22 V, don't Interfere!
Bastian quickly turned to his left, and saw a group of Kalari Scorpions headed towards him. They were moving in what seemed to be a clumsy single file. They would move this way underground, then encircle their prey once they get close. They were about 200 meters away.
"It was a group of Kalari Scorpions and judging from the scent, there are six of them. Two of them have a slightly different scent from the rest, I think it's the parents," said Bastian with a grave expression.
His sense of smell is so sensitive that it can even differentiate numbers! Incredible!
V was impressed, but unfortunately, now was not the time to be impressed. Bastian saw that the situation was dire but his previous performance had uplifted his spirit. He did not want V to fight, even though she could easily finish the pack of scorpions in a flash.
In an instant, he wanted to test the limits of his new body, much like her. Feeling confident, he searched through the information he had received from the Bloodline Awakening, to see if there was anything he could use right now.
Most of these techniques required lots of yuan. His cultivation level was so low that he could only use Dragon Descends, a move that used kinetic energy from his previous fall as the primary energy source. Other techniques from the Empyrean Equilibrium Void Shattering Fist were also dependent on kinetic energy. Furthermore, they often used the kinetic energy from one's opponent's strike as fuel, still, one required lots of time to master the entire technique. One mistake and one could die instantly.
The Tyrian Double Headed Storm Dragon, had sovereignty over many things. One of them was balance of forces; hence a lot of its attacks were about using one's opponent's force against him or her. This required a lot of finesse to execute and even more time to master.
Dragon Descendants only used the kinetic energy from one's fall and the force of the impact between the ground and the participant. This was much easier to execute, whereas a flurry of fists or kicks from your opponents were very difficult to block. Let alone to attempt to counter, using the balance of forces.
Hhmm, nope, nope, damn nope. Wait...This looks like the technique which uses the least amount of yuan but it requires one to at least be a middle disciple/student in order to be able to use it. Since I have just begun cultivation, I am only a lower disciple/student.
As Bastian pondered the situation, he rolled the daemon core around in his hand, an old habit of his when he had a problem he could not solve. Sometimes it was a pebble, sometimes a bead. On earth he used to have a tiny rubber ball he would use.
The situation needed him to be stronger, which meant he had to increase his cultivation somehow within a short space of time
Wait! That is it! But will it work? It's quite dangerous and I am not normal either. I'm confident my body can handle it; I will just absorb a little to test it. Let me just try...
Yes! It worked! Haha perfect!
After skimming through some information in his mind, Bastian had found a technique suitable for his situation, yet his cultivation level was too low to use it.
But he had a flash of inspiration. V only saw Bastian's face show a myriad of different expressions, until he finally grinned. He opened up the hand with the core, yet what came out was just dust. Having been surprised too many times, V just face palmed and shook her head. She was numb to anything that Bastian did.
If it was anyone else, especially cultivators, had seen what Bastian just did, their hearts would have jumped with fright because Bastian had just done something that was very dangerous in the cultivation World. Something that usually caused irreparable damage to one's body and crippled him or her for life. He absorbed World Energy directly from a daemon core!
World Energy inside a daemon core was extremely pure and tyrannical. Once directly absorbed by a cultivator, it would do damage to one's body, due to its tyrannical nature. It would also be impossible to process it into qi or mana. Usually, an alchemist would need to process the core into a pill. This World Energy would then be gentle and easy to absorb. The pills created by alchemists were called dans.
Daemon cores were an essential ingredient in the creation of many dans, thus, they were very valuable and expensive. Even dans themselves were incredibly pricy. One dan could cost tens of gold coins. Dans had miraculous properties and were made from rare ingredients. For example they could increase the speed of one's cultivation, thus they were very expensive.
Alchemist was a sub class of mages, who specialized in making dans and other elixirs for assisting in cultivation or spells. They were undoubtedly the richest type of cultivator on the Sovereign Continent. Their products were rare, highly sought after, and very few.
For one to be an alchemist, he or she, was supposed to meet certain conditions. First of all, one was supposed to be a mage. Secondly, one was supposed to have fire and wood elemental affinities. Thirdly, one's affinity for fire would have to be excellent and the affinity for wood would have to be at least average.
Few people met this criteria, thus alchemists were rare, to the point where they were even considered a measure of a countries' economic development!
If a cultivator tried to absorb World Energy from a core directly, without a dan made by an alchemist, their body would be damaged, and they would lose their cultivation, becoming a cripple. Sometimes this could even lead to death.
Yet here Bastian had smoothly absorbed World Energy from a core that was not even a fire or water attribute core! What he had just done was supposed to be impossible. Even when taking proper energy from a dan, one would either get a dan with an attribute one had, or a dan that was attributeless. Bastian had no affinity whatsoever for the earth element, and Kalari Scorpions were earth element daemon beasts. Yet he was able to absorb their energy, and quite smoothly at that.
The dust left over from the core is most likely waste from the energy he could not absorb.
Of course after a few moments, V merely added this to many of Bastian's baffling feats. She merely stood there and watched. Interested in what he would do next.
Then, V felt a small fluctuation of World Energy from Bastian; this was the sign of someone who had broken through to the next level.
No surprise there, if he had not broken through after successfully absorbing World Energy from a daemon core, then it would be weird. He is now probably a middle disciple, just after only cultivating for a few hours, what a monster.
Due to his powerful body, and the fire qi Bastian had shown before, V had assumed that he was a warrior. Yuan was a combination of both qi and mana. Bastian had the ability to use both qi and mana together as yuan, or separately like he had done earlier on. In the meantime, he only planned to use qi, to make V assume he was a warrior, until he fully understood what was happening in his body.
Bastian also did not fully trust her either. So far during their travels together, she had been good, but it could also be just a rouse, although Bastian doubted it. His skill set made him highly adept at judging people.
Even if she was from a super assassin clan, she was still just a child. Bastian may look like a child, but inside he was a man, one who liked to play the fool but hide his cards well.
In such a world, where the strong preyed on the weak, it was dangerous to blindly trust someone. Especially someone who's history one knew nothing off. Not to mention she was already a Custodian.
That meant she already had a Master, and had submitted to someone else. Being the smart man he was, Bastian never asked her about it. This was also one of the reasons V got along with Bastian so much
She had many secrets, and did not like being interrogated, especially about her history. Bastian was a child just like her, but when it mattered, he minded his own business. He was the first person she had met outside her clan, who was as mature as she was, in her own age group.
Not to mention, he clearly had secrets of his own. Due to his overtly friendly nature, he did not seem like the type to keep secrets. Yet to V, this nature, coupled with his intelligence and abilities, made him a very good companion, and most likely, an even more frightening enemy.
As soon as Bastian broke through to becoming a middle disciple/student, a look of ecstasy filled his face. When he did it, all the yuan in his body compressed itself and increased in quality, leading to his body madly taking in more World Energy. This breakthrough had increased his World Energy capacity and absorption rate. It also felt very comfortable, like warm and cool hands were massaging every part of his body.
After the sensation was over, Bastian put on a grim expression. The scorpions were only 70 meters away from them now, so it was time to act.
"V stand back, don't interfere, I'm going to finish this myself," said Bastian, as he flexed his muscles and bounced on his toes. V merely smiled and complied, taking a few steps back.
She was ready to enjoy the show. Her only hope was that it would last longer than the previous one. Although they were in a slight rush to get back to the city, she was more interested in his abilities, so she did not object to his proposal.
At that moment, however, she made sure she was close by, in case anything happened.
I hope the fight lasts long enough for me to see what he can really do.
Unfortunately for her, fate had other plans.
