Chapter 14: A Preliminary Alliance of Interests

At noon, although the sunlight was still covered by bizarre clouds, there was a little bit of warmth. It felt pleasant and affectionate, like the disciples of the Floating Cloud Sect were one big family.

The six Aberrant Wood Husks that Li Si had carried back earlier were sold under Senior Sister Jiang’s direction. Two were sold to Ji Chang, two to Xu Shen, and the last two belonged to Jiang Ying herself.

This was a fair distribution of benefits, a unified stance. The Four Heroes of Floating Cloud advanced and retreated together.

However, the price Senior Sister Jiang offered was one Aberrant Wood Husk for one Talisman Paper. She believed that Li Si had already taken a big risk by having the courage to go out and hunt Anomalous Weeds and Alien Trees. As his senior siblings, they had already gained a great advantage. If they played tricks in the exchange, it would be very unfair.

Ji Chang and Xu Shen naturally disagreed. They thought this price was almost a loss.

In the end, Li Si took the initiative to compromise. The price was fixed at two Aberrant Wood Husks for one Talisman Paper. But the buyers had to give him some guidance in cultivation and Dao Techniques.

In short, each transaction required answering one question.

“Junior Brother Li, do you have any doubts? Ask quickly. If I can answer, I will certainly not disappoint you.”

Xu Shen looked up at the sky. Every day at noon, the light only brightened for a very short time. As soon as the light dimmed, he would immediately retreat to his Stone House.

“Thank you, Senior Brother. I want to know how to kill Alien Trees at the lowest cost?” Li Si asked an easy question, but it hid a small ulterior motive of his.

Xu Shen didn’t think much about it. He just said dismissively, “It’s best not to think about cutting corners. Killing Alien Trees isn’t difficult. For you, two Demon Slaying Thorns can kill one. Even with careful control of the Evil-Warding Aura, you can kill it.”

“But the Dao Technique Demon Slaying Thorn you’ve mastered is different from the one we’ve mastered. Well, in short, I’ll give you this advice: if you can manage to cast Demon Slaying Thorn 300 times in a row, with your comprehension, you should be able to double its power. Alright, I’m done answering.”

Xu Shen threw down a piece of Evil-Warding Curse Talisman Paper, took his two Aberrant Wood Husks, and swaggered back to his Stone House. This was entirely his own extra property. So, when brewing the Great Soul-Returning Broth later, he only needed to give three bowls to the old man, and the rest belonged to himself. This would restore a lot of his Magic Power.

If that silly kid Li Si could bring back some Aberrant Wood Husks every day, that would be even better.

The cost of one Evil-Warding Curse Talisman Paper could basically bring a profit equivalent to ten such papers.

“Junior Brother Li, what other questions do you have? Ask quickly,” Ji Chang began to urge.

“Thank you, Senior Brother Ji. I want to know, is the power increase of a Dao Technique related to casting proficiency?” Li Si was clearly following up on the previous question.

So Ji Chang didn’t pay it much mind. He just said casually, “Of course. Dao Techniques: ‘Dao’ comes first, ‘Technique’ comes after. ‘Dao’ is the source of power, ‘Technique’ is the expression of that power. Since it’s a form of expression, there must be a pattern. It’s like the strokes—horizontal, vertical, left-falling, right-falling, turning, bending, hook—when writing characters. Different combinations form characters with different meanings. In the Cultivation world, this method of expression and its patterns have a general term: runes.”

“So, whoever understands runes more thoroughly and analyzes them more perfectly can naturally make the released Dao Technique stronger. But no matter how strong, there is a limit. Most Dao Techniques, even when controlled and analyzed to the most perfect degree, can only increase damage by up to six times.”

“If one can surpass this upper limit, that becomes a Divine Ability. That is the most powerful. But don’t even think about it. In our Floating Cloud Sect, currently, only our Master has mastered Divine Abilities. No one else can. It’s not that the Master doesn’t teach, but the cost of mastering them is too great.”

After speaking, Ji Chang also got up and left.

Then Senior Sister Jiang smiled and said, “Junior Brother, as we agreed, you can ask me one question too.”

“Thank you, Senior Sister.” Li Si first expressed his gratitude solemnly, then asked seriously, “Senior Sister, I want to know, if I want to be able to go out alone to fetch water, at least how many Dao Techniques do I need to master to get there and back safely?”

“Fetch water?” Jiang Ying was startled, then her gaze towards Li Si softened a little. What a silly child. Your daily hunting of Anomalous Weeds and Alien Trees is already a great contribution. How could we let you fetch water too?

But she couldn’t say that directly. So she thought for a moment and said, “Junior Brother, you don’t need to worry about fetching water. But what you mentioned actually involves many things. During the water-fetching process, one might encounter too many dangers. I can’t list them all. Well, let me give you three examples.”

“First, in the wilderness, it’s relatively easy to encounter wandering Fallen Demons. Some of these Fallen Demons were mortals in their previous lives. Their strength is even less than an Alien Tree, and they are easy to kill. But others were Cultivators in their previous lives. Those are very frightening. They can even mutate and develop more powerful, evil, and overbearing demonic Divine Abilities based on the Dao Techniques or Divine Abilities they mastered in life. If you encounter one—ah, forget you, even if I encounter one, life or death is uncertain.”

“Based on my experience, when encountering a Fallen Demon, the first thing is to ensure you have enough Magic Power. Otherwise, you can’t even run away. Second, you must have the Dao Technique Iron Prison Discipline. It can buy time to escape by restraining the demon. Also, the Mind-cleansing Aura must be kept active at all times. Otherwise, it’s easy to have your emotions influenced, which can attract Phantasmal Aberrations.”

“Furthermore, Demon Slaying Thorn and Palm Thunder can also harm demons. But Palm Thunder requires a huge amount of Magic Power. With my current Magic Power reserve, I can only cast it three times.”

“Second, in the wilderness, it’s also easy to encounter Evil God Cultists. Evil God Cultists are completely different from demons. They look like normal people. But because they fanatically worship the Evil God, they have a trace of the Evil God’s original power within their bodies. This trace of Evil God’s origin power even allows them to comprehend numerous Divine Abilities.”

“I don’t want to admit it, but the fact is, because the Evil God’s power has completely covered this world, the Divine Abilities these Evil God Cultists master are much stronger than the Dao Techniques and Divine Abilities we Cultivators master. Plus, they have strength in numbers. So the best method is still to avoid them.”

“Third, there are all kinds of Evil Entities. Besides Mortal Realm Evil Entities, the ones to most guard against are Phantasmal Aberrations. They come in many varieties and are hard to guard against. Our Master’s current tribulation seems to be related to the gathering of Phantasmal Aberrations. It’s a pity we can’t help the Master much.”

At this point, Senior Sister Jiang sighed softly and said no more. But the information she provided was extremely precious to Li Si.

Thanking Senior Sister Jiang, Li Si quickly got his things ready. Taking advantage of the early time, he left the village and headed straight for the Western Mountain.

He had successfully established a trading relationship with Ji Chang, Xu Shen, and Jiang Ying. By exchanging for Evil-Warding Curse Talisman Papers from them, he could cover up his daily activities, ultimately allowing his own strength to increase rapidly.

One li out of the village, he took out a piece of Evil-Warding Curse Talisman Paper and stuck it on his chest. Instantly, an invisible force spread out.

Simultaneously, information appeared.

“Acquired intermediate Evil-Warding Aura. Duration: half an hour. Can deal base damage + 300% extra damage to targets entering the aura.”

“Huh?”

Li Si was stunned. Although making a Dao Technique into Talisman Paper results in a 20% damage loss, it shouldn’t be this weak, right?

He knew that the Evil-Warding Aura he cast himself, besides increasing extra damage by 600%, also had a three-second evil-breaking thunder light damage.

“This Talisman Paper was given to me by Xu Shen. That cunning guy wouldn’t pass off inferior goods as good ones, would he?”

Thinking this, Li Si casually took out the Talisman Paper he got from trading with Ji Chang. After activating it, it only had 350% extra damage. This was too weak.

He didn’t even want to use it.

Finally, very puzzled, he activated the Evil-Warding Curse Talisman Paper that Senior Sister Jiang had given him this morning. The result shocked him. He believed Senior Sister Jiang was a good person and wouldn’t trick him. Besides, she specifically gave it to him this morning. But, only 280% extra damage? Was this a joke?

For a moment, Li Si’s gaze became ‘excited and thrilled.’

If Ji Chang, Xu Shen, and Jiang Ying weren’t doing it on purpose, then after deducting the 20% loss, he could basically calculate the real damage when they cast the Evil-Warding Curse.

For example, Ji Chang, who seemed careless and heartless, always following Xu Shen’s lead, often used by Xu Shen as a tool—he was actually the strongest among the three in terms of the Evil-Warding Curse. The damage of the Evil-Warding Aura he released in actual combat should be base damage + 440% extra damage.

Xu Shen: the real damage of the Evil-Warding Aura he released was base damage + 380% extra damage.

Senior Sister Jiang: perhaps because she was injured, she was the weakest. The real damage of the Evil-Warding Aura she released was base damage + 350% extra damage.

Not calculating, you wouldn’t know; calculating gives you a shock.

The three Foundation Building True Cultivators he had always dared not look up to were actually so far behind him in the Dao Technique Evil-Warding Curse. Although this didn’t represent their overall strength, it meant that he wasn’t incapable of catching up and surpassing them later.

Suppressing the slight excitement in his heart, Li Si first cast a Heart Cleansing Curse on himself to prevent his thoughts from straying too far and getting suddenly attacked by something like a Seven Emotions Mushroom. Then he opened the remnant scroll to check his current specific strength.

Name: Li Si

Age: 14 years old

Maximum Lifespan: 34 years old

Alienation Contamination Degree: 37.102%

Bloodline and Bone Evolution Progress: 14%

Magic Power: 520/520

Identity: True Disciple of the Floating Cloud Sect

Fate: Gray Fortune × 4

Dao Method: Heaven-Turning Scripture, Second Layer (Cultivation Progress: 3.7%)

Dao Technique: Demon Slaying Thorn, Enhanced Damage +400%

Dao Technique: Evil-Warding Curse, Enhanced Damage +600% + 3-second evil-breaking thunder light. Note: Has reached the enhancement limit. Requires Black Fortune to break the upper limit and continue enhancement.

Dao Technique: Heart Cleansing Curse

Dao Technique: Iron Prison Discipline

“I need to find a way to obtain more Dao Techniques. Although for Cultivators, focusing only on techniques and not the Dao is putting the cart before the horse, but I have the Fate Forge. So this is actually a minor issue.”

Immediately, he consumed two portions of Gray Fortune to enhance the Dao Technique Demon Slaying Thorn to its maximum.

Demon Slaying Thorn: Consumes 100 points of Magic Power. Instant cast. Can attack any Evil Entity with Mortal Realm conditions within a range of 100 meters. Deals base damage + 600% extra damage and a three-second paralyzing thunder light to the target. Note: Can be dodged.