Chapter Seventeen: A Drop of Blood
Normally, if Nie Qian couldn’t bear the heat, Nie Tian shouldn’t be able to endure it either.
Moreover, as Nie Tian said himself, his spiritual power didn’t resonate with the animal bone. Earlier, when the temperature of the animal bone gradually rose, Nie Tian did let go of it, which meant Nie Tian didn’t have a way to endure such a high temperature.
But now, Nie Tian dared to touch it with his hand, even after the animal bone had absorbed so much flame power and its temperature had become so unbearably high that even Nie Qian couldn’t stand it.
That, in and of itself, was already a surprise to her.
But more surprisingly, by this point Nie Tian’s finger had already been pressed against the animal bone, not moving a bit.
For the first time, Nie Qian felt she that she didn’t understand her nephew at all.
PTSSS! PTSSS!
Nie Qian watched closely as the contact point between Nie Tian’s finger and the animal bone began giving off sparks of fire.
In the meantime, Nie Tian’s mind had drifted away, and his eyes glittered with a peculiar light.
“Has he found something?” Nie Qian murmured and then quickly shut up, fearing that she would disrupt Nie Tian.
Nie Tian sensed little drops of fire, like tiny red stars, floating about in the animal bone, voluntarily moving and gathering at a point inside the animal bone.
The red spot grew larger and larger. Inside of it, strands of peculiar light mingled and flashed, as it grew even more mysterious.
He concentrated all his spiritual sense and tried to discover its secret.
BOOM!
All of a sudden, his mind shook violently, and he found himself in a grotesque and variegated world.
The entire world was covered in a reddish color; innumerable sparks of flame twinkled and strands of red light interweaved. They wriggled like snakes and kept forming different incredible patterns by the second.
Inside those sparks of flame and ever changing formations of red light, there seemingly lay the true essence of the flame power.
His spiritual awareness seemed to be swimming in a mysterious sea of fire, exploring the profound truths and mysteries that lay within.
He completely immersed himself into it.
After an unknown period of time, he felt as if he himself had turned into a fire spirit and soared across an unknown fiery heaven and earth.
Gradually, the bright red animal bone turned dark and lifeless again.
BANG!
The mysterious world of fire suddenly collapsed and exploded, causing millions of fiery sparks and strands of red light to fly off in every direction.
Nie Tian’s spiritual awareness was then violently pulled away from the miraculous land and back into the animal bone.
He saw a drop of crimson blood inside the animal bone, which then split into numerous tiny flames that dispersed into every corner of the animal bone.
Moments later, those tiny flames died out, one after another, and before long, the animal bone returned normal.
Nie Tian gradually retracted his spiritual sense and refocused on the rough texture where his finger met the animal bone.
HUFF!
He exhaled deeply, and as he pulled his finger from the animal bone, he kept his eyes fixed on it and said, “A drop of blood…”
After restraining herself for so long, Nie Qian immediately asked, “What happened?! What was going on? What did you do? How could you have withstood the high temperature of the bone?” She popped out a series of questions.
“I’m not quite sure.” Nie Tian said as his mind became lucid and clear again. “I don’t know why, but I just felt that I should touch the animal bone. When I touched it, I wasn’t hurt by the scalding heat, instead… I found something strange inside of it.”
“What do you mean?!” Nie Qian was absolutely intrigued.
“The animal bone might have absorbed enough flame power, thus innumerable fragments of flame gathered inside of it, forming what seemed to be a small drop of blood. That drop of blood itself was like a mysterious universe of fire. Then my mind spun as I seemed to enter that bizarre world of fire, and even move about inside of it.
“However, it seemed to me that that drop of blood was not completely formed.
“After a while, when the animal bone returned to normal, the drop of blood unexpectedly split into numerous little flames again, which disappeared into the bone.
“I have a feeling that the animal bone… hasn’t consumed enough flame power to complete the condensation of that drop of blood. Far from it in fact.”
“A drop of blood?” Nie Qian was full of questions. “How could there be a drop of blood inside the animal bone? And what’s more, the drop hasn’t been completely formed? This is too odd.”
Nie Tian spread his hands and said, “I don’t know what happened exactly either.”
Nie Qian pondered for a moment before she said, “I’ve run out of flamecloud gems, but your grandfather should still have some. Wait here. I’ll go find your grandfather right now!”
With these words Nie Qian left the room.
A while later, Nie Donghai entered the room together with Nie Qian, carrying an even larger cloth bag full of flamecloud gems. He handed the bag over to Nie Tian, and said, “This is my entire collection of flamecloud gems.”
Flamecloud gems were low-tier spiritual materials, and after years of mining, the Nie clan naturally had significant caches built up.
However, only those who had inner attributes of fire would be able to cultivate using the help of flamecloud gems. Neither Nie Donghai nor Nie Qian had fire attributes, therefore they didn’t save up a huge reserve.
Nie Qian’s eyes glowed as she said, “Try again.”
“Sure!” Nie Tian nodded his head.
Then, one after another, he channeled the flame power of the flamecloud gems into the piece of animal bone.
The animal bone soon turned thoroughly red, with its internal spots of flame visible to the naked eye.
After the bone absorbed the spiritual flame power from several flamecloud gems, and was burning hot, Nie Donghai reached out his hand and tried touching it. “Let me see!”
ZZZZZLA!
A streak of flame shot out of the animal bone. Nie Donghai screamed in pain and retracted his hand with an embarrassed look on his face.
Even for him, the temperature of the animal bone was too high to endure, hence he had to let go of it.
Completely astonished, he asked, “Did you say just now that Nie Tian could touch it?”
Nie Qian nodded. “Yes.”
“Nie Tian, be careful and show me,” Nie Donghai said with a serious expression.
“Wait a moment.” Nie Tian briefly shook his head and said. “It seems that we still need to wait. Only when the tiny flames inside the bone start to converge, will I be able to touch it.”
“Let it absorb more fire energy from the flamecloud gems then!” Nie Donghai instructed.
“Sure.” One by one, Nie Tian took the flamecloud gems out of the cloth bag and lay them next to the animal bone, channeling flame power of the flamecloud gems into the bone.
KAH CHA!
Every one of the flamecloud gems, after being drained of flame power, cracked and turned into pale-white normal stones.
Nie Donghai’s eyes glittered as he keenly watched the animal bone and glanced at Nie Tian from time to time, anticipation written across his face.
He had always wanted to determine whether or not there was a unique cultivation attribute hidden in Nie Tian, and he also secretly prayed that Nie Tian would reveal an amazing cultivation talent one day.
In his opinion, that piece of animal bone could be the breakthrough point.
At this point, Nie Tian noticed that the tiny flames inside the bone were once again starting to gather together at a single point. “It’s ready!”
He reached out his hand without any hesitation, and pressed his fingertip on the animal bone.
In a split second, it appeared that his spiritual sense had been sucked into the animal bone.
He sensed hundreds of sparkling flames, like tiny burning stars, racing to gather together.
In the blink of an eye, a drop of blood was formed again, and his spiritual awareness suddenly re-entered the unknown fiery dimension.
He immediately fell into a trance, however, his eyes glittered.
“He was like this before!” Nie Qian said in a low voice.
Nie Donghai’s expression flickered, and his breaths grew increasingly rapid, as he appeared to be trying to suppress the excitement in his heart.
Nie Tian’s spiritual sense started to roam about in that drop of blood, probing that world of ever twisting and changing formations of red light.
This time, he felt as though the mysterious world was vaster than before; the floating flames and interweaving red lights also became clearer and easier to catch.
It appeared that the mysterious, unknown space was reaching its complete form, after absorbing enough flame power.
From the ever moving bright spots and red strands, he vaguely discovered a mysterious fire incantation, the profound true essence of flame power.
However, even though it had absorbed fire energy from all their flamecloud gems, the mysterious space still wasn’t in its complete form.
Hence, when he tried to comprehend its secrets, he could sense that there were still things missing.
After a while, the mysterious world of fire once again collapsed, and his spiritual sense returned to his body.
Once more, he witnessed the drop of blood separate into numerous tiny flames, which gradually vanished into the animal bone, while the animal bone slowly regained its original state.
“How did it go?” Nie Donghai asked with a serious look.
Nie Tian concentrated his mind and deliberated over his choice of words, then said, “That drop of blood needs more flame power to fully form. I felt that there is either a mysterious incantation of fire was hidden in the drop of blood, or a secret regarding the power of flame.
“Excellent!” Nie Donghai was full of excitement. “I’ll get you more flamecloud gems! During this time, you must pay close attention to the changes in the animal bone, and carefully memorize any anomaly!”
“I understand,” Nie Tian said.