Long Di looked to the sky, his expressionless eyes now taking in the ash-grey colour that now pervaded it, "Here I am, busting my butt to force a couple of 14-16-year-olds to jump into a volcano and all I get in return is complaints. This must be how it feels to be a parent."
****
"Is it okay for me to abandon my cultivation base now, elder brother Long Di?"
"No, as I said before, keeping your cultivation base at its current level will make your body stronger and, by extension, faster. I want us to reach the volcano as quickly as possible. That way, we'll be able to get started with a lot more time to spare. I'm pretty sure that I told you this before."
Long Di and the rest of the disciples were currently travelling at a rapid pace towards a volcano that Feng Yu and the rest knew about.
There was a perfectly reasonable explanation for why Feng Yu and the rest knew where to find a volcano that suited their needs. Due to the cultivation technique they all practised, an environment rich in fire-attributed spiritual energy was the best place to cultivate the Flame Forge Body Art.
As a matter of fact, it was this characteristic of the art that Long Di saw through why he wanted them to cultivate inside a volcano. The matter of them just happening to be in an area close to a volcano was blatant happenstance.
If they were able to cultivate 24/7 near the volcano, this would allow them to be able to reap twice the benefit with only half the effort. There was just one problem, volcanoes like most other fire-energy-rich environments had their own danger and that was flame poison.
Flame poison was the energy present in impure fire-attributed energy that couldn't be absorbed by cultivators for any good use. It would only do more harm than good and even end up destroying a cultivator's body from the inside out by slowly burning and eating away at their spiritual qi followed by their internal organs and then their body.
The process was slow and extremely painful if left untreated for too long.
The good thing was that flame poison only existed in small quantities. So as long as the disciples were careful enough in balancing the absorption of the flame-attributed spiritual energy, and the expulsion of the flame poison right after, then they would be fine.
Of course, this wasn't enough to get rid of the flame poison completely. There would still be remnants in the body. These could only be ridden by staying out of places extremely rich in fire-attributed spiritual energy so that it could leave the body slowly.
Of course, there were medicines and treasures to both negate and cure this, but that was a luxury that they weren't able to afford.
As the four figures traversed the land, they realised that there was no longer any vegetation of any kind. The ground became craggy and dry, this meant they were getting closer.
"Big brother Long Di, can I destroy my cultivation now?" Tie Lang's cry came through once more.
"Should I be concerned that you're this motivated to throw away years of training down the drain!?" Feng Yu glared at Tie Lang, causing the latter to look away in awkwardness.
"I-I just want to surprise the elders when I come back stronger than ever." Lang Tie said after a while.
"Yeah, right. Do you think that you can not only reach but even surpass in a month what you had to spend years to achieve!? Do you think cultivation is that easy!?" Feng Yu scolded the young demon.
The ambient temperature started to rise to noticeable levels as, in the distance, the vague shape of a massive mountain came into view.
"Long Di, you're not really going to have us go inside the volcano, are you?" Feng Yu asked.
"I'll keep it a surprise," replied Long Di.
Feng Yu and the others groaned upon hearing this.
After some time, Long Di and the others came within a few miles of the volcano. Though they were quite some distance away from it, its size was still a towering monster of a structure. They had to look up even though they were so far away just to see the top.
The land all around was dry and bereft of any moisture. The top of the volcano was belching out grey smoke that drowned the entire area for miles around in a hue of the same tone.
The heat they felt at the moment was unbearable already, but this was what they came for.
Shen Ling, Feng Yu, and the others sat down and were trying to enter into a meditative state.
"What are you doing?" asked Long Di when he saw them trying to get comfortable.
"Getting ready to cultivate," answered Feng Yu.
"Not like this. Remember our plan. You need a cauldron with a higher grade so that you can have a richer foundation. Though your current foundation is strong, it'll be harder to get far in the future with what you have now, since the grade isn't good enough. Destroying your cultivation will allow us to remould everything from scratch. So Tie Lang, you know what means, go ahead and de—"
"Huh? L-Long Di?" Shen Ling called out, seeing that Long Di suddenly stopped talking with a blank expression… well, blanker than normal.
[Inside Long Di's mind sea]
'Long Di, I see that you left me all alone in your mind sea. Am I a joke to you!?'
'Why does this seem so blatantly familiar?' Long Di in an ethereal form looked all around before his gaze shot upwards to see the clouds splitting apart.
A large and imposing steel stele descended from the clouds above Long Di's mind sea before it floated before Long Di with a solemn air.
'Heya Steely, how ya been?'
[Wouldn't you like to know?]
'Are you sulking? I thought you weren't supposed to have emotions.'
[It's just… you have something in your mind sea that has knowledge amassed from throughout the ages and you have expressed zero interest in reaching out to me.]
'Well, you did say that I should come back when I get stronger. Plus, you refuse to tell me anything because of karma. So… y'kno, there's really not much reason to come here.'
[Oh really now? I guess you don't want me to tell you why starting them from the beginning is a bad idea and how you can save a LOT of time regarding helping them remould their foundation.]
'Wait, that's pretty useful. Then tell me that.'
[Oh, I'm sorry, I believe I was indirectly informed that I'm practically useless.]
'I didn't say that and are you really going to be THAT guy right now?'
[I am definitely going to be THAT steel stele right now.]
'I see you have cultivated your pettiness to unfathomable levels.'
[I'm not petty!]
'If you're not petty, then I'm not the social butterfly that everyone knows me to be.'
[I don't know what that phrase means, but something tells me it's terrifyingly inaccurate.]
[Sighs…]
Long Di looked at the steel stele with a confounded look in his eyes, 'D-Did you just sig—'
[I give up. I'll tell you what you need to do to help those little ones. They did nothing wrong and don't deserve to suffer simply because you are insufferable.]
Long Di stared at the destiny scale with the same inexpressive look. 'So help me, then. No petty play.'
The Destiny Scale started. [The two boys are both at the Tan'tien Saturation realm. You don't need to have them destroy their cultivation. The Tan'tien saturation realm is not all that different from a mortal, well, at least in my eyes. Now it would make quite the difference time-wise to simply have them continue from there and use some of your wealth to help them along the way to charge into the Cauldron-Forging realm.]
'I see, then what about Feng Yu then? She already has a cauldron, after all,' Long Di advised.
[I checked her first cauldron, and it is still malleable. She has not moved on to the other one. So we will help her to continue forging that cauldron to an acceptable level.]
'We?'
Long Di was a bit surprised. He honestly didn't think that the Destiny Scale was going to do too much apart from giving them advice.
[Listen, you must remember that even with your talent, it took a long time to forge those cauldrons of yours. You cannot expect them to achieve something similar. I will help them to cut that time down by a wide margin, but it will still take time.'
Long Di nodded in understanding. It did take him a long time to forge his black cauldrons and to expect the same from the disciples would be too much.
'Well, then what about Shen Ling?'
The Destiny Scale went silent. It simply floated before Long Di. It would have been unbearably awkward for him if he didn't thrive in awkward situations like a fish in water.
'… You know, the Spiritual Intent of the Peach Blossom Sage was pretty tight-lipped about her as well. I know I'm not strong enough to know, but it really interests me as to what kind of secret is there about Abyss Ghosts that is so critical that a little girl that simply shares their blood needs to look over her shoulder for a death that may find her?'
When the Destiny Scale heard Long Di's words, it shook before its ancient will rang out once more. [Because of a destiny you possess, it is my responsibility to protect you. As such, my advice would be to exterminate the Abyss Gho—]
'Another word of this, and I will use every ounce of my strength to rip you from my mind and body.' The Destiny scale shuddered when it hovered before Long Di's inexpressive gaze.
Nothing about Long Di changed, but it was almost as if something below the surface was struggling to get out but was stopped by something divine.
It couldn't take a deeper look before Long Di spoke again, breaking its focused investigation. 'You will help me to help her tap into her bloodline's power and help me to establish her foundation the right way.'
The Destiny Scale's aura pervaded Long Di's mind sea, as if it wished to advise the young man to back down, but Long Di remained undaunted.
After a while, a single word echoed across the void, 'Fine. However, it depends on how much of her bloodline is that accursed race. There no longer lives a pure-blood Abyss Ghost, however, there are mixed bloods around, few as they may be. I don't know how much of her bloodline is that of an Abyss Ghost's, but I will help you.'