The mission to aid their allied city was given to Mei Fan and Zhishi Wu but another person had been asked to accompany them, Jia Lin, her expertise in matters of alchemy had required her attendance.
"No way, you're going to ride on that giant panda alone right?" Zhishi Wu said as they exited the sect.
Mei Fan smirked at him threw Jia Lin upon Gomu before dashing away from the question.
"I'm sorry elder…" Jia Lin's voice slowly disappeared into the distance as she held on for dear life.
"Are all cultivators this annoying?" Zhishi Wu thought to himself as he instantly chased in pursuit.
He slowly caught sight of the beast and Mei Fan but was still lagging behind, this is when he noticed the difference in Qi usage between him and the beast, Gomu was actually projecting Qi outwards from his feet to create more opposing force between his feet and the ground to increase speed.
Zhsihi Wu analyzed the movement technique and put it into use, he had expected to mess up a few times but to his surprise it worked perfectly and he was able to match the beast's pace, a beast who was a inch away from foundation establishment.
If any other sects knew of Zhihsi Wu's ability to replicate someone's techniques after seeing them they may have forcibly killed him to prevent his growth. In reality, it wasn't exactly mimicry, for Zhishi Wu to do that he must have understanding of the concept behind the technique.
"So any details about the mission?" he asked while trying out his newfound movement technique.
"So far we know that Ironhold city has been occupied by a local bandit group, apparently their leader broke into foundation establishment and in a moment of flaring ego he decided to take control of this city." Mei Fan casually responded as Jia Lin desperately held on to the beast.
"Then why are we taking little miss Jia Lin with us?" he looked at her barely holding her glasses in place.
"That's where it gets complicated, there's also information that they started to sell strange pills in the city that alter the mental state of the locals causing an addiction and explaining why they hadn't asked for help." Mei Fan replied in a serious tone.
Zhishi Wu's expression behind the mask fell.
"Additive substances are a problem no matter the world." he thought to himself as he contemplated, although he never suffered from addiction he had studied its effects in depth.
"So our job is to eliminate the bandits and liberate the city and people,"
"Yes, and no, the leader has asked to avoid unnecessary casualties." she said with a frown.
"Subdue instead of eliminate huh, I guess conditional wins help me improve as well." he thought to himself
"Umm, Elder Sage could I ask about the pill you refined last time." Jia Lin tried to chime in.
Mei Fan turned her head curiosity present across her face eager to see what Zhishi Wu had to offer.
"Try and survive this mission and maybe I'll explain ." he said as he closed his eyes and practiced using his spiritual sense.
Although Zhishi Wu wasn't dead set on keeping his methods secret he also didn't truly trust this sect enough to blab about his methods anywhere.
"I am going to go on ahead and scout for potential enemies." Zhishi Wu said before speeding up, he didn't really care about scouting but an environment outside of monitoring was perfect to test a few theories he had about combat.
"Well on my to-do list, I have to test inscriptions on weapons, good thing my disciple lent me her sword, next I want to see the effects of Qi overdosing and the tangibility of spiritual sense."
As he had experimented with his spiritual sense he realized that it acted as a vessel to manipulate Qi meaning that in theory he could manipulate Qi at longer ranges than usual, one of the perks that cultivators at the foundation establishment had.
He continued speeding forward until he ran into a tiger like beast similar to the one he had seen during the beginning of his time in the wasteland.
"Time to fight it fair and square." he touched down on the ground from the branches and stared the tiger in its eyes, a beast at the late stage of Qi condensation.
They looked each other in their eyes, a standoff between two predators neither one made the initial move, Zhishi Wu slowly stretched his hands to either side of his head and cracked his neck in preparation for the battle.
The tiger in response got into a low punching position and let out a soft growl.
Zhishi Wu immediately pulled his sword out from the storage bag and rushed the creature without any warning.
The tiger out of instinct deflected the sword with its claws and it bounced off, the force of the impact was so great that Zhishi Wu went hurling towards a tree over 50 meters away. However, he didn't crash he merely used it as a surface to bounce off of and back towards the beast.
He felt his heart racing and beating out of his chest, a feeling of joy started to take hold, it felt as if a switch in his brain had been flipped.
"This feeling isn't so bad." he thought as he was rushing through the air
The second exchange of blows was near identical however right before attacking the inscription on the sword became active, the claw which had previously deflected the sword came straight off.
"Like a hot knife through butter."
Zhishi Wu had not expected such a clear-cut difference between the usage of the inscription and the non usage of the inscription, he remembered when he had been on the receiving side of the sword and felt relieved that he decided to dodge instead of deflect.
After cutting the claw Zhishi Wu had not lost any momentum from launching off the tree and went flying into some of the bushes surrounding them, as he stood up the tiger looked at him with a far more cautious expression, it looked as if it would run.
"Relax relax little cat, I'll put away the knife" Zhishi Wu put away the sword, after all he didn't really even treat this as a fight, it was merely an experiment.
"Now let's see how you handle having your Qi being condensed to the point of implosion." a strange smile spread across Zhishi Wu's face.