The sound of the stream filled the garden as the table of three was silent except for the flipping of pages as Shu He's eyes were fixated on the black book, his brows furrowed as he whispered to himself, Rong Jia merely continued drinking while looking off into the distance while Chao Shi watched his junior with intrigue.
On the other hand, Shu Xue gently lent over Shu He's shoulder watching the pages flip by, she didn't quite understand what was being described nor the depictions but the thoughts of Shu He's that were passing over to her filled her in, so she was silent too.
'This man… he was truly insane' Shu He couldn't help but think as he continued reading, his feelings could only be described as disgust that cloaked intrigue, he couldn't help it; Although Tai Min's experiments were all focused on improving his body and talent, the results and details that came from it were interesting to him as they included things he didn't know, such as how ones bodily talent can be split up between their organs and visceral features, for example Tai Min described it as 'Qi Threshold', ones heart may be able to hold Qi on the level of 'ten' yet the lungs or liver from the same person may only be able to hold 'two'.
Of course, he achieved this by continuous testing and dissecting humans, both alive and dead.
The cultivation community considers talent to be a blanket idea, a human's body will contain the same amount of 'talent' throughout, but this seemed to be wrong. Shu He couldn't help but think if this was the reason why cultivator families tend to have many children, because it wasn't guaranteed your child would have excellent talent even if the parents were outstanding.
If the so-called talent was an amalgamation of these separate features, then it was easily possible for the worst parts of a parent to be passed down, and that's not including how broad genetics could be and recessive genes, it's basically playing the lottery when you need to hit hundreds of correct numbers to win.
'This must be why once in a lifetime geniuses don't pop up like weeds in even the strongest families…' he thought to himself as he flipped the pages, the diagrams were still graphic in detail to a sickening degree, but he had long since started to become desensitised to such things, he had started performing operations under the guidance of Elder Jing after all.
The experiments began to shift midway through the diary, it seems he had become satisfied with his research and wanted to move on to the next step…
'Stealing' someone else's talent.
As he switched the page, he paused as his expression turned dark.
It got worse.
The basis for this experiment was organ transplant, but Tai Min knew little about such a thing so of course he failed, many, many times, he detailed how at first the organs immediately failed, some continued to function for a short period before rupturing or beginning rotting along with other types of clear rejection.
'Of course he would fail, he doesn't understand blood types, organ size variation and differing anti-bodies…' Shu He grimaced, Tai Min was essentially a quack doctor playing with people lives without the skill to do so.
But he still continued, and he began to succeed, he noticed that some of the transplants were successful, so he attempted to find out why, in the end he managed to discern there was a difference in the blood based on smell, taste, viscosity and colour which left Shu He utterly disgusted.
'There should be little no to perceivable differences between blood types, yet he managed to do so?' He was in disbelief, what kind of freak was this man, really? Even the test he learned about in this world was using a special formation, very different from his old world.
From then on, Tai Min slowly but surely gathered 'resources', he mentioned having help from 'that' organisation, to which Shu He assumed was Swarm, he extracted the best organs and transplanted them all to a host one at a time watching their stability, he still failed many times and kept adjusting his process… until he succeeded.
He created an artificial genius, capable of controlling and absorbing massive amounts of Qi within their body, it didn't make up for their elemental compatibility, but it was a massive increase in one's foundation… just, the cost for it was simply too much.
But it didn't matter to Tai Min of course, in fact the next thing he did was gather resources for himself and went straight to operating on himself, the detail was excruciating as he described how it felt when he removed his own organs and felt his blood spilling out, and the odd feeling of accepting a part of someone else.
He only managed to remain alive due to life support formations he had learned from a beneficiary, without them he would have been dead without a doubt. But in the end, he succeeded, he had fixed one of his biggest flaws or being born a lowly mortal.
He began to climb the ranks of Swarm, yet he still hit another bottleneck, despite his bodily talent his cultivation skills were pathetic, even using the special method given to him he was slow, he had to find a way to become even stronger.
That was when a certain man approached him and made him a deal, in return for his research, the man would grant him a method and resources to solve his issue. Tai Min took the offer without even a second thought, he didn't care what the consequences would be, he didn't want to fade away to be forgotten in history, he wanted to become something great, whether it be fame or infamy.
That was when he was given a 'Lifeblood Cultivation' method-
Alongside the spirit heart of an Awakened Spirit Beast – The Shadow Demon.
The method was surprisingly close to what he had been doing previously, it required one to transplant the Spirit Heart in place of their own heart while steadily syncing the body and core of cultivation to the one inside of it, there was a set mantra to help with this process as well that was written down in the diary.
The one catch was that the Spirit Heart couldn't be a normal one, it had to be extracted perfectly with all the surrounding vessels intact and kept 'preserved' and an alive state, if the heart crystalises then it is unusable for the process.
The cultivator also needed similar elemental compatibility as the heart, along with matching the Qi wavelength that can be achieved by constant meditation while holding the heart. Even then there's a chance it can fail if the will inside the heart rejects the cultivator, it was an incredibly risky technique.
Yet the gains were undeniable, one's body becomes strengthened akin to a spirit beast, you can gain their abilities, their level of affinity for elements and even the ability to 'evolve' like one! It goes without saying that Tai Min succeeded, Shu He saw this first hand as he suffered to those shadow merging abilities.
From then on, the diary started to skip dates rapidly, as if he had decided he had achieved enough and he didn't need to experiment more, unfortunately it didn't detail much about Swarm or their activities, rather it never even mention the organisation by name even once.
Shu He then flipped the page, and his heart skipped a beat, there was a single diary entry.
It read – "We've been ordered to gather some 'High Level' materials, so I took the chance and visited an old friend to try draw them out… Hopefully he will notice since I made such a mess, otherwise my efforts will have been for nothing."
And then he turned to the next page, it was the last page with anything on it.
"The plan is set, I'm free to do what I want. Oh Fu Li, Fu Li, first you betray us and now you live happily taking your wife's name 'Shu'. I wonder what will happen when you see me? When I kill those two in front of you? What expression will be on your face? I can't wait."
Shu He slammed the diary shut as he held it between his two palms, his eyes were closed as his mind span trying to suppress the emotions that were roiling inside his head. He then breathed out the turbid air in his lungs and gently opened his eyes, looking at Chao Shi.
"This diary… isn't it considered 'demonic'? The acts depicted would mark it as such…" he questioned. It was true, if anyone came across a scroll deeply depicting the acts of mutilating masses of mortals it would be burned on the spot usually, yet he had been handed this.
"What that man did was certainly the act of a demon, yet information holds no morals, what a person does with it is all that matters" Chao Shi shrugged "I know you had an interest in the medical field, and from what I was briefed on a little while ago it seems you've taken an even greater step in that direction, I'm sure that book will be of use to you".
Shu He glanced at the Sect Master, wondering if she had anything to say about this; Rong Jia simply shook her head lightly and said "I've had my say in this already, if the Chao Shi thinks he can trust you with it, then I will too; You've already taken the sect's oath anyway".
She made a good point; he can't harm the sect nor work with any black sects, so he was in the clear in that regard. He picked up the book and stowed it away in his robe, nodding lightly.
'I'm sure Elder Jing would love to give this a read as well anyway'.
"Right, now that that's done with I want to ask you something Shu He" Chao Shi sat forward in his chair as he suddenly called Shu He out.
"Hm? What is it?" Shu He replied curiously, he had thought the book was the main point of him coming here, so he assumed it was time to leave.
"How's your archery going?".
Surprised by the question Shu He slipped in his chair slightly before considering what to say.
"It's... fine" Shu He answered honestly. The fact was he felt like he had hit a roadblock, he was working on his skills daily, but he thought he was at the highest level his body could perform, he could learn new tricks, practice more longshots, but nothing felt like a qualitive change.
"Just fine, eh?" Chao Shi leaned back as he glanced at the sky "As expected it's not as easy for others…" he mumbled to himself before leaning forward again "I'm guessing you feel like you're not improving much?".
"…that's right, how did you know?" Shu He nodded.
"I hit the same point with my sword as well at one point" he replied, surprising Shu He. "Even you?!" Shu He's expression said it all, making Chao Shi laugh. "I guess you've heard, my talent is one of a kind along with my Living Sword constitution, you'd think I'd breeze along this path… yet I didn't, I hit the wall as well; We call it the 'Mortal Limit', when we as martial artists hit our bodily limit, we may improve as we age or put on muscle, we may be able to fine tune our skills or techniques but we will can't reach a qualitive change, that's what the 'Mortal Limit' is about."
"Then… how do you overcome it?" Shu He asked as he lent forward, intensely curious as to the answer.
"Intent" Chao Shi replied with a single word which made Shu He sigh.
"In the end, it's still Intent" Shu He lamented "I just don't quite understand it, is it a feeling? An understanding? How does one achieve it?".
Chao Shi crossed his arms, his face painted with a hint of confusion "So you really don't remember?".
"What are you talking about?" Shu He frowned in turn.
"Back when you dealt that final blow to Tai Min, what was it you did? What did you use?" he questioned Shu He with a sharp glint in his eyes.
Shu He stared deeply in to those eyes, reaching an understanding as he unearthed those memories he keeps buried deeply in the back of his mind, it was obvious that Chao Shi wasn't talking about what weapon he used, but the memory was so vague like static to him.
"All I can remember… I wanted to kill him, I wanted to make sure my arrow hit, I wanted to put everything I had in to that one arrow…" The feeling was vague now in his mind, but he knew back then, that was the strongest will he ever had.
"That feeling – That is a key to intent, a pure unbridled, unrestrained will"
"You mean?" Shu He's eyes flashed with light as he put two and two together.
Chao Shi nodded "Back then, what you used was, without a doubt – Intent!".