Chapter 53: This Young Master Gets A Boost (Patreon)

Chen Haoran picked up the pace after his Benjamin Franklin impersonation. Lightning-refined qi bubbled within him and filled his legs with vigorous power. If he had to describe it, it was like being supercharged on an already full battery. Was this what Heaven-rank qi felt like? He didn’t know, he lacked an example to compare it to. He bounded across the flooded cavern with loud splashes. He could go even faster if he weren’t worried about accidentally slipping into a pool.

Phelps squealed at him as he bounced on his back. Chen Haoran had to sacrifice his comfort for speed but he didn’t seem too bothered. If anything the sloth seemed to enjoy it.

“Shall we go a little faster then?” he asked.

Phelps squealed in response.

Chen Haoran grinned. “Hold on tight then.” He cycled more bright qi to his legs and shot forward…

Only to immediately lose his footing and fall face-first into a pool.

He felt the brief weightless terror that came part and parcel with any moment where one mentally said ‘oh shit’ before disaster struck. After his plunge Chen Haoran flopped out of the water, coughing and sputtering. Phelps burbled and slapped his shoulders in joy.

“At least one of us is happy,” he said. He secured Phelps to his back and continued on to the column at a respectably cautious speed.

———————

When they finally reached the column Chen Haoran had to take a moment and stare at it. He had known that it was huge when he first saw it from a distance, seeing it up close he could properly appreciate just how small it made him feel. Glowing blue moss and melting ice covered the skyscraper-sized rock formation all the way up to the clouds. It was a tower of light in this underground world.

They sought shelter under an overhang of rock that circled around the column just above the base. It did nothing for the water on the ground but it at least kept the worst of the rain from beating down on them. Chen Haoran moved a loose boulder in the area under the overhang and settled Phelps on it before stripping out of his wet clothes. The chill in the air was not yet gone but with his improved qi he could barely feel it. He ripped moss off the column where it grew in heavy chunks and piled it next to Phelps.

Received Hundred-Fold: Waterlight Spirit Moss

A casual thought summoned a handful of the reward moss. Chen Haoran was blinded when blue light bloomed in his hand with the force of a headlight.

“Fuck.” He blinked technicolor spots out of his eyes. It was certainly a hundred times brighter.

The Waterlight Spirit Moss weighed like air and had a soft, sponge-like texture. He fiddled with it, trying to learn what use it had. Channeling qi into it caused no reaction, nor did ripping it in half. Phelps on the other hand was intently staring at the moss, saliva dripping from his mouth.

Chen Haoran smiled and handed it over, watching Phelps devour it with gusto. “You better eat well if you want more of that in the future.” Not that he needed to tell Phelps that. As soon as he was done with the Waterlight Spirit Moss he turned his attention to the regular glowing moss.

Chen Haoran left him to his meal and wandered off in search of a suitable spirit pool. He picked a shallow one nearby and settled in to let the refreshing energy soak his worn body. He was healed but the lightning had done a number on him. He had fortunately come out of it without any major injury thanks to his toughness but it was still a near thing. Perhaps that was the issue? The 10 thousand-year-old Stygian Lotus was by far the most valuable reward he received from the Gifting Power, the enhancement in durability it provided him had proven invaluable many times over. He trusted his body to endure whatever he put it through, a faith that only grew with each success. What would he do if it couldn’t though? Recklessness was a loan of luck. What would he do if one day the bill was more than he could pay?

Chen Haoran sighed. “Control yourself.”

He sank into the water and cycled the Yellow Dragon River Refinement. He felt strong now but it was a temporary thing, he needed to advance. Chen Haoran meditated in the pool. The rain pattered its surface with a hypnotic rhythm. The yellow dragon danced like lightning through the refined qi and greedily devoured the water element qi entering his body in a deluge.

He frowned and the spell was broken, the yellow dragon roared in frustration. He carefully checked his body with his sense before cultivating again. The water element qi poured in, Chen Haoran opened his eyes before the yellow dragon could feast. “It’s faster?”

A person was limited in various ways when it came to cultivation. Chief among them was the spirit root. How fast one could absorb qi and make it their own depended on the quality of the root. With her high-grade spirit root Lan Fen could make the same progress as Chen Haoran in a quarter of the time he took. It was something that endlessly frustrated him both in the time he had to invest and in the time wasted because of bottlenecks.

Which was why he was surprised to find he was absorbing ambient qi faster than before. As the yellow dragon completed its revolutions around his body he found the speed at which qi was converted was still the same, but even without that being improved he was still saving so much time. The reason why the speed increased was obvious, something about the lightning-refined qi was causing it. Had it taken on a Metal attribute? It was a feasible but easily disproven idea, each element accorded a different property to qi. His refined qi flowed no different from his normally cultivated qi and lacked the characteristic sharpness of the Metal element. It couldn’t have been a change to his spirit root either, his processing speed would have been affected as well.

The quality perhaps, or the quantity? The lightning condensed his qi in a way similar to when he first switched his Profound-rank cultivation method to an Earth-rank one. Did qi reserves also affect how much ambient qi could be drawn in?

The thought struck him like a bell. Why wouldn’t it? He had to cycle his qi to draw in ambient qi after all, like a vortex. Since he was using his qi to create the vortex then of course improving it would have an effect. Chen Haoran frowned and thought back to when he started cultivating. Did he absorb more qi in the Seventh-Layer than he did in the Fifth-Layer? His reserves grew larger with each successive layer so that should be the case. If it didn’t then he would have noticed a steeper drop in efficiency as he advanced. It was probably an increase so gradual that he never noticed it until now when his qi took a qualitative leap forward.

The yellow dragon danced through his meridians. Each cycle around his body came with a noticeable increase in qi. Ever since he came to this cavern his cultivation had been getting quicker. Spiritual pools to increase his already long endurance, water-element qi that perfectly complemented his spirit root, an increase in his ability to absorb. Chen Haoran regretted that he only stumbled in here after using up all his cultivation supplements. How fast would he progress if he had some?

Maybe he did.

Thinking quickly he summoned another handful of Waterlight Spirit Moss and took a large bite…

Only to spit it out immediately. Chen Haoran heaved and washed out his mouth. “Okay.” He coughed. “Not a supplement.” On a whim, he stuck out his tongue and found it glowing blue.

Chen Haoran wasn’t discouraged, putting his latest horrible idea aside. There had to be more growing in this cave than moss and crickets, things that he could feed to Phelps and use to improve his cultivation. He felt a giddiness bubble up in him, the kind that came from knowing a good future on the horizon. What level would he be at when he left the cavern? Ninth-Layer? Liquid Meridian Realm?

He laughed. He would become stronger and then… well… he would figure it out. His good mood subsided and he looked up. He had been so deep in his thoughts that he didn’t notice the rain turning into a drizzle. A ray of blue light broke through the thinning clouds and Chen Haoran basked in it. While it lacked the warmth of sunlight he would take whatever he could get.

In this moment of peace, Phelps squealed. Chen Haoran looked around in confusion before looking back up with a horrified expression. Phelps divebombed into the pool with a loud crash.

“Phelps!”