Zhanxian

Chapter 35 – Breakthrough, Collecting The Sword Box

This ancestor of the Pure Yang Palace who had died while meditating here was a peak JieDan stage expert, however he was not able to find a way to reach the YuanYing stage and thus he slowly exhausted his vitality until he had no option but to die, sitting cross-legged on this spirit vein.

Within the qiankun pouch there were no great magical potions. But this was understandable since he had died while meditating, he had used all of them to strengthen his cultivation base and assist in reaching the next realm, so using up all the magic potions was very normal.

The ancestor was a sword cultivator. All of his accomplishments in cultivation, were precisely contained in that sword box, that is hanging on the outer wall: A scabbard with a long sword. Within the qiankun pouch were actually a lot of cold metal essences like gold and many others, such as refining tools and materials, only, unfortunately, seeing all of these good items, Yang Chen could only sigh helplessly, because, with his current cultivation he was completely unable to make use of these.

What caught Yang Chen’s interest were a few jade slips in the qiankun pouch. Picking them up one by one, he began to inspect them.

Cultivating the Dao of sword, Yang Chen did not think about it for the time being, also, the Dao of sword was quite fierce, but definitely not as fierce as the methods passed down by the members of the Heavenly Court he had executed. Yang Chen merely swept through this jade slip with his spiritual awareness once, remembered it in his heart and for the time being placed it to the side, and then picking up another slip.

To be exact, Refining tools are actually refined swords. The ones within the qiankun pouch were almost all reserved to be used for the next step in refining the sword box. After observing them, Yang Chen treated them the similar way.

The next few jade slips were all related to cultivation. Included among them was also a jade slip which contained all of the experiences the ancestor had made from the beginning until he entered the JieDan stage, which was extremely hard to come by. This piece, Yang Chen was most carefully examining it, merely looking that ancestor’s experience through only once before he put it down.

The last remaining item was a jade slip, however, it caused Yang Chen to be pleasantly surprised. This was the most significant cultivation method within the sect, the method to cultivate and bind the sword box.

After very carefully reading each and every word and line within, a smile was finally revealed on Yang Chen’s face. Previously he was quite anxious that he wouldn’t be able to collect the sword box for the time being, but now this problem had been resolved.

The spiritual influence of the underground spirit vein was abundant and the clean bottle had already absorbed a lot of it. That single trace of the blue colored liquid had already become much denser, however, the time required for the bottle to absorb the spirit power was very long. It was just enough time to practice the skill for binding the sword box.

An enormous amount of spirit power was required to collect the sword box, and based on Yang Chen’s cultivation of the first qi layer it was absolutely impossible for him. But since he had acquired this trick for binding, the problem became manageable.

To be prepared for all eventualities, Yang Chen took out his Profound Spirit Furnace and began to refine a simple yang qi pill to supplement his spirit power. This kind of elixir was utterly simple, so long as one had the strength of the second qi layer one could manufacture it. At the moment Yang Chen had the Profound Spirit Furnace, adding to his ability of almost perfect fire control, this was basically not an issue.

Previously, when Yang Chen had consumed the thousand year Profound Yang Fruits, he had stored to peels in his Achievement Ring, so, this time, they could be used to refine the yang qi pill. The medicinal strength of the Profound Yang Fruit was too fierce, so although its effect for supplementing the spirit power was quite outstanding, it would require Yang Chen to use the reverse Yin and Yang five phases secrets and meditate to keep it under control, which is not as good as the steady replenishment of a yang qi pill.

In the cave, Yang Chen was unhurriedly making preparations for concocting his pills, outside, however, the five people looking for Yang Chen were very agitated. The long bearded scholar had determined that Yang Chen had not left this area and he had stationed his comrades on the road ahead to monitor, but they weren’t able to discover even a trace of Yang Chen’s silhouette. That Yang Chen had to have gone into hiding in this area.

“If the Pure Yang Palace discovers that we are at the Meiqing Mountain’s edge and chasing to kill a disciple of theirs, we won’t even be able to run!”

The long-bearded scholar was anxious in his heart, but his face did not show even a hint of nervousness, he was merely using some sort of communication with other people, using their spiritual awareness to pass on these words.

In fact, he didn’t even need to stress the importance of this issue, as the others also knew about the seriousness of this affair. Every one of them was very alert and observant, afraid to leave out any one region. However, it was as if Yang Chen had disappeared without any intention of returning. In front of everyone’s eyes, he had disappeared without any trace. That guy who had claimed that he could trace the paper crane was facing even more blame for this reason.

When concocting the pill, Yang Chen sat on the obsidian jade mat, and the jade mat was on top of the mouth of the spirit vein, which just so happened to restrain the clean bottle. Despite a portion of spirit power being extracted already by the bottle, what was left for Yang Chen was just right to allow him to replenish, neither too slow nor too fast.

This underground spirit vein which was enough to supply a JieDan stage expert until death, while sitting in closed door training, was naturally able to support Yang Chen in binding the sword box and provide him with the required spirit power. He had concocted the pills just to guard against any unexpected eventualities after all Yang Chen’s current cultivation realm was very low. Even if he increased his spirit power by means of the five phases engendering each other, compared to a JieDan stage expert, the difference would be like a drop of water in the ocean.

The peel of the thousand year Pure Yang Fruit dissolved under the heat of Yang Chen’s flames and turned into a medicinal liquid. The yang qi pill was different from the xun qi pill: The xun qi pill required Yang Chen to make his flame move like air, whereas the yang qi pill could be properly manufactured with just one hand, as long as he has the spirit power to purify the drug ingredients.

Yang Chen had eaten one Profound Yang Fruit every day, thus, he had collected many Profound Yang peels. One peel could be used to manufacture ten yang qi pills, so even if Yang Chen would refine two hundred yang qi pills in his furnace, refining all of these peels and making the yang qi pills would require at least a day and two nights time.

At the time when all of the profound yang peels were used up, Yang Chen was left with two thousand yang qi pills. This amount of yang qi pills, in addition to the support provided by the underground spirit vein, would definitely allow Yang Chen to bind the sword box.

However just when Yang Chen started to put away the Profound Spirit Furnace, he unexpectedly found that there was some kind of change in the furnace, its medicinal qi had become a little more plentiful. Apparently it accumulates a little bit of the spiritual influence from the elixirs refined and thus becomes a little better. This Profound Spirit Furnace, the higher the number of elixirs refined, the better its quality would become.

In his last life, this sword box had become the property of Pure Yang Palace’s Luminous Moon Hall’s hall master, after those several YuanYing masters had cooperated to subdue this sword box, and he had become very famous, but unfortunately he ultimately betrayed Yang Chen’s master. In this life, Yang Chen would not help the tyrant in his evil ways and set it aside for him.

After practicing the technique several hundred times, so that he wouldn’t make a mistake while collecting the sword box, Yang Chen began his preparations for the job. The spirit power absorption rate of the clean bottle was changed by Yang Chen, so that it was a little bit slower so that he could increase the speed of his replenishment of spirit power by two to three times with the help of obsidian jade mat.

All of the yang qi pills were placed into the qiankun pouch within his hand. This qiankun pouch contained nothing apart from the yang qi pills. After all the preparations were done he adjusted his condition to the best he could, then he finally sat upright on the obsidian jade and began to circulate his qi.

The very first thing Yang Chen had to do, was to unleash his Yin and Yang five phases secrets and raise his own spirit power to the maximum. The underground spirit vein’s spirit power was steadily replenishing Yang Chen’s meridians. The gentle spirit power allowed Yang Chen to not worry about whether the spirit power would be too much and he would have to take control of it. When he was circulating the qi, he started mobilizing the spirit power to the limit, while he sat a few steps away from the sword box to start the binding according to the secret method.

The long sword which hung on the wall in its scabbard had apparently been attracted towards Yang Chen and slowly started flying away from the wall, floating to a region a few metres away from Yang Chen. As it was hanging in the air, it began to rotate.

All of this looked very effortless, but Yang Chen did not dare to relax even a little.

To properly use the secret method to bind it smoothly was Yang Chen’s sole desire. He was very doubtful, since he had found the jade slip of the secret method within the qiankun pouch of that ancestor, how come that the JieDan stage expert from his previous life hadn’t discovered it? Perhaps, after looking at the sword box, he had at once set out to bind the sword box but, on the contrary, was devoured and killed. Yang Chen would not make that same mistake.

The secret method was very complicated and had, at least, two hundred consecutive motions, where he could not make an error even on his first try. With every movement a portion of spirit power would enter the sword box and at the same time it was invaded by Yang Chen’s spiritual awareness, slowly replacing the original spiritual awareness.

Yang Chen’s present realm was very low, so he could only use lukewarm water to boil the frog, like grinding or other laborious methods, to slowly remove the spiritual awareness of the ancestor from the sword box, and brand his own spiritual awareness on top of it, to turn this magical tool into his own property.

Every time spirit power would enter the sword box, it would exhaust all the spirit power Yang Chen had available. If it were not for the steady replenishment from the underground spirit vein and also those yang qi pills which Yang Chen took every time after the spirit power entered the sword box, perhaps Yang Chen would only be able to persist for a short time, before exhausting all of his spirit power and getting devoured by the sword box.

Every time the spirit power entered the sword box, it flickered with a bright light once. Every time, Yang Chen would include all of the ten types of spirit power of the five phases of Yin Yang and every time the sword box would twinkle with five types of rays of light.

Within the small cave, a colorless light began to flicker incessantly, as if the sword box had turned into a light show.

Yang Chen’s movements were neither very fast, nor too slow, but had a constant speed. The time gaps in between were, by lucky coincidence, sufficient for him to replenish all of his spirit power and afterwards exhaust all of it once again. Under Yang Chen’s precise control, all of this had become a constant cycle.

The Yin and Yang five phases secrets were as effective as never before, it was as if the spirit power was completely exhausted within one breath and then replenished entirely within the next. All of his meridians were continuously waxing and waning under these kinds of circumstances and at the same time they were also getting tempered by themselves.

He had a lot of luck: to have the spirit vein, sufficient yang qi pills and at the same time to have the crazy Yin and Yang five phases secrets. When Yang Chen had spent nearly one thousand yang qi pills, his body’s spirit power had gone through the cycle of replenishment and exhaustion of spirit power one thousand times, suddenly all of the meridians in his body were jolted and began to expand.

It was as if his body had broken a seal: The limits on spirit power in his body had disappeared in a flash. Yang Chen thought of something and directly touched the clean bottle on the ground and once again controlled the speed to absorb the spirit power a little slower, allowing the obsidian jade to receive even more spirit power replenishment.

According to his experience, Yang Chen knew that this was an indication of him entering the second qi layer. Ascending a realm does not only affect the spirit power but also the increases the upper boundary of spirit power the meridians can hold by a little, as well as the comprehension of all kinds of laws. The later part was not a problem for Yang Chen, but even if his body was refined by an immeasurable amount of immortal blood, the boundaries could still only increase in a breakthrough, step by step.

After entering the second qi layer, not only did the speed of the Yin and Yang five phases increased but so did the replenishment of spirit power. The upper boundary of the spirit power had also frantically risen. Apart from just adjusting the rate of the replenishment of spirit power from the spirit vein, he could now put even more spirit power into the sword box with this secret method.

The results were quite obvious, the rays the sword box sent out started to become more and more clear, the speed at which it was revolving also started to slow down and the distance to Yang Chen started to decrease.

Finally, after another one thousand yang qi pills were consumed, the long sword and it’s scabbard calmly halted on top of Yang Chen’s hands. All the rays of light vigorously flickered once before they disappeared completely. In Yang Chen’s spiritual awareness he had the feeling as if he was able to completely possess this sheathed longsword before his eyes.

After replenishing his own spirit power, he halted all of the movements and stood up with a happy look across his entire face and both of his hands gently caressing and stroking the sword as if it were his lover. Only after having taken possession of this sword box did Yang Chen discover, that this sword box had many wonderful uses.

This sword box was both a flying sword as well as a receptacle at the same time and could hold hundreds and thousands of flying swords. The sword box’s appearance could also change according to the owner’s wishes. The previous owner was fond of the sheathed longsword appearance, therefore, it currently had the appearance of a sheathed longsword. However, Yang Chen right now was not very fond of this shape.

Under Yang Chen’s gentle caressing and stroking, a change started to appear on the sheathed longsword. Soon, it changed its appearance to that of the exceptionally fearful blade which he had used at the Xiantai platform.

Proficiently brandishing the immortal blade, a delighted expression lit up his face. This sword box was only a flying sword and a sword box which was not very complicated, but the most significant thing was, that it could fuse the sword spirit with the formidable power of the flying sword, and turn them into his own firepower.

The sword spirit could be one or many, however Yang Chen was required to have total control over them. Even the sword box itself could still, at the time of refinement, make a few sword spell formations, when the time came to attack the sword spell would directly draw the formidable power required from the sword spirit.

At the moment, there were at least ten flying swords which had all kinds of attributes within the sword box, however, their quality was, overall, very common. To refine a magical flying sword tool was not an easy task, even if it was that JieDan stage ancestor, he also was not able to manufacture hundreds of flying swords into the sword box.

For Yang Chen this was not a big issue, at the time when he was at the Xiantai platform, a lot of people had told him about the magical tool flying swords which they had left in the mortal world, so as long as he was able to find them he could fill the entire sword box.

However the sword spirit would not be easy to find, based on Yang Chen’s present knowledge and experiences since he had obtained this unique and unmatched sword box, it was certain that he could not randomly use some ordinary flying swords to make up the number. Only if Yang Chen’s sword spirit was among the highest quality of items, then and only then would it be of the highest quality.

Naturally it was too early to think about these things. When Yang Chen was stroking the sword box with the ghost blade’s appearance admiringly, he thought within his heart about sharpening the edge of the blade. The edge of the blade of the Imperial court’s executioner should stay sharp, so as to be able to chop off people’s heads with ease.