him. It was difficult to see the Qi flow of the satyr since it had a lot of experience using them which meant that it knew how to make his Qi signature extremely soft and it became hardly discernible unless you were extremely sharp. Ye Xiu could hear the menacing laughter as he searched the forest for the satyr. He could see why Bai Tian had told him that the satyr was the strongest beast in the area. Though it didn''t have the highest cultivation since that went towards Bai Tian, it certainly made up for it with its numerous amount of abilities that it could use. "You managed to break out of the illusion. I applaud since not many recognise the signs of an illusion." The voice sounded from all directions around Ye Xiu. He knew that the satyr was probably using another illusion to make sure that Ye Xiu would be unable to locate him. Ye Xiu knew that with the amount that he had been trapped in the illusion the satyr would''ve probably set up multiple illusions. The worst thing about this satyr''s illusions was that it made the surroundings look exactly the same as they were in reality. This confused Ye Xiu greatly and so he could only focus his efforts on trying to detect Qi flow abnormalities or the satyr''s Qi signature. The satyr was taunting Ye Xiu though Ye Xiu tried his best to ignore them. "You''ll never be able to fight me if you just get caught in my illusions. You''ll die of hunger and thirst by the time I''m done with you. Your body will be a delicious meal for me." The satyr chuckled as if it was thinking about the taste of Ye Xiu''s body. Ye Xiu''s eyebrows furrowed in frustration. ''There was a trick that I was planning on testing out... should I try it now? If it works then it''ll definitely help me a lot in this fight.'' He wasn''t sure whether his idea would work out since he had never tried to attempt it before. He had all the time in the world since the satyr wasn''t actually attacking him yet. Ye Xiu gathered up his Qi and released it in a concentrated manner. He essentially released a pulse of Qi that would go as far as his control allowed him to. The pulse was released in a circular manner so it would affect all areas around him just not below him. This would help him find the Qi signatures that were foreign as it passed through which would allow him to systematically destroy the illusions quickly. Ye Xiu''s idea worked and he managed to find multiple areas where the satyr had placed his illusions. The satyr was peeved that his fun was going to come to an end so quickly. "You managed to find my illusions so quickly. I congratulate you. With death." The satyr started to attack Ye Xiu as he was getting rid of the illusions which made his work much harder than it should''ve been. Ye Xiu was calmly dodging the attacks that the satyr had been throwing at him since he had no inclination in being hit by the satyr. The miasma was starting to affect Ye Xiu''s vision as it was extremely dense. He wondered how the satyr managed to create and emit so much miasma but when he thought about it he was less surprised. The satyr probably had years to build up its miasma and held it in so that it wouldn''t escape. Ye Xiu wasn''t happy to see the miasma so he pulled on his Qi and split it off into different directions. One to continue helping him find the illusions and the other towards his dimensional storage so he could get his whip. He had his whip in hand and started to light the whip on flames. He had modified his whip in the past few months so that it would be able to withstand the heat that his flames would produce. Once the flame was aflame, he took out his second whip before lighting it aflame as well. He used his dual whip style to create a dome of defence around him. Since the whips were aflame, the miasma that tried to get past was instantly burnt and it disappeared. Ye Xiu was also removing the illusions as he swung his whip around because it managed to get many areas in the forest that he wouldn''t normally hit.Love what you''re reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on. The flames were slowly burning the forest but Ye Xiu didn''t mind. The flames that lit up the environment was easily extinguished by his whips as they created enough wind to blow out the fires. The satyr wasn''t panicking yet which was interesting to Ye Xiu but it also made him extremely cautious. If the satyr wasn''t even worried that one of its main methods of attacking was being countered then he knew that the satyr definitely still had tricks up his sleeve. His father had told him that all satyrs have the same set of abilities but each individual one can develop a different set of abilities together with the one they were born with. Ye Xiu kept up his dome of defence as the miasma kept on being released, as Ye Xiu stepped forward the satyr retreated. After a few minutes of burning the miasma, the satyr was bored of the fight. "Are you seriously going to spend your entire time trying to get rid of my miasma?" "You''re going to have to tire sooner or later." The satyr was being extremely idle as it watched Ye Xiu. "If you aren''t going to come to me, then I''ll come to you." Though the satyr was idle, it had gotten impatient and wanted a fight. The horns on the satyr disappeared and a set of daggers appeared in its hands. The satyr threw one of the daggers that it held towards Ye Xiu where it was promptly hit away by the whips. As the whip hit the dagger, the satyr teleported to where it was and threw its next dagger which managed to get past Ye Xiu''s dome. The satyr dropped down to the ground as it picked up the fallen dagger before teleporting to the dagger that was close to Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu stopped swinging his whips and pulled them back towards him, he was hoping that he would be able to trap the satyr as it moved towards him. He managed to get both his whips to bind around the satyr as he let his hold on the two whips go and kicked the dagger that was flying towards his face. The whips that were binding the satyr went slack in less than a few moments since the satyr managed to teleport to the kicked dagger. Ye Xiu wasn''t expecting much when he was trying to bind the satyr since he knew that it could teleport around the place. The satyr was more difficult than Ye Xiu expected it to be. When his father had told him about the battle that they had against the satyr that had kidnapped him, he was obviously intrigued about how they fought and he listened closely but he didn''t expect that it would be this hard. Though he had something coming for him if he thought that he would be able to take something down alone easily when it had taken six people working together with extremely fluid teamwork. Ye Xiu had guessed that his parents, Xiao Tu''s parents and grandparents had probably restrained their strength in that entire fight with the satyr because they didn''t want to bring down the building if they did use their full strength. Ye Xiu had a sneaking suspicion that his parents were definitely much stronger than the third realm after San Guo had revealed that everybody above that realm restrained their Qi base. The satyr was extremely fluid when it came to its teleportation ability since it was abusing the technique to get out of sticky situations that Ye Xiu managed to put it in. So far, Ye Xiu had managed to not get hit by any of the satyr''s daggers which was definitely a good thing for him since he would''ve suffered from being attacked at a random moment if the satyr felt like it during the battle. He had taken out his katana so that he wouldn''t be defenceless when he was trying to dodge the satyr''s daggers. "You''re pretty good at dodging though you have to be tired when you''ve been flaunting around those flaming whips of yours." The satyr was trying to rile up Ye Xiu but instead, it made him snort in amusement though he made no other noise and he had no intention in talking to the satyr. Ye Xiu never noticed the miasma coming at him from behind when he was suddenly enveloped completely by it. Ye Xiu inhaled a huge amount of the miasma due to surprise and it allowed the satyr to feast on Ye Xiu''s memories. The satyr started to look through every single one of Ye Xiu''s memories, trying to find his worst one so that he could make it into his personal nightmare. "Should I take this memory or this one? Nah, this one seems interesting." The satyr flicked through years of memories quickly but with a speed that allowed him to take a cursory glance before dismissing them. To Ye Xiu, he was in a dark abyss and time seemed to be passing extremely slowly for him. When the satyr flicked to one of the earliest memories that Ye Xiu had, he was obviously intrigued. "There''s another world? What are all these things moving around?" It had managed to find the memories that Ye Xiu had of his previous life and the satyr was taking its time to look through them. It was giggling in childish delight as he saw all the possible things that the cultivation could''ve achieved through different means. Once the satyr managed to sate its curiosity, it found a memory that seemed to be a traumatic experience for Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu hadn''t repressed the memory in any way since he wanted to remember it for what it was but he had placed the memory to one of the darker corners of his mind palace which the satyr happened to stumble upon. "Now this... this is excellent nightmare material. I''m impressed that the kid managed to survive an encounter with another of my kind even though it was because of his guardians. At least I''ll get to have fun tormenting him." The satyr began to mould the nightmare to one that would suit its sadistic needs. "Imagine if I took this kid''s body for myself... I have his memories so his friends won''t be able to recognise anything is wrong." The satyr began to plot as he inserted the nightmare into the kid''s dreamscape. Screams erupted in the forested area as the nightmare took place. Satyrs Malice It didn''t help that he was stuck in complete darkness. He could see nothing because there was nothing to see. He had awoken to the pitch black view which wasn''t disconcerting to him but he had a feeling that he wasn''t supposed to be here. That feeling returned with thrice the force and he realised that he was probably trapped in an illusion. He remembered the fight. He was probably stuck in an illusion. He couldn''t get out of the illusion no matter what he tried. Ye Xiu closed his eyes but was unable to sense his Qi in his body. He was starting to panic since an illusion should not be able to affect how his Qi moved. It was impossible for his Qi to be drained completely. ''Was my Qi completely sealed? But that''s impossible... only those that have a much higher cultivation are able to seal a person''s Qi pool completely. At the very least he could still sense his storage of blood essence. If he wasn''t able to sense his blood essence, he would''ve been extremely concerned. With his own blood essence, he could use it to substitute as his Qi pool. With his eyes still closed, he could feel the darkness pulling him deeper into their embrace though he was already encased by the darkness around him. He let himself be pulled into the darkness since he had nothing else to do and it was likely the satyr''s doing that he was stuck inside this dark abyss anyway. Once he started sinking into the darkness, he noticed that he was touching a stone hard, cold floor. He picked himself up and looked around. When he looked around he already had a sneaking suspicion to where he was. Sighing, he continued to pace around the room that he was once trapped in before. Everything was the same as before. The sounds. The coldness. The door. Ye Xiu pushed open the door that had been the one that had stood in both his and Xiao Tu''s way. Silence greeted him as he opened the door. He drew in a deep breath before letting it go. He started his ascent up the stairs. He took his time to ascend simply because he had no reason to rush and he didn''t want to see the place where his jailer had once lived. Ye Xiu wanted to see what the satyr had planned for him because he had an inkling of an idea about what the satyr was planning to do. He was going to make him relive his worst experience. Ye Xiu wasn''t afraid. No. Definitely not afraid. He had built up his courage over the years and had gotten over the trauma that he had developed from that experience with the help of his friends. He worked up his courage just in case the satyr had anything malicious planned for him and pushed open the cellar door. Surprisingly it was unlocked but Ye Xiu knew that it was probably the satyr who had planned it. Ye Xiu didn''t realise that the cellar door was one that had been made to specifically block out the noise. Noise from outside the cellar could not penetrate past the walls and the door and the same could be said for the noise that came from the inside of the cellar. He could hear a person screaming and that was when he decided to rush to where the sound originated from. The sight he was greeted with made his entire body heat up in anger. Though he knew that this was a nightmare it didn''t help that the scene was definitely one that he did not want to see. He could see the bodies of Shang Yang and Shi Die lying on the floor with blank expressions. Xiao Tu was being tortured by the satyr as it had been skinning him with its daggers. Yan Guo was tied up and unconscious. Even with the anger about to cloud his mind, he was able to calm himself down quickly by ignoring the sights. He was pleasantly interested that the satyr did not bother to have his parents in the same situation but assumed that the satyr was going for his strongest bonds first. The satyr stopped the torture and looked up to see Ye Xiu. "Well aren''t you a smart one. You managed to stay calm even as I torture your friends. Does that mean you are heartless or is it that you don''t care about your friends?" It seemed to be taunting Ye Xiu to attack him recklessly. "Would that mean that I can take your body and kill them slowly and have them ask why I would betray them?" Ye Xiu''s vein on his head seemed to bulge out in irritation as the satyr continued to rant on. "I''ll go back to your parents and I''ll tell all your little dirty secrets before killing them. Letting them know that you weren''t actually their child but a person that stole their baby''s body." Ye Xiu was not in a good mood and knowing that the satyr had access to his memories didn''t make his mood any better. "Instead of killing them outright, I''ll make them my slaves now that I think about it. All your friends are nice and powerful but I''m sure that they''d do anything for you." The satyr started to walk closer towards Ye Xiu with two bloodied daggers in hand. Though Ye Xiu was unable to use his Qi, he moved quickly enough to take one of the daggers out of the satyr''s hands before plunging it into its stomach.If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. "You make me laugh." Snickers burst out into the room as the satyr slowly took out the dagger that was stuck. "Did you really think that you can injure me? This is my domain. I control everything that happens in here. Like the immediate deaths of your friends!" The satyr threw the daggers that it held directly to Xiao Tu''s and Yan Guo''s heads, piercing and killing them instantly. Anger. Despair. Vindictiveness bloomed as Ye Xiu let his emotions consume him. He knew that this was an illusion. He knew that this was a nightmare and yet, he was still unable to control himself when he saw the bodies of his four friends personally. His body unconsciously started to move as he grabbed the throat of the satyr and started its slow asphyxiation. The satyr had dropped its daggers due to the sudden strangulation, which he promptly teleported. It rubbed its sore throat once it had retreated before speaking once again. "You''re mad. I guess I''ll just en-" The satyr was cut off before he finished his sentence when Ye Xiu literally cut off the head of the satyr. He had moved much faster than he thought he could but that was due to the fact that his body was reacting to his anger. He had unconsciously activated one of the bloodline abilities that San Guo had taught him and it had boosted his strength and speed to unprecedented levels since it was fueled with his blood essence. Due to the purity of his blood essence, Ye Xiu would be able to use the ability for a longer period of time before the next drop of blood essence would have to be used. The essence that was being used as a Qi substitute caused a slight burning sensation throughout his whole body. The usage of the bloodline ability that San Guo taught him had caused him to start feeling pain since he was using it to an extent beyond what he had trained to do. The bloodline limit was burning the miasma in his body in reality and was helping him remove it from his system. The nightmare that the satyr had constructed was slowly crumbling due to the lack of miasma in his system. The miasma was a crucial part to the satyr''s ability to construct an illusion that was extremely life-like to the point that the only way for the person to leave was if they had a method to get rid of the miasma inside of their body. Attempting to remove the miasma would be nigh impossible in most cases since the satyr managed to affect the Qi pool that they could draw from, effectively sealing it as long as they were inside of its dimension. It could be said that Ye Xiu was extremely lucky that he had saved up his blood essence for situations such as this. Once the nightmare crumbled into pieces and no longer held Ye Xiu stationary, he immediately lunged for the satyr with his katana appearing in his hand in an instant. Ye Xiu was moving with no hesitation since he had already succumbed to his anger. He wasn''t even thinking since his mind was literally blank. The satyr had never expected the human to be able to get out of its illusion and was definitely not prepared for what had happened. It never noticed that its miasma was being removed since he wasn''t keeping an eye on Ye Xiu. He was busy planning what to do with Ye Xiu''s body but that had cost it with its life. He used ''Despairing Roar'' with ease and the satyr didn''t even have time to react to the sudden attack. Its head flew off in a single strike, limbs going limp. He used his katana to sever every single of the limbs before mutilating the leftover body. The surrounding area where they fought was not recognisable because each time he struck with his katana, he managed to burn away parts of the forest. It was surprising that Ye Xiu managed to burn such a massive area but with the bloodline ability boosting his attacks it was able to do what he wouldn''t have been able to achieve unless he had a few more months or years of training. Now that his Qi pool was unlocked from its sealed state, Ye Xiu''s body stopped unconsciously using the stored blood essence and was now using his actual Qi reserves. The body was burnt and mutilated till it was nothing more than a charred piece of flesh. Ye Xiu''s whips and katana were quickly placed into his dimensional storage before he fell to the ground unconscious. He had literally burnt himself for using an ability to a higher extent than he was supposed to. After minutes of being unconscious, a weasel appeared on the scene. "I''m surprised the kid actually managed to kill the satyr. It definitely looks like he''s exhausted himself though." The weasel picked up the body with surprising strength and placed it onto its back and carried it off. Once the weasel arrived at the open area where it rested, it dropped Ye Xiu down on the floor gracelessly. "He''s heavy. I wonder if he''ll accept my offer. It has been boring stuck in this little place my entire life. I want to go out and play." The weasel was actually hoping that Ye Xiu would accept its offer since it had no intention of staying trapped. "He''s the first opportunity that has ever come and I''m not going to let go. If I do let go, would my next chance ever come or would I be stuck here forever?" The weasel closed its eyes before falling asleep dreaming about life outside of the valley. Ye Xiu''s mind palace that he had built up was in disarray due to the violent perusal of memories when the satyr had placed him into his illusion. No corner of his mind palace was left untouched. The only consolation that Ye Xiu had was that he would be able to repair it to the way it was before due to his eidetic memory that would be aiding him. It would take several days for Ye Xiu to recover from the fight and the weasel was always there to feed and water him during set periods in a day. Familiar Contract Tian Bai was hunting for food for both him and Ye Xiu and was taking his time to get back to where Ye Xiu was lying unconscious. It had been undergoing the same routine for the past three days and the weasel was already getting bored of taking care of the kid. ''How long is the kid going to stay unconscious. It''s actually time-consuming trying to collect ingredients to cook soup for the brat.'' Tian Bai made his way back to the area, it placed down the basket that had carried everything before getting firewood so that it could start a fire. It was in the process of lighting up the fire when he heard Ye Xiu start to get up. ''Looks like the kid is going to wake up. At least I won''t have to get everything by myself now.'' The weasel was grumbling inside of its mind since it was tired from searching for ingredients. The weasel wouldn''t eat inferior food which is why it took so long to find ingredients. "Oi brat, stop feigning unconsciousness. I know you''re already awake when you started to turn all over." The weasel scampered up onto Ye Xiu''s body and started to slap his face in amusement. "I don''t know your name or age so I''ll just continue to call you brat until you wake up." The weasel''s tiny hands were slapping his face with speed that Ye Xiu looked like he was shaking his head. Ye Xiu groaned due to being hit repeatedly, he was going to take his time to fully wake himself but with the slapping, he had no choice but to actually sit up. He rubbed his eyes and let them adjust to the bright light. He looked around for what was slapping him when his eyes landed on a weasel. His eyebrows furrowed in annoyance, "Did you seriously have to slap me? I was going to wake up by myself anyway. I just wanted to take my time." The weasel had moved to the top of Ye Xiu''s head and was making a nest out of it. "I''m not going to wait for you. I want you to cook the food this time. I''ve been feeding you and watering you for the past few days. It''s your turn to return the favour." The weasel yawned as if it was bored of the conversation already. "I''m going to go take a nap. Wake me up when the food is ready." Ye Xiu snorted at Tian Bai''s behaviour but didn''t disturb the nap that the weasel was now taking. He fixed his mind on the task at hand and lit up the firewood with his Qi. He assessed the ingredients that the weasel brought and was pleasantly surprised that the weasel was able to recognise and find such high-grade ingredients. He saw the assortment of ingredients and quickly came up with what he was going to cook. The meal would mainly consist of soup, vegetable dishes and a single meat dish. He was obviously going to savour the meat that he had as long as it didn''t rot and with his seasonings and vegetables, he was sure that he could make the meat dish nutritious as well. He was going to infuse Qi into all the dishes because he wanted to surprise the weasel. He cleaned his hands with water and drying them off with his fire Qi before starting to cook. It was a little less than an hour when Ye Xiu had finished cooking. The meat dish took the longest to prepare due to the meat needing to be tenderised, he had used a prepared marinade that was a secret recipe that he and Shi Die had experimented for days before declaring it as finished. They had a special way to store the marinade for long periods of time which certainly came in useful for them. Once everything was finished, Ye Xiu picked the weasel off from his head and set him down on a log gently. The weasel was definitely cute when it was sleeping. The cute innocent face would melt hearts at the sight of it. He was thinking whether he should wake up the weasel nicely or be extra annoying to get back at him. He decided to be the civilised one and called for Tian Bai to awaken. The weasel didn''t stir from its slumber. Ye Xiu called once again for the weasel to awaken but it seemed as if the weasel was in too deep of a sleep to hear him. He mumbled under his breath, "Surprised the weasel is taking a deep sleep instead of a normal nap." He poked the weasel in the stomach a few times and he was rewarded with the weasel staring at him with its beady little eyes. Ye Xiu shrugged. "You didn''t wake up when I called for you normally. I simply resorted to other means." The weasel snorted before getting up. "I assume you finished preparing the meal?" The weasel acted as if it was royalty. "I hope this meal will impress me otherwise there''ll be consequences for you. Brat." The weasel walked over to the bowls that had been placed on a blanket. "What are these things that you have placed the food in? They hold liquid without even leaking." The weasel scrutinised the bowls that the food had been placed in. "Just imagine them as a container that can''t be closed. We eat from the bowls and we wash them for future usage." Ye Xiu had taken out a pair of chopsticks and a spoon for himself from his dimensional storage and begun eating. Tian Bai watched Ye Xiu use his apparatus to eat before throwing himself onto the bowl that contained the meat. Before Tian Bai could begin to eat, Ye Xiu had picked him up. "Wash your body before you eat." Ye Xiu took out another bowl and poured water into it so the weasel could wash.The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. The weasel impatiently did as Ye Xiu asked before jumping back to the meat and devouring it. The meal was finished quickly since Ye Xiu had to keep up with the speed that the weasel ate the meat and vegetables. "I''m surprised you even eat the vegetables, I thought your species was one that only consumed meat." The weasel sniffed in derision. "Try living here for a long period of time, you can''t always find meat so I have to substitute it for fruits and plants." Ye Xiu didn''t question the weasel on the topic any longer. They washed their hands and mouths to get rid of the oil that had come from the meat. The weasel stood up on its hind legs and looked up at Ye Xiu. "Have you thought about my offer." It immediately asked the question that had been on its mind for the past few days. It was extremely worried that Ye Xiu would deny him the opportunity to leave. Ye Xiu sat on the ground silently once the weasel had asked his question. The silence continued for a few breaths worth of time before Ye Xiu spoke up. "I have thought about it." He said nothing else as he had gone back to thinking. ''Though I haven''t interacted with him as much as I had planned, he definitely seems like he wouldn''t betray or use me easily. Not that the familiar bond would allow him to betray me anyway but it''s better to be safe. He helped nurse me when I was recovering and I know he nursed me since I was still aware of things that happened around me even though I was supposed to be unconscious.'' The weasel was now panicking since Ye Xiu wasn''t speaking. ''Please, please, please, please accept my offer.'' Tian Bai was screaming inside of his mind for Ye Xiu to accept his offer. "I accept your offer. I will have you bound to me as my first familiar. I only know of the most binding familiar contract since it is the most secure method of bonding. If you have any disagreements with me using the most binding contract that you are free to offer whatever method you have." The weasel shook its head since it had no knowledge of familiar contracts. "We''ll begin immediately then." Ye Xiu took out a piece of parchment that he had found in the storage vaults of the Dimension. The parchment was a contract and Ye Xiu was currently using a calligraphy brush to write down the rules of their bond. He checked it over with Tian Bai who agreed with the rules and he placed it on the ground as he started the next step. Ye Xiu had bottles of his own blood that he was going to use for the ritual. The ritual required the person who initiated the contract to use their blood to draw the necessary ritual circles on the ground where they would be holding the ritual. He drew the circles with a steady hand and was quickly finished. "Seven drops of both our blood essence mixed together." He took out another bottle and cut his palm with the sacrificial dagger and forced his stored blood essence out of his body. Once seven drops were added in, he handed over the bottle to the weasel who bit his tiny hand and did the same. Ye Xiu shook the bottle to mix the blood essences together. With the blood essence inside of the bottle, he poured it into his mouth and swallowed the blood. He gagged at the taste and the burning sensation that followed after. He pushed his Qi into the ritual circles that he had drawn to activate them for the ritual before repeating the words necessary for the contract to be created and put into effect. "As my familiar, Tian Bai will be free to do whatever he wants as long as it causes no harm to his Master. He will serve for as long as his Master lives and the Master will treat the familiar with respect and kindness. Our contract shall be overseen by the heavens and if the rules of the contract that are written are broken, judgement shall take place." Tian Bai started to push his Qi into the ritual circle as well so that his soul would be bound together with Ye Xiu. The majority of the work was actually done by the contract which would automatically form the bond when the correct steps for the ritual were followed. Tian Bai was tired due to the changes in his soul. His soul would now inhabit Ye Xiu''s soul space if he wasn''t summoned. To be summoned, Ye Xiu wouldn''t have to supply Qi to the familiar but would have to feed and water it. If it wasn''t summoned, the familiar could simply live off the soul energy. Tian Bai bowed his head to his new master. "I''m so thankful that you accepted my offer. I can finally get out of this boring place! I''ve always wanted to see what the world was like." Ye Xiu crossed his arms in amusement since he could see the similarities between Tian Bai and Xiao Tu. "Now about that thing with the test. Are you sure it''ll work?" "I''m sure it''ll work. The information told me so." Tian Bai assured Ye Xiu. Ye Xiu wasn''t too confident but had faith in Tian Bai either way. They continued to talk to each other so that they could learn about each other''s personalities more when Tian Bai was pulled into Ye Xiu''s soul space. Ye Xiu was promptly moved back to a place that he was definitely familiar with. He had been moved back to the giant room that he had been stuck inside for the first stage. He was wondering why he got pulled back here but assumed that it was to let him know that the second stage had been completed. He tried to mentally communicate with Tian Bai to see if he was alright and he was relieved to hear that Tian Bai was safe and was going to sleep inside of his soul space for now. Third Stage Just as Ye Xiu was about to sit down and meditate, the room was completely lit up. Knowing that he wouldn''t have his chance to meditate, he looked around the room to see if he could find the instructions for whatever he needed to do. It was barely a minute after the room had been brightened when a voice sounded out throughout the room. "You have passed the second stage of the test. Rewards shall be awarded dependent on your performance. The first checkpoint required you to kill 1000 Grade 2 Qi Beasts. Rewards for killing all 1000 in 10 days is access to choose a single item from the first floor of the storage vaults of the testing area. The second checkpoint required you to kill 100 Grade 3 Qi Beasts. Rewards for killing all 100 is access to choose a single item from the first floor of the storage vaults of the testing area." "The third checkpoint required you to kill a single Grade 4 Qi Beast. Rewards are not given for not completing checkpoint. Secret task: Acquire a familiar from the fourth grade. Rewards for acquiring a familiar is access to choose 3 items from the first floor of the storage vaults of the testing area. Participant has managed to complete the second stage in the time limit given and will not be punished." "Rewards will be given at the end of the test if you are still alive." The voice stopped speaking after that morbid statement. Ye Xiu raised his eyebrows. He was surprised that he got a reward by gaining a familiar when Tian Bai''s voice sounded out in his mind. "You get rewarded dependent on the grade of the beast that you bond with. A Grade 2 Qi Beast familiar has the worst rewards whilst a Grade 4 Qi Beast familiar has the best rewards. I wouldn''t lie to you because I''m very honest. This storage vault seems really interesting though but seriously? You only get the rewards at the end of the test and only if you survive? That''s pretty morbid and it is very foreboding." Ye Xiu shrugged. "It doesn''t matter. It''s probably to scare those that take the test." Ye Xiu was about to say something else to Tian Bai when he was interrupted by the voice. "The third stage will start in two weeks as a reward for clearing the second stage with exemplary results. You can choose to go back to the second stage arena so that you''ll have a supply of food and water. If not, there is the choice to be transported into a villa that has been prepared for participants to live in. I kindly suggest that you rest up and prepare yourself for the third stage because no breaks will be given during that period of time." Ye Xiu spoke to Tian Bai to see what he wanted. "Where do you want to go?" Tian Bai didn''t even hesitate to answer. "Let''s go to the villa. I don''t feel like going back to the valley at all." "Sure. It''s your choice anyway." Ye Xiu spoke aloud so that the voice would know that he had chosen to go to the villa. They were transported into the villa where they would be staying for the next two weeks. "Well... guess this will be our shelter for the next two weeks. What do you think we can do?" The weasel was curious about what they were going to do if they were going to be stuck at a place. "I thought they we might as well just train. I mean I have no idea what is going to come up in the next stage so I might as well prepare myself and get some training in. Every little bit of training counts and I don''t want to waste the opportunity that the free time gives me." Ye Xiu rubbed his neck as he spoke. Tian Bai rolled his eyes. "Yeah if you''re going to be training, I''ll just check out what there is to do. I''m not going to just train all day. That''s completely boring." He was not going to be like Ye Xiu who would spend all his time on training and nothing else. He wanted to have fun. It was one of the main reasons why he wanted to leave the valley in the first place. "Can you summon me, I want to at least see the villa for myself." Ye Xiu did as he asked and Tian Bai ran off to see the different rooms of the villa. He sighed in exasperation since Tian Bai resembled Xiao Tu way too much. He was happy that the weasel had such childish tendencies but remembered that Tian Bai had told him he was the youngest Qi Beast in the entire valley. He started his own investigation of the villa, mainly to find the kitchen and training grounds. - 2 weeks later - "It seems that our resting period is about to end." Ye Xiu declared when they were eating breakfast one day. "How do you reckon you know that?" Tian Bai questioned with his usual boredom when it came to topics such as this. He asked the question merely on a whim so that Ye Xiu wouldn''t feel like he was alone.Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. Ye Xiu didn''t mind that Tian Bai was asking the question for the sake of asking a question. "I know this due to the fact that there was an announcement made by the voice whilst you were still sleeping your life away. I still don''t understand how you can sleep 18 hours a day without suffering any side-effects." Tian Bai puffed up in pride. "My talent in sleeping for long periods of time might be due to the boredom. Once I ran out of things to do in the valley, I spent the majority of my time sleeping away. The other Qi Beasts didn''t bother attacking me since I''m very efficient at hiding. The reason why I don''t suffer any side-effects from sleeping so much? Well, I use Qi to cure my symptoms so they never affect me in the first place." "Only you would come up with something so ridiculous just for the sake of sleeping." Ye Xiu shook his head due to how amused he was. "Sleep is very important and don''t you forget it! You probably don''t understand the true worth of sleep!" Tian Bai jumped up and bit Ye Xiu''s finger, drawing blood. "Don''t bite me! Your teeth are very sharp, I''m still amazed that they can get through my skin so easily even if I''m enhancing it with ''Tyrant''s Physique.'' Either way, we''ll be leaving in an hour, so take everything you want to take and I''ll place it in my dimensional storage before I throw you back into the soul space." Ye Xiu was fascinated by Tian Bai''s teeth. The day seemed to be a good day as Tian Bai rushed off to find his toys that he managed to find in the villa. In less than an hour, Tian Bai had gotten everything he wanted including multiple comfortable pillows and couches. When they packed everything up, Ye Xiu had Tian Bai return to his soul space, he waited for the time to run out where he was transported out of the villa and back to the grand room that he seemed to be entering quite often. The room was always being relit every time he came in, at first the spectacle was obviously fascinating but after the first time it became rather dull. The voice sounded out. "The third stage will begin immediately. As I speak a statue will appear in the middle of the room and the instructions for the third stage will be on the statue. This is the final stage but it has the highest possibility of death since the failure of the third stage will result in death." The voice had finished speaking and Ye Xiu''s eyebrows rose in bafflement. "I think that I should be surprised that the voice literally told us that we would die if we fail. It was rather blunt but I like it." Ye Xiu walked to the middle of the room where he could see what the voice was talking about. It looked like a massive humanoid dragon which was holding a massive greatsword. Ye Xiu used his observation technique just in case he missed anything. He could see that the entire statue was infused with more Qi that he had ever seen at a single time and that was him comparing it to the house in the Dimension that was already saturated with Qi. Ye Xiu turned off his observation technique because the huge amount of Qi was actually starting to burn his eyes through some unknown means. He looked at the statue and noted that at the base of the statue there were several other tiny statues that held plaques that had writing engraved onto them. He read the words carefully and quickly and felt like water was poured over his head. "This stage is the final one that the participant will have to face. The stage is to test the speed of comprehension of the participant." "Those that don''t contain the bloodline of a dragon will automatically fail the stage since the technique that needs to be learnt requires a dragon''s bloodline to utilise. It is highly unlikely that any participant will not have a dragon bloodline awakened since the only way to enter the testing area is to have a dragon bloodline already awakened. There is one other place where it is possible to enter the testing area but the requirements are harsh." Ye Xiu was slightly happy. "I''m very glad that I have a dragon bloodline then. I wouldn''t have wanted to automatically fail and die simply because I didn''t meet the requirements." He continued to read the information that was given. "The technique that you must learn is as follows. Ignite the blood essence that you have, don''t have it converted into Qi just yet but have it moved throughout the Qi Pathways. No specific pathway has to be followed as long as it stays inside of the Qi Pathways. Add in your own Qi and mix it together with the travelling blood essence. The two must be completely mixed to the point that they can no longer be separated." "Move that mixture into your heart and hold it there for thirty seconds. Changes should follow. You will notice scales starting to appear on your skin. The first stage will be considered complete once you manage to cover the entire body in scales. The specifics for the second stage of the technique will be revealed once you master the first stage. The final stage of the test will last for an entire month due to the difficulty of the technique and the requirements needed to activate it in the first place." "No food will be provided for the entire stage but water shall be provided. The technique will be trained in the fastest possible way when the participant is hungry which is why food will not be given to the participant. It also tests the ability of a participant to sustain themselves with Qi. Though if the participant already has food prepared then they are free to eat it as they like since it means the participant was already prepared and it counts as the participant being smart." "The final stage is completed when the participant manages to reach the second stage of the technique and uses it in combat to defeat an opponent that will be assigned to them." Ye Xiu grimaced. ''I should be very lucky that I have so much smoked meat stored. I can''t believe that the test would something like this though. If what the information here is correct then apparently hunger will help me improve in the usage of the ability much faster? I can abstain from food for an entire month if I use my Qi to sustain myself though I''m unsure how it''ll affect me later on.'' "Tian Bai, there won''t be food provided here but I still have food for you stored in the dimensional storage. I''ll take it out for you when you are hungry." Ye Xiu set himself to the task of mastering the ability as quickly as he could. First Scale Ye Xiu had started his training with the technique with high expectations at first but with the multiple failures in the past day, he was certainly glum. He had found out quickly that the failure in using the technique wouldn''t force him to use the mixture that he was forced to make with his blood essence and Qi. The only time he would have to make the mixture again was when he had run out of it and that would only happen if he managed to complete his transformation. It was apparent to Ye Xiu that the mixture would only be consumed for the technique when he was successful so he was at least happy at the fact that he had a way to tell whether he had succeeded in the technique or not. Though this was helpful in that aspect, it didn''t help that he had no idea what he was doing wrong. He had followed the instructions to the best of his ability yet it proved futile as no results had shown themselves, He was currently meditating due to his exhausted mind. He wanted to continue his training but he was stopped by Tian Bai after he saw the mentality that Ye Xiu was training in. Even though Tian Bai was one who despised training, he still knew proper training etiquette from the inherited knowledge that he gained. Ye Xiu was calmly thinking since his meditative state required him to be in control of his emotions. He was able to keep the mixture from travelling around his entire body and managed to store it in a similar way to how he stored blood essence. He had seen no mentions in the instructions about being able to store the mixture in such a way but thought that it might have been something that they wanted the participant to find out for themselves. ''I''m glad that Tian Bai pushed me to take a break since I was definitely not in the right state of mind. Now, where have the issues in the technique come from? I have followed each of the steps but it feels like I''m missing something. I know I''m missing something because when I reflect back to when I was training it definitely felt like there was a crucial step I was missing but I was probably too stressed or annoyed from having so many failures to notice.'' Whilst Ye Xiu was trying to figure out what exactly he was missing, Tian Bai was running around the room to find something interesting to do. He had no intention of being cooped up in the soul space and had no intention of training together with Ye Xiu since it was boring, and since the room was so large, Tian Bai was certain that there must be something that would entertain him. Tian Bai''s speed allowed him to jump up to places that shouldn''t have been reached though he was aided by the statues that stood on the sides of the room. He was climbing a statue when he suddenly heard a click sound. He had just stepped on a statue''s palm when he heard the sound. He jumped off the palm and heard the clicking sound again. He jumped back onto the palm and once again he heard it. He started to play with the sound since he hadn''t been able to find anything else interesting and this was definitely better than just running around searching for something. He played with the palm for the next ten minutes before getting bored of it. ''I''m bored. I need something else to do.'' He made his way down the statue carefully but quickly and ran back to where Ye Xiu was. Ye Xiu had done a short meditation session and was already back at training. Tian Bai started to gnaw on the smoked meat that he had been given without care. What he didn''t realise was that the palm he was playing on had a switch and the switch had a function that would certainly surprise the duo. The room they were in didn''t have a very high density in Qi but with the switch being activated, the density of the Qi would get to suffocating levels. The room was actually one that was supposed to be used for meditation but had been redesigned so that it could also be used as a testing area. It was highly unlikely for a person to stumble across the switch since it was in such an obscure place that nobody would even be looking at. The density of Qi in the room would continue to rise and peak unless Tian Bai pressed on the switch again to drain the Qi back to where it came from. Ye Xiu noticed the increased in the Qi since he could feel his cultivation technique running at a much faster speed. He used his multitasking skill to cultivate in both the dragon and phoenix cultivation methods at the same time which is why he noticed the change in Qi density. "Tian Bai, have you noticed that the room has a much higher Qi density than before?" Ye Xiu looked to his weasel familiar. The weasel was continuing to gnaw on the meat until Ye Xiu flicked it. "Huh? What did you say?" Ye Xiu rolled his eyes at his familiar''s antics but repeated himself nonetheless. "I asked you whether you notice the increase in the Qi density in the room." The weasel contemplated the question before answering.This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it. "I didn''t notice it until you asked me about it? I was busy eating food so I didn''t really take notice of what was happening around me." Tian Bai seemed to have a one-track mind when it came to food. Ye Xiu seemed exasperated at this point. "Did you do anything to cause this? I know you were running around when I was meditating so it couldn''t have been me that triggered this change. If it wasn''t you then it could be the test that is providing benefits but I sincerely doubt that since they said ti was supposed to be the hardest stage." Ye Xiu continued to prattle on and forgot that he had asked Tian Bai a question but had never given him the opportunity to even answer the question in the first place. "Oops, I forgot about that question that I asked you but go ahead and answer it for me." He looked at Tian Bai who seemed really bored with the entire situation. "I may have stumbled upon something." The weasel''s tone of voice made him seem as if he was trying to pass off as an innocent bystander. "I might have played around with that something?" His tone became questioning since he was unsure whether it was actually his fault. Ye Xiu sighed. "Go back to wherever you found your entertainment and fix it. It''s actually getting hard to breathe in here and that''s saying something since I''m rather used to higher Qi density environments." Tian Bai nodded his understanding and quickly scurried back to the statue and jumped on the palm one last time before running back to his meat. He had been interrupted from his eating session and wanted to get back to it as quickly as he could. When Ye Xiu noticed that the Qi was visibly disappearing to his eyes he nodded his head in a satisfied manner. He returned to his training now that he could concentrate on it instead of suffocating. It was a few hours later that Ye Xiu managed to figure out what could''ve been the missing detail that he needed to successfully use the technique. He hadn''t been visualising his transformation. Though Ye Xiu found it hard to believe that he would need to visualise his transformation in order for it to work since Shi Die had no need for such things. He categorised Shi Die''s transformation being an instinctual one whereas his transformation was a learned one. Though talking about visualising his transformation was easy, it certainly didn''t help that he had no idea what a dragon''s scale looked like. He had the visual detail of the scale from the statue where the humanoid dragon warrior stood but he believed that the way to properly visualise a transformation was to know how it felt and worked. He knew that he was probably overthinking it so on a whim he visualised the looks of his transformation instead of anything else. He followed each of the steps to perfections whilst imagining the transformation. He didn''t imagine the complete transformation that the humanoid dragon statue had but had merely imagined the scales on his body. The reason why he did this was that he knew that he wouldn''t be able to complete a full transformation immediately since he hadn''t even stepped into the first stage of the technique. He also took his own advice that he had told Shang Yang to never visualise too much and get the basic details which wouldn''t be overlooked by others if they watched him under scrutiny. Though he failed this attempt he continued his attempts since he knew that he was getting close. He had this feeling in his body that was urging him to achieve the transformation faster. It took several attempts before results started to show for themselves and even then the results were barely there. When he succeeded he only managed to get a single scale that was on his face. The scale wasn''t big and when he touched it he could feel the softness of the scale. He was obviously surprised that the scale could feel so soft. Tian Bai had tried to bite through the scale but failed spectacularly. Tian Bai was now busy massaging his teeth in sorrow. After the first success, Ye Xiu knew that he had gone on the correct path and stopped training for a moment. He knew that once he succeeded he would''ve needed to stop. He wanted to take the time to review what had gone right and what he felt during the transformation no matter how small it was. He looked at the smoked meat that Tian Bai seemed to be enjoying and sighed sulkily. He knew that he wasn''t supposed to touch the food but the smell of it had gotten to him. He reached his hand towards the smoked meat before Tian Bai suddenly jumped on his arm and bit it. "I can see you trying to take the meat. THIS IS MY MEAT! MY FOOD!" The weasel shouted angrily and defended the food as if it was his precious babies. "Didn''t you say that you weren''t going to eat as well? Weren''t you going to use your Qi to stave off your hunger?" The weasel was now speaking in an accusatory tone Ye Xiu looked slightly guilty since he knew that it was his own fault for succumbing to his own desire. He moved further away from where Tian Bai was eating so that the smell wouldn''t get to him. There was barely any wind in the room to bring the smell over so he didn''t have to move too far. With that little debacle over, Ye Xiu went back to a meditative state. He started to review his first transformation before attempting to improve in the technique once again. He noticed that the transformation barely made the mixture change in volume. It looked to be the same amount. He believed that the mixture would be completely used if he managed to complete the entire transformation technique but if he could only do a partial transformation, only a portion of the mixture would be used. It was a logical deduction based on what he had already seen. This meant that he didn''t have to use too much of his blood essence. He only had a few more drops of blood essence stored up and those were for emergencies. He wasn''t sure that he would be able to master the technique without using all of his blood essences but he had to try. He wanted to save up the blood essence just in case the opponent he had to face later on was strong. He spent the next two weeks practising and abstaining from food. Refining Technique Ye Xiu had managed to finish covering his entire body in scales though not without effort on his part. It still counted as mastering the first stage since once you manage to cover your entire body in scales the first time, the succeeding transformations would come with greater ease. Once Ye Xiu had accomplished his first goal, he had immediately stopped to celebrate with Tian Bai. Though he knew that the test was far from over, he still wanted a tiny celebration. He knew that Shi Die had a hard time achieving control over his transformation and he was happy that he had something else in common with his friend. They celebrated for an hour since Tian Bai pushed Ye Xiu to meditate since his eating was being disturbed by him. Tian Bai had watched Ye Xiu carefully the past few weeks that he had been with him and had been surprised about his personality and the way he treated others. He had known that Ye Xiu had trauma. There was certainly no way for Ye Xiu to get past his trauma in such a short amount of time especially when he spent the majority of his time training. He never had a chance to rest even in the two weeks that they had been given at the villa. Tian Bai was certain. Yes, he was very certain that Ye Xiu''s coping mechanism was to forget about the event and train as best as he could. Training took his mind off other matters and that was what mattered to Ye Xiu. Tian Bai, however, saw that behaviour for what it was and wanted to help him. Though he had his own quirks, he was a very observant weasel, after all, he had survived years in the valley by his lonesome. He was only a few years of age yet he felt like an older brother quietly watching over the younger sibling. It gave a sort of warmth in Tian Bai''s tiny heart and he wouldn''t do anything to trade it away. Tian Bai watched as Ye Xiu meditated. He may be a person that was easily bored but that never stopped him from training. The weasel had its own method of training which would''ve been bizarre to anyone who heard about the training method though not completely out of the world. Many cultivators knew that Qi Beasts had unique ways of cultivation which meant that Tian Bai would be able to easily explain his rapid growth. Tian Bai hadn''t told Ye Xiu what species he actually was and allowed him to assume. It had learnt to hide the traits of its original species from its predators and Tian Bai would continue to do so due to the danger it would pose if word got out. His species was one that had the potential to surpass many Qi Beasts and it was only due to his young age that he was stuck in the valley in the first place. He watched as Ye Xiu got out of his meditative pose and walk over towards the statue. It was a short meditation session but he believed that Ye Xiu always had his own explanations for everything that he did. Ye Xiu moved toward the statue so that he could take a look at what the next stage of the technique would require. He was surprisingly able to review his first successful completion of the first stage rather quickly. He wanted nothing more than to train but then realised that he shouldn''t be so excited. Sure, he had managed to get his entire body covered in scales but it certainly took too much time. He was definitely not going to be able to use it for combat purposes unless he focused on dodging for the entirety of the time that the scales appeared. However, he didn''t want that. His transformation should be fast just like Shi Die''s and he should be able to shift between his forms with ease yet he was complacent with only covering his body in scales at a slow speed. Reigniting his flames of passion, Ye Xiu backed off from the statue and focused on learning how to achieve the first stage of transformation in the shortest amount of time possible. He would still learn the second stage of the technique since it was required for him to even be eligible for the final fight against a random opponent. He had made a pattern of his training, an hour to refine his transformation speed and the next two hours to be spent on the second stage of the technique. The information that was giving for the second stage of the technique was vague. Vague to the point that the only information that it actually had was the body part that he had to transform. Luckily for him, it wasn''t too hard to imagine the specific part since he had seen similar things. The claws of a dragon were definitely different compared to Shi Die''s, though that wasn''t something to be surprised about since Shi Die''s transformation was more of a canine species whilst his bloodline was of a reptilian species. The differences in the claws weren''t that massive of a change though he would still have trouble trying to visualise the claws. He eventually settled with what he could see on the statue and apparently his mind was able to supply what else was needed.Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original. Though it wasn''t stated Ye Xiu could obviously tell that a dragon''s claws were sure to be strong. It would be unlikely for a dragon''s claw to even break when it was busy smashing through buildings. He had imagined the claws to be dense and strong yet not too large. Each of the claws was easily identifiable and had a distinct curve to them. They were sharp. That was something he was sure about. His efforts led to him being able to get a single claw on his scales hands in no time. He was surprised that it was a much easier task compared to the scales but then remembered that the scales were probably one of the most important features about a dragon in the first place so it would''ve obviously been hard to replicate such a feat. His trial and errors continued. He did spend the majority of his time with his transformation training but he obviously delegated a portion of his time to one of the most important things that Ye Xiu would have to do. Combat training. Sure, he could perfect his transformation technique for all he cared but he still needed time and combat experience to get used to the changes that he has with the transformation. His weight changed. It becomes nearly double the weight he originally was and that was only with the scales. He would have to practice fighting using his claws. He would have to make sure he knew how to use his scales defensively since there were apparently different types of scales that would be most helpful during a fight. The changes were a welcome one with all the benefits that came with but there were always going to be cons to the changes. His control in strength had obviously been hurt and Ye Xiu doubted that he could swing his katana properly with the control he had currently. The change in weight might not seem like a big deal but it affected his motor skills greatly and due to that, he had obviously spent quite a bit of time to gain back his control. Without the transformation, his control was still the same. Nice and perfect. It only frustrated Ye Xiu to see that his transformation had affected his own combat potential if he didn''t relearn how to control himself. Ye Xiu didn''t have enough time for all of this so he settled for the method of brute strength. It was a less than graceful approach to fighting but Ye Xiu was sure that it would work out as long as didn''t spend too long fighting in his transformed state. He still felt much more comfortable in his original form. Tian Bai had to spar with Ye Xiu to correct the most glaring mistakes in his new combat style in the transformed state and it showed the difference. Before Ye Xiu could at least swing his katana to block a few of Tian Bai''s attacks, now he could barely react to Tian Bai smashing into his scales. Though the upside to his slower movements was that the attacks didn''t even faze him. Tian Bai was obviously put off by the strong defence. The schedule became a set one once Ye Xiu managed to fully manifest his full set of claws on both hands. He didn''t pursue past the second stage of the technique and instead started to refine the speed that his transformation took place. He had obviously taken a look at the instructions of the third stage and he had seen that it was nearly as vague as the second stage was though it definitely wasn''t just a few words. "To master the third stage, one must relinquish control to their dragon counterpart if they wish to complete the transformation. Be warned that this is the most dangerous part of the technique and is liable to have the user to go berserk. When the dragon counterpart takes over, it will automatically complete the humanoid dragon transformation for the user however from there on, the use must wrest control of the body back to themselves." "If the user is unable to wrest control of their body, it is best to knock the user unconscious or kill them if no other solution is present." Ye Xiu grimaced at the implications of the third stage of the technique. It was also the main reason why he stayed away from that particular stage until he felt that he was ready and it would also give him more time to refine his transformation process. He had less than a few days till the deadline was up but he was sure that he could at least cut down the transformation time to half of its current time. Tian Bai had helped Ye Xiu because he was his friend and even if he wasn''t his friend, he would''ve done it so that he could stave off his boredom. Tian Bai had managed to find many other little secret mechanisms that had different effects and he loved to torment Ye Xiu with them. One of the little mechanisms would''ve been a problem if Ye Xiu and Tian weren''t resistant to the poisons that were released into the air. Tian Bai messed around with the Qi density mechanism especially during fights so that Ye Xiu could get used to the environment. Ye Xiu could now manage to fight in the higher Qi density environment without suffocating. Ye Xiu had managed to cut down his transformation time to less than fifteen seconds, it was not optimal for most people in a combat situation but Ye Xiu knew that he could still shave off the time needed after the test when he passed it. Though it wasn''t optimal, Ye Xiu managed to use his multi-tasking to his ability. He was able to focus on the transformation whilst continuing to fight to the best of his ability. It was a gradual change but Ye Xiu also preferred it in the same that Shi Die preferred his gradual change. It allowed him to adjust to the changes in the body so that it wouldn''t affect his combat ability. He could brute force his way through the battles but he was unsure what his opponent''s abilities were going to be like. Tian Bai continued to spar with Ye Xiu so that he would have higher chances to win the fight that was coming. Tian Bai reasoned with Ye Xiu that the rules of the stage never mentioned that it was a one on one fight which meant that he would be joining to help. Third Stage Opponent The final day of the stage had come and Ye Xiu was busy resting. He had been resting so that he could rejuvenate his mind and body so that he wouldn''t be tired when it came to the fight. Tian Bai was eating as usual since they knew that they still had a few hours before the opponent would arrive for the testing. Ye Xiu had been shaving off the time needed for his transformation and he was now pleased with his achievement. Ye Xiu had been learning how to fight with his claws by doing similar training to what Shi Die had done when he had first come into his transformation. Ye Xiu realised why Shi Die had never bothered trying to use weapons considering his claws seemed to be just as sharp as his own though not as durable. The claws were a powerful tool and it felt much more natural to use the claws as part of an extension of their body. Sure, Ye Xiu had wielded his katana and whip for years on end but even then he felt that the claws were innately made for him to master. Which in this case, was the truth since his claws were part of his own body. He particularly liked gouging holes into the room''s floor that were promptly reformed in little to no time. This little piece of information was going to be a crucial part of Ye Xiu''s plans. He had several different plans for several different scenarios and he was ready to take on his opponent. After his meditation session, Ye Xiu took out his cauldron and began making a few pills. They were mainly pills to restore Qi and to heal injuries. Ye Xiu had been keeping up with his alchemy skills ever since he was shoved into the valley. He was lucky that the valley was abundant in materials otherwise he would''ve felt like his alchemy skills degraded. He didn''t mind that he was actually using some Qi now because it was technically a warm-up for him. He had finished making quite a few batches of pills before stopping. Ye Xiu had Tian Bai remember where each of the mechanisms was so that he could use that to his advantage when he was fighting the opponent. Time was running out so Ye Xiu got up to stretch. He took out his katana and whip and held them in his hands. He had less than a few seconds left before his opponent would be announced. "The participant has managed to reach the second stage of the Dragonoid Transformation technique and will now be assessed on his skill to use the technique in a combat situation. It is not necessary to use the technique to fight the opponent for the entirety of the match however the fatal blow must be dealt when the participant is transformed. There is no time limit to how long the fight will last and will only in the death of either fighter." The voice sounded out as he waited. "I wish luck to the participants and let us hope that you pass the test. May the final portion begin!" The voice faded as it said its last words. The opponent appeared in front of the Dragonoid warrior statue. Ye Xiu assessed his opponent. ''My opponent seems to also be able to use the transformation technique. That means that his defence would probably on par or stronger than mine. It also means that he''ll be using his claws to fight. Wait... It seems like my opponent has the completed transformed state.'' Ye Xiu noted the wings, tails, horns and a fully transformed head. ''I guess the horns and fully transformed head changes to look more like a dragon''s. It definitely looks cool now that I can see it in reality. I mean I thought it was just a random detail on the statue but it definitely looks fierce.'' He nodded his head in appreciation of the looks of the transformed state. Though he did also see that his opponent''s transformation didn''t quite look like his. There were differences especially when it came to their scales. ''His scales are of a completely different colour to mine, does it change according to the person or does it mean that his scales are stronger than mine?'' It was when he was thinking about the differences that his opponent attacked. His opponent wasn''t using his claws but was actually fighting by wielding two weapons, a dagger and sword. It was an unusual combo to Ye Xiu but he could say nothing about the combination since he himself had an unusual combination with his whip and katana. Ye Xiu knew not to forget about his opponent''s claws since that would simply be stupid. He was conflicted about staying in his untransformed state or his Dragonoid form. It seemed as if he would have to go into his Dragonoid form but he felt that he should test the waters with his normal body first. Whip held in his left hand, he flicked it ferociously towards his opponent. He had his Qi thorns already formed on the whip to see whether he would even be able to pierce through the scales. Surprisingly, his opponent went to catch the whip in its teeth and it didn''t even seem to be fazed by the Qi thorns. Ye Xiu''s eyebrows rose since the mouth was supposed to be a rather unprotected part of a body.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement. His opponent didn''t seem to have any intention of letting go of the whip and instead jerked his head, slightly pulling Ye Xiu towards him. Whilst Ye Xiu was stumbling due to the sudden pull, his opponent moved quickly and thrust his sword towards Ye Xiu''s unprotected body. Tian Bai managed to redirect the hit in time and instead of hitting Ye Xiu, the sword struck the ground. Tian Bai started to launch his own furious attack against the Dragonoid. Tian Bai knew. He simply knew. He knew that he wouldn''t be able to penetrate past the defences but he had to stall Ye Xiu''s opponent for long enough so that he could get his bearings back. Ye Xiu managed to stabilise himself and was thankful that Tian Bai managed to distract his opponent. Since Tian Bai was distracting his opponent, Ye Xiu had enough time to retrieve his whip. He placed his whip back into his dimensional storage for when he needed it to bind his opponent. He had a feeling that he wouldn''t need the whip anymore in the fight since he could see the devastating power behind the attacks that his opponent was throwing out. Tian Bai was dodging all the attacks easily but all it could take was a single fatal mistake before they were heavily injured. Ye Xiu was very unsure about Tian Bai''s defence which made him partly worried about him getting injured. He moved closer and looked for any weak spots that he could attack. Tian Bai was definitely doing a good job annoying his opponent seeing as he kept trying to stab him from either one of his weapons. Ye Xiu had spotted no weak spots on his opponent''s body which was a let-down. Knowing this to be the case now, he started to attack the back of the Dragonoid. He struck the spine and grimaced when he noticed that the attack barely made a mark and that was with ''The Solitary Stand''. Knowing that he wouldn''t get anywhere with just standing around, he continued to strike the same spot over and over. This method was obviously Ye Xiu''s strongest method of attacking since it was one of his primary offensive styles. Not that he had any defensive styles in the first place. In combination with ''The Solitary Stand'' and ''Tyrant''s Physique,'' Ye Xiu would''ve usually been able to break past most fighter''s defence after a few hits. It proved to be a different matter to the opponent he was currently fighting. He had managed to get through one of the scales on the opponent before the scale regenerated quickly. Ye Xiu was obviously confused by what happened because he had never seen anybody regenerate that quickly other than Shi Die. Shi Die''s injuries were for his body and Ye Xiu knew that scales would definitely take months if not years to regrow which is why it surprised him. He continued his piercing assault on another location to see whether it was the same for the entire body. The most shocking thing about the entire fight was that his opponent hadn''t actually started attacking him. His opponent had been purely focused on its attacks towards Tian Bai which made absolutely no sense since it would''ve felt Ye Xiu''s own attacks on his back. Keeping that thought in his head, he continued to chip away at the scales of his opponent. After realising that no matter how many times he managed to break past a scale, it was quickly regenerated. It was obviously confusing him and Ye Xiu was trying to figure out a way to beat his opponent. He realised that in the entire of the fight, the only sounds he could hear was the sounds of weapons striking or moving. He hadn''t actually seen his opponent take a breath. Ye Xiu quickly used his observation technique. He cursed himself since he had forgotten to activate the technique from the beginning of the fight. With his observation technique, he could finally see what on earth was going on. He noticed that his opponent didn''t actually have any Qi pathways in his body and the majority of his opponent''s Qi was gathered in the middle of the body. Ye Xiu knew that his opponent wasn''t human. It probably wasn''t even a living being in the first place. It was a statue. Every time the statue got injured, the core in the body would automatically supply Qi to regenerate. It didn''t help that the core that he could see had a huge amount of Qi. It probably had more Qi than Tian Bai did and Tian Bai certainly had an abundance of Qi. He supposed that his goal currently was to destroy the core in order to win the battle but he had no idea how long it would take for him to whittle down the statue. The statue felt no pain or fatigue which meant that it would definitely kill him if he tried to rest. He used his bond with Tian Bai to talk to him. "Tian Bai, you''re fighting a statue which means that it won''t get tired. I want you to keep on fighting the statue whilst I rest and when I attack, you''ll rest. The statue will wear us down before we even finish denting the statue considering that it regenerates using the Qi it has inside of its core. I suggest you to start using whatever Qi techniques that you have so that we can shave down the amount of Qi the statue has!" Tian Bai didn''t answer him but his actions spoke for him. Tian Bai had switched to attacks that consumed his Qi. Ye Xiu sat down to meditate as he had used a considerable portion of his Qi reserves due to him using ''The Solitary Stand'' over a hundred times. Ye Xiu could slightly feel the feeling of weakness in his muscles but used his Qi to soothe it. He remembered something that he had to say to Tian Bai as well. "Tian Bai, make the density of the Qi higher. I don''t think that the statue can absorb Qi from its surroundings. It''ll help us recover faster so we should take the chance." Tian Bai stopped his attacks and lured the statue towards the mechanism. He quickly jumped up onto the palm to activate the mechanism before returning to his speedy assault. Ye Xiu took a pill out of a pill bottle, fingering and palming it before placing it back into the bottle. Converting into Poison Dodging the claws, Ye Xiu panted as he watched the statue. He had thought that his original plan would work but for some reason, the statue had a built-in contingency plan that foiled his and Tian Bai''s efforts. They had spent over a day switching back and forth, attacking the statue and when the statue''s core finally ran out of Qi, it suddenly refilled to its maximum. To say the least, Ye Xiu and Tian Bai were pretty pissed. Though they had been switching with each other to take a break, it was still pretty tiring. Tian Bai had already managed to get hurt twice and whilst the wounds weren''t severe he had to sit out of the fight for a couple of hours so that Ye Xiu''s pills would do their magic. Ye Xiu himself had been hurt once but it was a tiny nick on his arm which was an easily ignored injury. Whilst he was fighting, Ye Xiu was doing his best to come up with an alternative to winning the fight. The only viable manner of winning he could think of was to win the entire battle in a single strike, piercing through the scales and directly destroying the core. It was the most foolish method that would use most of his Qi and it wouldn''t even be certain that he would be able to break through the defence. Ye Xiu was also unsure if he had any attacks that would pierce through the defences in the first place. He sincerely doubted that he could pierce through now since the statue''s scales had changed. It was surprising when Ye Xiu saw the shifting scales to reveal scales that were even harder and thicker. Ye Xiu had to admit that the statue was ingeniously made due to how life-like it looked. The only thing Ye Xiu could say was that the statue couldn''t feel pain and react to it, though that had both advantages and disadvantages. Ye Xiu was debating whether to use his dragon blood essence strength enhancing technique to test whether it would allow him to use his strongest move and pierce through all the scales. He was hesitating since he only had a few drops of blood essence left. Ye Xiu shook his head. ''I''ll use it as a last resort. I can still try to use my Dragonoid transformation since it has much more strength behind its attacks then this body does.'' He knew that using the enhancing technique would tire him much more compared to the transformation which was weird. The statue still had its sword in its hand but the other hand was free so that it could its claws. It definitely wasn''t fun trying to dodge either of the attacks though Ye Xiu steered clear of the claws. The claws were had a much vicious edge compared to the sword since the sword would only cause a single injury whilst the claws could cause multiple. As time passed, instead of the statue growing stronger in its attacks or defence, its technique in handling a weapon increased. Ye Xiu was hard pressed since the statue was able to finally counter his attacks. The statue''s counters were nothing to scoff at either since his katana would be flung away though Ye Xiu managed to get it back into his grasp using his whip as it was in mid-air. Ye Xiu started infusing metal Qi into his attacks since the statue''s scales seemed to be pierced through with much more ease than before. Ye Xiu wished that he had more practice with metal Qi techniques but his main focus has been on wood Qi and fire Qi. Ye Xiu had an idea once again but was unsure if he could make it work. He had the theoretical knowledge which he could apply to his idea but he didn''t have the practical experience which was needed for success. He lit a flame above his palm. Instead of using fire Qi to ignite the flame, he was using his inner flame. Ye Xiu rarely used his inner flame for anything besides Alchemy. His inner flame didn''t have too many properties that would be considered useful for combat but it had a property that he knew would come in useful for what he was planning. His inner flame had a property that aided in the conversion of Qi. He was planning to change wood Qi into a corroding poison. He had seen the effects of his metal Qi on the statue and was thinking that this was the reason why it was easier for him to pierce through the scales. He also felt like the corroding effect would allow him to continue striking the statue without it regenerating. It all depended on how corrosive the poison would be. He had no skill in converting Qi but hoped that his inner flame would help him enough so that he would at least be successful. He was thinking about all of this whilst attacking the statue but Ye Xiu knew that even he wouldn''t be able to fight and convert Qi for the very first time at the same time. He called out to Tian Bai using the bond link so that he could take over for him. Tian Bai took over his position and Ye Xiu quickly moved over to where he wouldn''t be disturbed. He took the chance to chuck a pill down his throat so his sore muscles could recover. The strong attacks caused substantial strain to Ye Xiu''s muscles. When he finished taking the pill, he forced his wood Qi out of his body and towards his hand.Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. It was a fairly delicate process since losing control would either change the effect of what he was trying to convert the wood Qi into or the entire conversion process would fail. ''I must not have what I am converting in contact with my body and I must use my ''Graceful Fingers'' to control the conversion process so that I am not in contact.'' He started to use his free hand to guide the wood Qi between his two hands. Once that was down, he guided his inner flame towards the wood Qi and started to use his free hands to mould the wood Qi. The wood Qi would have to be continuously shaped so that the entirety of the wood Qi that was there would be properly converted. Intent played a very big part to conversion and Ye Xiu dedicated his mind to simply think about the properties that he wanted. From there a signal would be given to signify the most important part of the change. Ye Xiu failed at the most crucial step several times before managing to grasp what was going wrong. The crucial step of conversion was different depending on the Qi type and what you are converting it into. Since he was converting his wood Qi into a corroding poison, it needed another ingredient that had a corroding effect to be placed together with the changing wood Qi. Since using his metal Qi as another ingredient would cause the entirety of the conversion process to fail, he had to find another solution. He had tried using his metal Qi multiple times already but that definitely failed. The only suitable thing that he had left to act as an ingredient was a plant that he had managed to harvest during his time in the valley. At first, he had managed to get poisoned in the valley by accident when he got scratched by one of the petals but luckily his pills to neutralise it did the job. The plant had a corroding effect much to his chagrin that day but he managed to nurse his injury back when he removed the poison from his body. He was now taking out a petal of the flower and was placing it into the middle of the wood Qi. He was crushing the petals with the Qi around it so that it would release the poison, and much to his relief, the conversion process had finally succeeded. The converted product was still flying in the air since it could be controlled by his Qi which was certainly a useful thing. He placed the corroding poison into a bottle specifically made to store such things. He had taken about an hour for his first success and he needed to rest to recover his Qi. After finishing his meditation, he swapped with Tian Bai to take his place in the battle. Ye Xiu knew that the statue had no defence against corroding effects, unlike his katana and whips which he had made sure which wouldn''t be affected by such things. He coated the upper half of his katana''s blade with the poison for good measure and started his attacks. The poison didn''t completely stop the statue from repairing itself but it certainly slowed it down by a massive amount. Ye Xiu knew that he would be able to get to the core easily at this point but the moment he thought about that, he seemed to have invoked Murphy''s Law. He didn''t mean to but it seemed like he was asking for it when he told himself that it would be easy. The statue moved much faster than Ye Xiu expected and the claws managed to claw past his fortified clothes completely and managed to get the body underneath it. Five long gashes ran down his chest and they started to burn. Ye Xiu let out a grunt at the pain but nonetheless tried his best to dodge away from the quick statue. He used his free hand and set it on fire once again. He wanted to cauterize the wound but thought better of it. He directed his Qi inside of his body towards the wounds and started during battlefield healing procedures. It was something he had to learn as part of his mastery of the Medical Arts and Shang Yang had to do the same. They kept up with their skill in the Medical Arts and they could easily mend most injuries if they had enough time. Currently, Ye Xiu didn''t have that time and would have to focus on dodging whilst he healed himself. The statue''s claws had more strength behind them now and they carried a burning effect together with that strength when it managed to strike something. There were spikes on the statue''s tails and they were just as dangerous as the claws which Ye Xiu found out when he got whiplashed once again in the chest where he had just finished healing his injury. Ye Xiu knew that he should really stop getting hit but what could he say, the thing was literally flying above him now. Ye Xiu was resorting to his whips that had also now been coated in the corroding poison. His corroding poison would not dry off or disappear until it was washed off by water which was what he had been aiming for in the first place. Together with metal Qi and the poison, he was doing his best to whittle down the statue. Whilst it was flying above their heads, it started to breathe flames down towards them. Luckily, they weren''t those mystical dragon breaths that he heard about but they were just plain old flames. He had a high resistance to the flames so they barely affected him. Too bad for Tian Bai though who had to resort to using water Qi to extinguish the flames that made his fur catch on fire. Tian Bai had to focus on dodging and taking the attention of the statue away from Ye Xiu if he recovered, not that he minded. Ye Xiu had multiple ideas he wanted to test out but he was happy with his Qi thorns on his whip that was completely made out of metal Qi. The normal Qi thorns were unable to even damage the scales but the ones made out of metal Qi were at least able to cause damage. Ye Xiu was trying his best to end it quickly without using his finishing moves since the statue was still flying which meant that he wouldn''t be able to reach it with his attack. Laying on the Floor He had managed to chip away the majority of the scales on the statue but unsurprisingly the actual body of the statue was much harder than the scales. It didn''t mean that he stopped attacking, no, it just meant that he had to put even more effort to get through the statue''s defence. His thigh had been slightly burned when the dragon released flames that Ye Xiu would have been killed with if he hadn''t dodged in time. He had used some of his burn salves though it didn''t help the soreness of the body part. He was planning to change into his transformation if he managed to strike the statue down to the ground, too bad its wings had been relatively unaffected by Ye Xiu''s whip attacks since it had blown it away with its powerful wings. His Medical Arts were slowly healing him though they wouldn''t be able to heal him back to perfect health since that would require too much Qi. The original gashes that he had on his chest had closed up and were angry red lines. Ye Xiu doubted that they would ever heal properly but at least they were battle scars. Tian Bai had kindly helped him with his healing process by doing some unknown technique that he knew. He managed to bind the statue down with both of his whips for extra measure. He had made Tian Bai hold on to the whips to that the dragon would stay bound to the ground. The whips wrapped around the dragon''s wings, preventing it from flying. It was unlucky for Ye Xiu that the statue''s tail was still unbound and definitely had an obsession with his body as it was still trying to strike him with ferocity. The tail was definitely scary and Ye Xiu wanted nothing to do with it. The statue had been able to heal up most of the damage when he was busy binding it down. The statue was fighting Ye Xiu with so much skill that Ye Xiu was slightly frightened by the proficiency that the statue was fighting with. It had been able to predict most of his attacks and the ones that got through the first line of defence were quickly blocked by its claws. Just as Ye Xiu was about to start the next step of his plan, the statue managed to break from its bindings by literally burning through the whips with its flames. Ye Xiu knew that he should''ve expected this but he seriously didn''t think that it would break free that quickly. Consuming a single drop of his stored blood essence, he started to enhance himself. He enhanced himself to twice his normal combat power since he had no idea how long he would be fighting for. By enhancing himself to only twice the strength, he could last for several hours on a single drop of his essence. Once he finished stabilising his strength increase, he started to use the technique mixture and transformed. Tian Bai had noticed what he was doing and was acting as a diversion for him. The statue, however, didn''t really care about Tian Bai and was now attacking Ye Xiu and only Ye Xiu. Its claws glowed crimson red and struck out towards Ye Xiu. Even without the visual glow of the statue using a Qi technique, Ye Xiu would''ve noticed it due to his usage of his observation technique. Ye Xui quickly kicked the claws that were approaching him and the only thing he felt was a dull sensation on his scales when the Qi technique struck. He was lucky that he used his legs to try and kick the claws otherwise he''d have been heavily injured. His legs were one of the first few body parts that he had managed to transform and he was still continuing his transformation now. His foot was still in mid-air which Ye Xiu seemed to have realised when he noticed the statue grabbing on to it. He rotated on the one free foot that he had left, holding his katana, ''Despairing Roar'' completely activated and ready for a strike. Ye Xiu had finished his transformation in the time that the little trade had been going on which meant that he was currently at the strongest he could be without completely exhausting himself. His attack was more of a swing due to the position that he was in though it didn''t matter as his katana managed to cut off the scaled hand that had been holding on to him. He pried off the fingers that had a firm grasp on him when he noticed the statue''s hand regenerating himself. To be honest, it was certainly grotesque since he could see things such as the body growth as well. Once again, Ye Xiu was amazed at the detail but at the same time, he was horrified at the sight since its a pretty traumatizing thing to see. Ye Xiu at least knew that his attack was enough to get through the scales with ease and that was without him using metal Qi to enhance the attack. It would''ve taken him too long in order for him to do so which is why he had used fire Qi though it seemed to still be effective. He had thought that if he literally amputated off the offending limb, it would be unable to regenerate back but he shouldn''t have applied logic to a statue that probably had more secrets than his entire life.The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement. Whilst he was wallowing in his disgust, the statue attacked him with its regrown hand together with a Qi technique. Luckily he dodged it with his ''Swallow Mirage Steps.'' It felt like the statue was about to release a very powerful attack and all Ye Xiu could do was watch as the statue''s core literally drained itself of Qi until there was barely a sliver of it left when he felt himself on the floor. He shouldn''t have been surprised really. If the claws had managed to cause such damage to his body even with fortified clothes then he should''ve expected the same even when he was transformed. The statue had used all of its power in a single strike and all it would take for Ye Xiu to defeat it would be for him to pierce the core. Yet, he seemed oddly calm as he lay on the ground, bleeding out. He saw the Qi drain inside of the statue, he should''ve been prepared. No, preparation wouldn''t have helped him dodge the attack. It simply moved too fast, especially with his weight being increased by the transformation. He continued laying on the ground wondering if he should get up. All he could do was stare at the lit stone ceiling of the room. ''I truly wonder if this should continue to be so. I was wondering when I was going to ever get to a fight that would truly threaten my life. The fight against the satyr would''ve been considered one but I had lost my own mind during that fight.'' He had plenty of time to think now that he was just lying around. ''I don''t know what to do. Should I get back up and fight or should I just leave myself to rest like I was supposed to the first time?'' He could hear faint sounds in the background but his thoughts drowned it out fairly quickly. Tian Bai was doing his best to fend off the statue as Ye Xiu lay down on the ground bleeding. He wanted to heal him but he could only do so much from a distance whilst fighting at the same time. He was doing his best with the long-distance healing but he wasn''t sure that it was enough. Ye Xiu was his master and he was his familiar. He had no choice but to defend and heal him to the best of his abilities. He decided that he couldn''t be alone in his efforts considering his master was just there lying about, contemplating his life choices. "Ye Xiu! Stop lying around and get your ass into gear! You''re literally bleeding out and you are still thinking about random things. You need to survive. What about all your friends that you told me about? What about your family? Do you really want to let them down?" Tian Bai continued to abuse the telepathy link to talk to Ye Xiu but it seemed like his efforts were being wasted since he didn''t seem to hear him. "Respond to me!" Ye Xiu could hear dull whispers directly in his mind, but once again, his thoughts were occupying his attention. Tian Bai forced his way into Ye Xiu''s mind by using a technique that was highly invasive but he knew that the current situation was dire and he needed Ye Xiu to fight back. He repeated what he said earlier and just continued to shout. The whispers grew louder and louder, until the dam burst and his thoughts could no longer occupy his mind and was forced to listen to what Tian Bai had to say. He listened closely to Tian Bai''s words, and felt his determination and will to live be ignited yet at the same time, he still felt like he should continue to lie down. It wasn''t completely Ye Xiu''s fault that he wanted to lie down so much but was mainly due to the fact that the statue hadn''t only attacked him physically but mentally. The mental attack was an obscure one and was very hard to even recognise that it was being used. It was rather effective seeing how Ye Xiu had little determination to do anything currently. Tian Bai''s last hope was to incite anger and that definitely wasn''t something he wanted to do, however, it was his only hope. He planted mental images of the statue killing Ye Xiu''s friends and family. How Tian Bai got these images of his friends and family were through some rather unknown means, but he certainly knew enough to make it seem realistic. Tian Bai noticed that these images were definitely inciting Ye Xiu into action but it wasn''t enough. He placed more and more images and the scenes continued to get worse. When Tian Bai jumped over Ye Xiu''s body as he dodged, he could see that his eyes had glazed over and that his body was trembling with anger. His muscles were tense and he was clenching and unclenching his fists. Tian Bai knew that he had done enough since it seemed like Ye Xiu was getting up. Ye Xiu''s body started to change into one that definitely looked more similar to the statue. Ye Xiu stood up as his body was changing. His scales seemed to change into a deeper colour whilst his head was changing into one that looked like a dragon. Wings started to sprout from his back and a tail grew from his tailbone. The transformation was completed in a relatively short amount of time and Ye Xiu''s body seemed to be moving by itself once again. Its claws were lit aflame and rammed through the chest of the statue, where the core was. The core was immediately shattered but it seemed like Ye Xiu wasn''t stopping anytime soon. Ye Xiu''s hand pulled back out of the statue''s chest and continued to pierce the body of the statue. Contrary to what Tian Bai expected, the statue didn''t shatter but he could still see the insides of the body. The organs and whatnot may have never been created but it still looked like an empty husk of a person Once Ye Xiu had finished mauling the statue for what it was worth, he started to fly and unsurprisingly to Tian Bai, Ye Xiu started to breath flames directly to the statue, literally incinerating it. Tian Bai noted that whatever took over Ye Xiu''s body when he was unconscious, definitely liked disfiguring and fire. Tian Bai quickly got out of sight once he realised that Ye Xiu would not snap back to reality or fall unconscious anytime soon. Amiable Beast Ye Xiu was still going on a rampage and Tian Bai could do absolutely nothing to stop him, especially when he was transformed into a dragon. He would personally love to use his stronger attacks to beat some sense into him but he also knew that it would drag Ye Xiu''s attention towards him and he would get focused down by the fire breaths. He really disliked the feeling of his fur being singed by fire. He loved his fur just the way it was. Nice and fluffy. Tian Bai watched as Ye Xiu flew around the room, trying to raze it to the ground, though it seemed like Ye Xiu had quite a bit of trouble doing just that. The entire room had been fortified to withstand any attacks after they had finished the battle. A voice had sounded out that this would also be considered a trial for Ye Xiu and that he would not be considered to have passed the test if he didn''t manage to control himself. Tian Bai knew what it was like to lose control of his inner beast. He had enough memories of other Qi Beasts losing control and it didn''t help that whenever they lost control, their strength multiplied due to the lack of restrictions that the inner beast has. The inner beast basically pushed out the potential they should''ve reached a certain age and it certainly made them extremely strong especially since they couldn''t feel pain when they lost control. Luckily for Tian Bai, Ye Xiu''s injuries had healed when he had lost control. The inner beast had probably healed Ye Xiu so that it could try and take control of a perfectly healthy body for itself. All Tian Bai knew was that the scars from some of the attacks that he suffered would definitely stay there unless he used something potent enough to remove the scar. He also knew that Ye Xiu would have to overcome the obstacle for himself and he knew that Ye Xiu would know that as well. When Ye Xiu had read out the instructions for the third stage of the transformation, he had already known the struggle that was going to come with it. When he had planted those images into Ye Xiu''s mind, he had known that he would lose control of his inner beast. It was Ye Xiu''s only chance after all if he hadn''t done such a thing, Ye Xiu would''ve died. He had seen Ye Xiu lose control of himself during that battle against that satyr and he knew that when he made him lose control this time, he would definitely transform. Those that were human but held a bloodline all had an inner beast. The purer a bloodline was, the stronger the inner beast was. They all had to face their inner beast eventually if they wanted to access the true potential that the bloodline brought to them. Mentors that knew of bloodlines would withhold the information from their students because it was a trial that the students would have to face themselves. The trial would become exponentially more difficult when they knew what they were going to face. The inner beast did not like having an easy fight. Tian Bai waited, hiding away from Ye Xiu''s sight. He would wait out Ye Xiu''s fight against his inner beast. It was either he died here together with Ye Xiu if he failed or they would leave together with Ye Xiu unconscious. Ye Xiu''s mind was definitely a fun place to be in but he seemed to be in a place that he had never seen before. He turned around to look at the cavern that he was in and he whistled at the size. It was certainly bigger than what he''d ever seen before and that was him comparing them to skyscrapers. He wondered why there would be such a big cavern and he started to walk around the entrance. He could see murals on the walls of the cavern and they were wonderfully beautiful. He wandered around when he managed to bump into something. He was confused since there wasn''t anything actually in front of him. He stroked the solid object that he had walked into and released that they felt like scales. He oddly looked up and still saw nothing. What he didn''t realise was that the thing he was touching was underneath an illusion. An abnormally powerful illusion that wouldn''t break unless the caster wanted it to be broken. The said caster was snorting in amusement at the audacity of the human that was touching him. The stroking certainly felt pleasant not that it would admit such a thing since it had its pride. Ye Xiu''s inner beast could actually be considered rather calm. It didn''t attack Ye Xiu immediately as it should have but rather than attacking him, it was observing him carefully. The inner beast would attack eventually, that it knew but it obviously wanted to see its host before it did anything. What sucked for Ye Xiu was that this cavern wasn''t shared by a single inner beast but a few others, though he had no inkling about that for now. Ye Xiu continued his stroking of the dragon until he backed off, trying to come to terms with what he had just been doing.You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. Ye Xiu looked at his hand and looked back to where the invisible dragon was. Ye Xiu had his suspicions but he had no idea whether he wanted to confirm them. He frowned before sitting down on the ground. ''It''s strange that I didn''t feel like living when I got struck by the statue. I''m here now but I definitely know that I want to live, so what made me feel like dying?'' He looked at his hands before dropping them onto his lap. ''Maybe the statue did something to me, and it wasn''t my fault. I can''t lie to myself like that. Even if the statue did something to me, I should''ve had the willpower to force myself to continue living.'' Ye Xiu knew that he couldn''t simply place all the blame on others. The dragon could sense Ye Xiu''s emotions in turmoil. After all, it was his inner beast, they were going to be merged sooner or later, depending on if Ye Xiu managed to control himself. The dragon removed the illusion that had been hiding it and waited to see whether Ye Xiu would notice that there was suddenly a massive dragon right behind him. An inner beast''s intelligence was dependent on the species that the bloodline was from and how pure the bloodline is. Most dragons were intelligent enough to speak. They need only grow in order for their strength to reach the levels needed for them to be capable of speech. Ye Xiu''s inner beast saw him sitting on the ground and huffed. Little rings of smoke came out of the dragon''s nostrils and into the air. The sound was enough to jar Ye Xiu out of his contemplating and he turned around to face the dragon. He was startled obviously, he was face to face with a large dragon and he had been surprised that it had been behind him. He stared at the dragon before gulping. His Adam''s apple could be clearly seen moving. "A dragon... and a cavern? Oh great. I''m stuck in the place that I probably do not want to be in right now. I suppose that you are my inner beast? Holy shit. I have no idea how I''m going to be able to fight you and my chances of survival seem to be really low right now." Ye Xiu''s depreciation of himself brought amusement to the dragon who started laughing a deep chuckle. "You''re amusing human. It''s been a long time since I''ve seen a human." The dragon was a male which Ye Xiu noted. Ye Xiu wondered how the dragon would''ve seen a human if he was his inner beast. Inner Beasts were born when a baby was born with a bloodline. "I see your confusion. Let me explain human." The dragon spoke in a manner that got on Ye Xiu''s nerves but he was able to stop himself from feeling irritated. "Inner beasts don''t have to necessarily be born at conception and you don''t need to have a bloodline in order to have an inner beast. Many inner beasts can be sealed into a person at any moment of their life. Most people are clueless about the inner beast because it would be rare for them to go into a mindless rage in the first place. You mainly find about having an inner beast after those particular rampages." "Inner beasts only meet with their hosts when they are about to complete their transformation. You meet with me since you''re about to finish the first half of a transformation that would change you permanently. Your bloodline is purer than any other humans that I''ve ever met and I have met many humans and that is the reason why I''m here to meet. You have many other beasts roaming about though I won''t say anything else since it''s not time." "Your body is currently moving by itself, though I can''t say that I''m completely free of guilt since I played a minor part into provoking you into that state. The bonded familiar, Tian Bai, had planted images into your head so that you would go into a rage. Now, mind you, this wouldn''t have worked unless I had pushed in a few little tidbits in as well. His plan certainly worked but now you have been forced into this little situation with me." "The only way for you to regain control of your body is to win against your inner beast. Now, this condition can be interpreted in many ways but the most common way is through a trial of combat between the inner beast and host. Obviously, this is the most common since those inner beasts are nothing more but mere idiots that wish to be free as quickly as possible." "The way to win can be adjusted depending on the inner beast. You should be lucky that you met me first. I am one of the more generous inner beasts and I don''t mind giving control of your body back to you for as long as you need it until you fly off into a mindless rage again. I''ve lived for a very long time and no matter how powerful you would be in the future with your potential, I would still outlive you." "I don''t mind waiting as I said. Your life is amusing and I have seen enough of your memories to know that you will meet many, many more interesting people. I just want you to pass a little test of mine." Ye Xiu was listening to the dragon intently and frowned multiple times when the dragon spoke some questionable words. He had many questions that he wanted to ask the dragon but held his tongue. "My little test would be for you to take care of a familiar." Ye Xiu''s eyebrows rose higher than it ever did before. He was now afraid just what the dragon would be planning. "Don''t you fret little one. The familiar would be a Qi Beast that I believe that you would like. I''ve seen enough of your little fantasies when it came to particular species." Ye Xiu blushed at the innuendo that his inner beast had just made. "What do you say? Would you like to hear me out?" The dragon questioned Ye Xiu who had managed to wipe the blush off his face once he realised it was a rather serious situation that his inner beast had laid out for him. He looked into the dragon''s eyes for any sign of deceit but he knew that if the dragon was as old as he said he was, then it would be highly improbable that he''d be able to get anything that was useful. He tapped his chin with his right index finger. Bond of the Young One Once again, Ye Xiu was stuck considering whether he should listen to his inner beast''s or not. The way the dragon spoke of his offer made it feel like Ye Xiu wouldn''t risk his life unnecessarily but at the same time, he felt like the dragon had dishonest intentions instead of simply offering a peaceful solution. It was certainly suspicious that an inner beast would offer such a deal but then again he didn''t know that much about inner beasts besides what he had heard of Shi Die''s own inner beast. The offer of having another familiar did sound rather interesting but at the same time, Ye Xiu had to be cautious of accepting the offer. He had no idea what the familiar actually was though he had some sneaking suspicions on what the familiar could possibly be. There were very few animal species that Ye Xiu particularly liked but he knew them well enough. He looked at the dragon''s eyes which seemed to hold mirth. Ye Xiu could tell, just from the eyes, that the dragon was taking pleasure at his internal struggle over what he wanted. He cleared his throat when he decided what he was going to do. "I''ll accept your offer if I know what the familiar is going to be. If it isn''t to my liking, then I''d believe you would have to suggest another method of me ''winning'' against you." The dragon still had that gleam in his eye that showed amusement. "You certainly drive a hard bargain, don''t you? Smart of you to do such a thing as well otherwise I might''ve forced a completely useless Qi Beast onto you. Not to worry, the familiar I''m going to have bonded together with you is going to make you a very happy child." The dragon waved its hand and the entire scenery changed. They no longer stood in a cavern but a forest clearing that surrounded a lake. The dragon transformed in front of Ye Xiu''s eyes into a human form. "Follow me, close your mouth. You''ll get used to Qi Beasts taking human form eventually." The dragon led Ye Xiu to another clearing where there was a baby Qi Beast sleeping on a rock. Ye Xiu inhaled a sharp breath when he realised what he was seeing. He was screaming internally and he was acting like those people that got lovestruck when it came to animals. His face showed absolute calmness, though the dragon was definitely fooled by his facade. After all, it could feel his emotions. How would you expect to hide from empaths? He literally ran towards the Qi Beast before the dragon had any time to react and picked it up. He nuzzled the Qi Beasts and Ye Xiu''s contentment could clearly be seen. The dragon cleared its throat to get Ye Xiu''s attention. The dragon could clearly see the shocked expression on Ye Xiu''s face when he realised he was being extremely shameless by molesting a sleeping animal. He put down the Qi Beast carefully and stroked the fur as he looked back towards the dragon. "I''ll accept your offer. I can''t believe that you would offer me something such as this but I''ll accept it. I would like specifics on how exactly I would ''win'' this battle of control over the body if I take care of the familiar." The dragon looked at Ye Xiu with a serious expression on its face. "I simply want you to take care of the Qi Beast. The young one needs to be raised by someone other than me and you''re the only other candidate which would be able to raise since nobody else would be able to get here. After all, this is your mind. How else would anybody get in here besides thoroughly violating your space?" The dragon continued to speak. "The young one needs a family and I believe that you can provide for him. I personally like the young one quite a lot so I''m placing a lot of trust in you so when you finish the bonding ritual, I expect you to live up to my expectations. Since you''ve already accepted my offer, you won''t be able to back out. The moment you accepted, a binding contract was placed to ensure that you will bond with the young one." Ye Xiu was startled by the revelation but let it go since he was the one to accept the offer in the first place. If he accepted something, he wouldn''t go back on his word and he would continue to do his best until the very end. "Very well then." Ye Xiu''s tone of voice was slightly stiff due to the tone of voice the dragon had been speaking to him with. The dragon simply shook his head at the boy''s sudden change but continued on explaining what was going to happen. "I''ll be the one to do the bonding ritual between the two of you to make sure no loopholes can be left. I sincerely want the young one to be protected so I won''t leave anything to chance." Ye Xiu nodded at the dragon''s protective streak since he would do that for anybody he loved as well. He understood the sentiment and would oblige with what the dragon wanted. "The moment you finish the bonding with the young one, I will begin giving you your responsibilities over the young one. I will teach you how to take care of it and will also give you any extra information during that period of time. You''d best abuse this privilege as best as you can since I have many answers."Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. "If I do not wish to answer some of your questions then answers will be withheld." The dragon said his piece and walked over to the young Qi Beast and picked it up. "We should start the bonding ritual soon. Though I''m not influencing your body consciously, just my presence in your mind is enough to have your body in a mindless rage. A miniscule portion of my strength is being used to fuel your body right now and sooner or later it''s going to run out and you''ll be trapped in here." With the dragon reminding him of what had to be done, he quickly took off the clothes that he had and allowed the dragon to do what he needed. Though Ye Xiu seemed to have given control over to the dragon to do what he needed for the ritual, he was still extremely wary and cautious. He didn''t know the dragon well enough to trust him and the dragon was his inner beast. The dragon did nothing out of the ordinary and followed similar steps to what he had done with Tian Bai. He still had some concerns over the deal that he had accepted. It was mainly because he''d just accepted two familiars in the span of a month and a few weeks. It felt like he was making hasty decisions but at the same time, he felt like he had done the correct thing. He felt like that him bonding with familiars was a way for him to escape trouble. He had first bonded with Tian Bai because he knew he couldn''t beat him and now he accepted his inner beast''s offer to escape without being harmed. As the dragon busied itself with the ritual, collecting all the necessary things such as Ye Xiu''s blood essence and the Qi Beast''s blood essence. The bonding ritual was finished much faster compared to what happened with Tian Bai''s bonding. He chalked up taking so long with the ritual was because it was his first time even attempting such a thing. The dragon made sure to leave no loopholes for Ye Xiu to exploit and made sure that the young Qi Beast would be properly protected until it was strong enough for it to fight alongside Ye Xiu as an equal. "I know you have many suspicions about me but go ahead and ask me questions." Ye Xiu took the chance that the dragon gave him and started to barrage the dragon with questions. "When you say there are other inner beasts inside of my mind, do you mean that they are sealed inside of me as well?" "There are a few other inner beasts inside of you. One that came with your conception, one that came through an inheritance, another that came through being sealed and finally me, I''ve also been sealed in here. I won''t tell you how exactly I got sealed in here but the only warning I can give to you about the one that sealed me here is to be careful. Be very careful. If you meet him, just run away. You won''t have the strength to fight him." Ye Xui frowned at the grave tone that the dragon took whilst he told him a warning but accepted the answer. He had to also be careful with going into a mindless rage. He still had several inner beasts that might take advantage of his little outbursts and take control of his body. With that thought, came another question that was related to the inner beasts. "If I go into a mindless rage, wouldn''t it be possible for my other inner beasts to be the one to take control instead of you?" The huma-dragon snorted. "They wouldn''t even be able to attempt it in the first place considering how much stronger I am compared to them. No, they won''t be able to take advantage of you unless I allow it. I made a deal with you. You raise the familiar, I''ll make sure you have your control over your body. If you ever want to face your other inner beasts, all you need to do is tell me and I''ll allow you to enter a trial against them but I won''t do it without your permission. It is how a partnership works." Ye Xiu was satisfied with the dragon''s answer. "I should be able to transform to my Dragonoid form without going mad now right?" The dragon grunted its affirmation. The dragon started to change back from its human form and into its original form. They were moved from the forest clearing and back into the cavern. "I''ll be able to communicate to you inside of your mind so don''t get frightened off by my voice when I do talk to you. I''ll talk to you when its something pertaining to the young one or if it''s important." "If you want to extract a favour from me, then another deal will be made. My mood changes depending on what happened during the day. Try not to talk to me when I''m in a foul mood." Ye Xiu shook his head in amusement. He was glad that he was able to get past this little trial with ease but at the same time, he certainly felt like he was cheating his way through these tests. Eventually, he comforted himself by saying that he would do anything short of killing his loved ones to live. He looked at the cavern''s murals once again and noted that they told a story. He was about to question the dragon when he was interrupted before he could even begin "Time is running out. If you have any more questions ask them quickly." Ye Xiu thought of one last question that he wanted to ask. "What is your name? The entire time that we''ve held a conversation, you''ve never mentioned your name. It should be polite to introduce yourself at least." He knew that he was coming off as impolite but he really wanted to know the name of the dragon. "My name? That isn''t something that you should know yet. In the future, I might find enough generosity to grace you with my name but right now you aren''t worthy. It''s time. Goodbye, and do take care of the young one. Remember to give the young one a name and please don''t give it a stupid one." Ye Xiu started to fall into unconsciousness when he heard the dragon speak one last sentence. "Remember, the last enemy to be defeated is death." Coming Back to the Dimension The dragon had slightly stalled Ye Xiu in his return to consciousness. The dragon hadn''t simply made Ye Xiu bond with the young one but had done an extra ritual that Ye Xiu didn''t even notice was being performed. That extra ritual had its own complications and Ye Xiu would soon discover what those complications were. Ye Xiu woke back on the ground, face down. His body had changed back to its human form. Tian Bai could be heard snickering as he ran towards Ye Xiu. "Ye Xiu! That was hilarious!" Ye Xiu was obviously confused since he had just woken up and that meant that he had no idea what had been going on with his body the entire time. "What''s hilarious? What did my body do when it was being controlled by somebody else?" Tian Bai looked at Ye Xiu with a sly grin. "Nothing much. You simply fell down to the ground whilst you were flying. You transformed in mid-air as well which was pretty cool." Ye Xiu could sense that Tian Bai was hiding something else from. Ye Xiu narrowed his eyes at Tian Bai. "You''re hiding something from me." Tian Bai still had a smirk on his face. "You''ll find out what I''m hiding from you when we finish the test. I''ll tell all your friends about what I''ve hidden. Oh, by the way, you''re very naked right now. I''d suggest you get some clothes on." Tian Bai''s laughter could be heard as Ye Xiu''s face reddened. He quickly retrieved some extra clothes that he had stashed away in his dimensional storage. Ye Xiu quickly checked his soul space to make sure the young one was sleeping inside safely. He had no clue whether his familiar would automatically be transferred over to his soul space when he left his mind, but he was glad to see that the familiar was inside his soul space. He was going to introduce Tian Bai to the young one but decided that he would wait until he gave his new familiar a name before doing such a thing. Ye Xiu rolled his eyes. He arranged his soul space in a way that would separate the two familiars so that they would not meet each other. Ye Xiu didn''t want Tian Bai meeting his new familiar so early since Tian Bai would corrupt the little one with his mischievousness. He also wanted to get to know his familiar before Tian Bai had the chance. He wanted to be the only one to fuss over the young familiar since it was his favourite animal from his previous life. He was glad that he had finally gotten to meet a real-life lion. No matter how small it was, it would eventually grow into its mature form and since this young familiar of his was a male, he would get to see the prideful mane of a lion. The familiar''s species was known to be an extremely powerful one. He only knew about this because the dragon had generously inserted information into his mind. Tian Bai was currently informing Ye Xiu about what was going to happen next and they were waiting patiently to be transported to wherever they were supposed to go. Ye Xiu lay down on the ground with his arms stretched out to the sides. He sighed as he reviewed the entire third stage that he had just finished. It definitely was the hardest stage. He wasn''t surprised by the near-death experiences that he faced since he was warned about the possible danger during the very start of the stages. He realised that he had survived many of his dangerous encounters through luck and fortune. He knew that he couldn''t simply count on his own luck and fortune to survive these dangerous encounters since even they wouldn''t be able to save him all the time. The fight against the Man-eating Satyr had definitely opened his eyes about how cautious he had to be when it came to having a firm grasp on his emotions. The fight during the third stage further made him gain more resolve to improve the control of his emotions. The third stage had also ended with him being able to access the third stage of the transformation technique that he had learned. He just needed to practice the technique so that it would become natural for him to transform. His inner beast had given him information on the technique and realised that there were several more stages to it but they were considered as forbidden stages unless the user was willing to change themselves permanently. Ye Xiu had no idea how long it would take for them to be transported to their next location since the voice that had given them instructions and advice had not given any specifics of what would happen after Ye Xiu managed to overcome his inner beast. It was a little over an hour when they were suddenly back to where he originally was. Ye Xiu could spot Xiao Bai floating around him and looked at him with concern. "Master, how was the test? I know that you''ve passed it at the very least since I''ve been informed to take you to the vaults. I''m not talking about the ordinary vaults but the vaults that you are only allowed to enter once you manage to clear the conditions necessary for them. Many of the conditions usually require you to receive a reward during a test. Apparently, you''re allowed to pick five things from the first floor of the vault and I have to say I''m surprised."Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. Xiao Bai continued to blabber on. "I shouldn''t be asking you about how the test went, I was watching it the entire time. You did amazing though I''m not quite sure whether you lived up to the previous Master''s expectations but you definitely did much better compared to the others that have ever taken the test! After all, you''re the first to come out alive." Ye Xiu raised his eyebrow at those words. "First to come out alive? How many people have taken the test before me? I''d sincerely doubt that nobody else passed before me. I''m sure that there are many others that were just as powerful or stronger than me." Xiao Bai looked slightly embarrassed. "The test that you went to was considered the first trial. A total of fifty-three candidates have participated in the test including you, and all fifty-two have died until you came. The first trial only allows those in a certain realm of cultivation to enter. Many of those that had entered weren''t even those that contained the bloodline of a dragon but had merely stumbled upon the entrance." ou "To their misfortune, they must have been carrying dragon''s blood essence for them not to be rejected and kicked out of the testing area immediately." Tian Bai spoke in a wistful tone. "It was entertaining to watch them though. I was put into stasis but I''m still able to know everything that happens in the Dimension. I may not have the highest authority in the Dimension but I am considered to be the one that watches over everything and informs those that have the power of the current affairs in the Dimension." Ye Xiu looked at Xiao Bai. "How many more of these trials that you speak of are there? I hope that there aren''t many." Xiao Bai put on a face that betrayed no emotions. A literal blank mask. "You''ll have to figure that out yourself. Now follow me, I''ll be taking you to the vaults. If you don''t keep up, then I''ll leave you in the dust." Xiao Bai took off, flying towards his destination quickly. Ye Xiu rolled his eyes at Xiao Bai''s behaviour but followed him anyway. Xiao Bai didn''t go at an absurd pace so he was able to easily follow him. Xiao Bai took him to a place that he had never gone to before inside of the Dimension. There was basically a door to a massive house that stood next to a mountain. Ye Xiu whistled at the sight. He had definitely not seen the mountain here in the Dimension which was highly questionable. Xiao Bai could basically guess what was on Ye Xiu''s mind and spoke to clear any confusion. "You won''t be able to see this place unless somebody specifically brings you here the first time. Once you''ve been brought here the first time, it''ll always be visible for you. For others, they''ll have to be brought before it becomes visible to them." "To enter the vault," Xiao Bai pointed to the door of the house. "You''ll simply need to inject a single drop of blood essence and push your Qi into the door. It''ll automatically recognise that you are here for collecting. The entire vault will only allow you to choose your assigned number of items. Once you choose the five items, you''ll be kicked out and won''t be allowed back in unless you meet the conditions to enter." "To choose an item you must insert your Qi into the said item. This will break the stasis placed on the items and it''ll be yours from then on. I wish you good luck in your venture of choosing. Your familiars may come out during this time to help you look for an item but they will be unable to choose an item for you." Xiao Bai started to float back to the main house and left Ye Xiu to do whatever he wanted. Ye Xiu followed Xiao Bai''s instructions. He was slightly sad about the fact that he would have to use another drop of his blood essence and he only had two drops left that were stored. He was pouting at that fact and was going to make sure that he didn''t do anything rash in the next few months or so. Though with the tournament that was coming up, he was unsure whether he would be able to keep himself safe enough to not resort to any bloodline techniques. The door to the vault opened and Ye Xiu shivered at the sight of the items. He had been transported to the first floor of the vault the moment he stepped past the boundary and he could see that the entire floor was filled to the brim. He sighed since he knew that it was going to take him more than a while to sort through what he would want to take. He was unsure of how much time he could spend searching in the Dimension and decided to start immediately. The house which was actually a vault was underneath a time dilation of the same scale as the testing area. The previous master of the Dimension was kind enough to place the time dilation so that any that wished to take a reward would have enough time to look for one. The previous master was also kind enough to leave a list. A long and lengthy list but a list nonetheless. The list had every single item that was inside of the vault. There was a list for each floor and looking at the list for the first floor, Ye Xiu felt like fainting. The list was placed into a book and the book had over a hundred pages. He sincerely doubted that he wouldn''t be able to find five things that he would want to take which made him happy at least. He called out Tian Bai from his soul space and had him look through the list as well. Tian Bai had a repository of knowledge that he had inherited through his predecessors and it would certainly help Ye Xiu to identify rare items. Ye Xiu didn''t have much experience when it came to identifying such things but he knew someone that had the most experience out of everybody he knew. He was unsure whether that person would answer his call but he would call for the said person anyway. Back to Reality The perusal of the list of items in the book was boring. Ye Xiu had noted several items of interest in his mind that he would love to take out but he hadn''t even gone half-way through the book. Tian Bai was a big help since he certainly knew many of the items, though the biggest help was probably Xiao Bai He had called Xiao Bai simply for his expertise and experience when it came to dealing with items in general. Xiao Bai''s skill in detecting rare treasures also helped tremendously as he pointed out several items of interest to Ye Xiu. Xiao Bai had responded to his call with slight irritation since he had just made it back to the main house. Ye Xiu was unsure how Xiao Bai had managed to enter the vault though Xiao Bai simply explained that he was given permission to freely enter the vault to sort out the items from time to time. Apparently, the vault was able to gather rare items that meet certain requirements and they get stored into the vault. It meant that it would be rare for the vault to ever be empty if ever. Ye Xiu asked how that function worked and how the vault would be able to gather so many items. Xiao Bai''s explanation was short and succinct, merely telling him that the vault was sentient, the Dimension has more functions that Ye Xiu would eventually learn and reminded him that time in the Dimension moved much faster than in reality. They were going to go finish going through the book before deciding on the five items that he would want to take with him. There was certainly a huge array of items that he could pick up on the first floor of the vault and many had unknown functions that intrigued Ye Xiu. It took them two more days to get through the entirety of the book and noting down everything that they would need to find. Xiao Bai''s explanations of the items of interest further shortened the list of potential rewards that they would take. Xiao Bai explained that if they wished to find an item, all they would have to do is direct Qi into the book that held the list and then say the name of the item. The said item would appear directly above the book and if it is not to your liking then the Qi flowing into the book should be cut off so it can be returned. If you wish to choose the item then simply pour your Qi into the item and it should register. Ye Xiu got his explanation pretty easily since it wasn''t complex at all. Ye Xiu had chosen his five items in a relatively quick fashion after he had examined all the items on his personal list of interest. He noted that he had chosen four books and a single weapon for the five rewards that he could take. He sighed since those books would cost him more than a simple weapon. He left the vault house and left the Dimension after thanking Xiao Bai for helping him. When he returned back to reality he noticed that it was midnight. He moved out of his bedroom and went to the kitchen to fix something up for himself. He released Tian Bai from his soul space and told him to cause some havoc in the residence. Tian Bai was more than happy to oblige with the command and scurried throughout the entire residence with a cooking pan in his mouth and banged it all along the floor. Unsurprisingly, the inhabitants of the household started to stir from their meditative sessions and wandered downstairs to see what was going on. When they saw Tian Bai with a pan in his mouth, they started to chase him. Shi Die managed to catch Tian Bai with a burst of speed that came with his transformation. Tian Bai struggled as he was being held in Shi Die''s hand and was about to bite him when Ye Xiu''s laughter could be heard from the living room. With Shi Die holding onto Tian Bai tightly, the group walked into the living room to see Ye Xiu simply sitting on a couch. Shang Yang raised an eyebrow at Ye Xiu. "What''s going on? Why have you disturbed us from our meditation session?" Shang Yang didn''t bother with any greetings since she was rather annoyed, she had barely had any rest since she had an epiphany and had been making steady advances with her illusions due to the epiphany. She was about to go into a meditative state when Tian Bai had interrupted everybody in the entire household. Shi Die was looking at Ye Xiu''s face and noticed relief and happiness. His nose was also picking up Ye Xiu''s scent but it had changed drastically. There were very faint signs that it was Ye Xiu''s scent but if he hadn''t known Ye Xiu on an intimate level then he would''ve believed that Ye Xiu was a completely different person standing in front of him. Ye Xiu simply smiled at Shang Yang''s question and shook his head softly. "I just wanted to see everyone. I found it amusing to have the little guy that Shi Die is holding wake everybody up in the most obnoxious way that he could possibly think off."If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. Shang Yang glared at Ye Xiu before turning and leaving the living room. She stomped her way back up to her room and they could hear every single one of her steps which dictated her mood. Xiao Tu simply looked at Ye Xiu with a gaze that was questioning him. He too left the living room and went back to his own room to rest. Shi Die stayed in the living room, still holding on to Tian Bai. Tian Bai decided to bite Shi Die at this moment which forced him to be dropped. Shi Die dropped him due to the surprise of the sudden bite and saw that his hand was bleeding quite a lot. Though Tian Bai didn''t bite very hard, the wound was still rather deep. Shi Die pushed his Qi towards the wound, quickly removing any signs of the wound existing. He glared at Tian Bai. "I thought you were an adorable little creature but now I want nothing more than to strangle you then use your fur as some kind of material for clothes." The glare didn''t give any pause to the cheeky laughter that had erupted from Tian Bai. Tian Bai jumped onto Ye Xiu and nested himself safely onto Ye Xiu''s head. He watched Shi Die comfortably from the position as Shi Die continued to speak. "You smell very different Ye Xiu. That weasel of yours has some of your scent on it. Did you claim a familiar? How have I not noticed this yesterday? You''ve been with us the entire day but I never noticed any changes with your scent so why is it that there are so many differences?" Ye Xiu was slightly surprised. He had forgotten that Shi Die would be able to smell the many changes in his body especially after he bonded with his familiars and his transformation. "I would love to tell you all about my adventure as long as you don''t tell the others. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu would probably overreact. I know them very well, if you agree to this, then I''ll begin my story." Shi Die looked at Ye Xiu knowingly, he knew that from the words that Ye Xiu said, it was more than likely that his adventure contained a life-changing experience. "Alright, begin your tale." Ye Xiu cleared his throat but before he could start speaking, Tian Bai used the telepathic bond to ask Ye Xiu for food. Rolling his eyes at Tian Bai''s behaviour, he took out several pieces of smoked meat and handed it to him. Tian Bai jumped off Ye Xiu''s head and started to eat enthusiastically. "Apparently when I was actually sleeping instead of meditating, I got transported away into the Dimension for a test. The test was apparently forced onto me since I had reached the realm of cultivation needed for that test. The first stage of the test needed me to look for clues in order to finish the stage. It barely took me a day before I finished the first stage which was fairly easy." "The second stage... would''ve taken an entire month to complete though I was rather close to the deadline. I was forced to kill numerous different types of Qi Beasts. I can say for sure that I faced a life-threatening situation and I''ve learnt from that experience. I''ve dealt with the trauma that came with that particular experience but I won''t go into it that much. I found my first familiar, Tian Bai, the weasel who is currently eating the meat on the floor after he offered me a deal." "For the third stage, I had to learn a technique and I had to use that technique to defeat an opponent. There, I faced another near-death experience. I found out about my inner beast and I can say for sure that the ordeal was definitely less dramatic compared to yours." Ye Xiu quickly explained the stages of the test since he didn''t really want to drag it on for that long. "I was able to choose five rewards from a vault for finishing the test. Though it''s weird that I didn''t receive anything for the third round. Though I could consider that technique as the true reward..." Ye Xiu trailed off, thinking about the technique. Shi Die was looking at Ye Xiu with a curious expression on his face. "I can see why your scent changed but it doesn''t explain how it would change so dramatically. I''ve seen many people with familiars before and after they bond with them, and they never have such a drastic change in their scent. What else are you hiding?" Ye Xiu was thinking about what else would''ve possibly changed his scent when he realised that his transformation had most likely made him smell more like a dragon. "My technique may have a hand in the change but I won''t give any details. It''s a secret move and I''ll use it to surprise everyone during a fight one day." Shi Die nodded his understanding. "I''ll be going back to meditate first. Keep on the schedule that we have." He left the living room and entered his own room. Ye Xiu heard his door shut and watched Tian Bai continue eating. "Tian Bai, I''m sending you back to the soul space." Ye Xiu told Tian Bai what he was going to do since he needed some time and space for himself to think about what would happen next. ''I''m surprised so little time had passed in reality but from what Xiao Bai told me, the entire testing area and the vault area had a time dilation placed on them. I think Shi Die has not only noticed my change in scent but probably the change in behaviour from the way he was acting just now. His transformation does give him some of his inner beast''s habits.'' ''I''ll need to name my new familiar. I don''t know how to come up with a name that would sound good for the familiar but I''ll try my best. I''ll also need to go to the Auction House to sell everything that I have. I also need to ask Shang Yang to help create more seeds since I''ve literally run out of them. I''m not sure how I''m going to explain that to her but I''ll probably tell her the truth sooner or later. Even If I don''t tell her the truth, she''ll probably be able to infer from the many changes that I''ve gone through.'' Ye Xiu sat on the couch and sighed. He looked older than he was as he continued to plan away. Sensing a Stalker Ye Xiu looked at the tiny bundle of fur that he had held in his arms in a cradle hold. "I really don''t know what to do with you. The only thing that I''m happy about is that you won''t develop a taste for anything until I start feeding you regularly instead of having you stuck inside my soul space." The little lion cub in Ye Xiu''s arms purred quietly as he ticked its belly. "I still need to come up with a name for you. I can''t just keep calling you young one forever. That inner beast of mine shoved quite a large amount of information into my head to make sure that I took care of you but even if he did shove so much information, I still don''t have experience in taking care of a baby. Animal or not." He continued to tickle his lion cub, not afraid that Tian Bai would notice anything weird since he blocked Tian Bai''s senses from noticing anything happening outside of the soul space. He looked at the lion cub once again, before sighing and placing it back into his soul space. "I''ll come up with a name when you do wake up. There''s no point in giving a name when you don''t like it." What Ye Xiu didn''t know was that the lion cub wouldn''t be waking up any time soon. Though the dragon had trusted Ye Xiu to take care of his own familiar, the dragon still had its reservations when it came to trusting others. He made sure that the lion cub would be in a hibernating state and would only wake when Ye Xiu truly proved that he loved the cub. After the cub was placed safely into his soul space, Ye Xiu walked out of the residence and looked for a nice secluded spot in the training yard. He had the four technique manuals that he had to go through. He was going to go through each of the technique manuals one by one since he didn''t want to overload himself. Learning new things is great but excess is harmful. He took out the first manual technique that he had chosen. It was probably the technique that had the most use out of all the techniques that he had chosen since he should be able to learn the technique and have the most progress with it before the tournament came. He read out the technique''s name that was written on the cover of the manual. "Divine Gem Fortification." Ye Xiu read the instructions of the manual that was on the very first page. It told him to push his Qi into the manual as it would automatically force the information of the different stages of the technique into his head. Though the information is stuffed into the brain of Ye Xiu, only the information of the first stage was open for him. It told Ye Xiu enough. It meant that the information would only unlock after he mastered the previous stage. The foundation of the technique was one that was definitely familiar to Ye Xiu who had lived in an age where such things were measured in their hardness. The technique was based on the different gems that existed though there were definitely more gems than he had thought possible in this world considering that there were over ten stages in the technique. The first stage of the technique would be able to allow him to have the hardness of a quartz gem. Ye Xiu felt like the technique was definitely bullshit. If he eventually got the same hardness as a diamond then he sincerely doubted that he would be able to be touched by many attacks. However, he couldn''t be complacent with such an idea. The cultivation world was definitely strange and Ye Xiu had no doubts that they would be able to pierce through his defence easily at higher realms of cultivation. After all, from the stories that he had read before, they could literally travel faster than light. The technique was rather simple to start learning, however, the process to progress in the technique required more than a little effort on Ye Xiu''s own part. He was required to have the technique on the entire time. If he wanted to progress with the technique, a layer of the gem of the particular stage is formed on top of his skin and the layer must be destroyed continuously until the gems were strong enough to no longer be broken. Ye Xiu glared at the ground when he processed that information through his head. He basically had to cause himself harm or have others do it for him. He likened the process to self-flagellation but to a worse extent considering that he or his friends would have to use more force to simply get through the gems protecting him. He wondered who, of his entire group of friends and mentors, would allow themselves to help him with the technique. He definitely wasn''t going to master the technique himself. He supposed that Yan Guo, Shi Die and San Guo would most likely help him but the others would definitely not. Xiao Tu and Shang Yang were likely to hover around him as often as they could to make sure that he couldn''t train in the technique. Ye Xiu didn''t want to keep this a secret from his two friends that he had known the longest but he felt like keeping it a secret would be a lesser crime since he could be strong enough to protect them.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement. As Shi Die had noted when Ye Xiu had first come back from the Dimension, his demeanour had changed to a more serious outlook. He had shed blood, though not human and some his own, he had gained enough experience from his fights with the Qi Beasts that he knew that it would definitely be best for him to keep this technique''s training method a secret. ''The first technique could be learnt at the same time he practised another technique. It would be killing two birds with one stone if I do different pieces of training simultaneously. Good thing that I have my multi-mind technique which allows me to do such a thing with ease.'' With such reasoning, Ye Xiu took out the second technique manual that he had chosen from his dimensional storage and placed the first technique manual back into the dimensional storage. Once again, he read out the name of the manual technique. "Pulsing Force." As he read the name out, he noticed that Shang Yang was walking over to him. He placed the manual into his dimensional storage since he didn''t want her asking any questions. "Hey, Ye Xiu. What are you doing out here?" She was curious as to what he was doing since nobody else was currently training. Ye Xiu thought of a suitable answer. "Nothing much, I was just out here to clear my mind and to meditate. The residence felt rather cramped and enclosed to me and I wanted some fresh air." He wasn''t lying since he actually liked the open space that the stages were set in. He preferred to be out in the wild now that he thought about it. He had so much more freedom. He decided to ask Shang Yang his own question. He inquired. "Shang Yang, do you have free time later on today?" "Of course I do. Do you need something from me?" Shang Yang confirmed that her schedule was free of any important events and any activities that she would be obligated to complete. "I just want us to make some more of the seeds. I''ve used up all of mine recently and I think that we should step up in the production speed since the tournament is coming up in two months or so. I''ve also had several ideas on how we can improve on our seeds and I also have a few ideas that I wish for you to try out with your illusions." Shang Yang raised her eyebrows. "What did you do to use up all of your seeds? There were over two hundred seeds that we made and how did you manage to use them in such a short period of time?" Ye Xiu didn''t bother answering Shang Yang, instead, he simply smiled at the memories he had of trapping Qi Beasts using the seeds or using them to attack. Shang Yang rolled her eyes at Ye Xiu''s silence before agreeing. "I don''t mind. We''ll at least be able to work out the kinks in our seeds and I''d love to see what you''ve thought up in regards to my illusions." Shang Yang waved goodbye to Ye Xiu when she sated her own curiosity. Ye Xiu shook his head and took out the technique manual once again. This time he read the entire manual since it didn''t have the same function as the previous manual. "The technique is to use your Qi to cause vibrations as you attack. The attacks don''t have to physically hit the enemy and they would still be affected by the technique as long as they are not too far for the vibrations to travel." "When an attack physically hits a target, constant contact with a target allows the user to continuously send pulses of force into the opponent''s body. This would disrupt their internal organs, blood flow and eventually Qi flow. The technique can also break bones if the vibrating force that is sent through the body is strong enough. These effects can be diminished in several ways, the most effective way is having a Qi barrier blocking the force. The strength of the technique increases as you progress through the stages." Ye Xiu stopped reading at that point and allowed himself to digest what he had just read. ''That''s certainly a powerful technique though it would definitely have its own repercussions. If someone is able to reflect the technique, then I''d cause myself harm. I''ll need to learn how to protect myself from my own technique, though I have to admit it would probably help me if I can use that Qi barrier to diminish the impact force from attacks.'' He continued to read the manual. "The technique doesn''t require the use of the user''s physical body but can also be used through weapons. The same principles apply and the user is definitely advised to use a sharp weapon or a long-range weapon in order to achieve the best results for the technique." Ye Xiu smiled at the information. ''I''ll definitely be able to abuse this specific technique when I use my whips. I didn''t have too much of an offensive skillset with my whips compared to my katana. This''ll definitely allow me to pulverize my enemies without even moving close enough for them to touch me.'' He read the steps for the initial stage of the technique. He placed it back into his dimensional storage. He wasn''t going to practice either of the two techniques today since he had something else he had to do. Ye Xiu walked back into the residence, took a quick shower, changed his clothes and left the residence to go to the Auction House. The sooner he dealt with what he had in his dimensional storage devices, the better. He moved quickly in the night and that was when he noticed his stalkers. His skills in detection had increased during his time spent in the valley. It was further enhanced when he started his training in the transformation. It also helped that he gained the so-called danger sense that many beasts possessed. His own brand of danger sense was much sharper and would sense anyone that had ill intentions towards him. If he transformed into his Dragonoid form, his danger sense would encompass a much larger area. Ye Xiu moved much faster when he noticed his stalkers. He wasn''t going to deal with them since he had a feeling that they had been stalking him for a long time and they were probably acting on orders. Selling those Bodies He managed to enter the Auction House in record time and he had also made sure that he hadn''t looked too suspicious. Ye Xiu wasn''t sure whether his stalkers had noticed his strange behaviour but he had tried his best. He looked around the Auction House for a moment or two to see whether it was crowded. Fortunately, though there was a huge number of people hanging around the lobby, there were very few that were actually there to sell things. He went to the receptionist which handled the registration of items that would be sold in the Auction House. Ye Xiu was going to register all of the unused meat that he had. He simply had too much, that even smoking the meat or using any other preservative methods wouldn''t help it last. There were obviously methods to store it for long periods of time but those were much too expensive. Ye Xiu kept half of the carcasses that he obtained and he was going to sell the other half. He was going to give half of what he had to Jin Yuan since he was sure that''d he love the many different types of Qi Beast meat that he had. Jin Yuan was likely to experiment with the meat and it would provide a variety of dishes for the group. He also had quite a few rare ingredients that he would give Jin Yuan though he would keep the majority of them for himself. Ye Xiu politely asked the receptionist for a room that could be considered a warehouse. The receptionist was sceptical that Ye Xiu would need such a large space but obliged with his request anyway. The receptionist was a trained staff member that would be able to identify anything that would be sold albeit not to the same degree as the specially hired staff. When the receptionist beckoned for Ye Xiu to present his wares, he promptly fell on his ass when Ye Xiu slowly took out each of the carcasses one by one. It took Ye Xiu over ten minutes to finish sorting through his dimensional storage devices and confirming that was all the dead bodies he had to sell. The receptionist had to call for another person to help him confirm the state of the bodies due to how many there were. The two staff members that were there to sort through the bodies were efficient, finishing their task in thirty minutes. Ye Xiu remembered to tell the two other staff members that he had Beast cores that he had to sell as well. Once again, the staff members were slightly surprised by it though they were quickly getting over the shock. It was rare to see such a huge deal in a single session but it wasn''t a singular experience. These types of deals were usually dealt with by the senior staff members. Beast cores were considered to be an item that was in high demand. The cores were highly useful for cultivation if the person who was consuming it was smart. Using a Beast core inappropriately would eventually lead to a person''s demise. The wild primal Qi that the Beast core contained could start to contaminate a person''s dantian. The quality of the Beast core could only be identified by those that had a specific skill set, similar to one that Ye Xiu had. The appraisers of Beast cores are those that are able to see Qi using an observation technique or other means. The quality of the beast core is dependent on the amount of Qi that the Beast core contains. There are three levels of quality for Beast cores, low, medium and high. A High-Quality Grade 3 Beast core has nothing on a Low-Quality Grade 4 Beast core. The strength of a Beast core is further separated on the basis of the Grade of the Qi Beast that the core was taken from. It didn''t take long for an appraiser to arrive who set about on his business. He quickly separated the hundred Beast cores that Ye Xiu had managed to harvest into three different piles. When the appraiser reached the Beast core that had been retrieved from the Man-eating Satyr, he placed it by its lonesome. The appraiser moved towards Ye Xiu. "This Beast core. Where did you get it from? Its existence is very... disturbing to say the least. Compared to all the other Beast cores that I''ve appraised of yours, none have such a similar feeling. They all have the natural feeling of wilderness, however, this particular Beast core is basically born of malevolence." The appraiser frowned, his eyebrows being brought together as he tried to figure out what exactly was wrong with the Beast core. Ye Xiu knew exactly what he was talking about and wasn''t surprised that he felt that the Beast core was malicious in nature. "It''s from a Man-eating Satyr. I''m not surprised that you find it disturbing. That Beast core is probably able to be placed in an actual auction." The appraiser frowned again. "I''m not exactly sure... I''ll have to check with one of my senior supervisors. They have more experience when it comes to rarities." The appraiser turned around to look for one of his underlings to fetch one of the senior staff. It wasn''t to say that the appraiser was inexperienced, it was only the fact that Man-eating Satyrs were rare for a reason and the majority of their population resided in a forbidden zone. The appraiser was young compared to the man that entered the room after being summoned by one of the employees. All it took was one look, and the man nodded in appreciation. "I haven''t seen one of those for a long time though I''ve definitely seen stronger cores." The man picked it up and placed it inside his dimensional storage. "This''ll fetch a fair price in an Auction. I''ll register it for you and when the sale is successful, you''ll be notified."Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website. The man left the room without further ado and Ye Xiu looked at the man''s back blankly. ''How does he expect to contact me if I haven''t even given him my details?'' Ye Xiu shook his head in confusion as the appraiser counted the appropriate amount of money for both the carcasses and Beast cores combined. Ye Xiu knew the approximate prices for everything so he wasn''t too concerned that he received a higher profit than he had expected. It was probably due to the quality of the carcasses. Majority of the carcasses that got sold were usually in a worse condition compared to his where there was only really one main injury that it had been struck. After receiving the money, he left the room and went to peruse the item list of the next auction. Seeing nothing that sparked his interest, he left the Auction House''s main lobby and moved towards the private selling booths. The selling booths often had many items that were interesting. Ye Xiu mainly bought the alchemy ingredients that were rather fresh directly from the selling booths. Those that had a selling booth had assured quality since every single of their items had to be run through stringent checks. The owners of the booths were all respectable cultivators and their wares were definitely of good quality. If they dared to lower their quality then it was possible for the Auction House to remove their contract to use the booth. This meant the owners were very careful when it came to handling their wares, making sure that nothing went below the accepted quality. He always went to a specific booth to buy his alchemic ingredients since it always seemed to have everything that he needed. It never ran out of stock which was obviously surprising to Ye Xiu. It made him see that those that owned the booths definitely had connections if they were able to keep their booths stocked all the time. After he managed to buy all of the ingredients that he needed, he started to make his way back to the Academy. With the number of alchemical ingredients that he had bought, he was certain that he would be able to stockpile his pills and elixirs once again. He had used a huge amount of pills and elixirs during his time in the Dimension to fuel his training process. Many of the pills that had been used were usually to help recover from injuries. Leaving the Auction House, he noticed that his stalkers weren''t in the vicinity. He wasn''t surprised about that fact since the area around the Auction House was considered to be a neutral ground and was the most well-protected areas in the entire city. Taking a cloak and pulling the hood over his head, he started to run across the streets. He was using ''Basilisk''s Gaze'' without care of his Qi reserves. He knew that he had a big enough Qi reserve that would allow him to make it all the way from the Auction House to the Academy so he didn''t actually have to worry about Qi exhaustion. ''Basilisk''s Gaze'' only consumed Qi with a vengeance if he went at an insane speed. He simply slowed down his speed to one that would be considered to be thrice the average speed of baseline humans. The baseline of an average human in this world was much higher compared to his previous world. Throughout his entire journey from the Auction House to the Academy, he had no longer been able to sense anybody stalking him. He was keeping himself well-aware of his surroundings just to see his stalkers since it was strange for anybody to be stalking him in the first place. He knew that something was wrong when his gut instinct had alerted him to danger months ago. This sighting confirmed his suspicions and was going to inform his friends to be careful from now on. Instead of heading back to the residence immediately, he went to San Guo''s home. He knew San Guo was probably in there considering that he rarely left his home unless there was something important. The past few weeks, San Guo had left the group to their own devices, telling them to come up with new things so that they''d be able to defeat all three of their mentors at the same time. San Guo had even cheekily told them that Yan Guo''s father might even join in the fun if they managed to beat them. He knocked on San Guo''s office door before entering. He saw San Guo looking at several books, who glanced up to see Ye Xiu enter. "Hello Ye Xiu, you seem very different." San Guo narrowed his eyes and noted the changes. "You''re definitely much more confident when I last met you. I wonder what happened." San Guo mused his thoughts out loud. "Oh, don''t mind me. What are you here for Ye Xiu?" Ye Xiu cleared his throat. "I''d like you to help with training. I need help to advance in a technique that I''ve recently just started. I haven''t entered the first stage of the technique but I do need help in regards to that." San Guo raised his eyebrows. "I''ll certainly help you. What exactly do you need me to do." Ye Xiu shrugged. "You could call it body conditioning. I''m conditioning my body to withstand stronger attacks and to withstand piercing attacks. The technique requires me to basically torture myself until I reach the next stage of the technique." Though San Guo didn''t show his worry, he still voiced his concerns. "That sounds like a very dangerous technique to learn. Are you sure you want me to help you?" He suddenly grinned. "I don''t mind abusing that body of yours. It''ll be fun to get rid of my stress." Ye Xiu shivered underneath San Guo''s grin but nodded his approval. "Yes, I do need you to help me. Just don''t tell Shang Yang or Xiao Tu about the training and we''ll be fine." San Guo mulled over his schedule for a couple of seconds. "I''ll be free on Fridays and Sundays. I''ll see you then." Ye Xiu gave his thanks before leaving and walking back to his residence. ''Well, that''s one thing that I''ve covered. Now to start training in both the techniques.'' Hua Fei Returns Ye Xiu started his training in the ''Pulsing Force'' technique since the other technique would require him having assistance to begin it. He was currently trying to figure out the way to begin the training. Though the technique manual had offered the effects and abilities of what the technique could do, it didn''t offer any instructions on how to begin learning. Ye Xiu was trying to come up with ways that would allow him to use the technique and eventually decided to start from the very basics of what he knew. He knew that the technique used some contact to send the ''pulsing force'' into an opponent''s body. This meant that he would have to at least touch an object. He placed his hand on one of the trees in the training yard. He concentrated his Qin into his hand and tried to push it out. He didn''t push out his Qi in a normal way but instead had his Qi act similarly to a pulse. He had done the same thing when he wanted to get rid of the illusions using his entire body but this time he was doing a concentrated Qi pulse using just his hand, for offensive purposes. He was able to send his Qi into the tree but his Qi was quickly absorbed by the tree. It meant that he had a lack of control of the Qi that he had just sent out and was able to be absorbed by others. This meant that before he had mastery of the ability, he would have to concentrate on having his Qi in his control. He also noticed that besides being sent into the tree, it had no other effects. The technique manual had said that it used Qi to cause vibrations. He had no clue on how to make his Qi cause vibrations. Though he had an inkling of how it would be possible. When he had thought about how it would be possible, he realised that the technique that he had chosen probably had another technique that had to be learnt before he should even begin attempting this technique. Even if he had figured out that little piece of information, he believed that his Qi that pulsed out of his body still had a similar concept to the technique that he was learning right now. His detection pulses were simply sent out to detect things but if he could change those pulses into ones that had another effect, then he would be on the right track. He stopped his experimentation and went back into the residence after several hours worth of attempts. He was getting closer to his goal but he had to rest now. It was also time for his actual training routine that he had to get back into. The rest of his friends were going to Jin Yuan''s kitchen to get some food. Ye Xiu went upstairs to freshen himself up, he was completely alone in the household so he was going to take his time to have his bath. After nearly two months of being stuck inside the testing area, he hadn''t gotten the proper chance to clean himself. He had the river in the valley but it just couldn''t beat the showers or baths that he took back at his residence. He never really relaxed during those times at the river due to all the Qi Beasts everywhere, even after he killed all of them in the two zones, he immediately moved to the third zone of the valley. He had wanted to finish the stage as quickly as he possibly could. As he was taking his bathing time to relax, an unknown person arrived at the front door of their residence. ''There shouldn''t be anybody in the house right now. I''ll finally be able to relax and smell the scent of my beloved for at least an hour before they come back! I''ve even bathed myself and poured the scent removal elixir all over myself just for this occasion!'' The person took out a wooden plaque from her dimensional storage and placed it on the front door of the residence. The wooden plaque allowed the person to freely enter the house as long as it was placed on the front door. Once the residence''s wards and seals had allowed the person entrance, they pocketed the plaque before pushing open the door. ''My love lives here. He showers and bathes here. He eats here. He shits here. He sleeps here. I finally have entrance into my beloved''s home. I feel so happy that I get to enter and leave his home as often as I want to. One day, he''ll notice me cooking and I''ll feed him after his training sessions or his meditation sessions.'' The person pranced around the living room and moved into the kitchen. They started to shuffle through the kitchen, gathering ingredients before beginning to cook. The person activated a function of the kitchen that blocked any smells from leaving the kitchen. It was really handy for the person that didn''t want their beloved to realise they were inside of his home. ''I''m sure he''ll praise me for my tremendously scrumptious food when I feed it to him.'' As the person''s thoughts derailed into pleasing Ye Xiu, the person who was being thought about was shivering as he relaxed into the bathtub.This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it ''Somebody''s thinking about me and for some reason, I feel like I should be very scared.'' Ye Xiu closed his eyes and started to play around with his Qi, not realising that somebody else who wasn''t his friends, was inside of his home. Ye Xiu was inside the bathroom for over thirty minutes before he felt that he had spent a long enough time inside. Taking a towel to dry himself off, he walked into his own bedroom to change clothes. The person downstairs, in the kitchen, had finished cooking up a meal for Ye Xiu and was just about to add the finishing touches to the meal. ''A little elixir here, and he''ll be mine forever!'' The person poured in an elixir into the main dish that they had made, making sure that that they had placed enough of the elixir to last for a long while, They finished placing all the dishes on the table in an orderly fashion. As they were doing this, Ye Xiu walked into the kitchen and was barraged full force by the smell. When he saw who was in the kitchen, he was obviously confused. "How''d you get in here Hua Fei? I''m very certain that the others haven''t come back yet so what are you doing in my house?" His tone was stern and accusing considering that Hua Fei was an intruder. He was still giving her the benefit of the doubt by letting her explain herself. Hua Fei''s ever-present smile dropped into a frown for a second before it came back up. "I thought you would be happy to see me! I''ve made all this food just for you. I want you to enjoy the food that I''ve made for you." She evaded the question and it didn''t escape Ye Xiu''s notice. "Hua Fei... I''d like you to get out. I''m not going to eat your food, considering you entered the residence without permission and used the house as if it was your own. I still don''t know how you entered but I''m going to make sure that you won''t be able to enter anymore. If you don''t get out right now, I''ll have to use force." He glared at Hua Fei who still seemed to have her smile present on her face. She continued to smile as if what Ye Xiu had just asked her to do, didn''t bother her. "I knew something similar to this would happen. Don''t worry! I''ll make sure you''ll love me by the end of this little meeting." The entire kitchen had already been prepared by Hua Fei. She had a feeling that this would happen if Ye Xiu didn''t accept her food. The elixir she had poured into the main dish had let off a scent that would intoxicate Ye Xiu to a level that she would be able to manipulate him into feeling love for her. The elixir would last for an entire month before she had to give him another dosage. With the smell already causing Ye Xiu to be drowsy, she made her move. She pounced towards Ye Xiu and she was planning to tie him up so that she could feed him forcefully. "Don''t move now, let me tie you up so you can enjoy my food nice and calmly. I''ll feed you the food so you don''t even have to move besides chewing with your mouth." The elixir had a similar effect to what Ye Xiu had faced during the third stage of the test. The statue had managed to attack him and encourage feelings of hopelessness and to make him give up. The elixir that she had used, however, was to induce feelings of love and the smell would basically intoxicate those that smelled it to the point that they wouldn''t feel like doing anything else besides obeying the one they loved. To be safe from the elixir, you either had to develop a resistance to it or take the antidote. The elixir was activated through the usage of Qi. Whoever activated it would be the one that the person that consumed the elixir would be attracted to. It was a rare elixir that was on the black market and had no business being sold in upright stores, however, Hua Fei managed to obtain the elixir and was using it for her own nefarious purposes. She sat Ye Xiu down once she managed to tie him up and started to feed him all of her dishes. Once the entire affair was done, she took out a glass bottle and poured the contents down Ye Xiu''s throat. This particular substance that Ye Xiu had consumed wasn''t considered an elixir but was technically a poison. It poisoned the mind and removed the memories that the person who activated the poison wanted. Once she removed any evidence of her interference, she quickly washed everything and placed Ye Xiu down on a sofa. She straddled his body as he was still drowsy and was about to fall asleep. She kissed him on the lips for a few minutes before leaving. She remembered to pour the scent removal potion so that there would be no traces of the cooking. She left but not without giving Ye Xiu one last look. ''Don''t worry, you''ll only look at me with those eyes.'' Shang Yang, Xiao Tu and Shi Die came back to a sleeping Ye Xiu, nearly an hour after Hua Fei had left. They woke him up gently so that they could start training. They knew that even if Ye Xiu didn''t go with them to eat, he had probably already made some food for himself to eat. They sat on the sofas, lazing around when Shi Die noticed something strange. He sniffed the air. ''Strange, Ye Xiu seems to be smelling different again.'' He dismissed the changes as Shang Yang pulled his attention to something else. Ye Xiu''s inner beast was obviously laughing in amusement at the situation that Ye Xiu had managed to get himself into. ''My host seems to attract the weirdest people. He''s managed to attract somebody who would do anything for his love, even drugging him. I''m rather impressed that the girl had gotten ahold of such things. I won''t help him with this little debacle but I''m sure his familiar would try to do his best to convince my host that something is wrong.'' The dragon closed its eyes and relaxed back into its cage. The cavern paintings once again changing due to the changes that had happened to Ye Xiu''s body in the past day. The cavern walls depicted Ye Xiu''s life very vividly and that was how the inner beasts kept track if they were unable to look out with Ye Xiu''s eyes. Typical Training Session It had been a week since Ye Xiu had been drugged by Hua Fei and she had taken the effort and time to visit the residence as often as she could when his friends weren''t at the house. Due to this, she was uninterrupted when she was trying to earn Ye Xiu''s affections. Ye Xiu, who was already drugged started to fall in love with Hua Fei though not at such a rapid pace since the elixir that Hua Fei used wasn''t that potent. The elixir was meant to be used long-term. It was supposed to build up feelings of love for Hua Fei to the point that the elixir would no longer be used. It was a fairly delicate process since Hua Fei noticed that Ye Xiu seemed to resist her seduction with ease, even when he had been dosed. Hua Fei didn''t mind since she quite enjoyed the thrill of having her love acting hard to get with her. Tian Bai, who was stuck inside Ye Xiu''s soul space was literally screaming at the injustice that his master was suffering. Ye Xiu had long removed the block that disallowed him to view events from outside. He had watched as Hua Fei drugged him and removed his memories. He was trying to get Ye Xiu to summon him out but Hua Fei managed to capture Ye Xiu''s attention for the majority of the day even after she left. Tian Bai was trying his best to figure out how exactly he would convince his master that he was being played around with. The only possible way for him to even achieve that is sending memories through the telepathic bond but he was afraid that Ye Xiu would dismiss it as lies. Tian Bai was busy skulking away in the soul space, thinking of plans to convince his master. Ye Xiu was currently training and all thoughts concerning others basically fled from his mind. Though Ye Xiu was able to split his mind''s attention to several things at once, Ye Xiu would completely focus on his training without caring about other things. This was a reason why Ye Xiu was able to advance so easily because he would dismiss any extraneous thoughts not relating to training. This meant that this would be the best period of time for Tian Bai to inform Ye Xiu of the trickery that Hua Fei had employed. Using the telepathic bond to send memories, Tian Bai started to scream for Ye Xiu''s attention. Too bad that Ye Xiu was so concentrated on resisting the pain, trying to regenerate the gems and using his Qi to vibrate the tree. Shi Die was helping Ye Xiu with his defensive technique training whilst Ye Xiu was training his ''Pulsing Force'' technique. He had managed to enter the first stage for his defensive technique though he still hadn''t had any luck when it came to the ''Pulsing Force'' technique. He was certainly close to achieving the first steps of the technique but he wasn''t there yet which meant he was still focused on the technique. Tian Bai was screaming. "You can multitask with at least three different things at once! WHY ARE YOU IGNORING ME!" After several minutes of trying to get Ye Xiu''s attention, Tian Bai finally gave up. He told himself that if Ye Xiu didn''t want to notice him, then he''ll just wait for the next time that Ye Xiu called him out to explain the issue. Whilst Tian Bai was fuming inside the soul space, Ye Xiu realised he should''ve done this type of training a long time ago. The training though barbaric, improved Ye Xiu''s ability to work under duress. This meant that he could technically keep a clear mind even whilst he was being tortured. When Shi Die saw that manic grin that Ye Xiu had when he realised what he had been missing, he started to shiver. Shi Die, though reluctant to basically torture Ye Xiu, was still helping him with the training because he could see the benefits that would come with helping him. Ye Xiu would get stronger and so would Shi Die. Shi Die could test out his techniques and abilities that would''ve been considered way too dangerous to use in a sparring session. Ye Xiu was practising a defensive technique that would boost his defence beyond what he would be capable of piercing through normally. It also helped that his claws and teeth were getting stronger. His claws and teeth were supposed to get stronger from constant use. When they regenerated from being damaged, they were supposed to come back much stronger than before. Now, since he was basically slashing against an object that was so tough, his claws would normally break if too much force was applied, he could strength his claws and teeth to unimaginable levels. He likened Ye Xiu''s body to a whetstone. Ye Xiu attempts at the ''Pulsing Force'' technique made others that watched him wonder what he was doing. Shang Yang and Xiao Tu obviously knew that he was trying to train some sort of technique but they could see no visible effect even after an entire week of doing the exact same thing. To Ye Xiu, his progress has been tremendous but though his progress in both his techniques was great, Shi Die still felt like there was something extremely off with him.Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. Being around Ye Xiu, for so long, it was natural for him to notice subtle differences in the smell. Shi Die had catalogued Ye Xiu''s scent when he had first told him about his adventures during his test and he knew that something else was off with his smell. It was strange since like Shi Die had told Ye Xiu before, it was hard for a person''s scent to change. Shi Die was going to talk to Ye Xiu after this to make sure nothing was wrong. Whilst they were training together, Xiao Tu was busy sparring against Shang Yang. Xiao Tu was learning the technique that Ye Xiu had employed against illusions. Ye Xiu generously taught everybody in the group including Yan Guo on how to identify illusions with his technique. Instead of looking for subtle changes in the Qi flow with an observation technique, the Qi pulse technique would help find any abnormalities in the surroundings. It not only allowed them to find and destroy illusions it also helped them identify whether there were people in the surrounding area or not. Though the technique was easily countered if a person knew how to completely hide their Qi signature and Qi reservoir. Whilst Xiao Tu trained in that technique whilst in a spar, Shang Yang was training in her ability to create illusions whilst fighting another person. This meant that she had devoted her time to being able to multitask. She was able to do up to two things at the same time but that was after three years of constant meditation and training that Ye Xiu helped her through. Though she was able to multitask, it didn''t mean that she was able to create illusions easily. Due to the new technique that Ye Xiu had introduced to the group, she had to make her illusions much harder to dispel and identify. It was possible to hide the abnormalities that an illusion would usually display and she was trying her best to perfect her own skill in doing so. She was also slowly incorporating the tips and tricks that Ye Xiu had delightfully shared with her. It certainly made her much more formidable. Shang Yang''s ability when it came to her daggers was nothing to scoff at anymore, especially when she had her illusions. She didn''t limit herself to her daggers but also used Qi needles and Qi scalpels to her advantage. Qi threads were also part of her repertoire that made her extremely deadly. She danced a graceful yet deadly dance that basically severed an opponent''s defences like it was butter. She had smoothly integrated her hand-to-hand combat skills and her dagger skills. Her attacks struck with deadly precision and after she made sure to dissect her opponent''s fighting style, it became easy for her to dismantle everything her opponent could do. If she knew that Ye Xiu had a technique that would be just as deadly in her hands, she''d probably beg him to teach it to her. Even though Shang Yang had all of that going for her, everybody in the group knew how to counter each other with ease. It was only through mistakes that they made during the fighting, were they able to win. Ye Xiu still hadn''t shown his transformation which meant that nobody would actually know how to fight him when he did show it. When it came to training in his transformed state, Ye Xiu made sure to have a private training room in the Dimension that only he could enter. Yan Guo himself had learnt several new techniques after spending months together with the group. They had helped him make up his flaws and he had started to attend more and more of their training sessions when his father realised how beneficial it was for him. His father grudgingly admitted to himself that the friends that Yan Guo had made had definitely helped him when it came to training and progress. He didn''t recognise that it was also because they helped changed Yan Guo''s mentality into a brighter one. The spar between Xiao Tu and Shang Yang was extremely interesting considering that Xiao Tu was using all the flashy moves which is what made it all the more interesting. Though Shang Yang didn''t use any flashy moves, she still kept up with Xiao Tu. Xiao Tu''s flashy moves were definitely strong in regards to what his usual techniques could do. He liked flashy moves since it covered the other moves that he needed to prepare as he fought. The flashy moves kept his opponent''s attention which is what he wanted. Xiao Tu always managed to stay out of Shang Yang''s punching and kicking distance and he always managed to block the daggers that flew at him. All the other Qi projectiles that Shang Yang seemed to love was being incinerated by Xiao Tu''s weapon. His weapon''s enhancement of Xiao Tu''s metal and fire Qi related abilities allowed him to destroy Shang Yang''s projectiles with as little of his own Qi as possible. The fights always lasted for a long period of time which meant both parties had to sustain as long as they could. Yan Guo was also in the training yard though he was up to his own things. Whilst Shang Yang and Xiao Tu fought, he could also practice the new technique that Ye Xiu had taught them since Shang Yang was using wide-range illusions. Besides that, Yan Guo was training using his own technique that he had created. It was a shadow partner that could attack physical objects and it didn''t receive damage. The only way the shadow partner could possibly be destroyed was if Yan Guo could no longer supply Qi. The best thing about the ability was that Yan Guo could control it remotely. He couldn''t be too far but he could use it to attack without him even needing to get his hands dirty. It could do everything he could in a fight, albeit at less strength. The shadow partner couldn''t speak but it could use its actions to relay what it wanted to say. Currently, he was using it as his sparring partner. He wasn''t actually fighting it but was testing his techniques against it. Whilst the group was all having their own training, the person with designs on Ye Xiu was busy at a black market auction. She had bought multiple things that would enforce her status in Ye Xiu''s heart and she bought multiple other poisons to make sure that if anybody came into her away, she''d be able to deal with them. Getting to the root of the Problem Shi Die looked at Ye Xiu as they were cooling down. He could definitely see that something was on Ye Xiu''s mind and it definitely wasn''t anything training-related. This he knew for sure because Ye Xiu would''ve voiced his concerns to the entire group just as everybody else. They all shared their concerns and would offer feedback and comments on how to approach something but this time Ye Xiu wasn''t saying anything. He already had his suspicions due to the changes in his scent. When he had come back from Jin Yuan''s kitchen last week, he had already known something was wrong. He didn''t say anything because he felt like it was a minor thing but now that Ye Xiu was in deep thoughts, Shi Die knew that he had to say something. He had already made up his mind when he was training with Ye Xiu and he was going to commit. Putting a hand on Ye Xiu''s shoulder he called out to him, "Ye Xiu, I''d like to talk to you for a moment." He steered Ye Xiu to a private corner of the training ground without his permission. Even if Ye Xiu refused to talk to him, Shi Die would still try his best to get all the facts that he needed. Ye Xiu looked at Shi Die quizzically. "What''s so secretive that you need to take me to another part of the training ground?" Ye Xiu got pushed down onto the floor by Shi Die. Shi Die started to sniff Ye Xiu as he crouched down. They looked to be in a very ambiguous position and nearly everybody in the training ground could see them. Xiao Tu got smacked in the face by Shang Yang when his mouth became wide enough that an entire fist could enter it. Once Xiao Tu got slapped back into reality, he closed his mouth rapidly and started to glare at the two that were still stuck in an ambiguous position. Shang Yang simply shook her head in exasperation since she could tell what was probably going through Xiao Tu''s head. She pulled Xiao Tu away from the sight and brought him into the house. After Ye Xiu and Shi Die did whatever they had to do, she was sure that Xiao Tu would make a huge fuss out of the entire situation. Yan Guo was still in the training yard but had employed his stealth skills to use. As he hid behind one of the trees in the training yard, he sent his shadow partner to listen in on the conversation. Yan Guo was a curious teenager and he obviously wanted to know what exactly was going on. Shi Die and Ye Xiu didn''t even notice Yan Guo listening in since both of them felt safe in their own residence which meant that they weren''t as vigilant as they would usually be when they walked outside. "There''s something strange going on with you and I want to know just what it is. Your scent changed in the last few hours that the group had been missing from the residence last week. It''s nearly impossible for that to happen and you definitely weren''t in the same circumstances that you were in with your first change." Shi Die''s entire demeanour was serious which was rare since he was usually a more soft-spoken member of the group. "I don''t know what you''re talking about. As far as I''m concerned, there have been absolutely no events that would''ve caused a change. Are you sure that your nose isn''t just malfunctioning on you? You weren''t so concerned about my bigger change in scent last time so why are you so concerned now?" Ye Xiu narrowed his eyes, demanding an explanation from Shi Die. Shi Die sniffed in response to Ye Xiu''s doubt. "I trust my nose to not fail on me. I''ve been smelling the same smell for the entire week so I''m intimately familiar with the changes. You can''t-fool me. I''ve also noticed that you''ve had something else on your mind besides training. You don''t usually think about other things, so what could you possibly be thinking about that would take up so much of your time? I know that you''ve been absent-minded for the past few days." He directed the topic back towards Ye Xiu easily since he had more to go on compared to Ye Xiu. When the topic was diverted to what Ye Xiu had been daydreaming about for the past few days, he blushed. The blush didn''t last for long but it was there for long enough for Shi Die and Yan Guo to see. "Are you thinking about girl problems?" Shi Die narrowed his eyes and was taunting Ye Xiu for amusement. He once again blushed at Shi Die''s comment. "I don''t know what you''re talking about. You are joking right?" He looked at Shi Die desperately. He was trying to deny the accusation. Shi Die simply smirked at Ye Xiu''s obvious reaction to his taunt. "You don''t have to be worried about talking to us about girl problems. We''re a team, aren''t we? We''re supposed to help each other with problems. Though I still don''t see how that would change your scent." He mused the last bit out loud. Tian Bai who was listening to the conversation intently was basically screaming to Shi Die that he was getting close to the core of the problem. "I''m so frustrated with the fact that he knows that something is wrong but he can''t figure it out because it is so unlikely for Ye Xiu to be drugged! I wish I could just come out. Wait. I''ll just shout at Ye Xiu again through the telepathic bond and he should eventually let me out." He started shouting as much as he could to the point that Ye Xiu''s face started to twitch violently. Shi Die noticed the violent twitching and was worried something was wrong with him. "Are you okay? Is there something on your mind which is causing you to react so violently?"The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Ye Xiu simply grunted. "Just wait a moment." Ye Xiu summoned Tian Bai out of his soul space considering that Tian Bai would''ve kept badgering him through the telepathic bond. He could''ve blocked Tian Bai from reaching him but that took much more effort compared to just simply summoning Tian Bai out and having him explain what his problem was. When Tian Bai was summoned out, he immediately stopped his shouting and spoke in a calm and serious voice. "Ye Xiu, have everyone in your group convene immediately. I don''t care how you do it, just have everyone inside of the house before I explain what''s wrong." Ye Xiu was puzzled by Tian Bai''s serious tone but the both of them complied with his order anyway. Yan Guo dismissed his shadow partner before slinking off back into the residence. When they were all gathered together, Tian Bai stood on the living room table. "Ye Xiu, you''ve been drugged and I suggest that you go for a cleansing as soon as possible. I have no idea what exactly that harpy used but it''s definitely not good considering that you''ve started to have a crush on that harpy. She removed your memories so I''m not surprised that you don''t remember what she did." Shang Yang blinked. "Is this Ye Xiu''s familiar? Why haven''t we been introduced to him earlier." She noticed that Tian Bai was definitely a cute little animal that she would love to pamper. Tian Bai rolled his eyes. "Focus on the important topic please!" Ye Xiu crossed both of his arms over his chest. "I sincerely doubt that anything has happened to me. I don''t see why Shi Die would question me and I don''t see why you have these weird misconceptions about me being drugged." Tian Bai jumped up and bit Ye Xiu on the arm. "Weird misconceptions? Haven''t you realised that you only started developing feelings for that Hua Fei bitch in the last week or so? Tell me, when have you actually met her for the entire week. You don''t remember seeing her in the last few months let alone last week. Can you say that you truly like her?" When Ye Xiu thought about it logically, he knew that Tian Bai was right. "I still don''t see what you mean by me being drugged. I''d have noticed if I had been drugged. You also have to consider that all the food that I eat is either made by me, Shi Die or Jin Yuan." "Like I said, she''s removed your memories by using some kind of liquid that she kept in a bottle. If you don''t believe me, I''ll shove the memories into your head if I have to. You''ll believe me then." Tian Bai was still adamant that Ye Xiu had been drugged. Yan Guo was just listening to the conversation that was going back and forth. He was planning a nasty surprise for the person that had drugged Ye Xiu. Nobody drugged his first friend without consequences. He had heard enough from Tian Bai when he called out the name of the person that had drugged Ye Xiu. Xiao Tu was keeping silent but he was fuming. He stomped his way upstairs to clear his mind. He knew that he wouldn''t be able to help Ye Xiu if his emotions were clouding his judgement. Shang Yang was still slightly confused but Shi Die had grasped the entire situation. "So that''s why your scent has changed. You''ve been drugged with some kind of potion or elixir that forces you to develop feelings of affection for someone." Ye Xiu rolled his eyes. "You can''t have possibly believed him." Shi Die shrugged. "He''s your familiar, he wouldn''t lie about things that concerned your safety and well-being. Tian Bai, is it possible for you to show the memory to all of us at the same time? It''d be best to have evidence before we start doing anything." Tian Bai nodded his tiny head. "Place your hands on Ye Xiu''s head and I''ll do the rest." They did as he commanded. Tian Bai connected the telepathy bond that Ye Xiu used with him and started to push the memory so that it could be shared with the rest. They watched the memory and at the end of it, Ye Xiu was shaking with fury. The potion was supposed to be used long-term which meant that if anything went wrong before true affection for the user was born, the effect of the potion would diminish but it would still be there. They still had to remove the potion that was in Ye Xiu''s system before he would be considered normal again. "I told that bitch to not come back and she retaliated by removing my memories?" "I should''ve remembered that encounter though, even if you removed my memory, my mind palace should still have stored it in my labyrinth." Ye Xiu was confused as to how the poison that Hua Fei administered had managed to remove his memories. Yan Guo started to speak up. "The potion and poison that was used can be considered to be fairly rare. I''ve definitely heard of it and I''ve seen it in use. The two are bought in black market auctions and they fetch a fair price. The antidote for the potion is much easier to get compared to the poison. As far as I''m concerned, you won''t be able to retrieve the memories that were wiped away immediately but they''ll slowly return to you after a few months. "The antidote to the memory wiping poison is usually snatched up by those of higher statuses so I''m unsure whether you''d be able to get it. I can still retrieve the antidote to the potion. I''m unsure if its the same potion I''m thinking about but we should at least try." Ye Xiu was rubbing his face in frustration. "Go, do whatever you can. I''ll get the bitch back. I''ll toy with her little fucking feelings if I have to. We''ll make sure that at least one other person is with me at all times so that we can fake the dosages that she gives me." Shang Yang and Shi Die were still shocked that Hua Fei would do something like this though Shang Yang wasn''t too surprised, considering the way she had acted the last time they had met. Shi Die shook his head. "I''m glad that I noticed the problem but I couldn''t tell what the problem was. I was close to guessing what the actual problem was. I''ll have to thank Tian Bai for clearing up the confusion." Shang Yang and Shi Die both left to go upstairs to tell Xiao Tu what had actually transpired. Tian Bai looked at Ye Xiu with a smug expression. "Next time you ignore me, I''ll make sure to bring out your inner beast." Ye Xiu just groaned and watched Yan Guo leave the residence to do what he to do. "I can''t believe she would do something like that. I''m glad that you managed to inform us so early. Imagine if she managed to continue dosing me without us knowing? I''m just going to plan what I''m going to do with her." Tian Bai was pulled back into the soul space as Ye Xiu was laying on the sofa, thinking about his plans. Going to the Underground Yan Guo vanished from Ye Xiu''s residence and made his way towards his own. He was going to ask his father for permission to go to the Underground. The Underground was dangerous and for good reason. It was a cesspit for the degenerates of society and that was being kind. Many things could be found in the Underground and the golden rule of the Underground was to never be caught. If you were caught in the Underground, then it''d be certain death. He found his father in his office, and with all the manners that had been hammered into him, he addressed his father. He was seeking for his father''s permission and it wouldn''t do any good if he managed to enrage him. "Father, I ask for your permission to go to the Underground." He kept his tone emotionless so that it wouldn''t give away his urgency and rage. His father had clasped both his hands together and held them underneath his chin as he watched his son. "The Underground? What reason do you have to need to go there?" Though it may seem like he didn''t care about his son, he wouldn''t needlessly send him into danger. The Underground was dangerous for a reason and it was wise to usually have a companion that was able to fight the majority of the denizens that skulked about in the shadows. Yan Guo was already prepared for his father''s questioning so it was relatively easy for him to answer without giving anything away. "There is something that I need to retrieve in the Underground and it is important to the safety of my group." He knew that he couldn''t lie to his father but it didn''t mean that he couldn''t omit the facts. Yan Shen watched his son''s expression to see if there was anything that he had left out but there was nothing to see since his expression never wavered from its blank mask. He knew that he had trained his son well to the point that even he can no longer see through his mask of emotionlessness. He was proud of the fact that he had managed to train his son to this point. "Important for your group? I''m surprised you are so invested in your little groups of your friend to be willing to brave the Underground for them." "Do they know of the danger that you face by entering the Underground? Or could it be that you haven''t told them what truly lies in the Underground?" His father questioned Yan Guo since he truly wanted to see whether his son''s friends were worth the effort that he would put in and the danger that he would face. Yan Guo''s blank face still gave nothing away though he was quietly fuming. His father was obviously mocking his friendship with Ye Xiu and the others but his father didn''t need to know that he truly treasured the bonds that he had formed with the group. He stayed silent. Yan Shen continued. "If you''re going into the Underground I want you to at least have one other person following you. No matter how much I trust in your ability to traverse the Underground by yourself, it''d still be safer for you to have a companion." Yan Guo nodded to show his understanding, already thinking about who he should take with him to the Underground. He didn''t want to risk people needlessly but he felt that there were only two suitable people that he should take with him. "I''ll give you my permission to go the Underground, but I also need you to send a little package to one of my acquaintances in the Underground for me. He''ll recognise you since he has met you before." Yan Guo nodded since he did such things for his father often, though he had never sent packages to people in the Underground. "You''re dismissed." Yan Guo bowed to his father before leaving the residence. Once he was far enough from the residence, he let out a sigh that he had been holding in for the entire time that he had been conversing with his father. He didn''t like dealing with his father. It was always tiring to deal with him. Ever since Yan Guo had started to bond with the group more, he realised that he felt more and more exasperated when it came to the way his father treated him. He knew that his father had his own troubles but it didn''t mean that he had to take out his anger on him. Yan Guo walked back to Ye Xiu''s residence since he was planning to ask Shi Die to accompany him to the Underground. He would''ve asked Ye Xiu but he felt like his emotions were in turmoil and that would affect his decision making. He was going to ask Ye Xiu whether he could have Tian Bai follow them since nobody would expect a tiny animal to attack. It also helped that both Shi Die and Tian Bai were fast enough that they would be able to escape the Underground if the situation required it. He entered the residence easily since the group had given him an item that would allow him unrestricted access into the residence. He knew that nobody would actually be asleep or meditating at this moment of time so it was safe for him to simply walk into Shi Die''s room. Shi Die wasn''t in his room though Ye Xiu was in his. He could see that Ye Xiu definitely wasn''t happy though he was much calmer compared to before.If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it. Ye Xiu looked at Yan Guo the moment his door had opened. "What do you want?" He was irritated and it was clear to Yan Guo when he spoke. Yan Guo didn''t bother antagonising Ye Xiu since he knew that would not help him in his endeavour to enlist Tian Bai for the trip to the Underground. "I need Tian Bai''s help, do you mind having your familiar with me for at least six hours?" Ye Xiu snorted. "Sure, go ahead. It''s not like I need him currently. I''m going to be stuck inside of the residence until that little bitch comes back." He summoned Tian Bai out promptly and Yan Guo nodded his head in thanks. Yan Guo picked up Tian Bai and placed him on his head. Remarkably, Tian Bai didn''t react to Yan Guo''s actions and instead calmly watched everything that was happening. He had no idea why he was required by Yan Guo but trusted him since Ye Xiu trusted him. Yan Guo made his way to the kitchen since there were only a few places that Shi Die would be found at. He found Shi Die in the middle of cooking food. He pulled a chair from the dining table and sat in front of the counter as he watched Shi Die cook. "Hey Shi Die, do you mind accompanying me for a trip after you finish cooking? My father won''t let me go to the Black Market unless somebody is following me and you''re the best choice currently." Without stopping his actions, Shi Die considered Yan Guo''s request before replying. "This trip to the Black Market is for Ye Xiu, am I right to assume that?" Yan Guo nodded though Shi Die couldn''t see it. "It is. I won''t be able to go to the Black Market without you. If you do accept to join me, we''ll have to take a slight detour before we reach the Black Market since I have a package that I need to pass along to one of my father''s acquaintances." Shi Die didn''t respond for several minutes and only gave his answer after he had finished his cooking. He cleaned his hands before drying them on a towel. "I don''t mind following you. It''ll be interesting to see this Black Market. As long as we can get what we need to help Ye Xiu then I don''t really mind if I waste my time with you." Yan Guo smiled at his response. "We''ll be gone immediately then." He left the kitchen and stood at the front door whilst he waited for Shi Die to prepare whatever he needed. Shi Die didn''t take long to request some extra elixirs and pills from Ye Xiu. After receiving the extra elixirs and pills, he followed Yan Guo out of the residence. Yan Guo started to explain what was going to happen and what to expect. "The trip to the Black Market will take awhile. We have to reach the Underground first. The Underground is basically what the city is for normal civilians but it is for the criminals instead. It means that it''ll be much more dangerous than you expect it to be. Though I don''t think we''ll have to be too worried about making it there since the people that usually prowl around the entrances to the Underground are a bunch of weaklings." "The true danger of the Underground lies within and you can''t underestimate anybody which is actually there. You learn to hide your actual strength and nobody attacks another unless they are certain of victory. It isn''t rare for fights to break out especially when it comes to different factions. It is best to avoid those though it is rather hard. It is also the main reason why my father probably wanted me to have a companion since people are more hesitant to attack when there are more people." Shi Die listened to Yan Guo''s explanation of the Underground carefully since it sounded rather dangerous. "From the Academy to one of the entrances to the Underground, would probably take us about an hour or two. We don''t want to be seen rushing towards the entrances since you''re more liable to be attacked. It''s best to approach by walking and we''ll walk the entire distance." Yan Guo looked at Shi Die to see if there was any hesitation or fear, he was glad that his friend showed none of that but seemed to be more excited at the fact that they were going to the Underground. "I was going to ask Ye Xiu to follow me but I don''t think he''s in the right state of mind to be doing anything subtle. It also helps that both you and Tian Bai are the fastest people in the group. It means that I wouldn''t have to worry about either of you if disaster strikes." Shi Die shrugged. "Ye Xiu''s probably going to be an emotional mess until he gets to have his revenge on Hua Fei. His anger seems to be much more pronounced ever since his scent changed. He''s more animalistic in a way and I''m guessing that has something to do with his bloodline. I''m not going to poke into his business unless there''s a good reason to." They made their way towards the Underground slowly, stopping at several places to buy things that had caught their interest. Yan Guo had brought a substantial amount of money with him since the Underground usually had things that weren''t able to be bought elsewhere. Yan Guo wasn''t sure exactly when he was supposed to give the package to his father''s acquaintance. He was only told the location. The two had entered the Underground and had been waiting for an entire hour for his father''s friend to show up. They hadn''t been looking around the Underground for things to buy since Yan Guo wanted to hand over the package before doing anything. He wanted to take his time to peruse the items in the Underground since there were usually shady businessmen selling fake goods to those that couldn''t appraise items. A person appeared after thirty more minutes of waiting. When he spotted Yan Guo, he simply grunted and held out his hand for the package. Yan Guo''s eyebrows rose. "Are you serious? At least confirm that you''re my father''s friend. He''s given a passcode so either you tell it to me or this package won''t be delivered." The man grunted once again before taking out a scimitar and lashed out at Yan Guo. "Tsk, brats that stick their noses in the wrong places should be silenced." Master Gua Gua The surprise attack could be said to be fairly quick though it was considered to be slow in the eyes of the group. It was highly unlikely that the man would be able to fight against either of them considering just how slow he was even when he had the advantage of a surprise attack. Shi Die simply looked at Yan Guo at the hilarity of the situation that they were placed in. "Are you sure the Underground is as dangerous as you said it was? If this is what they have to offer, then I can''t see why it is that much of a danger." He wasn''t very impressed with the capability of the thug that was attacking them, considering that Yan Guo had spent quite a bit of time explaining about the dangers of the Underground. Yan Guo was slightly embarrassed by the situation that they were in since it was a farce compared to the stories of the Underground that he had weaved for Shi Die. "We aren''t very far into the Underground yet so the majority of the cultivators that you see hanging about here are around about the second to the middle of the third realm of cultivation. Considering our strength in relation to those that reside here, we''re stronger than them definitely." They continued to dodge the thug''s attacks as they conversed with each other calmly. They weren''t even worried about the danger. The thug was seething with rage and was wildly attacking the pair. The thug never noticed Tian Bai. Tian Bai had already jumped off of Yan Guo''s head and was just waiting for either of the two to get bored of the entire farce. When Yan Guo nodded at Tian Bai, the thug was quickly dispatched in a nice and simple manner as Tian Bai twisted the neck of the thug in a single motion. It was rather sickening to see the twisted head but they calmly ignored the scene. Yan Guo quietly stored the dead body in his dimensional storage before continuing to speak again. "I didn''t think that you had such strength in you, Tian Bai. To twist a person''s neck like that is pretty amazing." Tian Bai snorted before pouncing on Shi Die and begged for water so he could clean his tiny paws. "A surprise attack combined with my speed leads to a very easy death. Considering that the thug never expected it in the first place. It''s also a good thing that the retard had a much lower cultivation base compared to mine." Once Tian Bai thoroughly cleaned himself, he jumped back onto Yan Guo''s head. Yan Guo waited until Tian Bai had settled down on his head comfortably before speaking. "Whoever is there better come out now. I know you''ve been watching us ever since the thug had appeared. I''d love to give you the benefit of the doubt that you weren''t involved in this but I''d rather much see you in the flesh." The group had noticed their spectator long ago, and it was only because that neither of them could sense any danger from the spectator did they leave him alone. A man stepped out of the shadows and walked towards where the group was. When Yan Guo saw who the person was, he simply greeted him politely. "I didn''t expect it to be you to be the one receiving the package, Master Gua Gua." Shi Die''s eyes moved up and down on the figure of Master Gua Gua. He didn''t dare continue staring at him for too long since even Yan Guo seemed to be respectful of the man in front of him. The man simply laughed. "There''s no need to be so polite to me, Yan Guo. Your father and I have known each other for so long and I''ve basically helped with different parts of your training. Just treat me as one of your family members. Anyway, is this your friend? I''m not surprised that your father has asked you to bring a companion with you into the Underground, especially with how protective he is of you." Yan Guo snorted and he handed over the package to the family friend. He didn''t bother asking for a passcode this time since his father had told him that his acquaintance would be one that would recognise him easily. They exchanged pleasantries for a few more minutes, catching up on how his training and cultivation was going. Once Master Gua Gua had left the vicinity, Yan Guo simply sighed. Shi Die watched his friend''s reactions. He could see that he had been tense for the entire time that they had been talking. He was curious as to why he had been so tense but knew better than to pry. Tian Bai, however, wasn''t as subtle as Shi Die but directly asked Yan Guo about his tenseness. "You seem scared of the man. I wonder why?" Tian Bai mused out loud, drawing a scowl out of Yan Guo. "He''s definitely nice when it comes to a conversation but he''s a sadistic man when it is time for training. I''d say that he''s definitely worse than my father when it comes to intensity of training. My father only knows him due to the fact that my father is one of the major powers in the Underground. Master Gua Gua is one of the top assassins in the city and has trained many others that are feared throughout the country."The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. Yan Guo shuddered as he remembered the training that he had undergone the assassin. "Now that we''ve done my little chore for my father, we can now be on our way to the markets of the Underground. The Underground essentially has three layers to it. The first layer which is where we are now is considered the area where the weaklings gather. There is a market in every layer, though the items sold in each market becomes much more expensive when you enter the second and third layer." Shi Die looked around and sniffed the air. He was surprised that it didn''t smell as bad as he thought it would be but he could definitely smell the scent of blood that lingered in the air permanently. "How long are we going to spend looking for things in the market?" Yan Guo stopped walking for a moment. "I''m not actually sure... how about we just go to the Black Market first. What we need would most definitely be there. I''ll just have to use my father''s authority to get the antidotes that we need if none are for sale. They usually have extra stock that they keep in storage but its usually reserved for the major powers in the Underground." "After we buy the antidotes, I guess we can just walk around the second layer. I''m not confident enough to be walking around the third layer for an extended period of time. Once we get the antidotes, we get out. The third layer is where the most fights break out since the major factions'' members seem to love fighting." Yan Guo was right to be wary of the third layer and he was making sure that Shi Die knew of the dangers. Shi Die nodded at his friend''s words. "Tian Bai seems to be really quiet. I''m surprised that he hasn''t said anything ever since we left Master Gua Gua." Tian Bai, who was simply resting on top of Yan Guo''s head, was actually asleep. They looked at the small little weasel and sighed. "I asked for Tian Bai because he seemed to be relatively fast when he had been summoned out. Turns out he''s rather unreliable when it comes to staying up." Shi Die chuckled. "Maybe he''s just bored of the trip already. I mean, for all that you have said about the Underground being dangerous, he hasn''t seen anything that''s probably worth his time. I''m certain that Tian Bai is stronger than all of us but I''m not sure of his actual strength considering that we''ve never seen him fight. What may seem interesting to us might be boring for him. I can''t blame him really." Yan Guo sighed. "I guess you''re right." Yan Guo thought of a topic to steer off boredom. "What do you think of the person that poisoned Ye Xiu?" He was asking Shi Die on his opinion on Hua Fei since he had his own opinion of her and it had changed after the little situation between Ye Xiu and Hua Fei had been revealed by Tian Bai. Shi Die tilted his head to the side slightly. "What do I think about Hua Fei? I can''t really say much about her since I don''t know her very well. I only know that she''s a relatively decent fighter considering her ranking on the Academy''s list. She''s met with Ye Xiu a few times after her first fight against him during the first year but other than that I don''t know much else." Yan Guo hummed in response as he thought of what to say. "I can say that I probably know more about her than anybody else in the group. My father and her mentor are friends with each other and she''s definitely different compared to what I had known of her." Shi Die looked confused. "What do you mean she''s different to what you know of her?" Yan Guo cleared his throat. "She''s a nice person. The friends that she does have all think of her as a very generous and kind person. Hua Fei likes to help people and she has many hobbies. Though after what happened with Ye Xiu, I''ll have to reevaluate her. It seems that she''s hidden much more underneath her public appearance." Shi Die was thoughtful. "I haven''t known you long enough to even say something like this, but don''t you think that the way your father treats is wrong? I mean you even had this Master Gua Gua who had taught you with the same ruthlessness. To me, it feels like your father has deprived you of your childhood, and yet you''re still there enduring his ''lessons'' with a smile." Yan Guo knew that such a conversation would arise within the group but he didn''t expect Shi Die to be the one to voice his concerns. "I know that the way my father has treated hasn''t been ideal but I''m of the belief that he''s doing it for the sake of my safety. I don''t really mind that he''s deprived me of my childhood. In a way, I''m being a child whenever I''m having fun with the rest of the group. Cultivators have a long life ahead of them as long as they can survive. If I can protect myself now, I can have fun later." Shi Die privately shared the same thought process as Yan Guo as he knew what he meant. He, himself never actually had a childhood considering that there was no childhood for him in the first place. An orphan that had to count on himself to survive. He shared the same mentality as Yan Guo, that he knew but he still couldn''t see why he would willingly put himself in that position. Shi Die had always thought that parental figures were to protect their children but not abuse them in such a way. He felt that Yan Guo''s behaviour when it came to defending his father was very similar to the other children that he had known. They had been abused but it was a part of their behaviour to defend their abusers to make it seem like they weren''t weak. They didn''t want others to know that they were suffering so they tried to hide it as best as they could. Shi Die simply shook his head. He would continue this conversation later when they weren''t in such a public area. There were eyes and ears everywhere and it would do them good to finish what they came here as quickly as they could. Yan Shens Underground Past They continued on their way to the third layer in a rather silent way. Neither boy spoke to each other after the little conversation that they had. The mood was awkward since it seemed like both boys wanted to apologise but they kept faltering in their attempts. Shi Die''s hesitance seemed to be more visible compared to Yan Guo''s who kept an emotionless mask on his face. Tian Bai had woken up from the little nap that he had taken and he was amused at the conflict of emotions that both boys seemed to be in. Tian Bai was not a nice person. He liked to play pranks and the awkward silence between Shi Die and Yan Guo was entertainment enough for him, considering that there was nothing actually interesting in the Underground that had caught his attention just yet. As much as Tian Bai enjoyed the silenced that was prevailing between the two, he decided to break the silence since he wanted to know more about the Underground. Yan Guo''s explanations and stories about the Underground were certainly more interesting than the silence. "What else can you tell us about the Underground. You''ve talked about the major factions that seem to like fighting, Give us more details about these major factions." Tian Bai started to tug Yan Guo''s hair to get his attention. He found it funny when Yan Guo seemed to tense up every time his hair was pulled. After a while, he stopped since he still wanted to hear Yan Guo''s explanation and continuing to annoy him would not do him good. Yan Guo was glad for Tian Bai breaking the silence since he felt rather uncomfortable with it. "The major factions of the Underground? There are seven major factions and even rule over a portion of the Underground. They have many sub-factions that help them manage the first and second layer but they all report to a major faction. Factions that aren''t underneath the major factions, usually have an alliance with one of them due to the need for protection from others." Yan Guo glanced over at Shi Die who seemed to be listening intently, he continued with confidence now that he knew that Shi Die was interested. "I''ve mentioned before that violence is basically a daily occurrence for the Underground but that''s mostly due to the tensions between alliances. They don''t fight over land, property or whatnot, They fight for the benefits that they could receive if their combat superiority is recognised." Shi Die tilted his head. Yan Guo noted that if Shi Die had a dog''s ears, it would look extremely cute. "Benefits? What do they receive from these benefits that fights are so common? These benefits must truly be worth it if these people risk their lives on a daily basis." Yan Guo tore his gaze away from Shi Die and adjusted his facial expression quickly. "Those that get recognised by their faction would start to be assigned missions. Do note that these missions that they get assigned are just as dangerous as the fights. No, the true benefit that they get is Faction Points. Faction Points can be used regardless of faction. They can be traded for anything, and when I say anything, I mean it." "Faction Points can be traded for whatever you can name. As long as the Underground can get their hands on it, and you have the appropriate amount of Faction points then you can have it. The major factions usually are the ones that set the prices for specific things and nobody dares argue over it." "The seven major faction''s names are related to flowers: Azalea, Lotus, Chrysanthemum, Hydrangea, Orchid, Rose and Violet. The Rose and Hydrangea factions consist of only females. The other factions are a mixture of both genders. Each faction has their own speciality that they teach to members that have contributed to the faction highly. Distribution of the techniques taught equals to death." "The major factions rule most of the things but obviously not everything. There are several other groups that have substantial power comparable to the factions though they are neutral when it comes to anything that happens in the Underground. They are just the powerhouses that don''t really care about anything that happens. They just go with the flow. My father is one these Neutral powerhouses. Master Gua Gua is also a Neutral powerhouse and he trains assassins that are hired by all factions and groups." Yan Guo sneaked another look at Shi Die and was glad that he had managed to keep Shi Die''s attention on whatever he was saying. He was slightly apologetic about his defensive behaviour against Shi Die but he still felt like he had said the correct thing. He knew that Shi Die had his best interests at heart just like everybody else in the group, after all, he was the same for the others as well. It was because he didn''t want others to question his father''s ethics when it came to training. He was his only living relative. Yan Guo could see that Shi Die wanted to ask a question so he stopped talking for a moment so that he had a chance. "How''d your father get involved in the Underground? I''m certain that you''d know of the Underground through rumours and all that but how''d he become a major power in the Underground? He''s the Vice-principal of the Academy so I see no reason for him to be involved with groups that could be considered to be criminals."Stolen story; please report. Yan Guo wasn''t very sure how to answer that since he didn''t know too much about how his father had gotten involved with the Underground. He only knew that his father had gotten involved with the Underground when his mother had died. "I don''t really know how he got involved with the Underground but I can probably guess the reason." Shi Die waited for Yan Guo to continue but he never did. Shi Die prompted him to tell him more. "What''s the reason? You can''t just leave me hanging." Shi Die, the one who was usually able to grasp the mood of the conversation was distracted by his own curiosity to notice that Yan Guo didn''t want to say anymore. Clearing the emotions that he was feeling on his face, he spoke in a dead tone. "He was involved with the Underground after my mother''s death. He never really got over her death and the Underground became his way to vent his frustration. The current principal, San Guo had my father become the Vice-principal due to the ties that he had to the Underground. It boosted the Academy''s strength and it became much safer when agreements were made with the major factions to have them stay away." "The Underground became a bloody battleground during the few years that my father was truly invested into the Underground. From when he joined to the moment he formed the agreement, fights broke out every day and casualties piled up. Those that weren''t involved with the Underground had absolutely no clue, only the major powers of the city really knew what was going on below them." "After the agreement was formed, my father was less involved with the Underground but he was recognised as a major power and neutral party due to his influence and strength that he held in the Underground. I believe my father fought many battles in the Underground which is why he is so respected. Other than that, I know nothing else." Shi Die was feeling angry with himself due to the insensitive question that he had forced Yan Guo to answer. He should''ve stopped trying to push Yan Guo into answering the question considering that everybody had their own secrets to keep. Shi Die also knew that he should''ve noticed the signs that Yan Guo didn''t want to speak with just his nose. He could smell emotions after all. He apologised because he was sorry and not because it was the right thing to do. "I''m sorry for pushing you. I should''ve realised that you felt uncomfortable with the conversation and left it as it was." Yan Guo smiled. "I''m sorry as well. I didn''t mean to react the way I did when it came to things about my father. It''s just hard to break the habit after doing it for so long. I''m still not quite used to having others care about me so much in such a way. My father cares about me in his own unique way, twisted as it may be." Tian Bai snorted at the atmosphere that had been created. "This became so corny. Why''d you both have to ruin my fun." Tian Bai pouted after he spoke. The two simply laughed at Tian Bai''s adorable expression, all tenseness in the atmosphere forgotten. "How exactly does the Black Market work?" Yan Guo took up his lecturing tone once again. "The Black Market is split into two portions. The first portion is the general market where you can simply stroll through the streets and look at stores or stalls for items that you need. The item quality that is sold at these stores and stalls are all kept at a standard. The factions play a major role in keeping these stores and stalls stocked with items since it provides a substantial income." "The second portion is the Auction Tavern. It''s basically the Auction House for the normal citizens but for the people that know of the Underground. The items here... we get rarer items on a common basis due to the illegality of the methods that the items were retrieved. We''re searching for antidotes for rarer substances so we''ll have to be going to the Auction Tavern. The things that Hua Fei used isn''t too expensive so I should be able to shell out the money that is needed for it." "We''ll also be lurking around the Auction Tavern after we find the antidotes. They have quite the selection of items as long as you have the money and authority to buy them. Luckily for us, I have my father''s permission. What that means, is that I basically have a badge that symbolises that I''m at the Auction Tavern in his capacity and I can basically do everything he can." Yan Guo''s explanation of the Underground was enlightening for both Shi Die and Tian Bai. It seemed as if that there was truly so much to see in the world, they hadn''t even finished discovering all the secrets there were to be discovered in the city. Shi Die was also glad that Yan Guo''s attitude towards him was no longer as cold as before when he had broached the topic of his father and the Underground. Seeing that Yan Guo was no longer speaking, Shi Die decided that he would at least make the conversation normal and to make sure that the atmosphere didn''t become as tense as it had before. "Don''t you think that our journey from the Academy to the Underground seemed relatively safe? I''m surprised we haven''t met anybody that had a grudge against your father or anything." Yan Guo sighed. "I feel like you''ve just cursed us to a bitter fate." "That would certainly be amusing, at least your bitter fate would bring amusement to this dreary trip." Tian Bai was mumbling his words as he was about to take another nap. The two finally entered the third layer of the Underground and Yan Guo steered Shi Die towards the Black Market''s entrance, the sign visible to all who could see and read. Of course, how else would a trip become interesting if the danger wasn''t lurking around in the shadows? Several pairs of eyes stalked the two figures that walked into the Black Market. Why would the Underground keep the pair safe from prying eyes if they weren''t even safe from them above-ground? Yan Guo and Shi Die had absolutely no clue for what they were about to face. Found the Love Potion! The pair drew many sets of curious eyes when they entered the Black Market. After a few subtle glances to assess the newcomers, they went back to their own business. Yan Guo gestured for Shi Die to follow him as they walked further into the Black Market. Shi Die could certainly see that the Black Market was massive. He couldn''t even see the other end of it and he had sharp vision. "This place is massive. I can see why you said that we''d be able to find anything we needed. How does nobody notice the Underground when it''s so massive? Your father is one of the major powers and he''s not even considered the strongest person in the city. How is it that nobody has bothered to shut it down?" Shi Die was whispering madly in Yan Guo''s ears since it would be unwise for others to know that it was his first time prowling around the Black Market. Yan Guo whispered back at Shi Die. "The Underground is well-protected, not just by those that control the Underground but also by the powerhouses that lurk in the city. Even they rely on the resources that they can get from the Underground. The Underground is basically richer than the city yet illegal in nature. Nobody bothers trying to do anything about the illegality of the entire Underground but this is a world where anybody would do anything just to survive." Shi Die mulled over Yan Guo''s words and found out that what he said held some truth in it. Even he would do anything to survive, no matter if it was illegal or not. The only thing that he wouldn''t do would be sacrificing his friends for his own gain. Yan Guo, seeing Shi Die''s understanding of what he had said, continued on with his explanation. "Even if they tried shutting it down I''m very certain that they wouldn''t be able to destroy the factions. The Underground is a bloody battlefield. Fighters are forged in the fires of battle." "I could say that compared to the blood-drenched fighters of the Underground, the powerhouses in the city are usually more inexperienced compared to them. Not that they are weak or anything because there are certainly strong powerhouses that can take on the leaders of the major factions but the majority of the city cultivators don''t have the battle-hardened senses that they have." "Either way, trying to shut the Underground down would be foolish since it ruins the economy for the entire country and too much blood would be shed." Yan Guo pulled Shi Die over to the massive entrance that literally read out "Auction Tavern." He could see that there were more people mingling around in this portion of the Black Market compared to the one that they had entered initially. Yan Guo explained that more people were going to be lurking around in the Auction Tavern because they were there to snatch up items before any others got there. It was also considered the central trading point in the entire Underground. No matter if they were from the first, second or third layer of the Underground, they would try their best to make it to the Auction Tavern since it was where everything was sold. Certainly, there were markets and auction houses in the first and second layers but they definitely weren''t as expansive as this. Nobody paid them a single glance as they wandered around. Shi Die found it strange that it was named Auction Tavern considering that everything that they had seen so far since they had entered the area had shown no relation to taverns. His curiosity was getting ahead of him again. "Yan Guo, why is this portion of the Black Market called the Auction Tavern?" Yan Guo blinked owlishly. "I''m not actually quite sure. I know there is an actual tavern which hosts all the Auctions but I''ve no idea why they called the entire area the Auction Tavern. It''s rather strange, now that I think about it." Tian Bai had woken up from his nap and was offering his own little comments. "It''s probably for convenience. You wouldn''t want to be remembering all the names of specific places. It''s much simpler to just call an entire area a specific name and leave it like that." Shi Die acknowledged Tian Bai''s words but then tilted his head as he thought of something to ask Tian Bai. "How would you know so much about the human culture. From what I''ve heard from Ye Xiu, you''ve never even been to a civilisation for humans." Tian Bai simply stared at Shi Die like he was dumb. Yan Guo was doing the same. Yan Guo decided to answer the question for Tian Bai. "All Qi Beasts inherit memories from their predecessors. Surely one of his ancestors has been to a human civilisation. Even if they haven''t, it is commonly known that even Qi Beasts have their own cities. Don''t forget that Qi Beasts are just as smart as humans." Shi Die had the decency to blush. It wasn''t that Shi Die was ignorant about Qi Beasts because he was stupid, no it was simply because it was thought to be common knowledge and nobody had ever taught him about it.If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. Tian Bai started to move around on Yan Guo''s head. "There''s something here that smells similar to that blasted love drug that the bitch drugged Ye Xiu with. I''m just going to assume that it''s the actual love drug and that we''ll need to find the antidote for it." Tian Bai was uncharacteristically serious and was actually snarling when he mentioned Hua Fei in a derogatory manner. Yan Guo nodded seriously in response to Tian Bai''s reaction. "Point us in the direction of the smell. If we can get ahold of the potion that Hua Fei used then it''ll be much easier for us to find the antidote. I can always ask a person for the specific antidote for any substance as long as I hand it to them. This''ll definitely help us in finishing things much faster. I''m surprised that Shi Die didn''t notice." Yan Guo was teasing Shi Die and Shi Die noticed it. He didn''t take offence from Yan Guo''s words since he knew that Yan Guo was simply joking. Shi Die decided to retort back at Yan Guo with a sharp tone. "Maybe it''s because I''m not that much of an animal, unlike Tian Bai. The only reason why he was able to remember the scent of the love potion was probably because he had access to Ye Xiu''s mind. In a way, he can literally smell using Ye Xiu''s nose." Yan Guo frowned slightly when he heard Shi Die speaking in such a sharp tone but when he noticed his grin, he let his frown drop. He realised that Shi Die was just messing around with him and Tian Bai. With that little moment finished, Tian Bai rolled his eyes and started tugging on Yan Guo''s hair to remind him about what he had just asked him to do. Tian Bai started to direct Yan Guo and Shi Die towards a tiny store that was located in front of an alleyway. The person that was at the front of the store was an old man which had unusually sharp eyes, scanning the streets for trouble. Tian Bai had led them into the shop and they had taken a single bottle of the supposed love potion. The man watched them move and noted the Qi Beast that seemed to be directing them. When Shi Die and Yan Guo made it to the counter to pay for the love potion, the man started to speak. "That''s very interesting. Such young children coming to the Underground to buy a love potion? I can''t say much since you might be children that have ties to the Underground, meaning that your innocence has been lost for a long time. The love potion is for sale for a thousand gold." The man watched Yan Guo take out the necessary amount and paid it straight up. "You''re certainly a rich little boy. That Qi Beast of yours is rather interesting as well." Yan Guo noticed the creepy behaviour of the man, he offered no words to the man and quickly left the shop with Shi Die. Tian Bai was simply snorting at the behaviour the man had been displaying. "I''d love to play a joke on that creepy man but we aren''t going to be here for long so let''s just get going already." They moved out of the streets and towards the tavern that Yan Guo had spoken about. Without taking a second glance back, they never noticed that the man behind them was certainly smiling. A grotesque and creepy smile but a smile nonetheless. "Ah... so it seems like Yan Shen''s son has grown up. Very interesting. I wonder what changes he could bring to the Underground when he matures... He shouldn''t worry about me though, I''m just here to watch." The man looked at the streets before closing shop. Yan Guo and Shi Die made it to the tavern at record-breaking speed. They decided to move much faster since the man in the store had certainly creeped them out. The people inside of the tavern certainly looked at them for a while, wondering what would possibly bring two children to such a place before going back to doing their own things. Yan Guo started to whisper to Shi Die. "We''re here. Just a bit more before we head back. I don''t feel like looking around anymore after that encounter. Besides, we can always come back to the Underground at a later date. We can even bring the others with us. It''ll definitely be interesting for Shang Yang and Ye Xiu, considering that the knowledge of being able to buy rare ingredients would lure them in like little ducklings following after their mother." Shi Die nodded. "Fine by me, that old man did creep me out quite a bit as well. My nose picked up on some very interesting smells in that shop and though the man didn''t reek of danger, he certainly smelled like blood." Yan Guo pulled Shi Die over to a line where many people were waiting. The majority of the people seemed to be men but there were some women as well that were also waiting. It took over an hour until they made it to the receptionist and the receptionist definitely didn''t look friendly. She seemed to be scowling and they had heard her snarling at a customer that had managed to piss the receptionist off even more. The lady snarled. "NEXT!" Shi Die and Yan Guo walked up and the lady''s face seemed to soften. It seemed to them that the lady certainly had a soft spot for children, though she still spoke in an irritated tone. "Name the item that you need and we shall find it for you. If the item is off-limits to you then identification will need to be provided to prove that you do have the proper requirements for us to sell you an item. Please remember that we respect our customer''s privacy and we bear no insurance if you manage to lose your item after you leave." Yan Guo and Shi Die blinked. It seemed like she had memorised what she had to say. Yan Guo, even with all the stories and information that he had provided for Shi Die, had never experienced the Auction Tavern so it was a first for both boys. Yan Guo blinked a few times before handing over the love potion that they had bought. "I''d like to find the antidote for this specific love potion. The price and requirements don''t matter." He slid over his father''s badge to the receptionist. The receptionist glanced at the badge and slid it back over towards Yan Guo. "Wait here. One of the Finders will be here later." Encounter with a Faction The receptionist pointed to the seats in the tavern. "Go and sit down, all the other finders are currently busy and when one is free, they will come to you and you will be brought along to find your desired item." When the receptionist had finished telling the two boys what to do, she started to wave them off and called for the next person. The receptionist certainly seemed to be less moody after dealing with Yan Guo and Shi Die. As the lady told them to, Yan Guo and Shi Die sat in the seats off to the side of the tavern. There were quite a few people already waiting around the area and it seemed like it would take a long time before it would get to their turn. Yan Guo looked at his father''s badge and noticed a little note stuck on it. Yan Guo read it out. "High priority, best service, the antidote to Deviant Love." Shi Die was looking over Yan Guo''s shoulder and read it as well before commenting. "That''s nice. I guess there''s definitely more to your father''s badge than you thought there was to it. I don''t think either of us should be surprised that your father is considered a high priority since he is one of the major powers. Being one of the major powers should also give him some benefits so I''d probably say that no matter how many people are waiting in the line, we''ll probably be brought along to get the antidote first." Yan Guo was relieved. "I feel rather exposed here. I can tell that at least half of the people that are waiting around here have their eyes on the both of us. It''s definitely not a good feeling since some of them have very greedy expressions on their face." Shi Die had noticed the stares as well but had done his best to ignore them. "Just ignore them. We''ll get the antidote and we''ll leave as quickly as we can. I don''t think they''d be able to catch up with us if we run away quickly." Shi Die tried his best to reassure Yan Guo since it seemed that Yan Guo was becoming more and more cautious the longer they waited. Luckily for them, a Finder had entered the waiting area of the tavern through one of the side doors. The Finder scanned the waiting crowd before seeing Yan Guo and Shi Die. The Finder walked over towards them. "Are you the high priority clients?" He held out a hand for verification. Yan Guo looked at Shi Die before handing over the badge together with the note. When the Finder nodded, he gestured for them to follow him. "Very well, follow me." He led them through the side door that he had entered from before closing it behind him. When it had been shut and locked, the man gestured for the pair to wait. "Stay here, I''ll be back with your requested item in a short while." The Finder had a very soft and quiet voice and if it wasn''t for Yan Guo''s and Shi Die''s enhanced senses, they wouldn''t have heard him speak. They nodded to the Finder''s commands and waited, and waited, and waited. Yan Guo found out quickly that the man''s interpretation of the words ''in a short while'' seemed to be distorted. They had been waiting for half an hour and yet the man still hadn''t returned. It was rather awkward for them since several others had entered and left the room since they had started their wait. Shi Die was sitting down on the ground after he kept on fidgeting when he was standing up. He felt that it would be better to sit down and wait since it seemed like the Finder was going to take a rather long time to get back. As soon as Yan Guo was about to sit on the ground, the man came back with a bottle in his hand. "Ah... here is the antidote. Sorry that it took me so long. Didn''t think that somebody would need such an obscure antidote for the love potion. Many people don''t even realise they are drugged by it." The Finder stared at them. "I''m surprised that children such as you would come to the Auction Tavern for such an item but I guess it pays to know that appearances don''t mean everything." He handed the antidote over to them "If you have any other items that you need me to find then ask me now. The price for all items will be paid at the end." Shi Die looked at Yan Guo. The two were unsure what to ask. They had gotten the antidote for the love potion but the memory poison''s antidote hadn''t been retrieved. They had no clue on what the memory poison was, they only knew the effects of it. Yan Guo spoke up when he had an idea. "Are you able to find an item if we tell you what it does?" The Finder let out a mock gasp. "Is there no belief for my skill to find items? All Finders are trained to find every single item that is stored inside of the room. The only items we can''t touch are those that require the permission from the Manager of the Auction Tavern." Yan Guo seemed slightly happier when he heard that the Finder should be able to find everything.If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. "What I''m looking for is the antidote to a poison that erases certain memories. When forced down a person''s throat, the person who activated the person using their Qi is able to erase the memory." Tian Bai spoke up since he was the one who knew the poison best in the group since he was the only person who could remember or had witnessed the effects of the potion. The man''s face was blank as he was running through all the antidotes that he knew of. He had some very interesting facial expressions that were displayed for Yan Guo and Shi Die as he was deep in his thoughts. After a few minutes of the Finder going through what he knew, he shook his head. "Damn... there are quite a few poisons with such effects but we don''t actually have the antidotes for them..." He trailed off as he looked very embarrassed. "I mean I don''t mind checking because I might have remembered wrong but I sincerely doubt we have any of the antidotes for poisons that can remove or change memories. The poisons in that category are already considered extremely rare to find since they are so hard to make and the materials needed for the creation of the poison are expensive as well. "I''m not too surprised that I can''t remember if we have any remaining antidotes for those poisons since it is harder to make antidotes for those poisons in the first place." The man stopped talking when he saw the sullen expression on Yan Guo''s face. Shi Die was much more dignified in his response. "Thank you for trying to help us, could you still check your storage rooms to see if there are any antidotes?" Shi Die put on his best puppy-eye look that he could and it made the man look away. The Finder couldn''t stand cute faces being made at him. It was why he was in the Underground''s Auction Tavern. It was rare for children to come here if at all and even if they did, it was usually accompanied by an adult or their faces were hidden from sight. The Finder sighed as he knew that he had succumbed to his weakness to cute faces. "Just wait right here. I''ll probably take a long time to get back so uh... here''s some food." The man took out food from his dimensional storage and ran away as quickly as possible. Yan Guo looked at the food suspiciously but ate it anyway. He sincerely doubted that there were many poisons that could affect him anymore so he was going to be the one to test it. Yan Guo found nothing in the food that he had been given and nodded towards Shi Die who had been waiting for his confirmation. He tore off a few pieces to feed to Tian Bai since he was badgering Yan Guo by tugging on his hair, whining about being hungry. Surprisingly, the Finder came back in less than twenty minutes. "I''m honestly surprised. I didn''t expect to find anything for the poisons but I found a single antidote for one of the poisons. I''m not sure if it is the correct one that you seek but it''s worth a try." Yan Guo nodded in appreciation for the man''s effort. "Thanks for taking all the extra effort for us. What''s the total price for everything?" The man went back into his business mode. "The total for the two items that have been retrieved is 50,000 gold. Due to the high priority status that you have, the price is lowered by 10% which brings it down to 45,000 gold." Yan Guo promptly took out the appropriate amount of gold and paid in full. Shi Die and Yan Guo didn''t even bat an eye at the price since they''ve seen much more expensive items before. "Thank you for taking your time to do business with the Auction Tavern, do come again. If you do, please look for me. I get a Finder''s fee for helping retrieve items. My name is Cao Ma." The man walked with them to the door and pushed them out gently. "Do be careful out there. The Underground is dangerous." He waved them off, Yan Guo and Shi Die to show their appreciation by waving back. "Time to get out of here." Yan Guo nudged Shi Die to remind him that they were going to leave pretty soon. "Do you want to run back? I don''t mind how we get back as long as we get back to the academy grounds quickly." Shi Die shook his head. "Let''s not run back. We''ll draw too much attention if we''re running since it would look like we''re running away from danger. It''ll be better to walk at a faster pace than before but certainly not at a running pace." Shi Die''s words had merit and it was very logical. Though Shi Die had only been in the Underground for a few hours, Yan Guo''s stories were enough for him to know that certain things were sure to draw attention to them. They walked out of the Auction Tavern and into the streets. Yan Guo looked at the stalls and stores in the Black Market longingly but drew his gaze away since he knew that he would be tempted to stop to buy things. It wasn''t long after they left the Black Market''s vicinity when Shi Die sensed danger. He noticed only because the people that were following after them, weren''t even bothered to cover up their intent. They were very focused and they were chasing after them. Shi Die narrowed his eyes and started to push Yan Guo into running faster. Yan Guo was confused with Shi Die''s actions until he looked behind and he started rolling his eyes. "I feel like it''s your fault for saying that the entire journey was boring." Shi Die snorted. "Let''s not focus on that right now, we can have a laugh later when we''re safe. Just concentrate on where we''re going. If we get lost now, we''d probably get cornered eventually. You don''t even come to the Underground often and I''m literally just following you. I hope you''ve remembered the way back since I don''t want to die." The two still felt relatively safe enough that they were tossing jokes at each other. Unluckily for them, they not only had to run away from thugs behind them but they also had to dodge the people that were standing in front of them. It seemed like many of them were of the same faction since all of their clothes had an insignia sewn onto them. Shi Die looked at Yan Guo. "I feel like your father has more enemies than we thought."