Chapter 54 Blood Test (Part Two)

Yao Qian concluded a session of Yin spirit cultivation, her heart fluttering with a touch of excitement. She had no immediate plans to begin a second session. Considering the time passed, shouldn't the members of the Yao family have arrived by now? With a single thought, she summoned her Yin spirit back into her physical body.

The moment her Yin spirit reunited with her flesh, a sense of discomfort washed over her. Her body felt as though it had been encumbered by a suit of heavy armor, so leaden that she felt as if she could barely lift her arms. Yao Qian knew this was the typical unease caused when a Yin spirit, having ventured outside for too long, reintegrated with its mortal shell.

By nature, a Yin spirit was unfettered and free; only the physical body could restrain it. To a Yin spirit, wasn't the mortal shell indeed a heavy suit of armor? She circulated her true essence, guiding the Yin spirit and her physical form to merge once more.

The scroll her senior brother had given her mentioned that many people, upon letting their Yin spirits wander, would become infatuated with that feeling of absolute freedom and delay returning to their bodies. Yet, a human body required delicate care; if a Yin spirit remained detached for too long, the physical shell would deteriorate, eventually trapping the Yin spirit outside forever, unable to return.

Before attaining the realm of the Yang spirit, a human body could not easily withstand destruction. Once ruined, one would be reduced to a ghost cultivator. Even if a ghost cultivator eventually ascended to become a ghost immortal, they remained mere ghosts, forever bound to the Netherworld and denied true transcendence.

Thus, no matter how swift the cultivation progress of her Yin spirit felt, Yao Qian would never allow it to remain detached for extended periods. Once her true essence had flowed through her entire body and every bone and joint had loosened up, she popped a Bigu pill into her mouth. She needed to reach Foundation Establishment as soon as possible. Once she established her foundation, she could abstain from ordinary grain and no longer worry about inadvertently starving her physical vessel.

"Finished cultivating?" At that moment, a youth's clear voice suddenly echoed beside her ear. "Come find me."

Yao Qian paused for a moment before realizing it was her master's voice. There was no helping it; ever since she became a disciple, she had spent far more time with her senior brother than with her master. Remembering her master's Nether River domain, she bowed toward the empty air and asked, "Master, how should your disciple come to find you?"

The instant her words fell, she felt her body grow light and her vision blur. In the blink of an eye, she was transported to the Nether River domain she had visited previously. This time, she was delivered directly to Ji Lingxiao's place of cultivation. Uncharacteristically, he was not sitting cross-legged in meditation; instead, he stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his back turned to Yao Qian as he gazed across the Nether River.

"Master," Yao Qian stepped forward and paid her respects.

Only after she rose did Ji Lingxiao turn around and ask, "Have you already comprehended the Yin-Yang Scripture's rune seed?" Though it was a question, his tone was certain, considering he had personally guarded the girl for sixteen days.

Yao Qian lowered her gaze and replied, "Yes, Master." Her senior brother had told her that their master had comprehended his rune seed even before drawing Qi into his body, and her senior brother had comprehended his during Foundation Establishment. It stood to reason that the cultivation world was not lacking in geniuses with high comprehension. She also felt her own comprehension was quite good; even without the aid of the Heavenly Evolution Monument, she estimated she could have comprehended it within a year.

"Decent comprehension," Ji Lingxiao praised, raising a hand to release several points of clear light right before Yao Qian.

Yao Qian received the clear light in her cupped hands and looked down. Within the luminescence lay three items: a small sword, a radiant pearl, and a jade pendant. She raised her gaze to her master, waiting for him to clear up her confusion.

"That pearl is a Steadfast Beauty Bead; it can protect your mortal shell from decay." Since he could not watch over her cultivation every single time, he simply gave her the bead. As long as she wore it, she need not fear any damage to her physical body, even if she cultivated continuously for several years. The sole function of the Steadfast Beauty Bead was to freeze the physical body at a specific moment in time, and it could only be used when the Yin spirit was detached.

A Steadfast Beauty Bead? Yao Qian was both startled and delighted. She had not expected her master to bestow upon her such a supremely practical treasure. Truly, her master was a rare and wonderful benefactor within the Boundless Sect!

"I fused your Wood-Spirit Needles and God-Slaying Needles together. There are eighty-one of each, making ninety-nine in total. Combined, they can serve as a sword; separated, they function as flying needles." Taking her self-esteem into consideration, Ji Lingxiao tactfully refrained from mentioning that her original two magical artifacts were utterly unsightly.

He had barely managed to salvage a scrap of wood pith and soul crystal; the rest had been burned to ashes. The materials for her current artifact were entirely provided out of Ji Lingxiao's personal stock. He asked Yao Qian, "The sect possesses the complete manual for the Wood-Spirit Needle Art. Would you prefer to cultivate the full Wood-Spirit Needle Art, or merely learn the basic needle techniques?"

The basic needle techniques only taught cultivators foundational methods such as directing flying needles to counter enemies and maneuvering through flight, whereas the Wood-Spirit Needle Art unlocked the far greater and more wondrous potentials of the Wood-Spirit Needles.

Yao Qian had no idea which one she should cultivate. Raising her head, she said, "Your disciple will defer to Master's judgment." Since her master was a formidable Yang spirit expert, he ought to give her the best possible advice, right?

Ji Lingxiao stated, "You possess a Wood Spirit Body. Cultivating any wood-attribute Daoist techniques or spells will yield twice the result with half the effort. It is far better for you to cultivate the Wood-Spirit Needle Art, which can also coordinate with your Azure Dragon Scripture to meet enemies." The essence of the Azure Dragon Scripture was a body-tempering and longevity-extending technique; dealing with enemies relied entirely on the might of the Azure Dragon, lacking overly flashy maneuvers. The Wood-Spirit Needle Art would precisely make up for this shortcoming.

Confused, Yao Qian looked at Ji Lingxiao and asked, "Master, what is a Wood Spirit Body?" Wasn't she supposed to possess a Glazed Pure Body? How had she suddenly turned into a Wood Spirit Body?

Ji Lingxiao briefly explained to his disciple what a Wood Spirit Body entailed. Yao Qian listened in stunned silence. Was she essentially a walking, talking millennial ginseng root?

Ji Lingxiao glanced sideways at his disciple. "You are far more precious than a millennial ginseng root. A millennial ginseng root cannot extend life, but once you cultivate to the Golden Core stage, you can use your vital blood to refine longevity pills that extend life by a hundred years."

Once she advanced to the Yang spirit realm, her vital blood could even refine longevity pills capable of extending life by three thousand years. How could Ji Lingxiao not worry about her being hunted down and captured as a living apothecary? This girl was a walking fruit of longevity; even actual longevity fruits weren't as useful as she was.

Hearing this, Yao Qian felt a flicker of unease. How could she possess such a constitution? Clearly, the Yao family was nothing more than an utterly ordinary, low-tier minor family in the cultivation world.

Yao Qian had spent sixteen days in deep cultivation, and her family members had long since been brought over by Shutian. They were now all settled within Yao Qian's peak. As soon as the Yao family arrived, Ji Lingxiao had drawn a vial of blood from each of them and used a formation to authenticate the origin of the Yao family's bloodline.

Surprisingly, the ancestors of the Yao family originated from a Glazed Longevity Lotus. No wonder the girl's aura was exceptionally pure and she possessed a Wood Spirit Body. As the name implied, the Glazed Longevity Lotus was a miraculous herb capable of purifying the body and prolonging life. Such spiritual vegetation had been extinct in the cultivation world for tens of thousands of years.

Even Ji Lingxiao had not expected that a Glazed Longevity Lotus could still exist in the cultivation world, successfully taking human form, cultivating into a Yang spirit, and even leaving behind descendants with its bloodline. With such a formidable spiritual plant bloodline, it was no wonder that despite countless generations of dilution—to the point where the bloodline had grown so faint that the blood of a thousand people was required for verification—it could still allow eight out of ten Yao descendants to be born with favorable wood spiritual roots.

"Our family actually possesses the bloodline of the Glazed Longevity Lotus?" Yao Qian asked in disbelief. Were the descendants of the Glazed Longevity Lotus really this down on their luck? Wasn't that supposed to be a legendary, supreme-grade spiritual plant?

Suddenly, Ji Lingxiao smiled. Usually aloof in temperament and rarely given to smiling, this smile was like spring water breaking through ice, bringing forth a hundred contending blossoms. For a fleeting moment, Yao Qian felt as though she could hear the sound of countless flowers bursting into bloom, leaving her momentarily dazed.

With a gentle smile, Ji Lingxiao said to his disciple, "Do you suppose the rogue cultivators alive in the cultivation world today had ancestors who were also ordinary rogue cultivators? Those whose ancestors were mere rogue cultivators perished long ago without descendants. The cultivators who manage to survive today all carry some measure of extraordinary bloodline within them."

It was just that this bloodline had grown extremely diluted, rendering it largely useless. For someone like his disciple, who relied on a trace of diluted bloodline to awaken a Wood Spirit Body, she was a fortunate soul born once every few millennia.

Ji Lingxiao's words reminded Yao Qian of an article of dubious authenticity she had read in her past life, which claimed that modern people were all descendants of ancient nobility, with no true descendants of common farmers left. That conclusion might not have been true in her past life, but in the cultivation world, it held absolute truth.

Those who managed to survive likely had glorious ancestors; if they had truly been at the very bottom, their bloodlines would have long since died out. For instance, the Yao family perpetually faced the crisis of having no successors. Once the Grand Elder perished and she herself was absent, the best outcome for the Yao family would be fleeing into the mortal realm, while the worst would be utter extermination by enemies.

Pointing at the jade pendant, Ji Lingxiao said, "This is a magical artifact used to conceal your Wood Spirit Body. Anyone whose cultivation is inferior to mine will be unable to pierce through your disguise and see your true constitution. If anyone asks in the future, just tell them you have a Glazed Pure Body."

This particular constitution was relatively common and unlikely to arouse covetous desires. Generally speaking, cultivators with high cultivation and superior aptitudes possessed quite pure spiritual Qi and did not need to rely on dual cultivation for purification.

Hearing this, Yao Qian unhesitatingly took hold of the jade pendant and integrated her spiritual sense to refine it. Once she left the sect, she would place this jade pendant inside the Heavenly Evolution Monument's spatial realm. No matter the circumstances, she would never let this pendant leave her person; she had no desire to be locked away and treated as a living longevity medicine.

Ji Lingxiao asked once more, "How is your cultivation of the Azure Dragon Scripture coming along?"

"I haven't looked at it yet," Yao Qian replied, feeling a twinge of guilt. Ever since she discovered that the Azure Dragon Scripture was somewhat unreliable, she had taken a rather indifferent, Buddhist-like approach to it. She practiced daily when not in seclusion, but paused entirely whenever she went into seclusion, never taking it very seriously. However, now that she knew she was a Wood Spirit Body, she still needed to put in genuine effort and abandon her laid-back attitude toward cultivation.

Ji Lingxiao observed, "I take it you haven't cultivated the body-tempering technique I gave you either?"

"Indeed," Yao Qian answered honestly. "Your disciple feels that a body-tempering technique relying purely on external objects is somewhat unreliable." She didn't mean that relying on external objects was inherently bad—after all, all cultivation required external resources—but this particular body-tempering technique depended entirely on external aids without requiring any personal effort of her own. She didn't care much for that; she preferred power forged through her own practice, as it provided a greater sense of security.

Ji Lingxiao instructed, "During this period, focus on cultivating the Azure Dragon Scripture. It is fundamentally a body-tempering technique. When you cultivate it to the extreme, you will attain the power of the Azure Dragon. Even at the very beginning of its cultivation, you can possess the strength of ten elephants, alongside an extension of your lifespan by a hundred years." It was a pity it wasn't a specialized constitution; otherwise, one could only cultivate it up to the Golden Core stage at most. Otherwise, he truly would have wished to continue cultivating it himself.

Yao Qian was still young and didn't have an urgent demand for longevity just yet, but the prospect of gaining the strength of ten elephants made her eyes shine with excitement. The Azure Dragon Scripture had such wondrous utilities as well? She must strive to master the Azure Dragon Scripture as soon as possible!

"If you truly cannot comprehend it," Ji Lingxiao added, "you can also go to the Dragon Burial Cliff and try your luck."

Yao Qian knew they were scheduled to head to the Dragon Burial Cliff shortly. The very purpose of their previous expedition to the Great Marsh was to harvest more dragon-beard grass at the Dragon Burial Cliff. Wasn't the Dragon Burial Cliff an environment heavily inclined toward pure Yin? How could one possibly cultivate the Wood-Azure Dragon Scripture there?

"Buried within the Dragon Burial Cliff is the corpse of an extraterrestrial dragon," Ji Lingxiao revealed with tranquil composure, uttering a horrifying truth about the cliff that made one's hair stand on end. "The so-called dragon-beard grass of the outside world is actually puppet-worms transformed from the vital blood of the dragon corpse. The sect collects dragon-beard grass precisely to extract that vital blood."