"Hmm…so that's how it works."
I didn't know what I was expecting when I inserted the thumb drive into the USB port of my computer and opened the file. It seemed that Cheng Long was telling the truth when he handed it to me. The thumb drive glowed brightly, its qi whipping out to make contact with my fingers. I felt a warm sensation on my forehead and the file immediately opened for me to view on the screen.
"Amazing."
I read the techniques and breathing methods, as well as training practices as depicted in the document. Scanning through them, I felt a thrill run through me. I couldn't wait to get started. Once I read through the whole thing once, I downloaded the thing into my smartphone so that I could read it when on the move.
Once that was done, I rested for the day. I was exhausted after the events today, both physically and mentally. Particularly psychologically – Shi Xiao Nian's predicament weighed heavily upon me. She was right. I wasn't her father, and I was downright intruding upon her privacy.
The more I interfered, the more trouble I would cause her. Perhaps it was best if I kept a healthy distance from her and watched from afar. That way, I could keep my promise to Jin Bai He and bail Shi Xiao Nian out whenever she needed me.
Unfortunately, I couldn't be there for her all the time.
Troubled, I eventually dozed off. When I woke up the next morning, I prepared to train once more. In addition to the usual daily routine of 100 pushups, 100 sit ups and 10km, I also practiced the breathing methods and combat techniques that Kai Li Si taught me. Before I left the house, I took my smartphone with me.
While I trained, I also had Magic Carp swim 10km in the river. I couldn't afford to allow him to slack off on his physical training. And from what I saw in the document that Cheng Long gave me, my spirit beast needed to be physically fit as well.
After I was done with my personal training, I jogged to the river to check on Magic Carp. He was just about done with his 10km swim and was splashing at the riverside when he caught sight of me.
"Carp, carp!"
"I got it, I got it." I sighed and approached him. "Sorry, little fella, but your training isn't over yet. Now we are going to try out these new techniques that I've received from Master yesterday."
Needless to say, Magic Carp looked less than pleased about that. He gave me a sad stare with those large, lidless eyes of his, but I maintained my stern expression.
"Don't give me that look. You want to become stronger, don't you?"
"Carp, carp, carp!" Magic Carp seemed to be saying that he didn't…that he couldn't care less. That I was the one who wanted to become stronger and I shouldn't push my own ambitions onto him.
This bastard was really a slacker…
"Just do it, Magic Carp." I sighed in exasperation. "I'm sorry, but the moment you became my spirit beast partner, you don't have a choice. Our fates are tied. I have demonic cultivators trying to kill me because I'm supposed to become the leader of some resistance in another world in the future, and if I die, you die too. So if you want to live a bit longer, you'll need to obtain strength….sufficient strength to help me fight those bastards off."
Magic Carp seemed to grumble, but he understood the situation. Nodding, he then splashed back into the river and awaited my instructions."
"Good boy." I smiled in relief. "Trust me, buddy, you won't regret this. The two of us will rule the heavens together!"
Well, I doubted we would, but whatever. In any case, I began the training session and the both of us worked hard for the next few hours until we exhausted ourselves completely.
"Carp…"
"Huff…"
I crashed onto the ground. Summoning cultivation wasn't as easy as it sounded. The summoner must be at least as strong as his spirit beast or it wouldn't work. Therefore the summoning techniques in the file that Cheng Long gave me also entailed the training of the summoner, both physically and spiritually. We were to train alongside our spirit beasts, not just stand by the side and watch them train. Brothers in arms. Comrades in suffering. However you wanted to put it, we were supposed to brave the dangers and trials together with our spirit beasts.
It made sense. After all, why would the spirit beasts obey us if we didn't go through the same thing as them? We had to earn the spirit beasts' respect or they wouldn't obey our commands during battle. There were cases of spirit beasts turning on their summoners. Those spirit beasts would rather die than suffer the indignity of serving an inferior and tyrannical master.
"Did it work?"
I glanced at Magic Carp and saw a slight difference. It wasn't very significant, but considering that this was our first day training with this specific set of advanced techniques, I didn't really expect a huge jump in Magic Carp's abilities. It simply wasn't realistic.
Those cultivation web novels made it seem so easy. The protagonist would sit cross-legged and meditate for a few hours and voila! Breakthrough! Progress through the cultivation realms! They had spirit pills and elixirs to help them boost their progression.
Unfortunately, the spirit pills and elixirs in reality were simply healing medicine. Of course, there were many that would grant a temporary boost in power – steroids – but just like doping in real life, consuming them would have serious side effects. It was no fun to be immortal if your organs were damaged as hell and your millennia of lifespan was spent living as a half-dead patient.
There were spirit pills and elixirs that served as supplements, but they provided nutrients that would help your body in cultivation, not do your cultivation for you. One didn't simply pop a supplement into his mouth and expect to make a breakthrough. Cultivation in reality just did not work that way. Hard work was required. There was no going around that.
Still…
"Good job, Magic Carp. We'll continue this again tomorrow."
My spirit beast groaned, but at least he didn't protest. He was aware of the need to become stronger. That fight against Gui Xiong, in particular, had left him worried inside my summoning space while I was hospitalized.
And so, for the next week, we trained vigorously. Initially, the effects of the training didn't seem visible. But after a week, I was beginning to see some results. It was imperceptible to the naked eye, but my sixth sense could detect a sturdier, unyielding layer of qi that was forming over Magic Carp's body. Much like a barrier, it protected him while augmenting his physical strength at the same time.
Right now, his strength was still insufficient to climb up a waterfall, but I saw a flicker of hope that he would attain the capability eventually. At least at a pace more reasonable than when I was originally training him with nothing but basic techniques from the manual that Ye Wu Tian gave me.
The advanced summoning techniques were worlds apart from the basic ones. I couldn't help but be grateful to Master. At the same time, if Ye Wu Tian didn't give me the basic summoning manual, I wouldn't have the foundation upon which I could learn the advanced techniques in the first place. So I should thank him as well for not dismissing me outright and giving me the chance.
"Speaking of which…"
Cheng Long's words came to my mind once more. Master wanted me to visit the sect to do the whole official disciple ceremony thing. It had been a week since then and I couldn't afford to put it off for too long. That would make me a not filial disciple.
So I followed the instructions on my token, which were transmitted to me through qi. Letting my parents know that I would be out the whole day, I then left home (after my daily training) and headed for the mountains.
Interestingly enough, the venue wasn't Tian Long Temple, but Cang Long Mountain. I was puzzled at first, but then I recalled Ye Wu Tian telling me that the dragon pool at Tian Long Temple was only one of the two pocket dimensions that the Divine Dragon Sect guarded.
Huh…I guess that made sense.
I had to take the train, which put me on an almost two-hour ride to the outskirts of Cheng Shi City. Then a bus toward the mountains, alighting at a nearby village and then trekking to the mountain on foot. All the while, I could see a golden arrow ahead of me, projected by the token.
Fortunately, only I could see it. Non-cultivators couldn't see the arrow at all…no, perhaps the correct work was sense. I was able to perceive the arrow with my sixth sense because I had mastered Heavenly Flow and Earthly Paths.
While I hiked toward the mountain, I suddenly sensed violent eruptions of qi. A maelstrom of powerful energies surged and swirled about the mountain, indicating that there was a massive battle taking place at the moment.
"What the hell?!"
I totally did not expect that to happen. Feeling anxiety coil inside my chest, I hastened my pace and ran as best as I could over the treacherous terrain. The jungle survival skills that Kai Li Si taught me came in useful here, but as anyone who had gone actual training in the forest could attest, trying to run in a dense forest was an arduous and demanding task. Most of the time, you simply couldn't run.
I had to bash through thorny foliage, occasionally using qi to protect myself. Hurdling over fallen tree trunks, I vaulted over shrubs and hacked through branches. Often I had to slow down to clear the impediments in my path. One simply did not run through a thick thicket of bristles, after all. Not unless you wanted to get maimed.
Eventually I managed to reach the foot of the mountain, where there was thankfully an open mountain path for me to climb. Unfortunately, the steep, upward elevation meant I had to expend more energy than usual to scale the damned mountain. Despite that, I continued rushing forward. I could feel the once colossal waves of qi begin to peter out.
The fierce battle was finally reaching its end.
Honestly, I didn't know whether that was a good or bad thing. Given my current realm and the density of qi that I sensed from the distance earlier, I knew that my presence wouldn't make much of a difference. I was nowhere near the level of the people desperately fighting against each other. They could most likely obliterate me in one attack.
That said, I couldn't turn back. Even though I was weaker, there had to be something I could do. I didn't necessarily have to fight. I could help the survivors escape, or perhaps distract the enemy long enough for Master and the elders to deliver a decisive blow. Whatever the case, I would only know how I could contribute if I got there first. Otherwise everything was academic.
I burst into the top of the mountain, panting. A temple came into view, its gates demolished and the once proud signboard of Divine Dragon Sect smashed into splinters. Deeper inside, in the courtyard of the temple, I bore witness to a massacre.
Hundreds of disciples and masters lay in the bloodied grounds of the Divine Dragon Sect's temple, their bodies torn apart, in pieces or unmoving. There were a few survivors, but they were either lying down in shock or unconscious.
At the center of the plaza, two people were fighting. I recognized one of them – he was none other than my master, Cheng Long, the guy I was supposed to pledge my discipleship to today. Right now, he was battered, with blood streaming down his face and staining his robes.
To my surprise, I recognized his opponent.
Long Ao Tian.
"What the hell?!"
Why was the first disciple of Divine Dragon Sect fighting his leader? This made no sense whatsoever. And from what I was seeing, the both of them were clearly trying to kill each other. Their dragons were clashing, one a blue and silver dragon, and the other commanding a golden dragon.
"How dare you betray us, Long Ao Tian?!" Cheng Long shouted, his golden dragon protecting him from a qi blast from the blue and silver dragon. He then launched an attack, a fiery dragon streaking out of his palm, only to be deflected by his much younger opponent. "We nurtured you, we trained you, and we brought you up! Is this how you repay the sect?"
"You are too weak," Long Ao Tian replied coldly. "You have outlived your usefulness. I don't need your pathetic sect any longer."
"You…!"
"The world of cultivation operates on the rule of strong eat the weak. You are naïve to think that I wouldn't gobble you up once I become strong."
Long Ao Tian laughed evilly before countering with a dragon palm strike of his own. Eighteen fiery dragons erupted from his palms and surged forward to subdue Cheng Long.
The elderly master desperately defended against this latest attack, but he found himself overwhelmed. Blood spurted from his mouth as several of the fiery dragons landed upon his body, leaving horrific burn marks on his skin and clothes.
"It's over!" Long Ao Tian gloated gleefully. "From today onward, the Divine Dragon Sect ceases to exist!"
His attack never landed. Instead, my Soul Crushing Strike struck him from the side, spinning him momentarily. He glanced at me, baffled at my sudden appearance. I glared at him, steeling my resolve, and then adjusted my glasses before issuing a declaration.
"Not if I can help it."