Corpse Flame

With an option to extrapolate its technique presented before it, the black skeleton did just that. The Battle Axe released a crimson light. This light was contained to the axe. The axe became completely crimson for an entire ten minutes. When it returned to normal, the writings on the axe head had changed a bit. The characters that outlined the cultivation technique were denser and much more complex.

The summary of these writings was very simple.

[Corpse Qi: 20Units]

[Skills:Life Sense----2/4...Upgrade /// Decomposition----1/3.....Upgrade /// Faceless Wonder---2/2]

[Unknown Technique-----1/2 (Life Force Vision, Rapid Decomposition, Dark Blade.)]

The unknown technique bow had two stages. This meant that he could increase his cultivation. All he needed was more corpse Qi.

The skeleton spent the day as usual. The young girl ignored it completely and stayed in her room upstairs. Her crying could be heard by the skeleton but it did not care much about it. It was only worried that the neighbours might hear her.

It did not stop her. It preferred reading its books in peace even though the quiet was still eluding it.

When night came, the skeleton went out once again. It noticed some increased security and wariness but it was still able to kill over fifty people. It collected eighty units of corpse Qi. With one hundred units of corpse Qi, the skeleton chose to first increase its cultivation of the Life Sense skill and the Decomposition skill. This was to increase its chances of survival. Although it felt immortal, it knew that the humans were very adaptive. It also knew that staying out in the sun for long would kill it.

With this much corpse Qi, it easily increased the skills to their maximum levels. It reached the fourth and final stage of the Life Sense skill. In the fourth stage, the skeleton could see using this skill. It could see one's life force and even get an idea of how long one had to live. It could tell one's age and whether they were afflicted with any illness that was damaging their life span.

It could sense life signs in a radius of one hundred meters. This meant that it could cover less than a quarter of the slums. Still, this gave the skeleton a huge advantage when it came to hunting.

The skeleton also reached the third and highest level of the Decomposition skill.

In the third stage, a mysterious energy could be released from deep inside the skeleton's bones. This qi was black and in the form of a flame. The skeleton named this the Corpse Flame. This black flame could spread out from the skeleton to a radius of two meters. This meant that the skeleton no longer needed to come in direct contact with its prey to decompose them into corpse qi.

The skeleton felt the urge to increase the radius of this skill more than anything else. If it could envelop the entire Hundred Man Town with its Corpse Flame, it would no longer have to go after a few people at a time. It would collect Corpse Qi more efficiently.

The skeleton had a few units of Corpse Qi left it was not enough to do anything.

It read its books and the young girl sat around the house sometimes crying. This went on for four months. The skeleton had been collecting Corpse Qi every day and it now had one thousand two hundred forty units of Corpse Qi but it was still not enough to increase its cultivation. It also needed more information if it wanted to extrapolate the two skills(Life sense and Decomposition). It had been gathering books but the information it gathered was irrelevant to cultivation.

That night, the skeleton went out to collect as much corpse qi as was needed to upgrade its cultivation technique.

The skeleton moved away from its neighborhood in the slums and entered the heart of the town. This place was occupied by powerful cultivators. These cultivators had powerful life forces meaning that they would produce the most corpse Qi.

When it reached the place, the skeleton released its Corpse Flames and began burning down the town. It moved like the wind setting one house after another on fire. The corpse flame was very hot. It burned hotter than any normal flame. It raged in the town. The flame was pitch black making it so that the humans could not see the reason as to why buildings were turning to ash. People screamed as they were devoured by the flames. They shouted for e help to come but even when other people reached the scene, the fire engulfed them as well. In the end, the entire neighbourhood of cultivators was set ablaze. Thousands of people lived in this place. A lot of small gangs and dojos had made this place their headquarters.

The town burned and people screamed for hours. When the flames went out, there was nothing left in the neighbourhood. Everything was nothing but ash and smoke. The town mayor, an old man with a short grey beard stood in disbelief. This was a disaster of epic proportions.

The old man could not believe that such a thing was possible.

At first light, some people decided that they had had enough of this town and its mysterious deaths and endless problems. Over the past few months, rumors of disappearances had spread through the town. Now that thousands had just died for no reason whatsoever, those wise enough realized that it was time to leave Hundred Man Town.

The population was reduced by thirty percent in a single night.

This was something that the skeleton had wanted to avoid but it had become anxious for success leading to this error in decision making. Its actions were sure to attract unwanted attention from the world. The skeleton was very clear that there would be a broad investigation into the matter. The skeleton could sense the human life forces leaving the town and with each departure,the skeleton felt something like pain in its soul. These humans were its source of corpse Qi .

The skeleton later calmed down and examined the axe .It had collected seven thousand units of corpse qi .This was the greatest harvest it had ever had .

The option to upgrade its unknown cultivation technique was presented for it .

It immediately chose this option and began increasing its power.