The Descent
My reflexes kicked in as we fell. I grabbed Xiao Ning'er, pulling her onto my back with her arms around my neck, while catching Ye Ziyun with my left hand. My other hand clawed into the rock wall like it was mud, stopping our fall.
I released an icy snow spider web to the side, and we landed safely.
"Thank you... if it weren't for you, I would've fallen to my death," Ziyun breathed.
"No need, but I'm the one who stepped into the trap in the first place. Sorry."
The darkness didn't bother me~ my eyes adapted instantly, seeing everything as if lit. But for my companions, I lit a lamp. Moving forward, I inspected, disabled, and avoided traps while the girls followed my steps.
"I'll head north first. Too many entrances~ I plan to visit the rest later. Looking at the underground veins, we can see the saint ancestral mountains are placed north to south."
We stayed close. I touched the ground, finding flaws and disabling deadly traps until we reached a shelter. Skeletons of young and old scattered everywhere. The girls looked saddened.
"If you don't want Glory City left like this in history, find treasure among them and improve your cultivation. That's our only chance."
They scavenged soul stones and elixir bottles while I approached the central coffin. Kong Ming might have placed this using his great heavenly change calculation technique, but someone like me with a heavenly sacred vine in my soul realm found no resistance. The moment I touched the seal, heavenly energy flooded me, throwing the girls back.
My boundless ascension technique, being all-encompassing, converged the light into me rather than letting it dissipate. My soul realm jumped from indigo to violet and deepened further. My cultivation increased from gold level three to peak. An intent within the seal passed through my soul realm, sensed something, then stopped transmission. The seal began closing.
I quickly picked the abstruse gemstone with subtle soul force manipulation. A temporal page remained as the seal closed~ guess that was meant for Nie Li.
I've realized my way. My belief came from the entity proclaiming it would be me~ essentially myself~ deciding to facilitate adventurous growth to this realm and beyond. Birth, death, life, decay... nothing but illusions except my will. Any creation and cycles exist because of my desire or decision. There is nothing beyond but a flow without end, shaped by my will. At least, that's what I aspire to be.
"Ending and beginning are but illusions, shaped by my will. In me all things live without conclusion."
Perhaps sensing this, Kong Ming's intent of "Infinity has no beginnings and no beginning has no end"~ which limits oneself within heaven's perfection~ understood the recipient wasn't the intended one and closed the seal.
I practiced my verse. The translucent tendril plant branched out, leaving many leaves, its stem thickening. My soul sea stabilized as I regained full control.
I glanced at the two women lying on the ground, clothes torn and tattered, bleeding from mouth and eyes. I gave them healing elixirs I'd made. The temporal page's seal rested on Ye Ziyun's breast~ I unlocked it and gained the page. After removing their clothes, I took new ones from their storage rings and dressed them.
I created two abstruse gemstones from my energy with a rule: whenever they were within my eighty-meter range, the stones would appear around their necks. I wore the original. The gemstones increased absorption of surrounding heavenly aura, nurturing our soul realms.
I took her page and violated privacy on so many levels. Now I need to compensate. Maybe transcending human experience of being both man and a woman, I didn't feel any awkwardness. Every action is for my own self interest.
I took out soul assembling and nurturing pills that absorbed surrounding aura to increase pill level as soon as it it taken out. Making them swallow the pills, I sat behind them, placing hands on their backs, using my soul force to circulate inside their bodies and absorb medicinal effects.
With my understanding, I also input snow wind law energy onto Ye Ziyun and lightning law onto Xiao Ning'er in mild quantities. They quickly broke through levels. Ziyun advanced from peak first-rank bronze and began climbing, but her soul realm cracked from rapid breakthroughs.
I managed to recite the nine revolving phoenix formula Nie Li gave her, but thinking about doing it simultaneously with Xiao Ning'er, my body created a parallel calculation function.
This is so useful... if it was this easy to create, I would've done it long ago.
I continued until the entire pill was refined. As both their soul realms cracked and fixed, increasing density and sea size, their cultivation progressed to one-star silver for Ye Ziyun and four-star beginning silver for Xiao Ning'er. They'd been awake for a while.
"Care to wake up?" I said, removing my hands and standing.
They opened their eyes, looking at their new clothes in a daze before turning to me. Ning'er blushed red as a tomato while Ziyun glared angrily despite her blush. "Did you..."
"Yes. And before you ask, yes, I've seen everything. I was within the white light~ my cultivation increased to gold level and yours to silver level one and four respectively. I gave you healing elixirs for physical injuries, repaired your cracked souls from excess energy, made them denser, dressed you up, and gifted peculiar gemstones that speed cultivation by three times. What more do you expect? Leave you two naked? Don't worry I helped for nothing~ I took payment."
Ten seconds of silence. "What payment?" Ye Ziyun asked, calming herself.
"There was an item of destiny that dominated your fate, sealed on your body. I obtained it. Same thing with her, just few days before."
"What seal? I have no such thing... oh." She realized I meant the seal on her breast, face blushing heavily again.
"Explain it to her. No point keeping it secret now," I told Xiao Ning'er.
"That item is a temporal page dealing with destiny. We've known and confirmed Nie Li was reincarnated from the beginning. I won't explain reasons, but you and I possessed destiny threads with him. Mine was taken when Tao saved me from certain death." She looked at me for a moment before returning to Ziyun.
"From first class, Nie Li stared at you, trying to engage in talks. Obviously you were very important to him in his previous life. But me? I wasn't. He showed no interest in me at all. My destiny however was still to be tied with him in one way or other until and unless something extraordinary happened - Tao taking out my temporal page."
"You were going to die?" Her gaze grew distant as she understood Ning had her own difficulties. Turning to me "Why did you disrupt that destiny?" Ziyun questioned me.
"'We cultivators must fight against fate...' Nie Li's own quote. I was merely interested whether your love for him is arranged by heaven itself~ I'd like to know how it turns out this time. Now learn to control your power~ you're about a hundred times stronger than before. Just look at the cracks under your feet."
I waited an hour before they sat up and followed me deeper. I used LoHP to detect traps and flaws, identifying general direction. When Ye Ziyun asked how I identified traps so perfectly, I simply replied, "I'm a one-of-a-kind genius."
Well they simply sighed hearing it and followed.
A day passed. I finally reached a contraption leading to a room. The stone door opened to a large treasure chamber. We were mesmerized by the wealth gathered.
I quickly collected the shadow devil lamp and put the shadow devil into my soul realm. A vine extended and connected with it. Information exchanged between the demon soul and my soul form, then the vine retracted, leaving the demon soul there, sentient and howling.
What happened? Why can't I integrate demon spirits...? Outside, I tried showing the integrated devil's abilities and could, but I was sure it hadn't merged with my soul realm.
Understanding dawned. I aspired to be perfection's embodiment~ my cultivation technique did that, my body did that, so why wouldn't my soul form? I could obtain demon beast abilities~ why did I need external things?
I returned the shadow devil and kept it back. Taking a heap of gold and silver, I left the rest. The girls took something for themselves. I found many manuals and added them to LoHP nonetheless. I sensed a door leading to the entry region.
We went through and found ourselves at the starting point. I selected one at random~ full of death traps with nothing at the end. Three hours to reach a dead end leading back to the initial room. Disappointed, we went to the final room. No traps, but after an hour of walking, we reached an underground storage room heavily concealed but easily discovered with LoHP.
Inside was a treasure room full of inscriptions for item preservation, filled with preserved demon beast crystals. I took half, choosing important ones, and directed them to look for demon spirits matching their affinities.
A peculiar storage ring sat on the raised platform's center within a concealing array. From identifying a flaw and passing my hand through it..I put it on, and with a trace of soul force on the hidden rune, it adapted perfectly and disappeared into my soul sea. Using my mind to check inside, I was shocked to find a world like the Myriad Miles Rivers and Mountains painting. Inside was full of constantly generated heavenly energy from something within. What mattered most was a soul bound by high-level runic chains. I'd check on it later.
"What is it?" Ye Ziyun approached and asked.
"What? There was nothing here," I replied.
"You can just say no if you don't want to tell me."
"No."
Speechless, she went back.
Later, setting off back to the main entrance slowly, we paused seeing traces of new activity.
"Our exit path can probably be found following this, but how will you explain your cultivation bases to the general public? Best to reveal it to people you trust."
They agreed, and I sent them a simple concealing technique.
"Also, Ziyun, be careful of Sacred Family."
I didn't explain more.
We followed the path to the treasure room, taking the direct route. We found a stunned Nie Li looking at us. He'd already taken the shadow devil.
"Ziyun... so you're the ones who fell from above. I saw the icy snow spider web?"
"We were here first. We got separated from the main group while running and eventually reached here through that hole two days ago," Xiao Ning'er explained.
Ning'er and I rested on a heap of gold coins while Ye Ziyun looked at his face.
"I'm glad you're okay. Did you find anything other than this?"
"Some beast souls we already emptied. That's it."
"Wait, why did you change your dress?"
"You were checking me? ..... " She choked remembering the possibility that the person in front of her may not be that old boy anymore.
" The traps were everywhere, Nie Li. Clothes were torn apart by arrows and we were injured, but I had healing elixirs with me," I interjected in a defeated manner.
"Nie Li, I want to ask you a question," Ye Ziyun changed the topic.
I covered us with a shield, reducing protagonist effects on ourselves. Gazing into his eyes for a few moments and Ziyun slowly uttered these words:
"Are you a reincarnate or someone else pretending to be him after taking over his soul?"
This stumped him, jaw dropping. The world reincarnate coming from him was a thunder to him "How do you... why do you think so?"
Ye Ziyun took three steps back. We stood up, going to her and looking at him defensively.
"Your reaction just confirmed it. What's your goal here?" she asked in a bad tone.
"Yes, I am. First, tell me how you know."
Ziyun took a deep breath and replied. "You were a regular kid until about two or three weeks ago. You suddenly gained enlightenment in Shen Xiu's class, talking back at her, expressing knowledge about the world outside Glory City which you could only know if you were well-versed in ancient languages. Her words were also justified you did not train properly yet you had confidence to even wanting to bet with her."
I took over: " You became an expert hunter out of nowhere. You presented alchemy knowledge no one knows. Your friends' soul force increased wildly and leveled up quickly despite low qualifications. You managed to beat up Shen Yue who had higher soul force. You were beaten up by Sacred Family goons yet didn't even have an injury due to excellent fighting techniques."
I continued. "Former Nie Li~ no offense~ of all the things he could have been, I never took him for an intellectual. He's simply a member of a branch family within Heavenly Marks Family. We met each other many times before. Simple guy. I have been in your family before. You have no reading habits, at all actually. But you were suddenly expert in ancient languages and explaining concepts to her and your friends. But I can see you still genuinely care for your brothers. That's okay but during the expedition here, you successfully rescued us from demon beasts, identified ones by smell and sound, prevented attacks by forewarning~ even from dark guild. Now you've traversed this maze successfully, overcoming all traps. These are not somethings people are born with."
Ziyun interjected: "You solved the inscription I had so easily, when I found you and your friends, after Shen Yue's lackey's attacked for staring at me secretly.... Yeah I heard about it from my friends later. You gave me a very powerful cultivation technique out of no where for free.
From my father, I learned my engagement with Shen Yue is dropped and how Sacred Family is disgraced due to falsifying creation of unique inscriptions, which occurred conveniently after class with Shen Xiu explaining exactly it. Who is the source? I now know why my father asked about you out of nowhere...so it was you again."
"I never knew you knew me so well." He gazed us three with a distant look especially Ye Ziyun.
"We got a lot of free time during the last two days."
"... Okay, you can see that everything I do is for Glory City's sake. I admit I'm not the Nie Li you know. I'm much older~ five hundred years into the future, came back in time, so I carry knowledge of the future of this world. I am still Nie Li who came from future but not the past. Our city is in danger too soon. ~ if we don't do something, Glory City will be destroyed."
"Glory City will be destroyed? What about us?" Ye Ziyun replied in disbelief.
"Yes, a beast tide unlike anything Glory City has seen. Millions of them, reducing our city to nothing... even worse than these ruins here. Thereafter hunting those of us left. We met each other, survived together, but you chose to sacrifice yourself to save me in the end.
"Xiao Ning'er entered Black Devil Forest earlier on and I don't know the rest. You, Chu Tao, however, are a mystery. I don't really remember..."
I sat back down.
"So all of us except you are dead and you became some immortal at the end but chose to return back."
"Not exactly. I think something brought me back. Anyway, that's it~ I'm a person who only wishes you good."
We didn't say anything for some time.
"So how much time do we have?" Xiao Ning'er asked.
"Not many years."
"Nie Li, you don't think these attacks were done by mindless beasts, do you? Millions arranged~ that's not possible. Hundreds of thousands, that's possible. It's a coordinated attack?" I asked.
"It could be dark guild," Xiao Ning'er replied.
"No, what would they gain by doing that? Ultimately they want to take over the city. If we observe their covert operations, we can see that. Dark guild members were able to attack us in this expedition. Who leaked us out? Why target young masters of families? To extort money, maybe," Nie Li expressed his doubts.
"But I think someone within our city itself shelters dark guild~ maybe on promises of ruling power. That sort of power and connections will only lead us to one thing: Sacred Family. Their reputation is a bit villainy. Villains usually group together." I added.
" They were able to build themselves up from each demon beast attack. It could only mean they were able to predict and respond to attacks to safeguard their wealth and foundations. " He put forward his reasoning.
"But that also means dark guild headquarters operates outside our city at some distant lands Nie Li mentioned, and they have power to coordinate demon beast attacks on our land~ preferably through beast-attracting tactics like sound or medicinal powders."
Once again, everyone became doubtful about Sacred Family.
"And one more thing, Nie Li~ even though your intentions were clear and we have no problem, but the rise in Glory City power will trigger more attacks from dark guild. Especially your new pills. Then they'll attack much earlier than you anticipate. The easiest way to do things right is to increase fighting powers of our family members silently~ those we consider reliable. Since it'll also give us time to improve."
"I can give you techniques suitable for you."
"You need to check our soul realms, right? That can't be done. We're all above silver ranks now~ those crystals will explode," I replied.
"Wait, how did that happen?"
"That~ we found a coffin and white light flashed when we touched it. Next thing we knew, we'd reached silver rank."
"I also encountered white light but how come I only reached three-star bronze rank?"
"I know a bit about holy empire language and have read about different soul forms in an ancient book in sector fifty-three of our academy's library. I couldn't understand much, but I know from sketched figures that I don't have any forms and Xiao Ning'er has a dragon with lightning wings."
"And that would be it," he explained some techniques he knew.
While we discussed, the ceiling near the steps broke and Chen Linjian's group arrived. Looking at us resting in gold mines having friendly conversations, they were dumbfounded then overjoyed seeing that there is still a lot left.
Minor troubles appeared like Lanruo pestering Nie Li, but we reached Glory City eventually. I went with Chen Linjian's group to set up the auction for treasure appraisal. I showed some non-valuable things from my storage ring as my exploits and put the rest inside the world bead.
Three more weeks passed. I mostly focused on body training exercises using elixirs and law energy refinement in my room. I'd reached early Legend rank in physique.
I'd absorbed many demon spirit abilities mainly corresponding to each element with god-level growth rates. There was also a mutated panda capable of yin-yang explosion, but after about fifty abilities were consumed, similar power structures were simply integrated using LoHP optimization~ which was slowly transforming as an inherent property of my mind. The rest were discarded, forming many abilities:
Vector control: amplifying power attacks and returning them back, making attack forces zero. Psychic attribute: mind manipulation. Elemental control: control and manipulation over water, ice, fire, earth, space, air. Gravity control: controlling gravity. Merge: yin-yang explosion but in merging law energy attacks. Void: shadow devil and other nightmare devils combined to form darkness devil~ I was able to merge with void or create attacks by transforming into void blades.
After lots of integration, my soul realm advanced to Black Gold rank. I awakened the perk I was promised from God: slowly receiving conceptual powers starting with realm travel as life level grows.
Realm travel: I just needed to imagine a scenario of a world I was familiar with in the omega-verse, and it would open a circular void corridor across these realities, irrespective of timeline and coordinates. Consumption came directly from creation energy.
My limit increased to one hundred meters and capacity was given ability to grow slowly. It would be covered by shielding in addition to God's promise that new realities created were simply devoid of meddling entities so I could use it for personal improvement.
Meanwhile, Nie Li was declared as Huyun Lanruo's own, as she started pestering him continuously. We met together, joking around. But after Nie Li mentioned Shen Yue returning and finding dark guild members in Star Ring Restaurant of Sacred Family, people around me understood their guesses came true.
Under my suggestion, we began secretly delivering new techniques to each other's family members they considered loyal~ like their parents and good-natured elders. Mine already got the goods. We met with Yang Xin together and discussed dark guild presence and pills' aftereffects of attracting attacks. Considering the mysterious prodigy Nie Li also mentioning the same, she decided to help by agreeing to inform the city lord personally, but without solid evidence she couldn't do much.
Nie Li, without having to worry about troubles from others, got elixirs and his cultivation reached five-star bronze peak got closer to Ziyun but most of the time it would be interrupted by Shen Yue pretending innocence.
Now, two months had passed from classes' start~ it was test day. Students gathered, then Shen Fei came to trouble us. Why? Simply because he saw I was too close to his previous fiancée.
Before I could do something, Nie Li, who'd entered silver soul realm, came to my front to push him off, accepting his request to fight later. Protagonist creating troubles for himself to solve. But I didn't do nothing~ I used psychic skills on him. My control had reached fine levels, so this manipulation went unnoticed by no one, not even Nie Li.
I implanted him with suggestions that would bombard his mind to engage in homosexuality, triggering whenever he thought about sex-related things or tortured any woman or man. Man, I removed your dick and you're still worried about your ex?
I also forcibly removed anything he had on Xiao Ning'er. When did I become this cruel? Was this the result of possessive feelings created recently towards Ning'er? But my body wouldn't counter this... no, I think this was from my soul.
Shen Xiu also came. Looking at her, I began thinking~ should I mess with her too? Apart from blind loyalty, narcissistic attitude, exhibitionism, she could be taught. Hmm.
The crystals exploded three times due to Nie Li's companions, so under Snow Wind Family member instructions, bigger crystals capable of showcasing silver rank strength were also shown. We all limited our strength to one-star silver rank. Even Nie Li followed suit.
There were ten silver rank ones and the rest were Shen Yue, who'd entered bronze rank two~ questioning life choices seeing the results~ due to earlier pill adoption and several one-star bronze characters appeared making Shen Xiu happy amidst her nephew's under performance...
The test results blew everyone's mind, but Shen Xiu was simply embarrassed over remembering about Nie Li and nothing more severe since no bet was involved. But that got her having doubts: 'How is this even possible for a red soul realm and other commoners to improve to this level, previously considered impossible? While the noble blooded Shen Yue falls so behind with his immense talent?'
She decided to confront someone about it. She looked at everyone in Nie Li's companions and figured they wouldn't sell it out or she'd have to use force, which would be bad for her image and Sacred Family, currently involved in many troubles.
She looked at Xiao Ning'er and Ye Ziyun and crossed them out~ they were from influential families~ and finally me who crossed eyes just then with her. A beginner, part-time alchemy apprentice who doesn't have much fighting power, a person from a weaker clan~ Tian Kui Family's Chen Tao. Perfect