Chapter 216: Heaven’s Son Gazing at Air
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Tears welled up in Su Yu's eyes. "Mistress," he said, "Teacher loved you all his life. It was true when he was alive, and it is also true now that he is dead…"
A smile hung on Xi Ruolan's lips, her eyelids slowly closing. She softly muttered, "That's good… That's good… I still have two bottles of elixirs in my robe left for his disciple, Zhao Guang… Help me pass it on as a last favor… Finally, can you bury me with Brother Guang?"
Su Yu replied through tears, "All right…"
"Thank… you…" Xi Ruolan's voice scattered with the wind, her lifeless hand, caressing Su Yu's palm just a moment before, fell limp. With a satisfied smile, Xi Ruolan drifted away, as if slipping into a deep slumber. Perhaps she would be reunited with Li Guang in her dreams.
Su Yu controlled his grief. Later, he brought her before the grave of Li Guang.
Whoosh—
Su Yu knelt on both knees, kowtowing three times toward Li Guang's grave. He had once sworn that he would not come to pay his respects unless he claimed Han Zhi's head. Today, he had fulfilled his promise, bringing Han Zhi's head to pay his respects for the first time.
"Teacher!" he said. "I have fulfilled my promise and exacted revenge for you. If you can see this from the underworld, I hope that you can find peace."
But Su Yu felt no satisfaction for his revenge. Instead, it just made him feel a little lonely. Even though the vengeance had been settled, Li Guang—who had given Su Yu a new lease on life—could not be raised from the dead.
Thinking about this, Su Yu clenched his fists. He would not allow the same thing to happen twice! He would never again let any harm come to those he was indebted to!
"Teacher!" he said. "I have to rush to save a benefactor of mine and cannot stay by your side. If I return from saving my benefactor, I will come pay my respects to you again!"
Su Yu rose, taking a bow before he left.
Later, Zhao Guang stirred from his coma. It was the same as always, but the front of the grave had two bottles of elixir. The difference was that beside the name "Li Guang" on the tombstone, there was another name: "Mistress Xi Ruolan."
Flying away, Su Yu returned to the yard of the Second Elder at the Liuxian faction.
No one noticed his arrival, however, because the Liuxian faction was in chaos.
Xianer… thought Su Yu.
Su Yu entered the yard, his heart troubled as he sought his only family, his fiancée Qin Xianer. Su Yu took out three Phoenix feathers from his robes, feeling excited as he pushed open Xianer's door. But all he saw was an empty bed.
A white letter lay on the bed. Su Yu grabbed it. The letter read:
Vermin, I should have vanquished your soul for taking the feathers of my pet, but seeing as how the person you were trying to save is a Death Phoenix Constitution wanted by the Nine Phoenix Cabinet, I'll forgive you! I have brought Qin Xianer back to the Nine Phoenix Cabinet and shall nurture her with priority. When you have become stronger in the future, you can come visit her.
The letter was signed, Master of the Nine Phoenix Cabinet.
Su Yu's mind was racing. Taking advantage of the chaos earlier, the overlord—ranked second of the Northern Continent, the master of the Nine Phoenix Cabinet—must have arrived and taken Xianer away.
Su Yu turned the letter over, realizing the back contained a note written in the large words of Xianer's handwriting:
"Brother Su Yu, there's an old lady that fed me a lot of Phoenix blood. I am no longer in pain. She wants to bring me away and nurture me to become the next Master, but I do not want that. I only want Brother Su Yu. Come save me quickly…"
When he finished reading, Su Yu was in shock.
"Death Phoenix Constitution?" said Yun Yazi, a bit surprised. "Lad, did your fiancée really have such an ungodly constitution?"
It was the first time Su Yu had heard Yun Yazi say the word 'ungodly'.
"Even I have only seen the Death Phoenix Constitution two or three times," Yun Yazi went on. "Each one of them grew to unimaginable heights. I once considered recruiting such a disciple but without much luck. The Nine Phoenix Cabinet is lucky, indeed!"
It seemed Yun Yazi was full of praises for the Death Phoenix Constitution.
"But recruiting you as my disciple would mean that your little fiancée is also half my disciple," continued Yun Yazi. "I would rather not send her away…" He punctuated the sentiment with a chuckle.
Wasn't Xianer's Bloodline of the Phoenix withering and developing death energy, endangering her life? How did it transform into the Death Phoenix Constitution? Suddenly, Su Yu remembered that the Second Elder had come out of her meditation early to read up on many ancient texts, for she had realized that there was something strange about Xianer's constitution, her symptoms different from a normal descent of the Phoenix of Death.
Could that be the Death Phoenix Constitution? wondered Su Yu.
"According to the legends," said Yun Yazi, "the most mysterious immortal phoenix amongst all the other immortal phoenixes was named the Nine Spirit Death Phoenix! It could control death. In fact, it could control the life and death of every living thing it put its eyes on, making it the most terrifying of all the immortal phoenixes. A Death Phoenix Constitution meant that the body had a shred of the bloodline from said immortal phoenix! These kinds of constitutions are extremely rare. Perhaps as few as one in a million people have the Bloodline of the Phoenix. Your little fiancée is extremely lucky. She might be the only one who has this in the entire Zhenlong Continent!"
Su Yu felt a little happy for Xianer. She had always been a playful lass and was not very diligent in her cultivation, yet her constitution was this terrifying.
"Lad, you need to work harder," scolded Yun Yazi. "The Death Phoenix Constitution is no laughing matter. Once it is revealed, every single talent from the continent will wish to obtain her. If you relax and become unworthy of her, someone will steal her from you."
Su Yu understood. He would never let what had happened between him and Jiang Xueqing to happen again!
"Thank you for the reminder, Elder Yun Ya," said Su Yu gravely. "I will work a hundred times harder!"
Yun Yazi's spirit floated out, standing in front of Su Yu with his hands behind his back. He nodded. "Great! You have avenged your teacher. Do you remember the promise you made?"
"I remember!" said Su Yu. "Thank you for the chance. Now that I have avenged my teacher, I would willingly become your disciple! Your disciple Su Yu pays his respects to his Master!"
Su Yu wanted to kowtow, but he was propped up by Yun Yazi. Yun Yazi was visibly elated. He had finally acquired Su Yu as a disciple.
"I do not like the nitty-gritty details," said Yun Yazi, "and you need not call me master. You can just call me Elder Yun."
Su Yu nodded. He would happily call him that.
"Since I am now your teacher, I would nurture you with all my ability!" said Yun Yazi. "What kind of heights you can reach will depend on your luck. I have a gift for you. It is the cultivation technique that I use most often. I have never passed on this mantle to anybody else, even my other disciple. Today, I shall pass it to you. Do not disappoint me."
Su Yu was shocked. "Thank you, master!" he said sincerely.
The gift was an ancient, green copper plate! It had a long history—its exact era, a mystery—but Su Yu's intuition told him that the green copper plate harbored a mysterious energy!
"This was something I found in a tomb!" Yun Yazi said.
Su Yu understood. "So, this is an item that accompanied a burial. Its owner must have been a powerful figure."
But Yun Yazi shook his head. "No! This is what was buried. The people were the ones buried alongside it. Furthermore, one million living creatures were buried with this item!"
Clank—
Su Yu realized he had dropped the green copper plate, causing a metallic sound to fill the surrounding.
A million living creatures, buried alongside this green copper plate?
"The secret soul technique Heaven's Son Gazing at Air is inscribed on the green copper plate!" said Yun Yazi. "It is split into nine tiers. With every tier, your soul will be upgraded and transformed. Unfortunately, it only has five tiers, and I have only cultivated it to the fifth tier. The last four tiers have been missing for a long time now."
Su Yu gasped, shocked at the notion that cultivating to only the fifth tier had created a soul powerful enough to materialize a physical form like Yun Yazi's.
"Master, what level is this technique?" asked Su Yu. "Could it be a legendary-level technique?"
Yun Yazi shook his head. "You will know after you start cultivating the technique. The green copper plate is special. You can only see the contents of the next tier after you finished cultivating the previous tier. Thus, you must start cultivating from the first tier."
Su Yu looked down on the plate. It read:
Heaven's Son Gazing at Air. First tier, changing the nature of your soul. This is split into lower, upper, and top class. This tier is an immortal-level technique.
"The first tier is an immortal level technique?" said Su Yu.
Su Yu was shocked, but he continued reading:
The difficulty of cultivating this technique depends on the foundation of the soul and the level of perception. The stronger the soul, the higher the level of perception, which allows for rapid cultivation of this technique. The shortest amount of time to enter the lower class is ten years. The longest is a hundred years.
Soul Change Lower Class. The soul strength is doubled and can begin to be released outside the body.
Soul Change Upper Class. The soul strength is doubled again and can leave the body for an hour. The soul is formless and does not carry a shadow, making it difficult to detect.
Soul Change Top Class. The soul strength is doubled again and can leave the body for a full day. The soul can materialize into a blurry figure to fight enemies. At the same time, you enter the beginner level of the Heaven's Son Gazing at Air.
Su Yu finished reading, thoroughly astonished. The first level could triple his soul strength? The fusing of both Su Yu's souls had only increased his soul strength by fifty percent. Even then, he had obtained a terrifying soul talent.
What would doubling or tripling his soul strength mean? It would mean that his level of perception would increase explosively! Furthermore, the soul could help in concealing and attacking enemies after it left the body!
Plus, this was but the entrance to the Heaven's Son Gazing at Air. It did not even scratch the essence of the technique. If the first tier was so powerful, how scary would the second, third, and fourth tiers be?
Su Yu wanted to cultivate the technique on the spot, but he suppressed his excitement, taking out the small rock Hua Zhilan had given him. Looking at it, Su Yu's heart thumped wildly.
"A complete immortal level technique!" he said. "Nine Fingers of Imaginary Thunder!"
Currently, Su Yu only knew about 100 words of the immortal-level technique Wind Shadow Step, plus the fragment of the Buddhist Saint's Eight Characters. The main technique he was cultivating, the Glazed Ice Flame, had hit the top class. Now, he was in need of a technique that suited him.
The impeccable timing of receiving the Nine Fingers of Imaginary Thunder was surprising. And it was a complete thunder-based technique!
Thunder-based techniques were considered unorthodox techniques and were very rare. And furthermore, this was the complete version. Su Yu was immensely grateful to Lin Xiaotian.
There are three stages to this technique, read Su Yu. First stage: Thunder Star Finger. Second stage: Thousand Thunder Finger. Third stage: Illusory Thunder Finger. Every stage can be split into lower, upper, and top classes, with each class accompanying a change in finger technique and its power doubling. The final finger thus has nine times the power of the first.
Thunder-based techniques were the most overbearing techniques amongst the many existing techniques. Thus, the power of this technique was immensely strong. What made Su Yu even more surprised was that there were a complete set of comments accompanying it!
Su Yu skimmed through it. Although the comments were rough, there were still many insights he could gain from them. Coupled with his own level of perception, this technique could be cultivated quickly and smoothly.
The multiple gains bolstered Su Yu's confidence. Even if there were going to be many talents at the Hundred Territory Alliance Meet, Su Yu was confident that he could battle his way to the top against the multiple geniuses to obtain the Regeneration Elixir!
A moment later, Su Yu and Yun Yazi set out to leave the Liuxian Faction. Looking from afar at the seventeen meteors circling the Liuxian Faction, Su Yu's gaze was icy. There was no longer anyone tying him to the Liuxian Faction.
But when Yun Yazi saw the seventeen meteors, he laughed.
"Say," he said. "Do you want another gift?"
Gift? thought Su Yu enthusiastically.