Chapter 18 - Practicing in the Secret Valley (2)

Chapter 18: Practicing in the Secret Valley (2)

Translator: Pan Junqian

Proofread by Peter Gong

When the breath flows through the meridians, there will always be some obstacles in some places that are not so smooth for the breath to pass, and to open meridians is to remove these obstacles. According to the Sun and Moon Mind Method, this is what opening acupuncture points means.

Each meridian has to go through several or even dozens of acupuncture points, and only by opening all of the acupuncture points could one opens a meridian. But now, Rowen has not even opened the first acupuncture point, and only when the breath of sun and moon reaches a certain intensity could one open the meridian.

It is late January of the year of 324.

In the Secret Valley, Rowen sits cross-legged on the floor. The moon is shining brightly on him, and a cool energy flow gets into his body and into his veins.

The breath of sun and moon runs at full speed to strike the acupuncture points. At this very moment, Rowen is attempting to strike his first acupuncture point. He feels that nearly a month of cultivation has greatly increased the amount of the breath in his body, so he wants to strike the first acupuncture point. As the saying goes, all things are difficult before they are getting easy. Once the first step is successful, the rest will be much smoother.

The breath violently strikes the obstacles in the meridian over and over again, but it fails every time. Later, the breath seems to become a little weaker, and there is no longer a strong momentum as before. Meanwhile, Rowen begins to feel the pain from the meridian.

“Hu……” Rowen knows he can’t keep on doing this, he opens his eyes slowly and lets out a long sigh. It is a near miss to him and it seems that he has to take more few days to cultivate before reaching a success.

“Let’s go home and see.” Rowen stands up. The last time he went home was the day before New Year. When he knows that Patriarch Brain doesn’t return, he goes back to the valley with enough solid food and continues his cultivation. For him, New Year is not such an important day.

What he only worries about is that Patriarch Brain has been away for a long time and doesn’t return. But he does not dare to think of the worst, and he tells himself that Patriarch Brain has just been delayed by something and cannot come back for the time being.

Rowen is about to leave when he hears someone’s footstep through a crack on the rock of the valley. Rowen feels stunned, who will be here this time?

Soon the visitor appears in the valley, and Rowen is surprised to see that familiar figure. Is it her again?

“Miss Karen, come here for another skinny dipping?” Rowen says hello to the person first, with something of a joke in his voice. It is none other than Karen, the daughter of the Tiger Family, who has arrived so late at night.

Apparently, Karen is not surprised to see Rowen here, but when she hears him say this, anger and shame come over her pretty face. She glares at Rowen and gnashes the teeth in anger, “Rowen, I’ll kill you if you say it again!”

“Really?” Rowen doesn’t care. “That doesn’t scare me at all.”

Karen’s chest goes up and down, obviously she gets angry. But somehow, she manages to suppress her anger and turns to a new topic.

“Rowen, do you know that the Wolf Family has brought a great turmoil to the Mayor Town in order to find you?” Karen says, but still with irritation in her voice. “How nice of you to hide here!”

“My family is looking for me?” Rowen really gets a little surprised now because Karen doesn’t need to lie to him about something that is going to be proven soon, so it seems that he really has to go back immediately.

“Your beautiful cousin came to my house looking for Caroline!” Karen snorts.

“Then, it seems to me that I ought to thank you for informing me of this?” says Rowen indifferently, “Unfortunately, Miss Karen, I want to tell you that I’ll be out of here in a minute even if you don’t come. Of course, if you want to have a skinny dipping here, I don’t mind watching it before I go back.”

“Yeah, you wish!” Karen gives Rowen a sharp look. “You don’t have to thank me, I didn’t come here to inform you. I’m just curious why Caroline doesn’t know you’re here? Isn’t this the place where you and Caroline have your tryst?”

“Why don’t you ask Caroline yourself?” Rowen looks at her coldly.

“Don’t worry, I’ll ask her,” Karen looks smug. “I thought you two really knew each other, but now I know that’s all you have to do with each other. Or maybe Caroline just doesn’t like you that much. Otherwise, how could she not know this place.”

“Is that what you want to tell me?” Rowen looks at Karen coldly.

“You’ve loved Caroline since you were a child, but now it’s me not her in the whole Mayor Town who know you’re here. Don’t you think it’s ridiculous?” Karen giggles.

“I just think you’re out of your mind.” Rowen gives her a snort as he steps into the crack of the valley. He doesn’t want to waste his time arguing with Karen.

“Rowen, you’re an asshole, a fool, an idiot…” Karen’s curse comes from behind. Rowen doesn’t pay any attention to her and leaves the valley quickly for the Wolf Manor.

Back at the Wolf Manor, Rowen quickly confirms that Karen is right because the Wolf Family does bring a great turmoil to the Mayor Town in order to find him.

Three days ago, Patriarch Brain arrived home that morning with dust all over him. He went to find Rowen immediately without changing his clothes but turned out to find that Rowen had disappeared.

Patriarch Brian was not worried at that time because he knew that Rowen was busy cultivating before he left. However, Rowen hadn’t come back till that night, which made him worried. After he asked someone about it, he learned that Rowen hadn’t been seen for serval days. Until then, Patriarch Brain had become very anxious and immediately asked all people in the Wolfs to look for Rowen.

They had almost found the whole Mayor Town and during this period they also had some conflicts with the Tiger Family. It was true that Nina came to find Caroline for Rowen, but this time the Tiger Family acted out of their normal behavior. They showed extreme tolerance to the Wolfs’ aggressive provocation, leading to a result that they didn’t aggravate their conflicts.

However, because of the fact that Rowen hadn’t told anyone about the Secret Valley, the Wolf Family had been looking for him for three days and hadn’t been able to find him. And now, rumors that Rowen was dead had spread all over the Town.

“Sir, I’m sorry, I…” Rowen feels disturbed to know that the family has brought the Town such a mess just in order to find him.

Patriarch Brian pats Rowen on his shoulder, “Rowen, it’s great you are fine.”

“Sir, are you looking for me for something urgent?” Rowen hesitates for a while and asks. There must be something emergent, otherwise, Patriarch Brain won’t be in such a hurry to find him.

Patriarch Brain nods. “Rowen, we’re going on a long trip tomorrow, and I’m taking you somewhere.”

“To where?” Rowen feels a little bit stunned and asks hastily.

“The Red Cloud City,” Patriarch Brain mutters. “Rowen, go home and have a rest. We’ll be on our way early tomorrow morning.”

“Yes, Sir,” Rowen nods, and he doesn’t keep on asking any further. Although he feels what they are going to do is important, he is sure that Patriarch Brain will tell him everything when it is the right time.

Next morning, a carriage gets out of the Mayor Town. It is driven by a middle-aged man whose handsome face is full of whiskers, leaving others an impression of rudeness.

The middle-aged man is Nina’s father, Bania.

Twenty years ago, the poor young warrior Bania came to Mayor Town and encountered the beautiful girl Laura of the Wolf Family. They fell in love at first sight and didn’t want to leave each other since then.Two years later, Bania became the son-in-law by adoption of the Wolf Family. And another two years later, they gave birth to a beautiful daughter, that was, Nina.

Bania is now a level-4 warrior, and a level-4 warrior is a line of demarcation of being a warrior because a warrior can let out Dou Chi only after arriving at level-4. At this time, the combat effectiveness of a warrior will improve greatly. However, it’s not so difficult to be a level-4 warrior as long as he would like to strive for his cultivation, even though he is not so gifted, one day he can be a level-4 warrior as well.

That is to say, a level-4 warrior is far from the strong. However, for the Wolf Family, Bania has been the strongest warrior and it also indicates that the Wolf Family has become down and out now.

But he is after all the strongest warrior in the Wolf Family. Generally speaking, he is not likely to drive on his own. So, when people in Mayor Town see the carriage, most of them think that it is Laura who is sitting in it because everyone knows, what Bania loves dearly is his beautiful wife.

Bania actually has a pretty good talent for becoming a warrior. 20 years ago when he first came to Mayor Town, he had been a level-3 warrior at that time. But twenty years later, he is still a level-4 warrior, just because he almost has put his heart into Laura. Some people gossip about them in private that Laura has actually harmed Bania, if not, he could have taken a place in the warrior world.

But in fact, it isn’t Laura who is sitting in the carriage now, it is Rowen and Patriarch Brain.

“Rowen, we’re going to the Ryan Family.” Sitting in the carriage, Patriarch Brain says.

“The Ryan Family?” Rowen feels a little bit surprised. “Sir, is this family the most famous weapon manufacturer within the Empire?”

“Yes, it is,” Patriarch Brian nods. “The Ryan Family is one of the oldest families on Cang Yun Continent. The Empire has a history of only 300 years, but the Ryan Family is nearly 500 years old.”