65: Chapter 65 Perfect Ending

Two Flying Swords hit their mark one after the other.

The flame gold flying sword struck the knee joint of the Rock Boar's front left hoof in the form of a Blazing Flame Slash.

It was not a head-on collision with the bone plates—the bone plates were too thick, and a hard strike might not necessarily sever them in one blow—so the sword edge accurately cut into the joint gap between the bone plates.

A crimson flame blade aura exploded from the sword edge. The smell of scorched flesh instantly permeated the air, thick smoke gushed from the wound, and the brown blood was scorched into black scabs by the high temperature before it could even flow out.

The Rock Boar's front left hoof went limp during its charge, the entire leg bent at the knee, and its heavy body lost balance and toppled to the left.

The purple-veined thunder sword followed closely behind and pierced into its right eye.

The moment the sword tip pierced the eyeball, arcs of lightning exploded from the tip, spreading inward along the eye socket, burning the entire cavity into charred blackness.

Crackling electrical arcs burrowed inward from the eyeball, burning all the way into the brain along the optic nerve.

A Divine Sense shock erupted at the same moment—a thin purple light flashed across the purple-veined thunder sword, like a red-hot needle fiercely stabbing into the Rock Boar's Sea of Consciousness.

It didn't even have time to let out a scream.

Its body slid forward on inertia for a few steps, its heavy frame plowing a shallow trench through the pebbles; gravel and dirt splashed half a person's height into the air, clattering against the nearby rock wall.

Its limbs twitched twice, its hooves kicked weakly against the pebbles, its tail flicked, and then it stopped moving.

The stone beach returned to silence.

Only a few pebbles it had kicked away continued to roll in the distance, stopping after a few turns.

Jiang Yan walked to the Rock Boar's corpse and crouched down.

This Yao Beast was nearly a zhang long, lying on the ground like a small gray mountain.

Its entire body was covered in knobby, dark gray stone skin, feeling like a rough stone wall when touched; pressing a finger against it didn't even leave a dent.

The three rows of bone plates on its back remained upright, the thickest one being as thick as a palm, its edges sharp enough to be used as a blade.

He pressed his palm against the Rock Boar's chest—he could still feel residual body heat beneath the stone skin; the heart had stopped, but the blood had not yet completely cooled.

The Bloodthirsty Demon Scripture circulated.

The vital blood inside the Rock Boar turned into a warm torrent and surged into his Dantian.

The vital blood of a Yao Beast was much thicker than that of a Mortal Martial Artist; the sensation as it surged into his Meridians was not like flowing water, but like slurry—like heated honey, both sticky and scalding.

The power of Qi and blood contained within was almost enough for his skin to directly feel the temperature, spreading from his palm toward his forearm, and a faint crimson flush rose across the skin of his entire arm.

The dark golden vortex in his Dantian suddenly jolted.

This jolt was more intense than the tremors when absorbing Zhao Kui and Liu Qi—the amount of the Rock Boar's vital blood was too vast, almost equivalent to the sum of several Innate Martial Artists.

The vortex spun crazily within his Dantian, stripping, devouring, and converting the thick Yao Beast vital blood layer by layer.

The volume of the dark golden vortex expanded slightly over a few breaths, its color deepening from dark gold toward an even darker shade.

He checked the state of his Dantian.

Qi Refining Level 4 Perfection, only a thin membrane away from Level 5.

In his Divine Sense perception, that membrane was no longer a wall—it was more like a layer of water-soaked parchment; through it, he could vaguely perceive that the spiritual energy density on the other side was higher, and the vortex was spinning faster.

Although the Rock Boar's vital blood volume was large, its grade was only Medium Grade after all, so reaching Perfection was already the limit.

To pierce through this layer of paper, he would either need another surge of vital blood of the same level, or to consume a higher-grade Medicinal Pill.

He withdrew his hand and stood up.

The Rock Boar's corpse had already shriveled up; the muscles beneath the stone-like skin had atrophied by more than half, its originally bulging back had collapsed into a concave shape, and the three rows of bone plates had tilted crookedly to one side.

The essence of its fur and the essence within its bones had been mostly drained by the Bloodthirsty Demon Scripture, turning the entire corpse into a withered carcass, a far cry from the gray mountain it had been just moments ago.

Only those two tusks remained intact.

The two curved tusks extending from its lower jaw were each about a foot long, entirely grayish-white, and extremely hard in texture.

He drew his Flying Sword and pried the two tusks out of their sockets.

As the sword edge cut into the socket, it made a creaking friction sound, and there was a crisp 'pop' when he pried the root ligaments loose.

The tusks felt slightly heavy in his hand, much heavier than they looked, with a layer of naturally formed earth-attribute spiritual patterns on the surface; the patterns spiraled from the root to the tip, glowing with an extremely faint earthy-yellow luster in the sunlight.

Probing with his Divine Sense, he could perceive the dense bone structure inside—a First Stage Medium Grade spiritual material, suitable for refining earth-attribute Magical Artifacts or grinding into medicine.

He tossed the tusks into his Storage Pouch.

He turned and continued on his way.

In the days that followed, he established a fixed rhythm for his journey.

During the day, he traveled, gliding silently between the treetops using the Wind Control Technique, his Divine Sense spread to its six-zhang limit; if he encountered a lone small Yao Beast, he would absorb it if convenient, but he would bypass pack-dwelling Yao Beasts to avoid wasting time.

At night, he would find a hidden cave or rock crevice, set up the Li Fire Killing Array, sit cross-legged in meditation, use the Bloodthirsty Demon Scripture to refine the scattered small Yao Beast vital blood absorbed during the day, and simultaneously circulate the Taixu Nourishing Spirit Art to temper his Divine Sense.

On the morning of the ninth day, a layer of grayish-white mist drifted through the stone forest.

It wasn't the kind of white mist condensed from water vapor, which is crisp and refreshing.

This mist carried a faint, fishy, pungent odor, surging outward from the depths of the stone forest; it left a thin, oily sensation when it clung to his skin, as if the bodily fluids of some creature had been dried by the wind and mixed into the mist.

Jiang Yan crouched atop a stone pillar.

The stone pillar beneath his feet was about five zhang high, its surface weathered with dense pits and gullies; when the wind passed between the stone pillars, it made a wailing sound, as if someone were hiding in the cracks and crying.

He had been traveling west from Woniu Mountain for nine days; the pine forest had been left behind two days ago, replaced by this increasingly dense stone forest.

The stone pillars were of varying heights, the thick ones like palace columns, the thin ones like bamboo poles; the pillar bodies were polished smooth and shiny by wind and sand, and when touched with his fingers, they felt ice-cold and damp with dew.

Below the stone pillars was a patch of gravel ground.

The grayish-white surface of the gravel was covered with a very thin layer of moss, which had already dried out completely and would crumble into powder if stepped on.

Occasionally, a few gnawed-clean bone spurs could be seen in the gaps between the gravel, the remains of some unknown small beast.

Just as he was about to continue forward, his Divine Sense suddenly captured three auras at its edge.

Two were as intense as raging fire; one was as weak as a candle flame.

His footsteps stopped at the edge of the stone pillar.

His toes hooked into the pits on the top of the stone pillar, his body motionless.

Those two powerful auras were flickering at the six-zhang edge.

They weren't unstable; they were breathing—every time they exhaled, the auras would expand outward, and when they inhaled, they would shrink back.

Only a Yao Beast at the Late Stage of Qi Refining could cause spiritual energy fluctuations through breathing.

He lowered his body, supporting himself with his knees and palms on the stone surface, inching forward.

He stopped when he reached the edge of the stone pillar, his fingers hooking onto a protruding weathered rock ridge, and slowly poked half his head out.