The burning soup

Sect Lead Qing was inside his residence managing the affairs of the Sect and it surrounding sphere of influence. Although it was natural for a lot of Sect Elders to pass on their administrative duties to its Elders, Sect leader Qing had a knack for administrative work and was quite good at it. It also gave him a breather from constantly cultivating. Considering he was also in the peak of the domain realm, the idea of advancing to the Soul Consolidation realm was but a pipe dream. This was because the continent of Dawn had lost the ability to advance to the next realm.

Throughout the many years, innumerable theories were discussed as to why they could not advance any further. The most popular one was that there was insufficient energy in the continent of Dawn to support the the Soul consolidation realm. Another theory was that there was insufficient comprehension and philosophy on the advancement to the next realm. The only reason why they knew there was a next realm after the domain realm was due to historical records dating back year and years ago.

A few moments later, Sect Leader Qing decided to take a break. He stood up from his desk and decided to check what was happening inside the Sect. Considering his residence was located at the peak of Sky Peak mountain, he needed to descend and see how things were going. Just as he was about to reach the middle section of the mountain, a fire stream with a strength of a Nascent Soul power had suddenly arrived from below heading in the exact direction where he was.

"What... The... ****" cried aloud the Sect Master

He barely dodged the fire stream but it still managed to singe the top of his hair. Although he was in the domain realm and could easily block or dodge powers below the Domain realm effortlessly, he was completely caught off guard this time. The idea of someone entering the sect undetected and shooting a fire stream at him had never entered his mind! Unfortunately for Sect Master Qing, he did not feel any damage and continued descending.

A few minutes earlier when Sect Leader had just descended from his residence, Yang Ning had just taken a bite of noodles enveloped with lava soup that was cooked from Chef Zhao. His face immediately turned red from the spiciness. His body begun accumulate fire energy at a rapid rate to the point his body began to turn red. The sweat that excreted off his body was evaporated immediately. He felt an enormous amount of fire energy gather within a short time that he was unable to contain it. He was like a dam that was about to burst. He quickly rushed out of private room inside the cafeteria, where multiple disciples noticed him running sporadically.

The moment he stepped foot outside the cafeteria, Yang Ning opened his mouth like a dragon and stream of fire energy gushed forth from his mouth piercing through the Sky. Unknowingly, Yang Ning had directed the stream of fire at the same spot his Master was at.

A minute later, Yang Ning had exhausted the accumulated fire energy. He was appearance was like that of a deflated balloon. Yang Ning also had steam coming out of him. Feeling extremely flustered, especially now that multiple disciples had arrived to check on what had happened, he quickly used his fastest moment technique he knew and fled the scene.

At the entrance of the cafeteria stood Chef Zhao who had a mischievous expression witnessing what had happened.

"I may have added a littttttle bit too much spice for brother Yang"

With that she entered back inside the cafeteria to continue cooking.

Back inside Yang Ning's residence, he quickly entered inside his cave abode to recover his energy.

"That... was... spicy" muttered Yang Ning to himself.

He sat crossed legged and began to mediate and accumulate his lost energy. His body also felt pained from over exerting himself. Yang Ning decided to stay inside his cave abode until he had recovered fully.

In the meantime Sect Leader had just arrived outside where Outer Sect Cafeteria was located. There was already a crowd of disciples being dispersed by several elders with the assistance of several inner sect disciples.

Upon noticing the arrival of the Sect Master, Inner Sect Elder Liu Mi greeted Sect Master Qing with a hand cusp and reported the situation with haste.

"Sect Leader Qing, there nothing too worry about here. I immediately arrived from the sect medical facility when I saw the fir..."

Before Elder Liu could continue she had suddenly stopped speaking as she noticed the top of Sect Leaders hair had been slightly singed. It looked like someone parted his hair down the middle.

Looking at Elder Liu inspecting him, Sect Leader Qing responded curiously

"Is everything okay Elder Liu?"

Elder Liu paused for a moment blinking her eyes twice before responding

"According to the statements from the disciples, it went like this. Your disciple Yang Ning entered the private room inside the cafeteria and was met by Chef Zhao. A disciple inside the cafeteria noticed Chef Zhao bring a bowl of food to Yang Ning. Only a few minutes later did they noticed Yang Ning run sporadically across the cafeteria exiting quickly. From there he released a huge amount of fire energy out from his mouth before disappearing"

"I have also questioned Chef Zhao, and asked what food she delivered to Yang Ning. From what she stated, the food was an experimental dish she created called the Floooowing Lava noodles. According to her, the dish allows the cultivator to absorb fire energy at an exaggerated rate. It was just that Chef Zhao didn't know how exaggerated the rate of absorption was"

Understanding what had happened, Sect Leader Qing felt dazed.

Walking towards Elder Liu's side, Sect Leader Qing placed his right hand on her right shoulder

"I'll leave this situation to you Elder Liu"

With that, Sect Leader disappeared feeling speechless.

Elder Liu stood silent wondering if Sect Leader Qing knew of his hairs condition.

"Forget it, I'll just pretend I didn't see anything" she muttered to herself.

Despite the uncanny scene that unfolded, the sect stabilized quickly and returned to normal. Among the 24 disciples that entered the Pagoda was Zhao Chang who entered the Sect and had reached the foundation aura of rank 1. Although he wasn't technically a foundation realm cultivator, he still had an aura of one.

Zhao Chang after exiting the medical facility and seeing the uncanny fire stream, he decided to head to the Outer Sect living quarters. He wanted digest what he had experienced. Upon entering the living quarters, he suddenly felt an intense pain coming from his chest

"Argh" he screamed clutching his chest with his right hand

A few disciples heard him and saw him fall down in a fetal position.

"Zhao Chang, what happened!" cried aloud a fellow disciple

"Bring me.... to the Sect medical facility"

Unable to bear the pain, Zhao Chang responded painfully before losing conscious a second time.