16 Ch 16 The Earth trembles

Su Ming and her sisters soon received the news that the Ming clan had fought the huge battle in vain; the weapon that they had received was a mere Mid mortal in quality. The girls behaved life they were in shock but in their minds, they were laughing. No one in the world would expect that a top earth weapon was in the possession of a cute hamster. Jiang Long was already suspecting Lan Long of some major trickery; when he received the new about Ming clans shame. He immediately realized that Lan Long was in the possession of the weapon. Jiang Long simply smiled, as he continued with his cultivation and saber arts.

Lan Long on the other hand was trying to teach Little Kong about the staff arts, he had transmitted the information to Little Long mind via soul sense and watch as the cute hamster fumbled around with the staff the size of a tooth pick. After many hours of fruitless teaching, Lang Long retrieved another staff and demonstrated the staff art for the hamster. This too was rather useless, there staff arts were designed for humans. Although these could be cultivated by monkeys and apes, due to the similarity of the bodies, hamsters were entirely different story. It was a fact that a monster would gain complete sentience and self-awareness after it reached core cultivation level, this was only true for common monsters. Some beasts would gain sentience as soon as they reach Ki gathering realm, while some were completely limited to their instincts regardless of their cultivation. Gaining sentience would mean that the monster could begin to accurately train in varied martial arts and movement techniques. The only other way to train a beast was to allow it to fight and sharpen its instincts to the point where its movements resembled martial arts.

Lan Long was theorizing and picturing the heavy Ki from the Heavy staff manual in his mind and he didn't need to put actual effort in his cultivation, he decided that this was the best time to train Little Kong. He grabbed the hamster and stuffed it into his sleeve as he left for the forest to find some bandits or beast as Little Kong training partners. With a single step, Lan Long exited the city and spread out his soul sense to blanket an area roughly equal to a billion kilometers. Although this was actually far from his actual limit, Lan Long imagined this area to have quite a lot of bandits and beasts. Although, the quality of the beast was rather disappointing, some bandits he found were actually at Late Ki sea realm. Satisfied, with his find, he took another step as he appeared in front of an unsuspecting snake, this particular snake was at Mid Ki gathering level.

"Little Kong time to train. Use Low Ki gathering strength to fight off this snake with your stick. Remember to only use your stick." Lan Long said to Little Kong. The little hamster grew to the size of 2 meters and took out his staff. He soon began to hit the snake which about 20 meters long with the stick and destroyed the snake within a few breaths of time. Lan Long had underestimated the strength of the staff.

"Okay, next time use this staff". Lan Long said as he threw a low mortal staff at Little Kong. The hamster caught the staff and twirled it around for a while. After getting used to the new staff, Lan Long took the hamster to his next opponent and each time he told Little Kong to use strength of two levels lower than his opponents. The next opponent was a Water jaguar. This beast was known for its cunning and frightening reflexes. As Little Kong grew accustomed to the jaguars moves, Lan Long immediately moved to the next opponent. Throughout the day, Little Kong was forced to suppress his strength to multiple levels lower than his opponent and was deprived of defeating any of them. This frustrated the little guy to an extent that he was trying to defeat him opponent before Lan Long could move to a different location. Subconsciously, Little Kong was growing more and more flexible and nimble with his staff. By the end of the day, Lan Long had to move the fight to next opponent within a minute. For Little Kong's last battle of the day, Lan Long had chosen a lone bandit who was at Ki was at early Ki sea realm and was harassing a couple of Ki Condensing cultivators.

"Now, take of all your clothes and hand over all your valuables immediately. You lady, remove your clothes slowly." The cultivator looked at the lady and smiled as he said the last part.

Whoosh. . .

"Okay, listen up mister. If you can defeat this beast, I will let you go or your fate will to dis as his hand." Lan Long immediately said as he nodded at Little Kong.

"What the fu. . ." The bandit didn't get to finish his sentence as he was attack mid-way by Little Kong's staff. Without any choice, the bandit pulled out a sword and defended against Little Kong's staff.

Twang. . .

The staff vibrated with at a tremendous frequency as it was abruptly stopped against the sword. The hamster pulled back the staff and flipped it in his hand, aiming to attack the bandit's feet. The bandit was an experienced cultivator, he was accustomed to launching these type of swift attacks; he defended the next attack with ease as well. The bandit quickly stabbed at Little Kong's neck but was stopped by the other end of the staff. The force sent Little Kong sliding backwards, the bandit then took a few steps back and look at Lan Long.

"Why are you sending this weak beast to attack? If you have the balls, fight me yourself." The cultivator roared as he pointed his sword at Lan Long. Whoosh. With a single move, Lan Long closed the distance between him and the bandit and lightly grasped his neck. Bandit grew alarmed, he had never expected the masked man to be such an expert. The after image he left behind had not even faded away but Lan Long had closed the distance and caught his neck.

"The only chance you have at life now, is to defeat the hamster. Now fight." Lan Long said in the bandit's ear before he returned to his previous spot, reoccupying his after image. The bandit looked at Lan Long with a terrified look as he made his mind to fight the hamster and defeat it. The cultivator at such high strength seldom lied. The bandit made his move and attacked relentlessly. Although, Little Kong suffered many injuries, none were lethal. His fur was as strong as a Mid earth armor, capable of completely ignoring the attacks by a late Ki condensing cultivator. The cultivator who were being robbed were looking at the scene with wide eyes. They were ambushed by a Ki sea realm cultivator who was ambushed by a higher realm cultivator and was now fighting a hamster wielding a staff. The whole situation unheard of and no one would ever believe them if they told anyone.

Lan Long looked at the cultivator and signaled them to leave. As they left, those cultivators saw the hamster whose fur was light brown was now covered with patched of blood. Little Kong although in pain, persevered looking for an opportunity to attack the bandit. He was so frustrated by the fact that Lan Long didn't allow him to defeat any of his opponents he had completely forgotten that this was training exercise. His only goal now was to defeat this human before Lan Long took him away. Inadvertently, Little Kong's skill with his staff was improving visibly. He was now blocking more hits from the cultivator and was even attempting to strike back. The bandit noticed this and as a result his attacks became even more berserk. The fight had now continued for almost two hours with the loss of any tempo; bandit was fighting for his life while Little Kong was fighting to defeat the bandit. These two hours were a major boost for Little Kong's staff arts. He had even tried to use the moves Lan Long had showed him earlier, although unsuccessful, it showed that Little Kong was slowly gaining the understanding to the staff arts. His attacks were more fluid and heavy, his movements were minimal and precise. Little Kong was now blocking almost every attack, he had even gotten a few attacks in on the bandit. The animal instincts and the experience gained over the course of hundreds of battles were now merging.

The bandit was didn't believe for a single second that a beast with a stick could defeat him, a cultivator with more than 50 years of experience. He was still optimistic and believed that he could still win. Little Kong finally pushed bandit's sword aside and swiftly pulled on the staff driving it straight into the man's chest. Bandit immediately did a low sweep with his sword but Little Kong jumped into the air with the support of the staff. The sword met the staff and swept it aside but Little Kong using the same momentum from the sword, rotated the staff on to the bandit's shoulder. Little Kong didn't stop for a moment as he rotated the staff in the other direction and hit the man on his chest. Bandit felt that he was about to be thrown back and he executed a quick upwards slash. The scene looked almost choreographed, as Little Kong met the sword with the very edge of staff and carried the momentum around his body and hit the man's chest again with the very moment from his sword. Bandit flew backwards and crashed into a tree, he tried to get up and coughed a few mouthfuls of blood finally passing out. Little Kong who had his very first victory squeaked out loud as he looked at Lan Long who was smile blissfully at him. The wounds and fatigue caught up with Little Kong as he passed out from exhaustion. Lan Long caught Little Kong and kept the staff away as he immediately began to heal Little Kong injuries.

"Little Hamster, you have done it." Lan Long said as he gently wiped the blood and grime away from his little hamster's fur. After healing Little Kong, Lan Long kept him back in his sleeve and looked to the sky, a proud look flashed on his face. He was genuinely happy for Little Kong, to see his pet hamster learning a new martial art was like watching a child take his first step him. Unknowingly, he had already comprehended the process of converting his Ki into heavy Ki, he already had the designs for the formations. Now the only thing to do was a field test.

Soon, Lan Long relaxed his mind has drew up huge amounts of Ki from his dantian, almost about 20 percent and converted in entirely into the heavy Ki as described by the manual. The heavy Ki in of itself was completely weightless. The object or material that it was combined with would gain weight, Lan Long immediately picked up a pebble and infused it with the heavy Ki but to his surprise the pebble remained the same within his hands.

"The hell, don't tell me the can only be absorbed by staff and through the heavy staff arts." He tossed he pebble in his hand but the pebble was identical to the state it was before. "Dammit, what a waste of time." Frustrated, Lan Long threw the pebble into the sky and went to the bandit. He was in a pretty bad state so Lan Long healed him to the point of consciousness and told him to scram. The bandit who was happy as the day he had cultivated for the first time fled without looking back.

"Now, back to the city. Maybe, I should visit the Cloud Inn again." Lan Long mused out loud as he took a few steps and arrived back in the courtyard of Jiang Long. Jiang Long was wide awake and was practicing his saber arts in the courtyard, he was surprised to see Lan Long appear. Without any explanation, Lan Long sat on the steps leading to the courtyard and watched Jiang Long practice.

BOOM. . . rumble. . . rumble. . .

A huge explosion was heard, south of the forest where Little Kong was fighting. Then the earth began to rumble and shake, it was like a minor earth quake and even had residual tremors follow it. Lan Long immediately sent out his soul sense, he had imagined a fight between two major power houses or an appearance of another treasure. The soul sense immediately revealed crater and larger cracks extending from the center of the crater. The crater itself was about a few dozen meter large while each crack was about half a kilometer wide at its start and thinned out as they extended outwards. At the center of the crater was a small pebble which was still falling into the earth at a slow rate. It was slowed down by a huge chuck of crystal ore about 5 kilometers into the ground.

"Fuck, it's this heavy." Lan Long mumbled as he controlled the bead to fly towards himself and immediately with drew the heavy Ki from the bead and stored in his dantian. Jiang Long watched from the side as he watched a small pebble land in Lan Long's hand.

"What is that?" He immediately asked. He was already suspicious of Lan Long's involvement in the explosion and the bead that immediately followed after was a huge give away.

"Just a pebble." LanLong said as he threw the pebble at Jiang Long who caught it. He tossed it afew times in his hand before tossing it away. The slightly heavier pebble by nomeans was an extraordinary find.