Chapter 232: Half-Dragon Gene Weapon

Chen Xiyi’s trip proved incredibly worthwhile, as he gained an incredibly powerful Four-Star friend.

Liu Ping might have lacked combat power, but his support abilities were incredibly strong. His cooking alone would allow the Itinerant Merchant to obtain specialty foods from this world.

Consider this: a Hellish Demon Chef needed Magical Items to create foods with special effects. Yet if Liu Ping really was the reincarnation of the First God of Cuisine, his ability to turn the ordinary into the magical might actually allow him to use basic ingredients to craft foods possessing those special effects.

Right now, Liu Ping was still using ordinary ingredients to create food with temporary buffs. His potential seemed limitless.

Strength wasn’t always about combat power for Chen Xiyi. Sometimes, it was about Favorability level, personality, and ability.

If Favorability was high, even the worst personality wouldn’t matter—the person would risk everything for Chen Xiyi. Ability was secondary and could be nurtured.

Finding someone like Liu Ping—with strong abilities, a good personality, and, more importantly, Four-Star Favorability—was incredibly rare.

Chen Xiyi wanted to boost Liu Ping to the maximum Five-Star Favorability as quickly as possible.

Generally, Favorability wouldn’t drop after reaching Four Stars. But pushing it higher was challenging.

Plus, based on individual personality, there was no guarantee they’d help Chen Xiyi recruit new friends.

Among all the friends Chen Xiyi had met, only social and management types like Li Zhao and Mi Hong had actively helped him gain new friends.

Lin Feng only helped Chen Xiyi boost Mei Yu’s Favorability to Four Stars—and she was his wife. He paid no mind to anyone else.

Whether someone would help expand his friend circle really depended on the person.

Liu Ping certainly had the potential, given how well he got along with others.

Next, Liu Ping planned to refine his cooking skills, heading to Bozhou. Chen Xiyi very kindly arranged a private jet for him.

Liu Ping felt a little awkward but didn’t refuse. He’d originally intended to take the train.

After all, it was cheaper, only taking two or three days to arrive.

But Chen Xiyi firmly arranged it anyway. To him, Liu Ping leveling up through ‘fighting monsters’ should be quick and convenient.

More ‘monsters’ meant faster leveling up.

Chen Xiyi assigned this task to Ling Hu. It was a top priority, second only to planting spies among the Peach Blossom Luck Bloodline Bearers and catching ghosts for himself.

Liu Ping’s safety and his cooking ‘battles’ had to be guaranteed. If possible, they’d rig the events, ensuring everyone involved was ‘one of theirs’.

After handling that, Chen Xiyi returned to his Underground Shelter beneath the Graveyard to continue his daily work.

Favorability needed to be boosted, but he didn’t need to personally follow Liu Ping. Distance could be good, even between friends.

Sending Liu Ping cookbooks or a few Magical Items later would hit right where he lived. To someone obsessed with cooking like him, that was the perfect way.

With Four-Star Favorability, there was zero worry about him turning bitter over favors gone wrong.

Anyone truly likely to turn hostile like that could never reach Four-Star Favorability. Three Stars would be their absolute limit.

After completing the entire funeral process—collection, cremation, burial—Chen Xiyi tidied the Graveyard before returning to the Underground Shelter. There, he cloned the recently acquired samples of the Peach Blossom Luck Bloodline Bearers to continue delving into Ao Lü’s memories.

This time, luck was on his side. He found the memory of Ao Lü crossing over into this world.

“Interesting. It was due to a magic duel. Served him right. Ao Lü, desperate to break through, actually tried to forcibly absorb power from a female Cultivator of equal rank. It completely backfired. He was lured into a trap by Righteous Path cultivators and ganged up on.”

“In desperation, he fled into the depths of the Polar Sea Abyss. Just then, the Abyss—which opens only every hundred thousand years—did so. By sheer luck, he didn’t die and ended up adrift in this world.”

“But judging by his situation, he clearly had no idea how to return.”

Absorbing someone’s essence differed greatly from mutual cultivation. Absorption was one-sided stealing, while mutual cultivation benefited both parties.

In his later stages, Ao Lü wasn’t just an unorthodox Cultivator anymore—he’d turned fully to the Demonic Path.

He fully embraced the legacy of the Peach Blossom Ancestor, even mastering the “Peach Blossom Luck” Divine Ability. This Karmic power caused numerous beautiful women to cross his path and fall inexplicably in love with him through some destiny influence.

This very Peach Blossom Luck got passed down to his bloodline descendents.

Chen Xiyi believed this wasn’t active inheritance though. This Karmic Divine Ability bound to Ao Lü’s Primordial Spirit was inseparable from him.

Their Divine Abilities differed vastly. Ao Lü’s were incredibly rare, exceptionally hard to cultivate, and required specific heritage.

Chen Xiyi’s abilities acted more like integrated attributes or skills—they could be updated, uninstalled, reinstalled, and even used as bait.

They might currently lack the mystic potency of Ao Lü’s Karmic Peach Blossom Luck, but their potential far exceeded it.

For instance, once his System upgraded enough, massive data processing might achieve similar Karmic manipulation.

The key issue was Ao Lü’s Peach Blossom Luck. Being ethereal, intangible, and lacking measurable data made it far less direct than Chen Xiyi’s clearly observable powers.

Of course, their foundational systems were just vastly different.

Chen Xiyi didn’t just see how Ao Lü arrived. He also witnessed Ao Lü acquiring the legacy of the Peach Blossom Ancestor, master of the Path of Union and Joy.

Back then, Ao Lü stumbled upon the Ancestor’s resting place. Through sheer effort—aided by a magic treasure given by his mother—he killed the Ancestor’s soul attempting to possess his body. Ao Lü then inherited everything the old demon owned.

As an old demonic sect founder, leaving a ‘legacy’ was never meant for successors—only for himself to possess and revive.

He just hadn’t counted on meeting a rich kid who turned the tables and killed him instead.

Victory came at a cost, however. The clash between a Qi Refining Stage Cultivator and a Great Ascension Stage remnant soul—especially during a Soul Possession attempt—irrevocably tainted Ao Lü. The Ancestor’s personality amplified the lustful nature of dragons within him.

Chen Xiyi wondered why the Peach Blossom Ancestor didn’t use the Bloodline Descendant Rebirth Art to revive. Opting for Soul Possession likely stemmed from two reasons: counter-measures against the Rebirth Art may exist in that Immortal Cultivation World, plus the sheer conspicuousness of the Peach Blossom Luck Divine Ability made stealth impossible.

In Ao Lü’s world, Cultivators distinguished between Divine Abilities and mere spells.

Divine Abilities demanded extraordinary talent, innate Bone Foundation, enlightenment, and heaven-defying fortune. Even Ao Lü, standing atop that world as a Great Ascension Stage expert, possessed only one Divine Ability—Peach Blossom Luck—inherited from the Ancestor.

Spells were far more common amongst regular Cultivators. Though spells varied in power, learning them paled in difficulty compared to Divine Abilities.

Chen Xiyi had tried replicating Ao Lü’s spells using his own Magical Power. But different systems rendered them weak and inefficient, making the effort pointless.

Ao Lü’s bloodline, however, fascinated Chen Xiyi. It held promise as a genetic weapon.

He abandoned studying Ao Lü’s spells and Divine Ability, focusing purely on his bloodline.

In bloodline research, Chen Xiyi excelled, especially with Qi Refiner works as guides. Just copying their methods revealed much.

For instance, he extracted lineage of the True Dragon Royal Clan.

Pure bloodline essence—not the template key used for the Bloodline Descendant Rebirth Art. Through purification and filtration, he isolated this lineage. Finishing development meant anyone receiving this bloodline transplant, after specific treatments, could transform into a True Dragon Royal Clan member—Ao Lü’s kin.

Sadly, inheriting their cultivation heritage seemed impossible. Ao Lü’s blood was already reshaped by the Peach Blossom Ancestor’s legacy. What Chen Xiyi extracted wasn’t pure dragon blood but that hybrid. Thus, it could only serve as a gene weapon.

Injected into an enemy, the True Dragon Royal Clan’s genetic material would attack their genes like rabid dogs.

Failure meant total genetic collapse and death.

Success meant dragon genes became part of the enemy’s core genetic structure. They would mutate into half-dragons, overwhelmed by the amplified draconic lust inherited from the Ancestor. Reproduction would consume their thoughts until either sanity shattered or they ditched the infected body.

Shedding the body had to be immediate. Otherwise, this genetic corruption infects the Soul itself. Eventually, the victim’s personality shifts irreversibly towards intense promiscuity. Picking up that altered Soul later risks inheriting serious issues.

Though seemingly weak, Chen Xiyi planned it not for strong foes but mass-produced deployment against low-level enemies.

Powerful foes? He’d rely on Sword Realm Projection or TNT.

“As a gene weapon, it has flaws,” he noted. Limited transmission capability. No bacterial vector yet.”

Weapons for cannon fodder needed low cost, fast results, and high effectiveness. Currently, it only offered speed and potency. Cost-cutting came next.

That wasn’t a big hurdle. Bacteria or specialized Gu Insects—perhaps tweaking the Force-Devouring Gu template—could cheaply deliver the half-dragon genes.

“Whew…”

Chen Xiyi exhaled deeply. Seeing the hour, he instantly deployed his bed and fell asleep.

Without noticing, it was 23:59. Due to catching this just in time, tomorrow wouldn’t bring him an awful debuff.

Waking up, an epiphany struck him.

“After assembling Heaven and Hell… I gained that ‘Light and Dark’ ability, right? Gaining one debuff simultaneously grants a buff?”

He scrolled through the bond System, locating the ability.

“Next time, I need to test its effect.”

[The Chivalrous Hero returns from history…]

[The Adventurer…]

[The Itinerant Merchant…]

Just as Chen Xiyi prepared to resume work after waking, the Chivalrous Hero, Adventurer, and Itinerant Merchant returned almost simultaneously.

“You’re back. This return was unusually unified. Weren’t your scheduled return times different?”

“Or was that just the latest possible return? Meaning you could come whenever you chose?”

Confused, Chen Xiyi didn’t dwell on it. Asking the Spirits or Fairies later would clarify things. Guessing alone would get him nowhere.