Stranger Danger

Chapter 37: Vessel Augmentation

After all, anyone who got too close to the tree would have their vigor and vitality sucked dry. How would he enjoy the fruits of his labor then?

“Oh right. I just need to use something that can’t be drained by the Dead Man’s Tree!” Ye Qing glanced at Prayer’s skin and sent it a command. The human skin immediately flew up to the canopy. As expected, it encountered no problems plucking the Fruit of Life from the withered flower.

As soon as the Fruit of Life was plucked, the Dead Man’s Tree abruptly withered at a visible rate. Its tree leaves yellowed and fell off the branches, and the wood turned dry and brittle. What was a vibrant tree that was full of life and died in practically the blink of an eye.

“Everything the tree has is used to grow the fruit and the fruit alone, huh. This Dead Man’s Tree is definitely an evil thing!” Ye Qing sighed as he took the Fruit of Life from Prayer’s skin. He did not consume it immediately, however. Instead, he took out the Annon Sutra and poured some blood on its surface, asking, “Is the Fruit of Life safe to consume?”

He was being paranoid, but everything about the Fruit of Life except its supposed effects screamed “evil”, “strange”, and “deadly”. He just didn’t dare to consume it until he was one hundred percent sure it was safe. Plus, what if Prayer’s knowledge regarding the Fruit of Life was wrong? It was just safer to ask the Annon Sutra before he committed to anything.

His blood wriggled, and a single word appeared on the vellum. “Yes.”

Short, simple and direct! I like it!

Ye Qing devoured the Fruit of Life as soon as he saw the answer. It was because the poison had progressed to a point where he couldn’t wait any longer.

The Fruit of Life melted like liquid as soon as it entered his mouth. As its golden juice slid down his throat, he felt a tremendous amount of vitality spreading throughout his body. But unlike the dragon-serpent runes, the Fruit of Life did not threaten to tear him from the inside out the first time he used it. It was smooth and healing, calm and gentle, warm and comfortable. His injuries were healed, and the toxin was removed like magic. Even the invisible damage he had been accumulating over time had vanished entirely.

“What pure power!” Ye Qing exclaimed in pleasant surprise. Although the way the Fruit of Life expressed its power was far tamer than the dragon-serpent runes, its purity was in no way inferior to the dragon-serpent runes. In fact, the energy contained in one Fruit of Life was equal to three or four silver dragon-serpent runes in total. It was incredible to say the least.

Unwilling to waste such an incredible boon, Ye Qing immediately dropped to his feet and started cultivating. While this was happening, the gentle power continued to circulate inside his body and expel the Bowel Necrosis’s toxin at a slow but steady pace.

Six whole hours later, Ye Qing opened his eyes once more. His eyes looked like stars, and his aura was a full magnitude greater than what it was before.

“Prayer wasn’t kidding about the Fruit of Life’s effects. It didn’t just remove the Bowel Necrosis, it gave me so much true qi that I’ve more or less reached the absolute ceiling of the Qi Invocation stage. What a time saver!” Ye Qing said cheerfully while sensing his newfound power.

Before he joined the group on this expedition, he had just entered the late-stage of the Qi Invocation stage. Even if he had Old Man Xueying’s cultivation arts, he would have needed to cultivate for months before he could finally take that first step to enter the Vessel Augmentation stage. Now, he could start right away.

“Speaking of which, let’s grab those boxes and check out Old Man Xueying’s cultivation arts!”

Ye Qing rose to his feet and commanded Prayer’s skin to remove the three boxes still sitting on the tree branch. Just in case they were booby-trapped, he backed a few steps from the human skin before ordering it to open the boxes one by one. Once he confirmed that there was no danger, he finally went over and checked out its contents.

The first two boxes contained a jade slip each, while the third held a red pill covered in twisted and sinister-looking patterns. It also reeked of blood stench. It sent chills up Ye Qing’s spine just looking at it.

“The jade slips probably contain the ‘Blood Shadow Divine Art’ and the ‘Blood Sea Fragrance’, and the pill is most likely the so-called Blood Shadow Divine Pill!” Ye Qing mumbled. He picked up the first jade slip and pressed it against his forehead. A tremendous amount of information immediately flooded into his mind. It took him a long time before he recovered from the dizziness.

“You wouldn’t think that Blood Sea Fragrance is a movement art from its name!” Ye Qing muttered in delight. Blood Sea Fragrance was a powerful movement art that enabled its practitioner to move like the wind while remaining as silent as a shadow. Not only that, the practitioner would be able to perform mid-air dodges, maneuvers and turns, and float like they were weightless. It was such a graceful and elegant movement art that the author even wrote a poem to praise it:

“The sky may be infinite,

But not infinite enough to hide the stars and moons from me.

The sea may be vast,

But not vast enough to stump a blood celestial like me.

Wherever I go, the scent of blood follows.”

The Blood Sea Fragrance was exactly what Ye Qing needed right now. If he had learned a movement art before he fought Prayer, he might not have been pushed to the extent he had.

“Time to check out the other jade slip!” Ye Qing took a moment to calm down before picking up the second jade slip and pressing it to his forehead. Since he knew what was coming, he did not get nearly as dizzy as he had with the first jade slip. Unfortunately, there was no avoiding some measure of headache and nausea.

After Ye Qing was done processing what felt like an ocean of information, his lips widened into an excited grin. “The ‘Blood Shadow Divine Art’ really does fit me to a T!”

The “Blood Shadow Divine Art” was a top-notch Vessel Augmentation cultivation art. Generally speaking, a human possessed twelve standard meridians, eight extraordinary meridians, and three hundred and sixty points (also the total number of cycles in the human body). The Vessel Augmentation stage was the stage where the warrior unlocked, expanded, and strengthened these blood vessels to form a network that was far more powerful and self-sustaining than the one they were born with. In summary, augmenting one’s blood vessels dramatically increased the amount of true qi a warrior could hold in their body, accelerated its flow speed, improved its flexibility to the point where one could command it like an arm or a finger, and—depending on what kind of cultivation art they were using—imbued it with all kinds of incredible attributes and abilities.

There was a well-known poem regarding the Vessel Augmentation stage that went like this:

“Draw a thousand flowers

To hide a true dragon in your chest.

When the storm passes,

The dragon shall rise to the Nine Heavens.”

It was essentially a laudatory statement about how amazing the Vessel Augmentation stage was.

Generally speaking, the more meridians and points were unlocked, and the higher the degree of augmentation, the greater the amount of true qi one could hold in their body. One’s true qi would become more flexible, and one’s future potential would increase by leaps and bounds.

At the adept level, the “Blood Shadow Divine Art” was said to unlock every meridian and point in the practitioner’s body and achieve perfect augmentation.

Besides augmenting one’s blood vessels to perfection, the “Blood Shadow Divine Art” also claimed to combine one’s true qi and vigor to cast Blood Shadow Magic, a magic art [1] that summons one or multiple blood entities, a.k.a Blood Shadows. A Blood Shadow was invisible, untraceable, shapeless and formless. It could split into countless bodies and slay enemies without a trace.

This was easily the most powerful aspect of the cultivation art!

The reason Ye Qing thought that the “Blood Shadow Divine Art” was perfect for him was because it took an immense amount of vigor to cast Blood Shadow Magic. The magic art could still be cast without sufficient vigor, but the entities one summoned would be far weaker than they should be. But since vigor was the one thing he did not lack, the “Blood Shadow Divine Art” was easily the best cultivation art he could ask for.

On a related note, Old Man Xueying had left behind the Blood Shadow Divine Pill because it improved one’s vigor. It was so that his successor would have enough vigor to cultivate the Blood Shadow.

“I’ve reached the ceiling of the Qi Invocation stage, and no one can hurt me or disturb me while I’m here. Now is the time to cultivate the ‘Blood Shadow Divine Art’!”

Unable to wait even a second longer, Ye Qing dove head first into cultivation.

……

“Tianyuan’s Lifetag is broken! Who killed my son?”

Inside an opulent hall, a striking middle-aged man dressed in luxurious clothes let out a scream of rage when he discovered that his son had been killed. His expression was as warped as it was mournful. There were several other people in the hall, and they were all bowing their heads and staying completely silent.

The middle-aged man was none other than the patriarch of the Zheng Clan and the father of Zheng Tianyuan, Zheng Feng!

“Zheng Shou, you’re the steward of the clan. You should know why Tianyuan left the residence!” Zheng Feng spun on a portly middle-aged man. His eyes were bloodshot like that of a man-eating beast.

Zheng Shou wiped away the sweat on his forehead before stammering, “Y-yes, my lord! Before the young master left, he told me that he was going on a treasure hunt!”

“Treasure hunt? What treasure? Where to? With whom?” Zheng Feng asked harshly.

Zheng Shou answered, “The young master didn’t tell me what he was searching for, but he did say that he was going to er, August Hill Village. He is accompanied by his personal bodyguard, Pao, and our two keepers, Granny Snake and Chi Long.”

“Pao, Granny Snake and Chi Long! How did he die with three Qi Invokers protecting him?” Confusion overcame Zheng Feng for a second before he asked, “What do you know about this August Hill Village?”

Zheng Shou answered again, “There’s nothing special about August Hill Village, my lord. It’s just a small, secluded village about one or two days away from Anyang.”

“A small village, you say?” A murderous sneer crossed Zheng Feng’s lips. “Then how did my Tianyuan die, pray tell?”

It was at this moment a young man with sharp features and a dark aura spoke up, “Send me to investigate this August Hill Village, stepfather. I shall make whoever killed Tianyuan pay the price of blood!”

A couple of keepers also responded, “We are willing to accompany Young Master Qi to August Hill Village and investigate Young Master Tianyuan’s death as well!”

Zheng Feng swept his gaze around the hall once before uttering in a brooding tone, “Very well. I trust you will find your brother’s murderer at all costs, Tianqi, and when you do, make sure you kill anyone and everyone who has something to do with his death. Leave no one alive!”

“As you command!” Zheng Tianqi saluted his father before turning away, eyes turning as cold as ice.

“Ahhhh… Tianyuan… Tianyuan…”

Zheng Feng did not stop mourning after his dead son even after everyone was gone.

……

“I’m finally back. I was a little worried I might run into that damn bull, but thankfully it’s just groundless fears.”

Ye Qing was currently standing at the foot of Little August Hill, and August Hill Village was just a short distance away from his location. He was looking at the familiar settlement with a small yet complicated smile on his face.

“It’s time I say goodbye to this place.”

From the moment he learned that Granny Xia had sent him to follow Zheng Tianyuan’s group into Little August Hill instead of his more “qualified” seniors, he knew that the old woman had abandoned him.

From Granny Xia’s perspective, it was the right thing to do. It was all for the sake for August Hill Village. But from his perspective, Granny Xia had abandoned him for her so-called greater good. As a transmigrator, he had almost no emotional attachment to August Hill Village whatsoever, but there was no denying that he felt a pang of abandonment.

It was for the best though. It canceled out the debt he owed August Hill Village, however insignificant it might be. Since there was nothing left for him here, it was time to say goodbye.

Of course, the biggest reason he had to leave was because he was the sole survivor of Zheng Tianyuan’s doomed expedition. If the Zheng Clan learned about his survival, they would come after him with everything they got, and there was a not insignificant chance the villagers of August Hill Village might be affected as well. That was why the best way to handle this was to leave in silence. If everyone believed that he had died in Little August Hill, then the only thing the Zheng Clan could do was to drop it.

Besides that, he was now a Vessel Augmentor. He was finally strong enough to survive in this world. Wherever he went after this, he should not have to tip toe like every step might be his last.

“That’s it then. Goodbye, August Hill Village!”

Ye Qing stared at August Hill Village for a moment longer before getting ready to leave. Alas, fate had something else in store for him today. Right before he would turn away, he saw out of the corner of his eyes a group of people coming straight for Little August Hill.

1. 神通, which generally translates to some sort of special ability, talent, or magic.