Chapter 114: Steal the Lamp
Translator: StackThatCoin Editor: Hitesh
It was late at night. There was a sound of snoring coming from Duke Yan Le's Mansion like the rumbling of thunder. It was so loud that even the nearby ground was shaking.
Upon arriving at the mansion just now, Wu Qi roughly mentioned today's strange encounter to Lu Chengfeng. When Lu Chengfeng heard that Yan Dan had bestowed Wu Qi with the title of Marquis Tianyun and gifted him 130 cities as his fief, even assigning twelve demon bear brothers who had formed their Gold Core to serve Wu Qi, he couldn't contain his excitement and cheered. Hastily, he ordered someone to prepare a grand feast filled with good liquor and meat. A celebration banquet was held in Duke Yan Le's Mansion for Wu Qi's extraordinary fortune. Yet, under Wu Qi's deliberate control, Lu Chengfeng, Xiong Qing, and all his brothers were drunk with liquor, and currently, were sleeping soundly in their own room.
The snoring that sounded like the roaring of thunder was coming from Xiong Qing and his brothers. When these twelve demon bears were drunk, they would transform back into their bear form. When twelve huge black bears who stood over twenty to thirty feet tall snored together, the loud noises could definitely make those with a weaker mind feel painful and wish to kill themselves. Wu Qi guessed with a rather mischievous mind, ‘Was it all because of their loud snoring that made Yan Dan generously throw these bear brothers to him?’
From the lake in the backyard, Wu Qi drew out a large clump of misty water vapor. Hiding amidst the water vapor, he dashed out from Duke Yan Le's Mansion like a sharp arrow being shot out of a bowstring, rushing toward Mount White Sun located outside the city. When he left the city, Wu Qi pulled out a flying sword of lower tier magical item, turning himself into a dim three feet long sword beam. Then, he carefully flew at a low height, against the grass and through woods, towards Mount White Sun.
While riding on the sword and flying at a great speed, Wu Qi kept thinking about what he saw and heard today. He felt really surprised, as it was the devil in their minds that prevented Yan Dan and his brothers from breaking out of the realm of Gold Core. Yet, with just a few words he simply made up on the spot, it actually made them obtain the breakthrough smoothly. It made Wu Qi wonder what these men were doing during the last two thousand years. He was also thinking about Xiong Qing and his brothers. All twelve of them were demons, real demons, demon bears who had formed their Gold Core. If they were brought back to the Earth, their only fate would be being captured by some scientists and have their body dissected for the research. Or perhaps, they would be kept captive in a large cage, and have their gall juice extracted every day.
As they were demon bears who could transform into human shape, the effectiveness of their gall juice must be many times stronger than those ordinary black bears.
"Demons, they are real demons!" Wu Qi kept sighing with emotions, expressing his awe for this world full of magical and peculiar things.
Above him was a dome of pale-green sky, marked with slowly fleeting, thin, white clouds, decorated with a great array of bright stars, which were so bright that their glow lit up the entire sky and earth. Riding on the sword beam, Wu Qi flew against the coming wind on this silent night. He felt his body was light, as if he was an Immortal that was riding on a cloud and wandering in this land of wonder. It was such a magical and miraculous world! At that moment, a sudden enlightenment struck Wu Qi; his footsteps would not be bound within this Great Yan Dynasty, and he would not be bound in this tiny dome of sky.
In the future, he would definitely follow all the records found in Scroll of Stealing, bringing himself to those strange and peculiar places, to see how those places looked like, and to widen his horizon. He wanted to stand on the pinnacle of this world, so he could enjoy the even more splendid and extraordinary scenes and strange matters. Great Yan Dynasty was just the beginning, and it was far from the end.
Within his water meridians located in both arms, pure and condensed energy kept rushing out from two Gold Cores of water element. Driven by this powerful energy, the speed of Wu Qi riding on flying sword was at least two times faster than riding on a single-horned deer. In just fifteen minutes, he had arrived before the gateway of Mount White Sun. Without alerting anybody, he went straight past the gateway up to the mountain.
The defensive formation of Mount White Sun was deployed by some latecomers. The most advanced formations could be constructed by the Master of Arrays in Great Yan Dynasty was merely an array with eight pillars, barely reaching the level of Array of Eight Trigrams. On the other hand, Heaven Breaking Sword Sect did not cultivate their own Master of Arrays, and the Master of Arrays hired externally didn't perform their best effort in constructing the defensive formation for Mount White Sun. As a result, they merely constructed a 'Heavenly Fire and Ice Formation of Reversed Five Elements'.
It was an elementary and simple formation which Wu Qi simply ignored and passed through without triggering it. After bypassing the formation, he avoided some little and secretly placed alerting mechanisms along the way, and dodged a couple dozens of teams of Heaven Breaking Sword Sect's apprentices, who were on night patrol. Stealthily, Wu Qi eventually came to the foot of the main peak.
The surroundings were quiet, and not even a soul was in sight. Wu Qi took a deep breath, as a large curtain of water vapor suddenly surged up around him, turning into a few threads of passing clouds that had no fixed shape. They swallowed him up, and together with a gentle night breeze, they brought him lightly up to the cliff. Wu Qi's body had dissolved into the watery clouds. The 'Escape Art of Watery Cloud' in Scroll of Stealing had helped him conceal his body, as his body had now transformed into a passing cloud. Without alerting the large flock of white cranes resting on the cliff, he floated up to the top of the cliff, as if treading on air.
The numerous large holes on the top of the cliff, which were created by the thunderbolts Princess Zhang Le unintentionally summoned during the daytime, had been patched and leveled up. However, those ancient pine trees smote by thunderbolt were now all gone. Wu Qi saw nobody here, and he did not hesitate. He tilted his head slightly up and looked into the sky, then hastily dashed into the Immortal's Cave, striding past a few layers of defensive mechanisms and arrays. In his eyes, the outermost three layers of illusionary arrays were like nothing. As for the formation that consisted of 108 array pillars which was constructed inside the cave, under the skillful control of his divine sense, it didn't bring its supposed function into play, and was bypassed with ease.
Right at this very moment, there was a bright gleam glinting from Wu Qi's eyes, as he felt a deep gratitude towards the man who gave him the Scroll of Stealing. Without the profound, vast, and in-depth knowledge of arrays in it, how could he come into this place with such a leisurely manner? After all, this place was the heart of Heaven Breaking Sword Sect, the sect that ranked the first among all thirteen sects of cultivating Dao of Immortals in Great Yan Dynasty.
Stealthily and quietly, he entered the Immortal's Cave. With a single leap, he crossed the little river that was filled with immense natural energies. He did not use the jade bridge to cross the river, as it was deployed with at least eighteen secret alerting mechanisms. Abundant natural energies filled every inch of this cave, and white mist condensed from natural energies was hovering and lingering everywhere. Once again, Wu Qi transformed into a wisp of white cloud and mixed himself into the white mist and took a quick tour of the cave. Very soon, he had a clear understanding of what everybody was doing in the cave.
Nie Baihong was not in the cave. Supposedly, he was at his own residence of the Sect Leader. There were sixteen Human Immortals of Gold Core realm in the cave. Two of them had the cultivation of middle tier Gold Core realm, while all the other fourteen had just formed their Gold Core not long ago. Each of them had occupied one pavilion on their own, sitting in a lotus position and meditating, completing their homework of night-cultivation. In the deepest area of the cave, inside a little weapon forging room hewed on a rock wall, Nie Yaonu was seen using the flame of lava and crafting three flying swords that were clad in a leaping flame.
Due to the energy from the flame of earth's core being overly powerful, its gas was shooting and springing into all directions, nearly dispersing the watery cloud which Wu Qi was hiding in. As a result, Wu Qi could barely give Nie Yaonu a quick peek, who was now focusing all her attention on crafting the swords, then hastily left the weapon forging room. Though it was a quick glance, Wu Qi had brought himself a clear understanding with regards to Nie Yaonu's level in weapon crafting. All the materials she used were of excellent quality, and all three flying swords were crafted using the 'Iron of Flaming Thunder', which was extracted from the 'Sands of Flaming Thunder' found in the lava rock deep in the earth's core, and its age was at least ten thousand years. It was a material with the characteristic of pure toughness and Yang[1], an excellent material for crafting Fire element magical treasure.
However, the three flying swords crafted by Nie Yaonu could at most reach the level of upper tier magical item, and it was all because the main and supplement materials were not matching each other. By looking at how Nie Yaonu had sweat breaking out all over her body and trickling down her back, Wu Qi knew she must have poured in all her mind and soul in crafting them. Yet, weapon crafting was a skill that required innate talent. Even though Nie Yaonu had been arduously crafting them, in the end, what she obtained would only be three upper-tier magical items which approached closely to the level of lower tier magical treasure.
With Wu Qi's professional gaze after he inherited the Scroll of Stealing, he disdained stealing a mere upper tier magical item.
Shaking his head, Wu Qi spun and entered the tower of Peerless Sword Formation. With a slow pace, he came before the portrait of Immortal Zhenyi. Standing in front of the altar, he lifted his head and gave a look at Immortal Zhenyi, who had an obscure face and was riding on a serpent. Wu Qi bent his body and bowed deeply towards the portrait, then a layer of watery cloud emerged from underneath his feet. Noiselessly, it brought Wu Qi up to the supporting beam on the ceiling, and he carefully approached the Dustless Lamp.
"There are three innate spirit objects in this Dustless Lamp. If all three of them were left behind by Immortal Zhenyi, then his cultivation must have reached at least the legendary tier of 'Taiyi Golden Immortal' [2]. These are all innate spirit objects. If he was not a Taiyi Golden Immortal, how could he obtain them? And how could he be so generous and leave them behind for his descendants and juniors?"
"However, for an Immortal's Cave left behind by a Taiyi Golden Immortal, the defensive formations here are really inferior. Also, the manual of sword technique actually lacks the scripts of Earth and Fire element. Did he do this on purpose to make fun of his descendants and juniors? He could leave behind three innate spirit objects, yet two sword techniques are missing from the legacy of Five Elements Sword Technique."
"I've now confirmed that Yan Dan and his brothers are the same Yan Dan I know, the same Jing Ke who assassinated Emperor Qin, and the same Gao Jianli. But, how did all of them get here? Not only that, according to what Yan Dan said today, he was beheaded by his own father. His head was brought before Emperor Qin, and his soul was still trapped in his very own head, which made him see what happened after he was dead. Since he was dead, how could he still appear in this world?"
While having his mind filled with all kinds of thought, Wu Qi carefully dismantled the Dustless Lamp.
He flipped his palm, and the Hand of Web was noiselessly unleashed. A thread of innate Earth element energy contained inside of the Innate Stone of Dust Repelling was extracted and absorbed into Wu Qi's body. Then, it was quickly stored within the Earth meridians on each of his arms. After that, he brought his palm and pressed against the Innate Wood of Arousal, extracting a thread of innate Wood element energy and storing it inside his Wood meridians.
After harvesting two innate energies of Earth and Wood elemental, Wu Qi felt a sensation of refreshment and vigor spreading across his entire body. When these two innate energies entered his body, they immediately started to merge with his corporeal body. The energy of innate Earth element made his physical strength stronger and stronger, and further strengthened his muscles and made them tougher. The energy of innate Wood element had improved his ability of recovering, and his vitality was growing luxuriantly. In addition to that, as Wood element could give birth to Wind, and wind and rain could transform into thunder, both Wu Qi's agility and the explosiveness of his muscles were also climbing up bit by bit.
Now, what was left in front of him was the most powerful, rarest Divine Flame of Order.
With utmost care and caution, Wu Qi extracted a thread of Fire element energy from the Divine Flame of Order and merged it into his Fire meridians. Then, he clenched his jaw tightly and took a deep breath. He unleashed a thread of divine sense from his temple, coiling up the thumb-sized, one foot and two inches tall, purple-green divine flame, and absorbed it into his Spiritual Ocean. Upon entering it, a vast divine flame purple-green instantly exploded within his Spiritual Ocean, rocking and spreading in all directions. Rolling mountains of waves surged up high from Wu Qi's Spiritual Ocean, that stretched tens of thousands of feet. They quickly enveloped the violent ball of divine flame, and forced the dispersing flame to merge back into one.
The strength of Wu Qi's spirit was diminishing at an incredible rate, as he used it to keep forming one after another profound rune in his Spiritual Ocean, aiding the waves in suppressing the Divine Flame of Order. All these runes were inherited from Scroll of Stealing, and were used specifically in trapping all flames of Yin and Yang nature, either corporeal or incorporeal. It was the most ingenuous incantation of controlling any flames under the heaven.
When 108 fiery red runes purely formed with divine sense were formed and wrapped around the Divine Flame of Order in his Spiritual Ocean, Wu Qi finally breathed out a long sigh of relief.
Wu Qi looked at the Dustless Lamp. It still maintained the same shape as before, but all three innate energies contained in it were now stolen by him, as well as the Divine Flame of Order. Without hesitation, Wu Qi quickly fished out many ingredients from his storage ring, which he had purchased from Market of Four Seas during the daytime. Using the oil of Merman that would not die off for at least ten thousand years as the lamp wick, and aided by a few ingredients that helped the burning, a wisp of purple-green flame was once again lit up inside the Dustless Lamp.
After that, using the Soul of Broken Worm, Dust Repelling Shield, threads from Purple-Gold Stripe Spider, he constructed a little defensive array on the Dustless Lamp. Hence, Wu Qi had smoothly completed his mission of stealing the innate spirit objects. With all these rare materials, he had constructed a defensive array that could repel dust and calm one's mind. The Dustless Lamp could still bring thirty percent of its original effect into play. As long as the oil of Merman didn't dry off, no one would find out that this Dustless Lamp was no longer the same Dustless Lamp.
With just one drop of the oil from Merman, the flame could burn for over one hundred years, and Wu Qi had filled the lamp with nearly 60 ml of it. Thus, the flame should last for at least ten thousand years. With that, Wu Qi would not have to worry that someone might discover the Dustless Lamp had been stolen in the short term.
Satisfyingly, he looked at the defensive array constructed by him. Then, he transformed into a thread of passing cloud stealthily and noiselessly, and left Mount White Sun.
[1] Yang (阳）= As the Yang in 'Yin and Yang' （阴阳）. (To learn more about Yin and Yang, you can refer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yin_and_yang)
[2] Taiyi Golden Immortal (太乙金仙) - Taiyi means 'primordial unity of Yin and Yang'. (Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiyi_Zhenren)