Chapter 10: True self and Fake Mask

"Your current aptitude should be B grade!"

Hearing this, Li Gang frowned. 'How can one's aptitude be increased? What truly is an aptitude of a person?'

He directly asked. "Do you know what is an aptitude?"

Wang Xueyao looked at him and said: "There is no such thing as an aptitude. There is only compatibility between soul and body. If your soul is properly synchronized with your body, then your aptitude will be higher. The only reason Spiritual Imprint helps in increasing Cultivation speed is because it helps in syncing the body and soul!"

Li Gang thought inwardly. 'Now that I think about it, she is right. If a body and soul are 100% synced, then the person would be a perfect human! But, there is no such thing as 100% in this probabilistic world, the more synced body is with soul, the lower probability becomes for more synchronization! My low talent is probably because my soul is from another world and body from this world, which might have caused incompatibility in between.'

5 year passed like a breeze.

Li Gang and Wang Xueyao had been wandering together and farming benefits here and there. These days, Li Gang's vision of world took a new change. He has evolved from a bookworm to a person with real world knowledge, thanks to Wang Xueyao.

He saw many spiritual plants, beasts, different kinds of spiritual stones in last year. He also realised this place contains various materials for making poisons, and also made few of them. They met very few people during this time! But, ignoring them Li Gang and Wang Xueyao continued their journey. Not only that, he specifically learnt many languages from Wang Xueyao. She is a walking Wisdom to an ignorant being like him.

'Soon, I will reach peak stage rank 2!'

Li Gang has already reached rank 2 late stage few months ago! As soon as he realised that training in this place gives him more benefits, he doubled the effort of his Cultivation, and halved his efforts of learning skills and sharpening his mind.

Even this isn't sufficient for him to reach such stage so early, the Celestial Serenity Technique also played a crucial role!

Suddenly a loud bang sounded, catching Wang Xueyao and Li Gang off guard. Wang Xueyao immediately came over and asked: "What happened?"

Li Gang's face was serious. He was looking at a certain direction and said. "I don't know, it seems someone is fighting over there. Looking at the explosion, it has to be a rank 5 Warrior fighting."

Wang Xueyao suddenly activated a Secret Technique, and her face turned serious.

"It's rank 5 Spiritual Beast, Spiritfire Wolf. Against it, few Thunderous peak sect members are fighting."

Li Gang's face also turned serious. Spiritfire Wolf is not something they can face at this stage! Even though Wang Xueyao is peak rank 5 Warrior, she can't defeat a rank 5 stage Beast, without any loss.

An average Beasts are stronger as compared to the Warriors of same rank, though they do lack intelligence.

Li Gang thought of something and said. "Let's save them!"

Wang Xueyao looked at him deeply. 'He is too soft. It seems he never killed anyone before.'

She isn't wrong. Even though Li Gang has adapted to this world, but he has never seen real life cruelty of this world. He has yet to experience many things. There is huge difference between theoretical knowledge and practical knowledge. Even in his previous life, he was only good at theoretical knowledge, but when it comes to real life implementation, he couldn't do that good.

Wang Xueyao said coldly. "If you want to save them, go on your own. I am not interested."

Li Gang looked at her and said. "I am not doing charity saving people for no reason. Our efficiency is too low, and we are low on time. Using them as tools, we can increase our profits multiple times."

Wang Xueyao teased him: "Oh, I thought you are too soft!"

Li Gang looked at her and said. "I am indeed soft. I really can't bear to see them killed, but I won't take such risk for nothing. If they put themselves in such danger, then they should be prepared to make choices."

Wang Xueyao looked at him and said: "Let's go."

While living with Li Gang for a year, she has also changed a bit. Usually, she would have talked more. But, the way Li Gang utilises his time, she admired him. Subconsciously, she also started avoid wasting time! This is true for any person. If you start living with someone, you start copying them subconsciously, even if it is only to very minute level.

Soon they reached the region where the fight was going on. Three rank 4s were fighting against the rank 5 beast. It seems Thunderous peak disciples are having an advantage!

Li Gang looked at the situation and frowned. 'They don't need our help at all. I wasted my time coming here.'

Wang Xueyao looked at the scene and her smile deepened. She took out a pouch from her space ring.

A space ring is a Spiritual tool developed by a Forger who has mastered Space element to certain degree! It contains internal space, which can vary depending on the level of the ring. It is used for storing various non living objects. It's not that living beings can't be stored, but it doesn't have the necessary environment to sustain the survival, like breathing environment, temperature, etc.

There are various types of space ring, for different storage purposes like, storing food requires a cold environment, storing grains requires a dry environment, storing spiritual plants also require special space rings suitable for safekeeping them and even space rings to store space rings!

Wang Xueyao took out a blood red pill and pinched it and threw it in the direction of the fight. Li Gang's face changed at this.

He shouted immediately. "What did you do?"

Wang Xueyao narrowed her eyes. "Lower your voice."

Li Gang immediately shut down his mouth. He knew, he can't loose his temper. His behaviour is getting out of his control now. He has to keep them in check. A strategic mind can conquer any mad beast! Not to mention, what happened can't be reversed back.

"You are increasing the rage of the beast so that it can fight more harshly? Is that your way of forcing them to ask for help?"

Wang Xueyao ignored him and keep looking at everything coldly.

Li Gang suddenly thought: "No, they would never ask anyone for help who is below rank 4 Warrior. They might use us as a decoy, but given the situation, they first have to figure out how to run away before they could use us as decoy. That beast is not giving them any chance. She likely want to be a bystander who farms benefits after two sides finished dealing each other."

Li Gang sighed. "You are really cruel, is there a need to kill innocents?"

Wang Xueyao looked at him with disdain but didn't say anything. Li Gang started thinking about many ways to save them, but couldn't find one. He felt bitter and helpless, but still didn't give up and keep thinking of various solutions.

Suddenly one of the rank 4 Warrior pushed his team mate to the Wolf's mouth and making use of the time, ran away towards Li Gang and Wang Xueyao.

Li Gang was shocked at his cruelty. Even though he knew lot about this cruel world, experiencing in real life and merely knowing about them is like the difference of heaven and earth!

Liu Jingsheng ran towards Li Gang and Wang Xueyao. He suddenly looked towards them and became cautious!

'This brat is no danger, he is only rank 2 Warrior. But that girl seems dangerous. She looks mortal on the outside, but how can a mortal come inside an inheritance? She is obviously hiding her cultivation!'

He avoided Wang Xueyao and caught Li Gang and threw him towards the Wolf chasing him! Wang Xueyao looked at everything coldly without any intention of intervening!

Li Gang knew, he is just a useless person in view of Wang Xueyao. But somehow she is keeping him alive, mainly due to some special bloodlines or special humans, who don't possess Spiritual Imprint but Special Ability. She is only curious why he don't possess any of them.

'I don't believe last few years companionship is enough to move her! I am not narcissist enough to believe I have such charm. She might not care about anything, I have to do something!'

But as soon as he fell in front of the Wolf, his body was accompanied by huge fear! His mind went blank again.

"What to do? What should I do?!"

This fear was not as much as he faced Wang Xueyao! He could move and speak, but he became blank! He didn't know what to do.

Looking at the razer sharp claws coming towards him, he dodged subconsciously and fell towards one of the rank 4 Warrior, who has fainted due to previous battle. Without thinking anything, he immediately used the Warrior as a shield to block the upcoming attack!

Even though he survived the attack, the momentum not only killed the rank 4 Warrior, but even Li Gang was thrown towards one of the tree and crashed, breaking through it's trunk flew few more meters before stopping miserably. The tree was a lower grade one and helped him reduce the momentum. If it was higher grade tree, instead of breaking, it would remain sturdy and Li Gang might have died when crashed. At least, he would not be able to recover within a year.

At that moment, suddenly the head of the Spiritfire Wolf was separated from it's body. Li Gang only heard a familiar footstep before he lost his senses and fainted.

Wang Xueyao came slowly towards the body of the beast, and took away it's Core. 

Whether it is human or beasts, after achieving rank 4, they form a Core within their body. For humans, it is called Heavenly core, but for beasts, it is called Beastly Core. It is a very good supplement for those rank 4 to rank 6 Warriors in their cultivation. They can absorb the essence of Beastly Core to supplement the Heavenly Core!

Only after taking it did she glanced towards Li Gang with contempt as she remembered his previous words.

'You are really cruel, is there a need to kill innocents?'

She murmured at him with contempt: "A person's true self is only revealed in the life and death situations. You looked down at me for involving innocents, then what did you do? Kill innocents to save your meagre life?"

Without looking at him anymore and without caring, she left forward.