Chapter 83: Chapter 57: Dark Water_l
Translator: 549690339
In dreams thirty-six months, in reality one hundred and eight days.
Three years had passed.
In the Blackwater River, within Shallow Bay.
A green fish was moving sneakily.
It was over six feet long, with jade-like green scales glinting, as if radiant light was circulating. The body beneath the scales was taut, resembling a fully drawn bow, exuding a sense of strength from inside out.
An overwhelming sense of power!
As if beneath those scales, not fat, but muscles twisted like dragons’ sinew were concealed.
In fact, it had both!
In this bend of Shallow Bay, the size of the green fish had become enormous; no predators dared to provoke it, turning all the other fish into its prey.
But it still acted covertly, poking its head around and ensuring safety before it felt at ease to swim freely in Shallow Bay.
“Crack crack crack! ”
The fish flicked its tail and shot off like an arrow released from a bow, rushing to the river bed to bite a large river clam.
That’s right, bite!
Ordinary green fish only have pharyngeal teeth, unable to tear apart their prey, capable of only swallowing and grinding.
This particular green fish, however, had sharp teeth, just like those of a shark.
With one bite, it crunched the clam’s shell, and then plunged its head into the shell to enjoy the rich and sweet clam meat.
Indeed rich and sweet. After becoming a fish, even its sense of taste seemed to have changed; the clam meat, which was extremely fishy to humans, appeared unbelievably sweet and perfect as an appetizer before a meal to the fish.
After a few crunches, the clam meat was swallowed, and the green fish swam out from the clam shell with a bit of radiance flickering between its teeth.
Upon closer examination, it turned out to be a pearl, nurtured within the clam’s body.
“Crack crack crack! ”
Clasping the pearl, the fish wasted no words and crunched it up, swallowing it dnum
Afterward, it patted its belly/chest with its fins and continued to swim leisurely and hunt in the water bay. Xu Yang
Species: Green Fish (Alien Species)
Cultivation: Qi-blood realm
Lifespan: 3/29
Skills:
Swimming (Muddy Water Jiao Dragon)
Eating (Daily Devour One Ox, Form Supplementing Form, Big Fish Eat Little Fish)
Breathing (Strengthening the Body, Stabilizing Foundation and Cultivate
Essence)
Sleeping (Pacifying the Spirit and Nourishing the Soul)
Taoist Skills (Whim, Divination with Grassroots)
Martial Arts (Fish-Dragon Change, External Muscle Bone Training)
Cultivation Technique: Martial Arts Scripture Fish-Dragon Transformation!
Three years is neither long nor short.
In these three years, Xu Yang’s size had grown from less than three inches to over six feet.
It was a complete transformation, a revolution of earth and sky.
Green fish are a species that typically grow slowly. In just three years, to go from three inches to six feet is like a child of five or six years old growing into a small giant two to three meters tall in just a few months.
It was indeed exaggerated.
But looking at the skills column, it was perfectly reasonable.
Aside from the “Muddy Water Jiao Dragon” trait inherited from the start and the “Taoist Skills” specifically transmitted earlier, Xu Yang, through relentless diligence, had developed several new skill traits over the three years.
The traits for breathing and sleeping need no elaboration, as they are old friends.
What’s essential is the eating skill!
Daily Devour One Ox, Form Supplementing Form, Big Fish Eat Little Fish.
Daily Devour One Ox, a trait Xu Yang’s original form also possesses, includes lower-level traits like “digestion,” “chewing,” and “smooth flow,” enhancing his digestive and chewing capabilities, ensuring smooth excretion, thus avoiding any discomfort.
Form Supplementing Form is a new skill trait Xu Yang has cultivated, which, just as the name implies, means to supplement form by form—eat what you need to strengthen. Eating crustaceans like shrimp, crabs, and snails can significantly enhance the scales’ strength, and eating different fish results in various enhancements. Xu Yang’s sharp teeth stem from consuming carnivorous fish with sharp teeth, such as pomfret, catfish, and blackfish.
Not just fish, but whatever he could digest would bring the effect of “Form
Supplementing Form.”
For instance, the pearl he had just savored could improve the whiteness and nutrition of his scales, enhance their strength, and slightly boost his internal Qi-blood power.
With this skill, Xu Yang had evolved slightly, becoming an “Alien Species” green fish!
As for the last skill, Big Fish Eat Little Fish, it’s a trait that applies in combat.
Big fish eat little fish, little fish eat shrimp!
When one’s size is more significant than the opponent’s, all abilities are enhanced, including but not limited to strength, speed, body’s toughness, neural response, life recovery, scale armor protection, and so on. In short, as long as you are bigger than the opponent, your capacities are comprehensively enhanced-
However… it is limited to aquatic creatures such as fish, shrimps, crabs, turtles, and the like, and it also requires an underwater environment.
If the opponent is not a fish or an aquatic creature like a shrimp, crab, turtle, or soft-shelled turtle, and the battleground is on land rather than water, then the effect of “big fish eat small fish” will be lost.
There are many restrictions.
But these restrictions do not negate its value; rather, they highlight its strength and preciousness.
Xu Yang had personally experimented with it, and this characteristic of “big fish eat small fish” can currently increase an entire realm of body training.
That’s right, Muscle Bone Realm!
After a year, Xu Yang took himself as a model, continuously experimented and revised, and finally created a Martial Arts Scripture suitable for the “fish” physique that focuses on horizontal training, naming it “Fish -Dragon Transformation.”
Because of the short time and only referring to himself, the data was insufficient, so the current Fish-Dragon Transformation Cultivation Technique has only revealed three cultivation realms.
These are the Qi-blood realm corresponding to the Inner Strength realm, the Skin and Flesh Realm corresponding to the True Qi Stage, and the Muscle Bone Realm corresponding to the True Gang Realm.
Practicing this “Fish-Dragon Transformation” Cultivation Technique also allowed Xu Yang to develop martial arts skills and gain two new traits— Fish-Dragon Change and External Muscle Bone Training.
The Fish-Dragon Change can enhance the cultivation effect of the “Fish-Dragon Transformation” and gradually turn the “fish body” into a dragon’s body.
That’s right, transforming into a dragon!
When creating the Fish-Dragon Transformation body training method, Xu Yang referred to the dragon-subduing concept of the Descending Dragon Palm.
The Descending Dragon Palm is about subduing one’s inner dragon to master one’s power, thereby achieving a rebirth and reaching the ultimate martial arts state.
The Fish-Dragon Transformation takes this as its core concept, similarly subduing the self, mastering the self, controlling body evolution, and eventually transforming fish into dragons.
According to Xu Yang’s ideas, as long as this Fish-Dragon Transformation continues to improve and he persists in practicing, it is absolutely possible to eventually transform from fish to dragon; even if not becoming a True Dragon, one could become fish-dragon species such as Jiao Dragons or other dragon-like alien beasts.
Now that the martial arts skill of Fish-Dragon Change has emerged, it aligns even more with his ideas.
Pursuing this development, if he persists, there will come a day when he can undergo a rebirth and change from fish into a dragon!
Compared to the Fish-Dragon Change, the other trait “External Muscle Bone Training” does not seem so impressive and can only enhance the effect of body training.
But it’s still satisfying and better than nothing.
Indeed, with these skill traits assisting, coupled with his newly created Fish-Dragon Transformation Cultivation Technique, Xu Yang was able to transform from a nutritionally deficient, nearly three-inch-long little green fish into a powerful six-foot-long being in just three years, with a strong physique, covered in green scale jade armor, and sharp fangs and teeth.
Not to mention Shallow Bay, which lacks big fish, even if he enters the Blackwater River where big fish swarm and many monstrous aquatic creatures exist, he would still be considered significant… in the fish world!
That’s right, Blackwater River!
Although as a fish Xu Yang could not communicate with the outside world. by
chance, he poked his head out of the water to survey the surroundings and overheard a conversation among passersby on the bank, from which he learned the name of this river.
This river is called Blackwater!
When he first heard this name, Xu Yang was very shocked, even a bit panicked.
Blackwater River, it seems there is also one in “Journey to the West”!
Could it be the same?
Did he inadvertently travel to the fantastical world of “Journey to the West” inhabited by gods and Buddhas?
What a joke?
Xu Yang was somewhat shocked, but soon he calmed down, investigated carefully, and ultimately discovered…
It should just be a coincidence in name.
This Blackwater River is not the Blackwater River from “Journey to the West.”
Because he had roamed the river for more than a year and had not seen any shrimp soldiers or crab generals, let alone the second -generation good-for-nothing little kappa crook that occupied people’s cave mansions, kidnapped their daughters, and insisted on eating Monk Tang’s flesh.
So, it is almost certain that the two rivers simply share the same name.
Having confirmed it was not the world of “Journey to the West,” Xu Yang felt much more at ease and began to explore the Blackwater River step by step.
Firstly, the river can be divided into three areas: the outermost Shallow Bay, the middle Deepwater area, and the innermost and true “Blackwater” Blackwater area.
Shallow Bay is a normal water area with regular fish, and the most that happens is the occasional appearance of big fish from the deep water, but nothing too extravagant.
The Deepwater area is different; the water starts to turn black, and there are many strange fish and even monstrous aquatic creatures living there, with fierce competition, and many big fish die fighting each other every day.
Regarding this, Xu Yang found it somewhat incomprehensible.
The world of wild beasts is simple and not as complicated as that of humans. Wild beasts typically fight each other for only two reasons: first, for hunting and survival, and second, for mating and propagation.
Besides these, few things are worth the risk of injury or death for wild beasts to fight.
However, the situation in the Deepwater area breaks this common sense.
The big fish fight fiercely in the Deepwater area, not for hunting, nor for mating.
Why is that?
Xu Yang couldn’t be sure himself but had a feeling that these big fish, like gu insects raised by humans, are driven to fight and kill each other under the urging of a certain will or factor, for the purpose of elevation and evolution.
Xu Yang trusts his instincts very much.
Therefore, he could be certain that the water of Blackwater River was not only black but also profoundly deep!
After the Deepwater area comes the Blackwater area, which he defined as the
“forbidden zone.”
The water in that region is completely black, thick as paste, giving off an extremely dangerous vibe.
Xu Yang has yet to venture into that area.
After all, he’s only at the first realm of body training, how could he possibly enter the unfathomable and terrifying Blackwater area?
Don’t even mention entering, even approaching is difficult, because the periphery of the Blackwater area is guarded by powerful aquatic creatures and top-level overlords from the Deepwater area, as if the Blackwater benefits them greatly; they squat there and are simply unwilling to leave.
The last time Xu Yang went there to check it out, a large corpulent catfish nibbled at him, almost splitting his back open.