27 Of Imps and Knives

The moon was lighting up the night sky with only the stars to keep it company. The plants rustled about in the light wind and water from the flowing stream glistened like pearls under the moonlight. The peaceful oriental music from the boom box was still playing gracefully throughout the pavilion.

The smell of burnt ingredients wafted about with the slightest hint of the remnants of smoke which dance about, almost as if it was riling up Zhen Shi for his multiple failed attempts at pill refining. But Zhen Shi was too engrossed in his current task to notice any of this.

He took a deep breath as he made another attempt. He calmly opened his palm and formed a flame of pure qi burning a dark hue of red-orange. With practiced ease, he threw the flame on to the lively green pill cauldron causing a light hue of green to mix into the fire. With calm eyes, he flicked his fingers and brought out the usual set of ingredients for grade 1 healing pills. And he sent the ingredients into the flaming cauldron.

His calm eyes suddenly burned with intense concentration as he carefully handled the ingredients and melted the essences out carefully. His eyes relaxed as he finally separated the ingredient essences and the ingredient husks successfully. Next, he brought his two hands slowly towards each other in order to combine the ingredient essences. He grinned as there were no problems this time. He had performed the essence extraction perfectly and had maintained an almost perfect ingredient to ingredient ratio. Thus by the time he stopped his hand motion the pill embryo was successfully formed.

In fact, Zhen Shi had succeeded in this part many times before. But he had always attempted the grade improvement skill and had failed to properly apply it. However, he was unwilling to follow a path against the beliefs of Vivienne's mistress. And out of respect, he had kept repeating the process.

So with the same intention, he once again he flicked his fingers and burnt the ingredient husks into fine particles with the Undying Flame. Now that the pill embryo was formed it was completely fine to use the flame of the Vermillion bird. And with an experienced wave of his hand, he sent the husk particles towards the pill embryo. As the pill embryo combined with the husk particles Zhen Shi formed his hands into a familiar hand sign and whispered, "Ashes to Ashes!" For the first time, Zhen Shi smiled deeply as the pill embryo combined with the husk particles properly improving the pill grade!

But his smile disappeared as he realized to carry out the next part of the technique he would have to mark down a rune. But he would undoubtedly faint if he tried that. His brow frowned in contemplation as he tried to find a solution for this conundrum...

His eyes suddenly glowed in inspiration as he was reminded of Myne's . And he decided to take a risk and give that skill a try since he had no intention of carving something nonsensical on to his first pill.

In reality, Zhen Shi was familiar with the term 'Ohtur'. It was rather similar to the ancient Norse term for divine inspiration or inspired mental activity; basically an epiphany. Zhen Shi who knew well the value of this had been awed at the ability of this skill to lead cultivators into a trance-like state.

He calmed down his breathing and mentally followed the steps of the technique. Immediately his eyes glossed over as his eyes were filled with a vacant look. Zhen Shi lost track of time as his mind was filled with images and visions. These visions passed by his eyes too fast to even register what was going on in any of them. In the end, a singular memory paused in front of him...

Zhen Shi's eyes opened hurriedly as he felt his mind and spirit being filled with strength and vigor. He felt a strong intention to inscribe what he had just witnessed. He materialized a small butterfly-like insect in his hand. With another flick of his hand, he burned it apart into small white particles with the undying flame. With graceful movement, he moved his hands into another familiar posture as he muttered, "Dust to Dust!"

The white energy particles rushed towards the pill embryo and were absorbed into it one by one. And with each disappearing particle, a faint picture appeared on the pill surface. If one didn't look closely at this, all they would see was a pill slightly darker than usual. But if they did, they would be met with the astounding image of a small boy fighting off a powerful and terrifying giant with only a small sling-shot for a weapon. The grit and determination of the brave child and the confident face of the giant were like a painting coming to life! This was !

The fire flickered out as the pill flew into Zhen Shi's hand. He calmly scrutinized it and was surprised to realize it was a middle Grade 2 Healing Pill! But it did make sense, after all, he had used a total of three grade improvement techniques. But he was very happy with this success after countless failures. But a familiar notification rang out...

Ding!

Congratulations to the user for unlocking a new status category: professions!

The user has gained his first profession, Pill Refining Alchemist- Grade 1!

Ding!

Profession related quest system active.

First Quest Available. Do you accept it?

Zhen Shi was frowning as he thought, "System, I'm fine with the Grade 1 Alchemist since I did use several grade improvement techniques. But why do you add in a quest system now? Shouldn't it have been activated sooner? It's like you're making this up as you go!"

System: (◕‿◕✿)

Zhen Shi heaved a sigh of defeat and thought, "Yes."

Ding!

Grade 1 Quest: Refine 10 pills of grade 1 or higher.

Reward: -1 random alchemy ingredient

-gift of experience

Zhen Shi was confused for a moment, as he wondered why the system would give him a 'gift' of experience. Discovering that the system was unresponsive to any further questions, in the end, he gave up assuming it would be experience points to improve cultivation and neglected it as such.

Although he had required several hours to reach the level of a Grade 1 Alchemist, Zhen Shi was fairly confident of completing this quest as he had finished the previous pill within 10 minutes. So he wasn't in a hurry and calmly checked his spiritual incarnation that was practicing formations.

As his will manifested within his spiritual incarnation on the planet, his mind received its memories. To his delight, he discovered that the incarnation was now capable of manifesting four formation talismans and could easily set up the simple strengthening formation.

But Zhen Shi was suddenly inspired as he contemplated these memories. The strange familiarity he had had with formations was solved as he made a huge breakthrough in understanding!

With the experience of his spiritual incarnation and his knowledge from Myne's books, Zhen Shi was able to make a direct connection between the art of formations and programming! In this epiphany, he concluded that a formation was a series of commands given to qi or aether to carry out just like a basic code. In fact, the main difference between using a formation and simply exerting one's will upon qi would be the sheer complexity of the command. By using a formation talisman one could set several commands upon qi and aether. Then by combining those formation talismans in a specific sequence the power of an individual's attack, speed, defense and etc. could be multiplied by many folds!

Zhen Shi grew excited as he contemplated all the infinite possibilities that could be achieved with formations. Butt for the moment he only had four formation talismans. Leaving the spiritual incarnation to its practice he returned back to the pavilion.

Now he manifested the four formation talismans and easily set up the strengthening formation using three of those talismans. He eyed the strengthening formation which was useful for nothing much than a few seconds of defense against another spirit formation cultivator. So Zhen Shi whisked his hand and combined the remaining talisman to it as well in an experiment. Miraculously it glowed with a bright light as the formation defense improved by multiple times.

This was miraculous in and of itself since this was an unusual formation not in accordance with the generally accepted ones. It wasn't that more skilled formation masters of higher grades couldn't create this formation. It was just that ordinary formation masters of the same grade as Zhen Shi would have difficulty using it.

But Zhen Shi shook his head in dissatisfaction. He whisked his hand and rearranged the formation talismans. He kept trying for several minutes while making minute changes to each formation talisman. Luckily he only had to use four talismans and so was able to obtain the desired effect within a short time. The formation glowed with fiery light as a strange globe appeared within the formation.

Zhen Shi let out a smile as he held the formation in front of him. In accordance, with his thoughts, it spread out in front of him as a powerful defense and the globe glowed with a bright light as it shot a blast of pure fire qi with power bordering at the peak of spirit formation. In addition, the defense was at least three times better than the basic strengthening formation.

Zhen Shi was very satisfied as this would be a useful attack to surprise an enemy even though the power wasn't as great as his maximum battle capability. In fact, this was a very unique formation since the most basic formation for attacking listed in Myne's Book required 5 formation talismans. That formation was actually stronger but Zhe Shi's new formation had dual purposes! But another notification rang out...

Ding!

Congratulations to the user for unlocking a hidden profession: Unorthodox Formation Master-Grade 1!

Ding!

You have a new quest, will you accept it?

Zhen Shi mentally said, "Yes" while mentally muttering, "Your mother is unorthodox..."

System: "..."

Ding!

Grade 1 Quest: -Create ten original formations (2/10)

-Manifest 9 formation talismans(4/9)

Reward: -One OP lottery ticket

-gift of experience

Zhen Shi grimaced as he eyed the rewards and thought, "I don't believe in the lottery..."

However, he was unable to complete this quest by the morning. He could already sense that the spiritual incarnation had slowed down its improvement and realized it would take at least a few days to master 9 formation talismans and complete this quest.

Since it was beyond his control Zhen Shi decided to artifice his first weapon as a blacksmith. So he put the pitch-black furnace in front of him and manifested the Undying flame. He was unworried to use it as he had a fair amount of experience from pill refining and the lively nature of the fire had little to no effect on materials for blacksmithing.

He threw the flame on to the furnace causing a pitch-black smoke to slowly waft out. Under continuous burning and Zhen Shi's practice of the the smoke slowly formed into three furnace spirits in the form of demonic imps. They were rather unresponsive and seemed to disregard Zhen Shi as if his very presence was beneath them.

Zhen Shi was flabbergasted, Where did these fucking imps get so much attitude?

Still, he grinned mischievously as he considered how they'd be obedient under the spirit taming skill and so immediately executed it while muttering, "Taming the Spirits!" Suddenly the imps who had acted with disrespect and disregard turned towards him, causing Zhen Shi to grin from ear to ear in satisfaction. But this grin died down as the demonic imps started chittering and dancing about while eyeing Zhen Shi with great 'evil' interest. Zhen Shi couldn't help but shiver as he felt their dead eyes boring into him with their eery smiles...

He cleared his head and disregarded this as he materialized and threw a piece of black silver into the burning furnace. With the practice from the extended hours of pill refining, he was able to fairly easily control the imp spirits to melt the metal under the powerful undying flame and he brought out a fairly large hammer. Zhen Shi had opted for a hammer larger than the one that Myne had used because he had always thought that, the bigger the hammer, the cooler one was!

Clang! Clang!

Sparks flew as Zhen Shi slammed the hammer on to the heated dark silver with the support of the chittering demonic imps. He manifested the power of on his arms and covered them with Azure scales and Vermillion fathers. His divine beast hands roared with every slam as the black silver slowly molded into a flat shape while being gently nudged by Zhen Shi's spiritual force and the fairly obedient demonic imps. Surprisingly while they seemed evil they were rather obedient when it came to the task at hand.

Zhen Shi brushed off some sweat as he returned the hammer into his spatial pouch. Under the control of the furnace spirits he separated the hammered black silver into the three main parts; the blade, bolster and hilt. And the imps continued to laugh with evil intent as Zhen Shi controlled them to fit the three parts together forming the weapon base.

Now, Zhen Shi whisked his hand and formed the undying flame qi into four formation talismans which he settled into the malleable dark silver, in the sequence of his dual-purpose formation with both high attack and defense.

As the heated metal glowed with the fresh formation symbols, Zhen Shi readied himself to enter into another Ohtur and perform another Dream Engraving.

But suddenly his mind filled with unbearable fatigue and exhaustion which sent his soul and spirits reeling. As a result, he lost his concentration and broke off from the Ohtur forcibly.

Zhen Shi gasped for breath as he realized he was unable to use the skill and could only conclude that there was a limit to its usage. He paused for a moment allowing his spirit and mind to settle down from the fatigue. In fact, he considered pausing this attempt and taking a rest...

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But his determination burned brightly as he was reminded of 'the eyes and ears everywhere'. With no other choice, he pushed himself to use the same vision he had seen before. So he slowly closed his eyes and imagined the scene he had witnessed before. To his relief, his mind calmed down and the fatigue was washed away as he was reminded of the vision of the boy fighting the giant.

Now brimming with renewed inspiration he brought out an engraver and let his thoughts loose on the heated metal components of the knife. His hand was a blur as it danced upon the heated black silver knife as the image slowly grew clear rewarding him for his grit and effort. It was slightly different from before as this image showed the young boy shooting a stone from his slingshot at the ever-confident giant. The young boy was on the blade and the giant was beyond the hilt as the stone lay loaded on the slingshot. But the image was just as life-like as before.

Zhen Shi grinned in satisfaction as he admired the craftsmanship of the weapon. With a flick of his hand, he materialized a stream of water qi cooled heavily by his aqua spiritual roots. He immediately poured this water on to the steaming dark silver knife.

HISS!

A cloud of steam wafted out within the pavilion as the heated dark silver cooled down. Zhen Shi relaxed slightly as he noticed that the demonic imps were still chittering about and had done nothing strange like they had Myne's knife. So he calmly brushed off the steam while admiring his first artifact without any worry.

But his relief was short relieved. Because suddenly the three demonic imps jumped into the air and supported each other as they kicked the fresh dark silver knife with their full power. A powerful wind blew though out the pavilion as the grade 2 knife shot towards Zhen Shi's head from point-blank range, with the combined power of three soul formation furnace spirits. Zhen Shi was caught off guard and the attack was extremely fast... But he wasn't going to be killed at the hands of a bunch of imps!

His first decision was to activate the unorthodox formation on the knife. The formation activated and blasted off a qi attack to the side immediately causing the knife to slow down and miss his head. Now with ample time to retaliate, he activated Vermillion Dragonifiaction to the extreme maximum on his two arms. Small horns poked out on his scaled and feathered hands and he instantly moved into a defensive posture while positioning his bestial arms against the oncoming knife.

Clang!

Sparks flew as the fresh dark silver knife collided on to his scaled arm. But the divine beast protection was indeed powerful as the knife dropped on to the ground harmlessly without causing Zhen Shi to take even a single step back. As the wind calmed down, Zhen Shi let out a deep breath while realizing he had escaped from that sudden attack with only a moment to spare. He stared angrily at the demonic imps who proceeded to giggle eerily and disappear in a poof their job now completed.

But, Zhen Shi was still angered and could only blame that idiotic Great Mage and a certain system. And he was about to shout out his thoughts...

Ding!

Congratulations to the user for unlocking a new profession: Blacksmith-Grade 1!

Ding!

The user has a new quest. Will you accept it?

Zhen Shi: "..."