Chapter 72 - A Celestial Treasure Beneath The Academy

Hearing Yang Su’s introduction of her, Xi Shen finally realized why she seemed so familiar to him. He also took another look at her face and was questioning whether she was in another disguise or this was her original appearance.

“So, senior sister Xia, what brings you here to our courtyard?”

Ling Xia, who was caught off guard by being caught in such a situation, regain her composure. After she glared at Yang Su, she said, “I only came here for a rematch with junior brother Su, however, I find it odd that he hasn’t reached the Sea Expansion Realm yet, so I offered to spar with him by suppressing my cultivation. But he hadn’t told me of his injuries, and during our spar his wounds were aggravated, so feeling responsible I offered to treat his wounds. That’s all.”

Ling Xia said those last words firmly as if she wanted to remove any doubt of something else happening between her and Yang Su.

Sensing the aura around her, Xi Shen could tell she had become a Sea Expansion Realm cultivator but didn’t know how many meridians she used to reach that level.

Xi Shen turned to look at Yang Su to see him nod in confirmation.

To be honest, Xi Shen didn’t mind and only headed for his chambers, while throwing out a couple of words as he went.

“Well, don’t mind me, I’ll be enjoying a cup of wine inside the mansion so you two can continue what you were doing out here.”

After Xi Shen went inside, Ling Xia shot a hateful stare at Yang Su, who was smiling bitterly. He hadn’t asked for her help to rub ointment on his wounds, she was the one who felt responsible and had insisted she did, which resulted in this situation where Xi Shen came home and created an awkward atmosphere between them.

In his room within the mansion, Xi Shen sat cross-legged on his floor. Of course, drinking wine was an excuse he used since Ling Xia was here. He was actually planning to pick up on his cultivation where he had left off. But first, he had to get his thoughts in order.

With a hand on his chin, several thoughts ran through Xi Shen's mind.

Now that he was back in the Celestial Academy, he had to focus on resolving his imbalanced physique. Even though cultivating through the four physical realms won’t resolve all of his problems, it would greatly improve them.

Xi Shen had lingering thoughts on Meiling’s Divine Spirit Body essence, but considering her status and her impression of him, getting her where he wanted would be a hassle, so he decided to place it at the back of his mind for now.

After that, he had to start the process of creating his own faction in the academy. For an Inner Disciple to create a Faction, that scenario was common, but without the support from a powerful backing, they would eventually get suppressed and disbanded as soon as they were created.

Another fact is that most Factions created by Inner Disciples were those Puppet factions that were universally hated by everyone who came in contact with one of them.

With Xi Shen having the reputation he has, getting people to join won’t be easy, especially since his Faction would be different from everyone before it. He would take his mother's advice about participating in the Inner Disciple Rankings, but he would need to increase the power of his Soul Arts and Soul Cultivation to be able to battle disciples, he assumed, would be in the Foundation Realm.

Oh, and there was that particular matter with the Pill Furnace that contains Chaos Qi. Tai and Little Snow haven’t shown up yet, so Xi Shen had to hold off on investigating the Lin Clan and the Bai Clan.

After Xi Shen got his thoughts together and made several plans on how to go about the upcoming days, he realized he was going to be quite busy. And that wasn’t even considering the fact of Yang Su’s breakthrough to the Sea Expansion Realm.

Upon thinking of Yang Su’s breakthrough, Xi Shen’s narrowed into slits, and a serious expression appeared on his face. With Yang Su having a Dao Foundation, Xi Shen was sure his progression into the Sea Expansion Realm wouldn’t be like normal cultivators.

Qi cultivation itself was a form of going against the heavens, as opposed to when the heavens bless said person. And anything that goes against Heaven’s Mandate is always punished in some shape or form. Xi Shen would know that best from his past life.

Shaking his head, Xi Shen decided to deal with that when the time came. For now, he would finish Reconstructing his bones, before studying his three Soul Arts.

With that, Xi Shen closed his eyes and sunk his perception into his body. After examining his bones once again, he couldn’t help but sigh. He knew that using his Heavenly Laws would come back to bite him, and though it gave him less bone to Reconstruct that was beside the point since that was a bad thing and not a good thing.

While bemoaning the fact that navigating his two cultivation systems was difficult despite his expansive knowledge about said cultivation systems, Xi Shen manipulated the layer of Time Qi he had placed over his Skeletal Structure and infused it into his bones, all the way down to his bone marrow.

With this, Xi Shen would be able to reconstruct his Spiritual Physique bones in one go. However, he also wanted to infuse his Time Qi into the parts of his bones that held his Heavenly Physique as well.

Xi Shen wanted every part of his body to be cleansed with his Time Qi, not just the parts his Spiritual Physique occupied. This was so that it would be easier to integrate his Qi usage with his Heavenly Law usage in the future.

Looking at his blood cells, which were already purified, one could see properties of his Time Qi flowing within them. Not only that a dark hue had surrounded each of them that twisted and warped the space around them.

This caused a strange occurrence where they blink in and out of existence.

However, this was for his blood, as for his bones, it wasn’t as if they would start vanishing and reappearing, that would be too ridiculous. But they did have a dark hue surrounding them as Xi Shen finished cultivating through the Bone Reconstruction Realm.

Xi Shen made sure to rein in his cultivation breakthrough since there was a guest visiting.

After releasing a breath of air Xi Shen open his eyes and looked down at his hands as he clench them tightly.

Feeling his physique as it was now, he could tell his strength had increased by quite a bit.

Pinching his skin to feel its thickness, Xi Shen also determine that even being struck with ordinary steel swords won’t cause an injury.

One thing that was also refined and strengthened as a consequence of moving through the Four physical Realms, was one’s flesh and skin.

However, it isn’t exactly focused on that much. Those who chose to focus on delving on the path of a body cultivator, or completely forsaken Qi Cultivation for it. They would be identified as a Fleshly Body Cultivator.

Even though Xi Shen hadn’t forsaken Qi Cultivation, he had decided to focus on cultivating his fleshly body more so than an ordinary cultivator cultivating internal and external cultivation methods would.

That also meant he would have to find a cultivation method for Fleshly Body cultivators, and not the ones that were developed to cultivate alongside internal cultivation techniques.

At this moment in his cultivation, Xi Shen was considered to be a Meridian Opening Realm expert. With his Heavenly Physique and Time Qi though, he could battle a disciple in the 1st or 2nd stage of the Foundation Realm solely using those too.

As for his Heavenly Law Comprehension, it was already established he wouldn't use it willy nilly, but if it comes down to it he could battle a 9th stage Foundation Realm disciple without massive consequences.

As for his Soul Cultivation, it would be hard for him to defeat a Sea Expansion Realm disciple. Compared to his other two cultivations, his Soul Cultivation could be said to be way behind by his standards. And that was ironic, as seeing that it was the only cultivation he could openly show.

This made Xi Shen decide to study the three Soul Arts he had chosen from the Techniques Library. Especially the Raindrop Sword Sutra Soul Art.

He could tell that it was only a part of a whole Soul Art from the incomplete mantra inside the jade slip, but despite that, it was now it was extremely strong. If he fully comprehended he could battle anyone in the Foundation Realm. These results took into consideration that his unique soul amplified its power.

Like this, Xi Shen studied his Soul Arts, and standing outside of his door one would be able to hear the lovely sound of a zither playing slowly within.

The sun went down, revealing the dazzling stars in the night sky.

Xi Shen didn’t come out of his room until the next day.

Walking to the main dining area, Xi Shen grabbed a Fiery Plum fruit from the same table and bit into it.

The sight of Yang Su sitting at one of the tables with a cup of tea in front of him greeted Xi Shen at the main dining area. Though Xi Shen also saw his pet cat, Little Snow, sitting within his lap while being caressed.

As soon as Xi Shen approach the table, Tai appeared on his shoulders, casually licking the fur on his front leg before rubbing it behind his ear.

Without pausing Xi Shen sat down at the table and then asked Tai, “So, where were you all this while?”

Tai leaped off Xi Shen’s shoulder onto the table, and after turning to sit in front of him, he meowed a couple of times.

This made Xi Shen’s eyes widen slightly and he paused biting into the fruit.

“Are you sure? There’s actually a Celestial Treasure beneath the academy?”

Xi Shen asked rather disbelievingly, which also drew Yang Su’s attention.

Hearing his master’s question, a rather derisive look appeared within Tai’s eyes before he meowed at Xi Shen, which translate to, ‘Who do you think I am? Of course I’m sure when a treasure is involved’. After which, he lifted his right back right leg into the air and dipped his head down to his nether region with his tongue out.

Seeing this, Xi Shen scowled at Tai’s disregard for the fact that he was right in front of Xi Shen while doing that and quickly shooed him off the table.

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Word Count: 1765