Chapter 177 - A Miraculous Discovery

Qin Fen grew silent. He had yet to forget the feeling of when he entered the five-star level. He needed to properly recall the sensation.

The smile that was on the master’s face faded into the darkness. In his place was the figure of light, who was formed of white light and had blurry facial features.

Qin Fen, from his own perspective, was far too familiar with this figure of light.

When compared to Vile King and the other powerful experts, Qin Fen felt the greatest headache when facing this figure of light, who was completely formed from pure white rays of light.

The figure of light possessed no emotion whatsoever, nor did it listen to any explanations. It carried out orders as if they were programmed in it with the utmost devotion.

Qin Fen raised his head and saw the figure of light appear out of nowhere. He really didn’t understand. No matter what angle one computed from, it should be absolutely impossible for Qin Fen, and his current state, to draw out the figure of light. Why did the figure of light appear?

“Please engage in cultivating the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art….”

The figure lights had a voice that was forever stiff and without any emotion whatsoever. When Qin Fen heard this voice, it was as if an enormous bolt of lightning cleaved into Qin Fen’s body, causing his entire self to be dumbfounded.

“You want me to cultivate right now?” Qin Fen gazed at the figure of light and couldn’t help but ask. “Hey, there something wrong with your programming or something? Look at my current state. Do you want me to become useless?”

“The cultivator has entered the five-star state. Consolidation is needed. Consolidation is needed….”

Qin Fen’s body was covered in cold sweat from shock when he heard the synthetic voice of the figure of light.

There was something wrong with the system! No, it should be said that there was nothing wrong with the system. It was just that the system was completely inflexible. It just knew that the cultivator had entered the realm of five-star strength, but it didn’t know that the cultivator had fallen back to four-star and that the cultivator was situated in a fatigued state unprecedented.

“Please begin cultivating….”

Qin Fen was completely speechless. It was impossible to bicker with this figure of light. There was only one way to not engage in cultivation, and that was to defeat this figure of light.

Defeat the figure of light? Qin Fen looked at himself. If he was in the same state as when he fought against Scarlet Scorpion, there was the possibility of defeating this figure of light, who was above his star level.

But now? Qin Fen was very clear about the situation. Any child at the age of ten, who cultivated for two or three years, could defeat him right now.

It was impossible for him to resist. He could only cultivate.

Qin Fen sat crosslegged in Five Hearts Faces the Sky. He properly sucked in his stomach and pulled up his chest, breathing through his practically-withered dantian region. In this sort of state, the first thing he had to do wasn’t circulating his true energy. Instead, it was to restore his true energy as quickly as possible. He had to take this withered dantian region and fill it up once more.

This withered dantian region quickly caught up to the state like a dried-up reservoir during drought season.

Qin Fen laughed at himself, and his mind flashed with an epiphany.

A reservoir…. a dried-up reservoir needed the heavy rain of the rainy season to refill it. At the same time, countless streams could be used to refill it.

Then what about the dantian region? Qin Fen began to look for his own meridians.

The many years of diligent cultivation in regards to controlling true energy gave Qin Fen an understanding of something. During battle, during cultivation, or during rest, not one hundred percent of all true energy could be utilized.

In the body, true energy was not one hundred percent gathered in the dantian region. True energy was mostly like when a man tried to grab a handful of sand. Quite a few grains of sand would slip away between the cracks of the man’s fingers. The same logic could be applied to true energy. Quite a few meridians within the body contained remnant true energy.

It was just that the higher the precision of control over power the smaller the true energy remaining in his meridians was.

Normally, the cultivator’s speed in the growth of strength will become quicker with the retention of true energy being smaller and the gathering of true energy in the dantian region being bigger. This was something important that the Vile King had emphasized without end when it came to the degree of control over true energy.

When Qin Fen cultivated, he really did discover that there was quite a bit of remnant true energy in his body’s meridians in the past.

When he thought about the concept of streams this time, he naturally thought about the true energy in these places.

Perhaps the quantity of true energy there wasn’t a lot, but for a dantian region on the eve of withering up, and for a reservoir that was on the eve of drying up, these places were extremely important resources.

Soon, Qin Fen found quite a bit of remnant true energy within his meridians. He carefully began to collect this true energy, guiding them.

The quantity of his true energy was usually large, and Qin Fen often found it hard to pay attention to them. Even when he did notice them, it was because his true energy was far too great. He didn’t have the energy to completely control these true energies.

Right now his dantian region was practically dried up. Qin Fen didn’t need to distract himself in managing the true energy of his dantian region. He just needed to take the true energy that was wandering in his meridians and ask them to return. This was all that he needed to do.

One bit. Two bits. Three bits….

Qin Fen was like a hard-working worker bee as he collected his true energy bit by bit to his dantian region.

A bit of true energy gathered at the base of the practically dried up dantian region. Though the quantity was extremely small, it was a huge change compared to the environment from before.

Qin Fen somewhat composed himself and began to search within the various meridians in his body. He wanted to find a few fishes that had escaped the nets.

In the end, Qin Fen found that not only had the major meridians in his body lacked fish, the diversely entwined tiny meridians were also completely clean. This made him suspicious of whether or not he had the potential to scrape the ground.

Everything was prepared appropriately. Qin Fen began to slowly circulate the Dragon Elephant Prajna Art. Since much of his true energy was gone, he would be much slower when it came to following the circulation channels.

With his speed slowing, Qin Fen discovered many things about his true energy that he couldn’t have discovered when it was in abundance. A person’s meridians were not smooth like the flattest and smoothest lens. It was actually more like a highway.

In this world, there was no road that was as flat as a mirror. Even the high-speed formula one racetracks were incapable of reaching such a degree of flatness and smoothness.

The meridians were the same.

For someone who just started cultivating energy, the feeling of contact with energy wouldn’t be that sharp. To be able to feel one’s energy and aura was already something extremely difficult. Naturally, it was impossible for them to observe their own meridians.

When someone’s true energy reached a certain realm—a realm of relative abundance—and when one has his attention drawn by the difficulties of circulating true energy, the cultivator would often ponder over how to increase the speed of a complete cycle of circulation.

It was very hard to stop and study one’s meridians. This highway, which carried the load of the circulation of true energy, really wasn’t smooth in shape.

When a cultivator uses up far too much of their true energy, they would conventionally choose to rest, waiting for their true energy to recover bit by bit before engaging in cultivation. This was to avoid mishaps from occurring when cultivating without enough true energy.

Every cultivator knew that when one engages in cultivation without enough true energy, the cultivator’s control and focus of mind would need to be at extreme highs. Otherwise, it was very easy to descend into the flames of madness, leading one to be unable to take care of himself or causing one to simply die.

Very few cultivators were treated like Qin Fen, being forced to cultivate even though his true energy was clearly depleted.

The meridians were indeed channels that were full of bumps and weren’t smooth at all!

Qin Fen was very shocked. He always believed that the meridians were smooth. So it turned out that they were not smooth and that they were like this!

With such road conditions, it was no wonder that the movement of true energy on these highways would have its speeds reduced. This was like taking a Formula One racing track and tossing a section of road that was full of potholes and wasn’t smooth. With these limitations, it was impossible for the cars on the track to reach their boasted speeds.

Could the meridians be repaired? Like repairing the potholes of a highway? Qin Fen carefully controlled his true energy, letting it undulate up and down on the bumpy meridian channels. The forward speed was several times quicker than when he had an abundance of true energy, like in normal times.

In the past, it took several hours to circulate one cycle. This time, he only needed to use one hour to do the same.

After circulating this one cycle, Qin Fen discovered that his true energy had grown a bit thicker and more solid.

During his second cycle of situation, Qin Fen discovered something due to his true energy becoming a bit thicker. His control wasn’t as smooth as it was during the very beginning. The degree of difficulty when it came to the up and down undulations of the bumpy meridian channels had increased substantially.

In such circumstances, it took Qin Fen all the way to one-fifth of completing the second cycle of circulation to finally obtain complete control over the true energy that had changed to be a bit thicker.

The second cycle took a bit longer because of how un-smooth the first one-fifth of it was. This time, it took Qin Fen just over an hour to truly complete the cycle.

In the third cycle, his true energy had strengthened quite a bit when compared to the second cycle. Controlling his true energy through the bumpy up and down undulations of his meridian channels became even more difficult. This time it took him one-quarter of the entire way to ultimately control his true energy to be unconstrained.

The fourth cycle. The fifth cycle. The sixth cycle. The seventh cycle. The eighth cycle….

The difficulty of controlling true energy to total free control increased with the completion of every cycle of circulation. When Qin Fen reached the eighth cycle, Qin Fen discovered that he needed to take make it ninety-five percent of the way through in order to obtain complete free control.

Though his true energy grew harder and harder to control, Qin Fen still discovered that his degree of control over true energy was reaching unprecedented heights after going through these up and down undulations. If he were to face the Vile King once more, he was confident that he could eliminate his opponent with his opponent in a three-star strength state.

Aside from the control over true energy, Qin Fen also discovered a way to control the up and down undulations of true energy. The speed of growth of true energy far exceeded the times when he had yet to discover the problems with the meridians.

“Could this be the good thing that the master talked about?” Qin Fen was a bit suspicious. He faintly felt that the master’s words weren’t this simple.

Though the discovery of the bumpy meridians was indeed something rare, the discovery was still something that was visible on the surface. The master had a habit of giving hints that made one discover deeper things.

“Something on a deeper level?”

Qin Fen was puzzled. Just what could it be that was on a deeper level?

Qin Fen silently controlled his true energy and pondered the master’s tip.

Within the special dream space of his mind, it was as if Qin Fen had turned into stone. The white figure of light was like the strictest of teachers. He silently floated by Qin Fen’s side.

Du Zhanpeng’s room wasn’t that big. It contained a simple wooden bed and an enormous bookshelf lined with all sorts of books.

Military affairs, politics, martial arts, science, and technology….

Outstanding and remarkable youths don’t come out of thin air. Men may appear to blossom in a split second, but behind them are often hardships and diligence that others are unaware of.

There were secret martial artist books that countless people viewed as treasures, and they were tossed to the ground by Xing Wuyi. Behind the books was a hidden compartment half a square-foot large.

He gently pressed the button on the hidden compartments, and a virtual projection appeared in the air. Please enter the full name of the person I love the most.

“Du Peng.”

Xing Wuyi quickly typed the two words that he loathed the most on the virtual keyboard. The hidden compartment quietly opened up toward two sides, revealing a delicate red metal box about the size of a fist.

Xing Wuyi carefully took out the red metal box. A scene of the past emerged in his mind.

“Do you know, Wuyi? I secretly participated in an encirclement and annihilation operation of mercenaries. I eliminated two terrorists on the bounty list of the Federation, and I made a bit of money.”

“You can’t be needing money, right?”

“Haha, how can I not be needing money? I need quite a bit.”

“Oh? Really? What do you want to buy?”

“A biochemical beast egg….”

“Don’t you have an extremely high-grade biochemical beast? There is no need to risk secretly going out and participating in operations, right?”

“My little brother is almost eighteen years old. I want to prepare a birthday gift for him.”

“What, he wants it? Even if you give it to him, he won’t thank you.”

“Isn’t it simple? I just need to provoke him a bit, and the little fool will accept it.”

“Is it worth it?”

“It has nothing to do with worth. I am his big brother, after all.”