"Divine ability—truly marvelous." Having tested his Illness Qi Sword Finger once more, An Jing said in admiration, "Even without any illness qi, I can still channel my own Blood Qi into a flying sword."
"Though its power is a bit inferior to a pistol-class sword case, and it does some damage to my finger meridians, once my physique grows stronger and my Blood Qi more vigorous in the future, I might not even need any hidden weapons—I could unleash this technique anytime, anywhere!"
"That's the convenience of a technique derived from a divine ability—it's as nimble as your own hands and feet."
Watching the crater left by the Illness Qi Sword Finger through An Jing's eyes, the Sword Spirit smiled. "After all, all Destiny Pattern divine abilities originate from 'Heaven'—each is one facet of a world's Great Dao."
"A divine ability that a postnatal cultivator develops may be mightier than a Destiny Pattern divine ability, and its effects may be more refined and effective, but in terms of 'universal compatibility,' most of them fall short."
"It's like humans observing birds and creating their own wings—wings that can be faster than birds, steadier, and able to fly higher, the strongest of all kinds of wings."
"But human wings, in the end, are only one facet of 'all wings,' not the whole of them."
"From what I know, quite a few sects' founding masters were divine-ability wielders who bore a Destiny Pattern. They analyzed their own divine abilities, turned them into techniques and cultivation methods, and passed them down, giving rise to an entire great lineage—one even mightier and more refined than the original Destiny Pattern."
"But that was only the very beginning. Before long, the way of Qi Refining cultivation surpassed the shackles of Destiny Pattern divine abilities, and all manner of technique lineages with no connection to Destiny Patterns were created."
"Yet by the same token, this 'expansion and enrichment of lineage' could also strengthen 'Destiny Pattern divine abilities.' Take a wing-type divine ability: at first it could only fly; later it could fly with astonishing speed, as fast as the Golden Crow or the great Peng bird; and in time it could even break through realms and shuttle across them, ranging freely through the void..."
At this point the Sword Spirit's tone took on a note of feeling: "After circling round and round for thousands upon thousands of years, today's Huaixu has come back around to the very source of cultivation, one rooted in Destiny Patterns."
"Only this time, the vessel is not Qi Refining, but the Martial Path."
"Everything begins anew... The Great Dao is the cycle; the cycle is the Great Dao."
An Jing could understand the Sword Spirit's sentiment. For an immortal sword like Him, who had lived through the vast ages, He could probably witness the transformations and cycles of the Great Dao with His own eyes.
But to him, all of it merely stirred a surge of heroic ambition: "In that case, if in the future I can put my divine ability to all sorts of uses, then I too could found my own sect, leave behind my own lineage, and even become the founding patriarch of an entire branch of the Dao!"
"Mm... perhaps."
The Fuxie Sword Spirit answered simply—perhaps dismissively, perhaps with a cautious sort of approval. But An Jing didn't care about any of that; he merely laughed aloud, then went on preparing his future emergency rations.
His time in Another World was soon to end. He was about to return to the Huaixu Realm and thread his way through the mountain forests.
By then, he would have no time to hunt for game, nor could he afford to leave any traces for pursuers to follow.
With time to spare, An Jing roasted a full ten-odd jin of Dangkang boar jerky, along with a great quantity of the nutrient-rich symbiotic root tendrils.
He also carefully cut away the two pairs of Dangkang boar tusks and stowed them away—the place where a spirit beast's spiritual essence concentrates could surely serve as material for some kind of pill or for artifact-crafting, and might fetch at least a little coin.
Compared with all the resources on the two Dangkang boars, this was merely a scrap among scraps, but right now he had no time to worry about the waste, so he took only the finest parts.
If other beasts happened upon the rest, they could count themselves blessed by nature's gift.
The sun set behind the western mountains, and the evening clouds cleared away.
The heavy rain had stopped, and An Jing's time in Another World was about to run out.
In the last quarter hour, An Jing left the cave and raced at top speed down the mountain, toward the wilderness beyond the forest's edge, where there were signs of human habitation.
It was no coincidence that the two Dangkang boars had gone into the cave to shelter from the rain; that place was likely a spot where the beasts of the area came to rest and hide. Now that he had killed the boars, their flesh and blood would draw other beasts as well.
He would most likely stay in the Huaixu Realm for only a day, and a single day was too short. The beasts drawn by the Dangkang boars' flesh and blood were most likely still prowling about nearby. Given that, he should get as far away as he could.
An Jing was in peak condition now, and he ran with tremendous speed. Along his path, birds and sparrows scattered in every direction, and the beasts of the mountain forest grew alarmed and uneasy.
Even the fiercest savage and ferocious beasts, for all their absolute confidence in their own strength, would not act rashly when they could not make sense of the situation—lest they be the first to stick their heads out and expose an opening.
When caught off guard, whether a fierce tiger or a wild hare, the first instinct is to 'avoid.'
Of course, soon enough, once those ferocious beasts sensed that An Jing's lingering scent was not 'strong,' they would naturally fly into a rage and hunt down the human who had trespassed on their territory.
By then, however, An Jing would already have left this world.
As he ran, the three sword lights around the broken sword in his Divine Sea all went out at once, and An Jing felt a pulling sensation that came from his very soul—indeed, from something even more fundamental.
A silver radiance flared up, transforming into layer upon layer of exquisitely intricate, arcane runes and sword marks that encircled his whole body.
The next instant, An Jing vanished.
All that remained were the cold ashes in the distant cave, along with the two Dangkang boars' butchered bones and flesh.
The Huaixu Realm.
In the crevice between space and time, An Jing—now nothing but a ball of light—saw a mountain range built out of silver streaks of light.
It was precisely the 'spherical space' with a radius of one li, centered on the origin point from which he had first been transported to Another World.
"So this is the arrival point I can choose."
Through the broken sword, An Jing sensed that he could choose to descend at any single point within this spherical space-time of one-li radius—whether in midair or deep underground.
So long as he could withstand it—if his body was tough enough to burst stone apart—he could even transport himself inside solid rock.
Of course, he couldn't do that now, and he had only ten breaths in which to choose.
After a moment's thought, he chose to descend deep in the mountain forest, into a secluded gully.
The Huaixu Realm—the mountain forests around Suspended Fate Manor.
At the hour of sunset, dark-gold twilight smeared across the mountains and wilds.
Without a sound, a dim silver light drew open a sword mark in the empty darkness. The sword mark widened into a door, and An Jing stepped through, appearing deep within the impenetrable forest.
An Jing had long since studied the terrain around Suspended Fate Manor during his daily training. The very instant he returned to the Huaixu Realm, having fixed his bearings, he immediately put on a burst of speed, and his figure vanished among the shadows of the trees.
After breaking through to Inner Breath and awakening his Spirit Root, An Jing's physique had been strengthened in every aspect—his strength, his speed, and his perception had all risen enormously.
Even laden with plenty of supplies, he could leap over a rock two zhang high in a single bound, and even over the tangled terrain of the mountain forest he could cover three zhang in an instant.
What's more, so long as he channeled Inner Breath into his legs and employed Mysterious Step, An Jing could not only effortlessly evade every obstacle along the way at full tilt, but also do so without making the slightest sound.
After only about half a quarter-hour of full-speed running, An Jing had raced nearly ten li. His face was not flushed and his breath not short; he had merely spent a portion of his Inner Breath, and could keep up such a full-speed run for more than another shichen.
And An Jing's decisive action had indeed spared him a good deal of trouble.
Rustle.
About half a quarter-hour after An Jing returned to Huaixu, accompanied by the faint sound of treading on grass and dry twigs, two brown-armored soldiers silently emerged from among the plants and the shadows of the trees.
"Strange—no traces?"
The patterns on his armor seemed ready to melt into the jungle. The young soldier examined the surrounding growth but found no beast tracks at all, and couldn't help muttering in puzzlement, "The grand formation clearly detected a medium-sized human or beast appearing here."
"Maybe a Cloud-Treading Leopard, or some other ferocious beast with the power to hide itself and tread the air."
Another soldier, his voice steady, was also surveying the area. The armor on his body was slowly shifting from dark green to brown—clearly a kind of color-changing spirit armor that could mimic its surroundings.
The steady soldier likewise found no clues, but his tone did not change, as though he had long since grown used to it: "Even though the area around Suspended Fate Valley was long ago sealed off by the grand formation to keep the Extramundane Demon's corruption from spreading—so that even beasts coming and going would be detected—"
"—the 'Demon-Observing Formation' is only keen to demonic qi. Any ordinary spirit beast or ferocious beast, so long as it's fast enough, can come and go as it pleases before the grand formation reacts."
"Look."
Now the soldier found a scattering of crushed leaves and broken twigs. Bending down, he sniffed carefully. "Something did pass through here—but it wasn't a demon beast, nor a demon person."
"Its aura is pure and clear, carrying the fragrance of some kind of plant. It should be some sort of spirit beast."
"Should we chase it?" The other was clearly a newcomer, his tone eager for the hunt.
At this, the more experienced soldier sighed. "It's not a demon beast—why chase it? We're Demon-Imprisoning Guards, not Five-Color Armor Guards. Catching this kind of spirit beast earns no merit, and delaying our patrol duty counts as a fault."
"Besides, what if we actually caught up to it?"
He left the sentence unfinished, but the meaning was plain enough. The young soldier weighed his own strength, the spirit beast's strength, and the pay that he and his comrades drew, and had to admit that the veteran knew best: "Then we..."
"We drove off a ferocious beast that trespassed into the sealed zone," the veteran said. "To protect the grand formation's integrity, two dutiful Demon-Imprisoning Guards fought it in a great battle and used up a good many supply pills."
"It works like that!" The young soldier's eyes lit up with understanding. "Got it!"
The two Demon-Imprisoning Guards left.
Several more shichen passed.
The sunlight had wholly faded, and the full moon hung at the zenith.
Beneath a pale-blue veil of moonlight, a red-armored soldier who seemed like a spectral wraith stepped out from the shadows of the trees.
Chapter 63