Archive - 006 (Patreon)

Chapter 006 –  Luo Bing

It was five days later that Fang finally arrived before a sealed cave at the side of a small densely-forested hill. The cave was hard to recognize as such because the boulders sealing it looked perfectly natural.

Honestly speaking without the Archive, Fang would have never found this place and he doubted anyone else would have.

Seating himself before the cave, Fang connected with the Archive and dug up all the knowledge about the inheritance he could find, which was made easier due to his physical proximity to the cave and the fact that the senior it belonged to had died, making it 'dead' knowledge.

It took some time, but Fang had managed to find the way to open the cave, as well as making sure that no danger would await him inside. The rest of the information he decided to ignore for now.

Taking out his dagger, Fang cut open his palm, before pressing the wound against one of the smaller rocks near the ground. The moment his blood came in contact with the rock, it gave off an intense glow that lasted for only a moment.

A moment later the biggest boulder in front of the cave entrance suddenly turned transparent and incorporeal.

Not hesitating, Fang directly entered the cave after which the boulder turned back to its original state.

'True Illusion Array Formation ... It seems that senior was a master in his own right ... ', Fang thought to himself as he watched the cave seal itself again, causing his surroundings to become pitch-black.

It took only a few seconds, before light illuminated the cave entrance again though, as some kind of crystals on both sides of the path lit up.

Runes could be seen all over the walls and even the ground and Fang guessed that they were probably part of an enormous formation that spanned the whole cave.

The cave walls were smooth, looking more like carved and polished stone walls than a dug-up cave.

Fang followed the lights on this path downwards and deeper into the hill and before long he came across a small hall. The hall was pretty big, stretching for tens of meters in every direction with stone columns all around near the walls.

His gaze was immediately drawn toward the middle of the hall. There on a small praying mat sat a skeleton in a cross-legged position with its clothing still intact.

The bones had a bright luster and seemed more like white jade, than the remains of a person. That alone was proof enough that whoever that person had been when alive, his cultivation had probably reached a higher boundary. Only the tempering of spirit essence over an extended period of time could transform the bones of a cultivator like that.

Before the skeleton, several pieces of jade and a black ring were laying on the floor. The complicated inscriptions on them were proof enough that they were memory jades, a kind of jade cultivators used to inscribe knowledge on with the help of their soul force.

Picking up the one in the middle, Fang pressed it against his forehead and injected his soul force into the memory jade, causing words to suddenly appear in his mind.

'Dear Inheritor, as fate had once made me stumble across the inheritance of a mighty senior, which was responsible for my success and strength, I decided to leave behind my own inheritance for a future generation. As I am aware of the dangers in the outside world and always preferred to cultivate in peace and quiet, I have used formations on this entire cave-dwelling, as to turn it into a perfect training place and safe heaven...'

What followed was a detailed explanation of the layout of the cave system and introductions to the different formations that senior had set down.

'… At last, it is time for me to talk about my identity. While alive, I was an Elder of the Refining Tower, the greatest refiner faction on the whole continent – a hegemon without rivals. And while I left my Elder Token behind, so it may be of some use to you, I advise against using it, if you are not a refining master yourself. The Refining Tower is unlike a normal sect. No matter your talent or heritage, without being a refiner yourself, the tower's doors will remain closed for you.'

The end of the message was signed 'Refining Grandmaster Luo Bing'.

The reason why Fang was able to find this inheritance cave first as rather simple, as the Elder had not managed to place a hint and map to this place in the outside world before dying. Elder Luo had worked on the cave in the last years of his life, his vitality waning greatly as he neared his death.

Eventually, he had been unable to supress the backlash of his cultivation as he had treaded on the unorthodox path. The runes making up the foundation of his cultivation had thus escaped his control and had killed him before he could place a hint that would lead here in the outside world.

Fortunately, he had managed to finish the cave before his passing, so with the knowledge from the Archive, Fang had still been able to access it.

Setting down the memory jade again, Fang picked up the rest and scanned through them.

Besides one of them being the Elder Token from the Refining Tower, there was also a cultivation technique, refinement methods, and a guide for formation techniques.

Sadly, these things were all useless for Fang, as the knowledge from the Archive on these topics was more extensive and advanced, but for anyone else, these would be priceless treasures. The cultivation technique alone was one that had more than one hundred runes at the highest level, which was incredible. Well, for this planet it was.

Picking up the black ring, which was obviously a space ring, Fang was way more enthusiastic about its contents.

The moment he bound the ring, he gasped in surprise. The ring itself had more than ten times the space that his other two had combined and it was filled to the brim with riches. Pills, spirit stones, beast cores, rare ores, and treasure weapons.

Fang had been a bit disappointed that the two rings he had found before didn't contain any suitable weapons for him, but now his worries had disappeared as with a simple nudge of his mind two mat-black blades appeared next to him.

The two blades were roughly three feet long with a slight curve to them and no hand guards. Deep black wooden hilts that fitted perfectly with the rest of the blades ensured a good grip.

Placing the ring on his right hand, Fang picked up the perfectly balanced blades.

They were light, and even though they had the width of a palm, they were extremely thin.

Masterpieces, absolute masterpieces.

These twin blades were Mortal-Rank treasure weapons suitable for high-level Spiritual Stage cultivators to use, they stood at the peak of weaponry in this world. Even without everything else, it would have been worth coming here simply to get these blades.

They had even been named by Elder Luo after he had created them.

Midnight Shade Wings.

…

Fang sorted through all his stuff and only kept the black ring on his right index finger filled with pills, beast cores, and treasure weapons. The rare ores and materials had been placed in the other two space rings.

For now, he had also placed the memory jades in the black ring, as well as the skeleton of the senior, emptying the main hall completely while doing so.

Afterward, Fang began to explore the whole cave system, as the entrances to the other parts of the cave were hidden behind the stone columns.

There were private quarters including a bathroom, a refining room with formations to support the refining process, and cultivation rooms where formations constantly drew in spiritual energy to increase the density of spiritual energy in the air.

The two most attractive rooms for Fang though were the training room with the Illusion Killing Array in one and the Battle Arts training room with different formations.

'It seems that Elder Luo Bing wasn't only a grandmaster in refinement, but also very proficient with formations. No normal cultivator could set up all these top-grade formations.', Fang thought as he analyzed the formations with the help of the Archive.

The formations that had been placed in this cave-dwelling were relatively basic in nature, but their quality was astonishing, which showcased the Elder's skills in setting up formations. Though considering that refining weapons also included placing runes and formations on said weapons, maybe Fang shouldn't have been so surprised. Nevertheless, Luo Bing truly had possessed great achievements in both fields in comparison to this world's standards.

There was one last room, which was more like a small alcove. Inside the alcove was a small altar on which a fist-sized glowing crystal was resting. Hundreds of tiny runes were inscribed on the surface of this crystal, which Fang recognized as runes with a sealing nature.

'Low-Class Elemental Soul with a wind attribute...'

Fang recognized the sealed item on the altar from the Elder's message, though that didn't diminish his surprise and admiration for the man.

Elemental Souls were spiritual objects that could be of great benefit to cultivators. Strictly speaking, they weren't objects but more like living beings. A Flame Soul for example was often also called a Living Flame, Fire Spirit, or Eternal Flame, which described a fire with spiritual consciousness that could burn forever. The stronger said consciousness the greater the Flame Soul's power.

Flame Souls were especially sought after by refiners and alchemists to refine ores or medicinal material to process them into weapons or pills. Sadly they were incredibly rare and could only be born under special circumstances, their power also had a clear upper limit from the moment of their birth. Only under the rarest of circumstances could they advance a rank.

Elder Luo had encountered a Low-Class Wind Soul near the end of his life and as he had no use for it at that time, he sealed it so that his inheritor could use it and maybe find a chance to exchange it for a flame-attributed Elemental Soul in the future.

After all, a Wind Soul was of no help in refining weapons but was still incredibly valuable for most martial artists, as it could enhance their combat power substantially.

And while Fang knew about the Elder's thoughts, he didn't plan to exchange the Wind Soul at all, as he already had other plans for it. Though these plans had to wait for now, as only a Meridian Transformation martial artist would have the strength to subdue a low-class Elemental Soul.

After making sure that the seals were still functioning properly, Fang returned to his quarters and took a bath, before falling into a deep and dreamless sleep. Finally resting after his rather intense journey, because even with the Beast Repelling Powder he had to be cautious at all times, he had tired himself out greatly.

…

The next morning after Fang woke up and finished his morning duties, he ate a Fastening Pill.

Fastening Pills were special alchemical creations that could keep a martial artist satiated for several days, while only leaving behind minimal impurities in their bodies. Fang had found an abundance of these pills in all three storage rings and he saw no reason not to make use of them to avoid having to endager himself just to eat some meat.

From what he knew, high-level cultivators also rarely wasted time on cooking a meal, especially when they traveled, adding the fact that these Fastening Pills were relatively cheap and wouldn't go bad even after decades of storing them.

It was no surprise that he had found a small stash of them in all three rings, which would probably last him a few years, considering his rather shallow cultivation at the moment.

Afterward, Fang directly went towards the cultivation room and sat down in the middle of it.

Taking out all the lowest-level beast cores he had gathered over the last few days of travel, he counted roughly two dozen. This was not surprising as he was mostly focused on getting to the cave, instead of hunting as much as possible.

A few calming breaths later, with his hands full of beast cores, Fang began to draw in their energy and started his cultivation session, as he planned to break through to the Flesh Transformation Realm in one go.

The pain of the tempering and reconstruction process caused by the Titan's Essence overbearing nature did cause him to grit his teeth, but Fang endured it nonetheless.

One, two, three, four, …  half a dozen … a dozen beast cores.

As the beast cores slowly turned into dust one after another, Fang felt his progress clearly.

Early Top-Grade Skin Transformation Realm.

Middle Top-Grade Skin Transformation Realm.

Peak Top-Grade Skin Transformation Realm.

Peak Skin Transformation Realm.

The moment Fang reached the Peak Skin Transformation Realm, the pain caused by his cultivation process suddenly turned more intense and deeper, a tearing sensation spreading all over his body.

Blood began to drip from the corner of his mouth, as the pain caused Fang's teeth to sink into the flesh of his lips.

Then just as the feeling of his skin aching painfully lessened considerably and caused him to let out a breath of relief, Fang felt the Titan Essence moving from his skin inwards, drilling into the flesh beneath it.

A pained grunt left his lips at the unbearable sensation and only recalling the memory of him using the Soul Forging Rune made him hang on, feeling some sort of strange comfort in the knowledge that he had suffered worse before.

The moment the last beast core shattered and Fang ran out of Titan Essence, he directly collapsed and fainted right there.

…

After waking up a few hours later, Fang dragged his body into the large bath and let the inscribed formation take care of cleaning his body and clothes of the expelled impurities.

Relieving his ravenous hunger after the breakthrough with some Fastening Pills, Fang went towards the large training hall.

The training hall had different sections. Some were equipped with True Killing Formations, where puppets imitated armed opponents for sparring training. There were also special formations laid out for movement technique training with shifting floor panels and other obstructions that would activate randomly.

These formations were all very basic, but that was exactly what Fang needed at the moment, as he had basically zero combat experience.

It could be seen that Elder Luo hadn't planned for this place to be used for extended periods of time as no advanced formation for Spiritual Stage cultivators had been placed down in the whole cave.

Placing some spirit stones in the eye of the formation, Fang activated the parkour to train his movement technique on the lowest level of the thirty possible levels.

A randomly glowing light on the floor panels showed him where he had to tread next while avoiding obstacles and overcoming the abrupt floor movements.

He trained there for hours, forcing his body to endure exhaustion and suffer light injuries from some blunt swinging weapons. His clothes and hair were drenched in sweat, while his vision had turned hazy from exhaustion. At this point, Fang moved more by instinct than by conscious instructions.

Still, this was the point where he seemed to make the most progress, just before he reached his limit.

After Fang took another bath, he swallowed a low-level recovery pill to regain his stamina, before he went towards a wooden dummy to train his Basic Dual-wielding Technique. Of course, he kept the sheaths on his mat-black blades, as they would have cut through the wooden dummy like butter otherwise.

Moving through the different stances and performing all the basic strokes over and over again, Fang kept up his focus, so as to correct even the slightest mistakes.

Ten thousand.

That was the number of times one had to repeat a movement before it would transition from conscious movement into muscle memory.

Fang knew very well that perseverance was probably the greatest requirement of all if one wanted to become a true powerhouse in the Nine Universes.

So if he couldn't even persist while training a Basic Blade Technique, then he shouldn't even dare to dream about becoming the freest existence of all.