Mastery

Since it was dark within the inner area of the forest and the sky was getting dark, before heading towards the clearing he made, he broke off a large branch from a nearby tree and set it on fire with the fire he made for Moddy a while ago. With his strength already at the high 40s, it was no problem for him to even punch a rock into smithereens.

Afterwards, with the help of his memories before he went to Moddy's territory, he started to walk with the large branch giving off light in order for Shi Li to see his surroundings. Since Moddy was a cat, it was no problem for it to follow Shi Li since it had night vision.

As he was walking, a sudden thought crossed his mind as he looked at the branch he was holding.

"Hm. A burnt large branch," Shi Li muttered. "I don't know why that novel existed back then, but it did give me a new outlook towards wood. I wonder if Aurus truly exists."

Noticing that he was getting distracted, he shook his head vigorously. After a while, he decided to grab Sundering Flame from his back, wanting to see if his earlier assumptions were correct.

Ever since Shi Li was chased by that Rank 5 Beast, his Flame Slash showed the characteristic of having small golden wisps within it, allowing the slash to exert more force.

"I don't know if it's correct or not, but if it's what I think it is, it'll get me one step closer to learning the [Five Element Sword Technique]."

Continuing to walk with the burning branch on his right hand and Sundering Flame on his left, he turned his head and looked at Moddy before asking, "Is it alright if I cut down some trees to speed up our journey?"

Moddy shrugged its shoulders in a humanlike way, giving off weird vibes that Shi Li ignored. It then sent a wisp of inner energy towards Shi Li with the words, "I don't mind."

Since he had the approval of the cat that was many times stronger than him, Shi Li smiled as he grabbed on Sundering Flame with a tighter grip. He then started to circulate all of the strength within his body and soul and...sent it out to the tips of Sundering Flame!

"[Flame Slash]!" Shi Li could only shout inwardly since it was the night and beasts were more active at night.

Whoosh!

Within a few tenths of a second, an orange sword light manifested at the ends of Shi Li's sword before heading towards the trunk of a nearby tree. As Shi Li saw this, the orange sword light slightly shrunk in size, forming a few golden wisps that contained condensed slashing power.

After seeing the golden wisps, Shi Li couldn't help but smile as the trunk of a nearby tree was cut in half.

"I knew it! I'm nearing the mastery of the Flame Slash!" Aurus said to himself. Although it was possible for Shi Li to only successfully execute the Flame Slash and then move on to the Water Slash and Earth Slash, it would give him a shaky foundation in exchange.

Of course, this idea arose in his mind after seeing Tian Zhenfei's slashes as he used the [Five Element Sword Technique]. Each elemental slash had a condensed strand of sword light in the middle while the remaining sword light surrounded the condensed sword light, allowing it to have more force within it. Thanks to the remnant voices within Tian Zhenfei's memories, Shi Li was informed that this was the mastered versions of the slashes.

"I don't know how I was able to form these golden wisps but I guess it had something to do with the Rank 5 Beast chasing me, forcing me to squeeze out all of my potential," Shi Li lightly laughed as he said inwardly. "In any case, that's like a few months of effort saved in mastering the Flame Slash. I can already form golden wisps, so I just need to condense the golden wisps in the center and let the orange sword light surround it, forming the mastered Flame Slash."

As he was thinking up of ways to do this, he continued to execute Flame Slash on the trees they passed by, easily making the path in front of them wide enough for them to easily run.

...

A few hours have passed since Shi Li started walking towards his clearing. Thanks to this, Shi Li realized that he had run a long distance from his clearing to the point that he couldn't even believe it himself.

Along the way, he had to get more branches since the large branch he brought wasn't enough to last the journey. But with a few branches being lit with the fire at certain times, the two of them were able to reach the clearing Shi Li made at the time the moon was its highest.

"Finally, back to where I was," Shi Li couldn't help but smile as he looked at the clearing. The small wooden house he made was still intact while the remains of his campfire was still there. It was quite bizarre to think that no beasts dared to trek his clearing while he was in Moddy's territory. Nonetheless, Shi Li was just happy to see his stuff intact.

He entered his wooden house and grabbed the Wooden War Hammer he crafted from the surrounding trees. He also dug a bit under his floor to reveal the special parts of the Rank 2 Beasts he killed before. Since he thought that beasts or other people would come to his clearing, he made sure to hide those parts in a special spot so he didn't have to kill more beasts just to obtain his previous amount.

He put those parts in the knapsack he brought and then went outside once more to walk towards Moddy who was currently looking at the stars.

Shi Li looked at this sight and couldn't help but lightly smile. A cute cat being dazzled by the numerous amount of stars hanging in the sky, who wouldn't smile at that.

He then lightly tapped on Moddy's shoulder, startling the cat back to reality.

"Nya!" Moddy was definitely surprised, not expecting Shi Li to come back. Although it had met humans before, most of them left Moddy. It didn't know why the human behind it still stayed. "What are you doing? Aren't you going to leave me alone nya?"

"Leave you alone? Are you stupid?" Shi Li tilted his head as if it was confused. "You're going to help me kill Rank 3 Beasts to finish my challenge right?"

Hearing the words Moddy said to Shi Li being said back at it, it felt a sense of trust forming between the two. Moddy, who was new to this feeling, became defensive all of a sudden. "Nya? Did I say that? Well, I have to help you because I'm strong nya! Don't you dare misunderstand nya!"

Looking at Moddy's current expression, Shi Li couldn't help but laugh as he pet Moddy's head.

"Alright, alright. Take a rest inside the house I made, we'll start hunting Rank 3 Beasts tomorrow."