Elder Ragur smiled and shook his head as he watched John plummeted to the ground below. A small object suddenly appeared in his hands, and Elder Ragur channeled his Qi into it. Some time later, another person suddenly appeared in the air next to the drake that Elder Ragur stood on.
He wore the same grey Enforcement Hall robes as Elder Ragur, signifying that he was an Elder himself.
Elder Ragur turned to the newcomer.
"The boy below will be in this forest for the next three months. Watch over him secretly, and make sure no fatal harm comes to him. Other than that, do not interfere."
"It will be done."
The newcomer nodded in affirmation, and his figure suddenly vanished from sight. Elder Ragur turned his eyes back down towards John for a moment before the drake once more took to the skies, returning to the Heavenly LIghtning Sect.
…
John braced himself for impact as he crashed into a tree's canopy. Branches continuously shattered as he crashed through them violently, and continued to plummet to the ground below.
Boom!
John's feet landed on the solid ground, causing a loud sound to echo throughout the forest. The force of the landing sent a wave of pain through his body, and his organs shifted slightly, but he was unharmed for the most part.
He looked up at the tree he had just fallen from, and was able to see the hole he had carved into its canopy. Many branches, both thick and thin, had been snapped in half from his quick descent.
'The tree branches slowed my descent by quite a bit. Otherwise, that would have hurt a lot more. I can't wait until I'm able to start flying. Then I won't have to deal with things like this.'
Once one reached the Core Formation Realm, they were able to start using their powerful Qi to take flight and propel themselves through the skies. However, John was still quite a ways away from the Core Formation Realm, making him quite envious of those who were in that realm already.
John's head turned to observe his surroundings. In every direction as far as the eye could see, towering trees dominated the mountainous landscape. Their canopies stretched hundreds of yards high, and many massive branches on the way up held various beasts that were staring at him. The forest was blanketed in a perpetual shade, due to the trees blocking most of the sunlight.
"Mist Creation beasts huh? Let's explore and see if I can find any Qi Condensation beasts to test out my strength. I also need to start gathering beast blood essence, so I have plenty of reserves for the entrance exam."
John proceeded to walk through the forest for some time, curiously observing everything within. The forest was littered with areas scarred by battle, clearly due to fights between cultivators and beasts. Many towering trees were cut clean in half, their long trunks littering the forest floor. Sharp scars in both trees and earth hinted towards the attacks used in those battles.
An ancient feeling permeated throughout the forest, making John feel quite insignificant within.
Before long, John walked into a slight clearing in the mountainous forest. One hundred yards ahead of him, he could see a massive nest, housing three large eggs. Behind the eggs, a giant lizard, nearly twenty feet long and eight feet tall was sleeping.
"An early stage Qi Condensation Red Scaled Lizard? This should be a good test fight to gauge my strength."
John started walking towards the lizard, with no intention of hiding his presence. The lizard quickly noticed John's arrival. It powerfully hissed at him, attempting to drive it away from the eggs.
"I'll leave your eggs alone, but come entertain me for a bit," John commented, stopping fifty yards from the nest.
The lizard noticed his provocation, and quickly dashed towards him. The ground quaked slightly with every step it took, and it reached John within a second.
Boom!
A fist collided with the head of the lizard, knocking it back slightly. John quickly dashed forward once more, raining a barrage of fist blows on the lizards head and body. He was using his fists at the moment to test the new strength of his body.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
The rapid barrage of punches continued to rain down on the lizard, causing its scales to shatter and its blood to flow. The lizard hissed in pain, and quickly turned around, sending its massive tail directly towards John.
The tail collided with John's body, sending him flying back violently towards the treeline. His body collided with a large tree, causing it to snap directly in half.
He slowly stood up and wiped the blood from his lips as the massive tree behind him crashed into the ground. The ground shook from the weight of the tree crashing violently to the forest floor, and dust kicked up all around them.
"Not bad. Let's kick this up a notch. Supreme Battle Art!"
John once again dashed towards the lizard.
The sound of powerful blows continued to echo throughout the forest, and trees were constantly snapped in half and crashing into the forest floor below. Before long, the area near the nest of eggs was littered with fallen trees and sunken craters in the ground, depicting a story of the battle that had taken place.
...
John sat on top of the unmoving body of the lizard with a satisfied smile on his face. His robes were torn in many places, and blood was smeared on his body, from both the lizard and himself. His breathing was somewhat heavy, but other than that, he was mostly unharmed.
Below him, the corpse of the lizard rested. Its body was broken in many places and blood covered all of its scales, showing the brutal beating it had taken in their fight.
A piece of meat was forcefully ripped off of its corpse, and John sent a slight stream of gentle lightning into the piece, slowly cooking it.
"While I may not know any lightning battle arts yet, at least I can use my lightning like this," John chuckled as he cooked the piece of meat before biting into it. His eyes lit up at the taste of the meat.
"Not bad."
He added some salt to it from his storage ring, and continued to eat the juicy piece of meat while he ruminated over the battle he had just fought.
'My body alone, augmented by the Supreme Battle Art, is enough to defeat and kill an early Qi Condensation beast. If I were to throw in my scythe, as well as my Divine Reaping Scythe, I'm sure I could more than hold my own against a mid Qi Condensation beast. My strength has truly grown a lot in such a short time.'
John was quite pleased with his progress, which had grown rapidly in just a short span of time.
'I wonder how strong my battle prowess will be when I use the Immortal Asura Transformation Art on top of all of that.'
The Immortal Asura Transformation Art was a physical transformation of John's body, and it provided an immense strength increase to him. It was his peak battle state, however, it required an equally immense amount of blood essence to maintain.
'It provides me a massive power boost, but from the small amount of time that I used it before, I can tell that it was putting a great strain on my body. I estimate that I can use it for a minute at most, before I am no longer able to endure the stress on my body. I'll need to save it as a trump card. However, I need to test it out in battle, at least once, to fully quantify how much more powerful I am in that state.'
John finished eating the piece of meat and hopped off the body of the lizard. He made a small incision on the lizard's forehead and drew its blood essence from its body, before storing both the lizard's corpse and blood essence in his palace realm.
He walked over to the nest of three eggs next.
"These won't survive without their parents to guard them, but I can't store living things in my palace realm or storage ring, so I'll leave them here. Maybe their other parent will show up soon. Either way, good luck!"
John walked through the forest once more, seeking powerful beasts to battle. Before long, he ran into the territory of another powerful beast. It was a large Spike-spined Snake, nearly thirty yards long, and its power signified it was equivalent to a mid Qi Condensation cultivator.
John's face lit up as he noticed the snake.
"I've already cleared the surrounding area, and you're the only strong beast here. You'll be the perfect target dummy to test my full strength."
He slowly walked towards the snake, which hissed at him in anger. It was unable to deter the boy from approaching, and so its massive mouth, filled with two sharp fans, lunged directly towards him.
John smiled confidently at the approaching snake as a scythe appeared in his hands and his eyes slowly turned blood red.