Questioning Heaven, Desiring the Way

“Forget it; there’s no point in sticking around.” The wandering cultivators sat down to rest for a time and then went their separate ways. They still had a few more days in the secret realm, so they wanted to find as many spiritual herbs and other treasures as possible. Even if there wasn’t much left, it was better than nothing. After all, unlike how the disciples of the Seven Kill Sect received a monthly allowance of Spiritual Stones and could even take on missions to earn more, the wandering cultivators had to rely on themselves.

“What the heck happened there?” asked Li Rong with a sullen expression, only after stowing away the bronze corpse, stationing a few of his jiangshis around them to keep watch, and swallowing a pill.

Mu Tian had also calmed down by now, and the look of pain and misery he had earlier was gone. He glanced at Yan Wuheng and grumbled, “If Yan Wuheng hadn’t executed Brilliant Light and Flaming Steps inside that tiny space and made the entire cave dark and dusty that it was impossible to see anything, that Gu Suihan wouldn’t have been able to get anywhere near me.”

Yan Wuheng did not argue back and only nodded with a sigh. “I thought that after Miss Mo stabbed him with her sword, the frosty Qi from her sword would start to freeze his organs and injure him severely. He also suddenly stopped while running and looked like he was succumbing to the attack, so I decided to launch my best attack to kill him with one blow. I didn’t know he knew a technique like that. This was my fault.”

“No. Nobody would have thought that Gu Suihan could possibly execute a technique that only a cultivator at Origin Core could, especially when he is only at the Foundation Establishment stage. Besides, no matter how powerful that technique might be, he’s not strong enough to use it, so I believe he must be severely injured from using it right now. It’s a good chance to attack him,” said Li Rong maliciously.

“Let’s recuperate first, then make plans later,” said Mo Yuluo flatly. She had returned to the elegant and unapproachable goddess-like persona she usually had. The authoritativeness in her voice made the other three reluctantly listen to her.

None of them were afraid of Gu Suihan despite everything that had happened. This was something that happened very often in the world of cultivators, after all. Just because Gu Suihan had escaped despite being attacked by five others did not necessarily mean that Gu Suihan was more powerful than them. Everyone had their secrets and trump cards. Nobody would go all out to fight an opponent unless they had to.

Besides using that bronze corpse to kill several cultivators, Li Rong hadn’t done anything and wasn’t injured in any way. Mo Yuluo was also unhurt.

Only Mu Tian was in a pretty bad state. Then again, he had been very unlucky this time. He was a cultivator and expert in using illusionary spells to tire his opponent out, but he had run into someone like Gu Suihan, who did not become afraid or hypnotized by these illusions. On top of that, he had to protect both the Blood Jade Fig tree and Nan Xingyuan. It was only normal for him to get badly injured in the process.

As for Hang Chulong, he deserved to die. He was a sword cultivator who wasn’t good with spells or anything like that, yet he chose to lead the attack and even tried to use the Blood Jade Figs to lure Gu Suihan towards himself. Of course, Gu Suihan was going to cut him down.

Mu Tian and Yan Wuheng walked over to the remaining ten-odd newbie disciples and told them to move in small groups so that it would become difficult for others to spring a surprise attack on them.

…

Pfft! Gu Suihan’s face was pale as he leaned against the walls of a narrow cave weakly. He looked as though someone had pulled him out from a pool of blood. Several long cuts on his body were so deep that you could almost see his bone.

There was also another fist-sized hole in his body that looked equally frightening. The hole was filled with blood, but it was frozen over and gleaming in the light. In fact, it was still giving off wisps of frosty Qi.

“Heh heh!” Gu Suihan smirked as he retrieved the Blood Jade Figs from his storage ring. Once the figs had been plucked off the tree, the tree would dry up and wither immediately. At the same time, it was impossible for him to put the entire tree into any sort of storage space because it would lose any spiritual qi it had and become completely useless.

The five Blood Jade Figs were only as large as grapes and gave off a faint bloodied smell. As for the tree, Gu Suihan had just left it behind somewhere. It had withered and was of no use to him, so he didn’t bother taking it with him.

He figured that Mo Yuluo and the rest were hoping to take the entire thing back to the sect to plant it there instead and use that in exchange for some Contribution Points. But Gu Suihan didn’t need the tree or the figs per se.

Blood Jade Fig trees bore fruit only once every ten years. In other words, you had to spend at least the next ten years tending to this plant carefully only to reap a minimal profit.

On top of all that, it was practically useless to someone at Foundation Establishment like himself. Even if he were to be at Mid Foundation Establishment, the chances of making it to Advanced Foundation Establishment with these fruits were extremely low.

He pulled out the concave stone filled with Qi-filled water the tree was growing in. He then crushed three figs without hesitation and mixed the resulting juices with the Qi-filled water.

The water slowly turned a bloody red, which put a smile on Gu Suihan’s face. He wasn’t going to use this to cultivate. Instead, he was going to use this to recover from his injuries. He remembered that Mo Yuluo could track him down using the blood from one of his relatives.

If he didn’t take this chance to recuperate fast, he would end up dead in no time.

He sent Qi out from his fingers and gently used it to surround the water in the pool. He started sweating profusely from the pain this process caused him. The Qi flowing through his body made it feel like he was getting cut by knives and even breathing hurt.

His Extreme Ra-Asu Breach had transformed his body into one with robust bones, but it was still no match for the spiritual weapon that Mo Yuluo used. She had only stabbed him once with it, but that was enough to make the rest of his internal organs freeze over and kill him.

If his body was not made strong enough by his cultivation efforts, he would have turned into an ice sculpture, and Mo Yuluo could take him home as a souvenir.

“Hoo!” He exhaled deeply, and his fingers trembled slightly as he directed the water he had gathered with his Qi into that hole in his body.

It was like a meeting between ice and fire. The frosty qi within his body instantly gushed out to fight the water mixed in with the juice from the Blood Jade Figs.

Blood Jade Figs carried the element of fire in them, so if an ordinary person ate them, their bodies would be burnt from the inside out. If Mo Yuluo hadn’t stabbed Gu Suihan with a sword filled with frosty Qi, he wouldn’t have done something like this either. It would have been suicide.

“Ssss!” He was already prepared for what would happen next, but the sudden surge of pain still made him gasp from the excruciating pain.

The Blood Jade Figs mixed with qi-filled water went all out to eliminate the frosty qi as though it had met its mortal enemy.

But the frosty Qi wasn’t giving up without a fight either. It congealed together inside Gu Suihan’s body to fight off the fire coming its way. As the two elements continued to fight each other, the pain the conflict created made Gu Suihan feel like his head was a river embankment that was being repeatedly hit by the gushing river waters. He was barely holding on.

After some time, Gu Suihan felt like he was about to pass out, but he could also feel that his wound was finally beginning to heal. He breathed a huge sigh of relief.

As for the remaining two figs, he decided to deal with them later. The sun was setting, and he figured that Mo Yuluo and the rest would probably start hunting him down soon.

He took another Qi Gathering Pill, and his body began to recover on its own. The surging Qi in his body made him marvel at how excellent this Extreme Ra-Asu Breach technique was. It made his physical body impossibly strong, but his body was also able to recover from injuries very rapidly.

But that made him let out a sad laugh too. Did this mean he would end up being more of a physical cultivator?

He shook his head and quickly got changed, erased all traces of his presence, and was about to leave when a thought suddenly struck him.

“Hmm.” He walked towards the empty stone pool and realized something very strange. Logically speaking, a Blood Jade Fig tree was rare but not particularly valuable. It didn’t need such a large pool of qi-filled water to survive.

Besides, the water inside this pool alone was worth the same or even more than the five figs. Why would someone do this?

“It’s a bit warm too.” Gu Suihan ran his fingers down the inside of the stone pool to find that the dry stone walls were slightly warm.

He took his sword out and cut away most of the stone until he was left with a smaller slab only a few meters in diameter.

He focused his qi on his palm and spun the slab slowly, using his qi to whittle away at the slab.

“This…” Gu Suihan’s mouth fell open, and his usually expressionless eyes lit up.

A block of wood that didn’t quite seem like wood appeared in his hands. It was about 30 centimeters in diameter and did not have clean edges, as if it had been broken off from something larger.

He inspected it for a long time, reading the strange carvings on this piece of wood. His eyes shone even more brightly now. “This is demonic script. A demonic script from ancient times.”

These inscriptions were somewhat similar to the words inscribed on the hide he no longer possessed. It was just as mysterious and just as old. He had keenly sensed the faint decaying air emanating from this object.

“There’s something wrong with this secret realm.” His expression hardened as he told himself to investigate this once he returned to the sect. He needed to know if this thing connected to that piece of hide, what the words on it meant, and whether it had anything to do with that legend about an ancient flood.

“It’s time to go.” Gu Suihan snapped out of his thoughts and calmed back down again. He kept the broken pieces of the stone pool back inside his storage ring again. There might be other things inside that he had not discovered yet, so he thought it best to take everything with him.