Chapter 34 - Powering up

'Finally, this terrifying bear is dead.' Ulf breathed a sigh of relief.

However, Ulf wanted to be sure that it was dead and stabbed the bear a few times. As no sound came from the beast, he could calm down and mind other things inside the cave.

Such as the cave lion, which was laying on the ground like a corpse. After the beams of sun banished the surrounding darkness, Ulf could see this big cat's whole body from a distance.

It had several serious injuries. Some of them must be due to falling from the cliff, but others were thanks to the giant short-faced bear.

There were bruises across its back and abdomen, clearly had gotten after rolling over the rocks. Its hind leg on the left side was so damaged, that would hinder his mobility.

However, the wounds on the head and the left shoulder must be the work of that overbearing bear.

As Ulf looked a bit deeper inside that cave, he discovered that his theory about the reason for the start of the fight was right.

There was a corpse of the young moose. It had a few large marks of the massive claws, which were of course made by the dark-brown giant bear.

Even if Ulf wanted to check it right away, his prime concern was still the cave lion. He wanted to test if it was alive in order to protect himself from the surprise attack of one of the southern forest's strongest predator species.

Because of that, Ulf started moving toward the cave lion. He was moving like there was nothing dangerous and showing a lot of loopholes in his defence.

Nevertheless, the lion didn't budge at all and was laying on the ground like a lifeless cadaver. Ulf got just 3-4 meters away from it and stopped advancing, intended to observe from this distance.

'Let's see.' After some time, Ulf moved, as if he was going to turn his back on the big car.

Right then, dead like the beast, suddenly opened its eyes, gathered all power it still had and jumped toward the Ulf.

'Haha, in the end, you couldn't hold yourself back anymore.' Ulf thought as he had been secretly paying attention to the lion's behaviour.

The cave lion leapt so high in the air. Such a sudden attack would break every bone of Ulf. That was why instead of waiting or retreating, he turned toward the upcoming predator, ran forward and pointed Aeglos at the opponent's mouth.

BAAM...

Aeglos' sharpness once again showed its superiority. The lion didn't have time to make any noise, as the spear fulfilled its job perfectly, pierced deep into the mouth of the beast and caused its death in an instant.

"Now everything is solved and I can continue my original plan. However, rather than getting one, I have three. It seems, my tribe's lovely god Hadda pitied me." Ulf was watching three beasts' corpses and could no longer hide his excitement.

After enjoying the beautiful sight of his harvest, Ulf began to search for useful parts. Of course, it was a well-known fact that almost everything gained from those beasts was important for cultivation. However, the most desired for Ulf was one particular organ - the heart.

Ulf was informed in the village that the heart of the beast was very profitable to nourish the hunter's body. The heart blood was richest with natural energy. From Ulf's point of view, the main reason should be the huge amount of qi gathered in this organ. This idea was formed, due to his experiences in mind cultivation.

The mountain rhino's heart also got picked by Ursa and became his trophy as leader of their group.

Ulf had been circulating the inner qi during the cultivation across every part of the body. He discovered that one of the most important organs to distribute qi between every organ was the heart.

Originally, every human had dormant qi inside the body and it was replenishing and increasing with the new supplies sent by the heart and delivered through the veins. However, the interaction of inner qi with the organs to strengthen them was minimal.

That was why spiritual energy was needed on the stage. It could increase the rate of reciprocation between the inner qi and every cell of the body.

However, unlike the humans, these favored creatures by the nature most likely didn't need any intermediary to make their strengthening operation much faster. But this knowledge was still on the level of theories and needed more time to study.

As for the beast's heart, its usage was also limited in time.

Because of the extremely strong body, the beast's heart could endure the process of decomposition much longer, however not eternally. After a few days, it would start to decay, so would no longer have any value.

Ulf thought he would be very lucky to get one but now had three. He was looking forward to his advancement in cultivation and wondered what kind of surprises there would be for the next few days.

Until he would begin powering up, Ulf took out the bone knife to skin the beasts. Their furs would be a very good material to make the clothes or use as a cover for the bed.

However, he had to spend so much time, due to the toughness of the skins. Ulf had felt like he was cutting the metal, rather than the part of dead beings. To finish the work, he had to push his knife so hard that after the whole skinning procedure was finished, it would no longer be in any use.

When Ulf finished his task, the light of the sun could already reach quite deep inside the cave. It was already afternoon,

"Hm, it seems this place isn't simple either." He whispered and became interested because even at that time, the end point of the cave wasn't perceptible to him.

It was a very tempting idea to wander inside the unknown place, but Ulf restrained himself. The cultivation came first in a row. If there were some dangerous creatures, they would come out, after hearing the loud commotion created by the human hunter and the beasts.

Among the beasts, the moose's heart was most urgent to extract, because its corpse was very damaged. When Ulf observed it closer the throat was half eaten by the short-faced bear and it was losing blood alarmingly fast. If Ulf didn't hurry, all heart blood would be wasted.

In order to reach the inside organs, Ulf used his first gifted spear from the village to cut the moose's abdomen. Its intestine and other entrails became visible. Soon he noticed the huge heart that could be hardly contained on both of his palms.

With the weapon in his hands, Ulf cut the veins that connected this organ to other parts of the body, so quick and yet so neat.

As the heart was placed in his hands, it was easy to feel powerful inner qi, which was purer than qi spread outside.

"It seems, I was right about the growth potential of inner qi and spiritual energy in quantity." Ulf was happy because his years of observation showed positive results.

After little observation, Ulf drank the blood into the heart and without waiting for the effect, ate the whole organ raw too. The warm feeling of the blood running from his mouth to his stomach via the throat was apparent. Right after that, Ulf sat down and started meditating to watch what was happening inside.

BOOM...

BOOM...

As soon as the digestion process started, a large amount of pure, powerful qi broke out from the beast's blood inside his guts.

'Ah no. The outburst of qi still exceeded my expectations.' Ulf was alarmed, but it wasn't an unsolvable problem.

He used the spiritual energy to mobilize the inner qi and shield the internal organs from harm. The new waves have been resonating across his body for a very long time. If not for inner qi, some of these explosions could even ruin his internal structure.

Maybe inner qi could secure his life, but the pain was still there. Two different types of power collided and were almost evenly matched. Ulf's inner qi had some small advantages because the fight was going on its territory.

However, after the first wave of unfamiliar qi, Ulf felt that some changes were triggered inside him. He could sense that his physique body was gaining enormous power with astonishing speed and the warrior rank cultivation was advancing.

When Ulf had been promoted to the warrior rank, his foundation was already near to perfection. Past several days' experiences polished him even more and his talent couldn't be also disregarded. Under the promotion of energy produced from the beast moose's heart, Ulf's body was adapting flawlessly.

He lost sense of time and didn't have any idea how long he had been in the lotus position.

When the last wave calmed down and the energy was absorbed, Ulf opened his eyes and was stunned. There wasn't light any longer, dankness reigned in the cave once again.

'It's already night? It seems quite a lot of time has passed.' Ulf sighed. 'Hah, It was a hellish torture.'

Even though, when Ulf checked his new physical and inner power, every negative feeling was ignored at once.

"Late warrior rank? It's also near to advance on peak warrior. Though the inner qi strengthened too, there isn't a major breakthrough." He was very excited.