22: Chapter 22 Six hours? Not enough? Then let's run away early.
Six hours to travel from the North Sea Ice Abyss to the Qingming Sect was, even for a Golden Core Stage Cultivator, an extreme flight that required almost no sleep or rest.
What's more, this was like an express delivery "expedited" by the Heavenly Dao.
Run away?
The thought that flashed through his mind first was instantly snuffed out by himself.
Run where?
Right now, in the entire Nine Heavens Continent, he was likely the brightest star on the Heavenly Dao's radar.
Xia Lengbai was like a cruise missile with built-in GPS; as long as the "Fate-Defier" label on him wasn't removed, he would be locked onto no matter how far he ran to the ends of the earth.
Rather than being chased like a stray dog, only to be crushed to death with a single finger after his Qi ran dry, it was better to use this remaining time to play the cards in his hand.
Shen Xiao did not get up and remained sitting cross-legged where he was. The stale scent of dust in the Scripture Pavilion, mixed with the musty smell of old books, drifted into his nostrils, yet it only made him calmer.
He closed his eyes, and his mind sank into his Sea of Consciousness like mercury.
Within his Sea of Consciousness, it was no longer empty.
A vast, boundless azure nebula was slowly rotating.
This was the life's work of that old guy, Xuan Chenzi, the complete Legacy of the "Counter-flow Step".
Countless tiny specks of light were born and perished within the nebula, each speck representing a portion of insights into the Cultivation Technique.
It was spectacular, but when Shen Xiao's Divine Sense tentatively touched the outermost periphery of the nebula, trying to analyze the first layer of the Mind-Cultivation Technique, an extremely complex and obscure feeling surged up instantly.
It felt as if he had obtained a peerless machine with an extremely precise structure, but he couldn't even understand the first page of the instruction manual.
All the parts and structures were laid out before him, but he simply didn't know how to start it or how to make it run.
That old ghost, Xuan Chenzi, had indeed kept a trick up his sleeve.
He had handed over the Legacy, but he hadn't handed over the "key" to open it.
"Heh." The Consciousness Entity of Shen Xiao let out a cold laugh in his Sea of Consciousness, revealing a hint of barbarity.
Can't understand it? Then force it!
With a thought, he mobilized the Qi in his Dantian that had only just recovered, and forcibly began to circulate it according to the Mind-Cultivation Technique path of the first layer of the "Counter-flow Step" in his memory.
However, the Cultivation Technique he cultivated himself circulated Qi along his Meridians in a forward cycle, endless and ceaseless.
Yet this "Counter-flow Step" had its core Profound Truth in the word "Counter", requiring the Qi to flow in reverse, breaking through conventional norms.
"Pfft!"
The two diametrically opposed methods of circulation collided violently within his Meridians!
An indescribable, tearing pain, a hundred times more intense than the "Seven Injuries Reverse Meridians Art" he had used when self-harming earlier, instantly exploded from his Dantian and spread crazily along every Meridian!
Shen Xiao's body suddenly arched like a boiled shrimp, a sweetness rose in his throat, and a trace of bright red blood slowly slid down the corner of his mouth.
Just at this moment, from deep within his Sea of Consciousness, that Soul mass—Xuan Chenzi—which had become extremely weak after being devoured by him, sent a faint but gloating wave of thought.
"Cough, cough… Junior, know the severity of it now? This is a Heaven-Defying technique that seeks to comprehend the true meaning of 'finding life in death' while on the brink of life and death. Every circulation is a simulation of death. You rely on Evil Path methods to forcibly plunder it, but ultimately, it is a tree without roots and water without a source… It is simply impossible to master!"
The old guy's voice was as weak as a gossamer thread, but that sense of satisfaction of "you deserve it" could be smelled from eight hundred miles away.
For the wailing of such a defeated dog, Shen Xiao couldn't even be bothered to spare a glance.
He endured the acupuncture-like, fiery pain in his Meridians, steadied his mind, and directly opened the familiar pale blue System panel in his mind.
Lines of data flashed by rapidly.
His gaze swept from his own attributes, passed over the few "Plunder Talents" he had just obtained, and finally, fixed firmly on a grey option next to Xuan Chenzi's memory nebula that he had previously ignored.
[Memory Scenario Deduction].
Following it was a line of small text describing its function: Can consume destiny value to convert specified plundered memories of the host into a highly realistic first-person mental experience.
The host will experience its critical moments in person as the original owner of the memory, obtaining the most profound instinctive imprints.
Isn't this just a VR experience version of a life simulator?!
And it's paid, too.
Shen Xiao's eyes instantly lit up, like a wolf that had been hungry for three days finally seeing meat.
"System, select to deduce Xuan Chenzi's cultivation memories regarding the 'Counter-flow Step'!"
[Deducing this high-level memory segment requires consuming 1 point of destiny value. Confirm?]
"Confirm!"
[destiny value -1, current remaining 74 points. Memory Scenario Deduction… Initiating!]
The moment the System prompt finished, Shen Xiao only felt his consciousness being yanked backward by an irresistible, tremendous force!
The Scripture Pavilion before his eyes, the cold stone slabs, the pervasive dust… everything was rapidly twisting and stretching, finally turning into a vortex of Chaos.
The world spun!
When his consciousness stabilized again, he discovered he was no longer Shen Xiao.
He had become a spirited young Daoist, wearing an azure Daoist robe, currently besieged by dozens of demonic Cultivators with soaring Evil Qi on a precipitous cliff.
He had become the young Xuan Chenzi.
"Xuan Chenzi! Hand over the Sect's supreme treasure, and I will spare your life!" The lead demonic Cultivator grinned hideously, the demonic blade in his hand wreathed in blood-red light.
"Wishful thinking!"
The young "Xuan Chenzi" shouted angrily, but the Qi in his body had long been nearly exhausted from successive battles, and wounds of various sizes on his body were gushing blood.
There was nowhere left to retreat! Behind him was a bottomless abyss!
Life and death in an instant!
At the moment the demonic blade slashed down, the shadow of death shrouded his heart, and his instinct for survival was stimulated to the extreme.
Subconsciously, he reversed the last trace of Qi in his body, not to attack, but to dodge!
It was this instinctive reaction at that very moment that caused him to inadvertently step across the threshold of the "Counter-flow Step"!
His body twisted at an angle that completely defied common sense, narrowly avoiding the fatal blade, his figure turning into a lingering shadow as he shifted sideways.
Although he was still grazed by the blade wind, leaving a deep wound on his back that exposed the bone, that feeling of struggling on the edge of life and death, of forcibly twisting one's own fate, was like a bolt of lightning that split the fog in his mind!
So that's how it is!
It is not about deliberately going against the flow, but in a desperate situation, involuntarily "countering" for the sake of "life"!
This was only the beginning.
In the torrent of consciousness, time lost its meaning.
He experienced thousands of struggles on the edge of life and death; every time he was hunted down, every time he was on the verge of death, it was a deep realization of the "Counter-flow Step".
Under the impact of a ten-thousand-foot waterfall, he realized how to shed ten thousand jun of force like a fish swimming against the current.
In an airtight sword formation, he understood how to seek that glimmer of survival in a place where it was absolutely impossible.
Thousands of death experiences, thousands of desperate survival attempts!
Every muscle tremor, every bone groan, every path of Qi reversing in his Meridians… all of it was no longer dry text and theory, but transformed into the most profound, most primitive physical instinct, forcibly branded onto Shen Xiao's Soul!
In the outside world, within the Scripture Pavilion, only the time it takes for an incense stick to burn had passed.
Shen Xiao's body was motionless, but his forehead was covered with fine beads of sweat, and his face was pale, as if he had personally experienced one tragic battle after another.
Finally, that huge suction force that pulled his consciousness away disappeared.
Shen Xiao opened his eyes abruptly!
A flash of sharp light flickered and vanished from the depths of his eyes!
Deep within those jet-black pupils, it seemed as if a hundred years of hardship had settled, carrying a trace of vicissitudes and calmness that did not belong to his age, but even more so, an absolute self-confidence that played with all rules in the palm of his hand!
He slowly stood up from the ground.
Just a simple standing-up movement seemed to carry a certain strange rhythm.
The flying dust around him seemed to pause slightly the moment he stood up, as if time had been pressed with a 0.5x slow-motion button.
It was done.
The corners of Shen Xiao's mouth hooked into a cold arc.
He lifted his foot and took a light step forward.
There was no explosion of Qi, no howling wind, and not even a sound of wind was raised by his clothes.
His figure just vanished from the spot out of thin air.
The next instant, he had silently appeared at the entrance of the Scripture Pavilion, ten zhang away. The entire process was like flowing clouds and moving water, leaving only a blurred afterimage at the original spot that was almost impossible for the naked eye to capture.
This was the true "Counter-flow Step"!
The six-hour countdown now had five hours remaining in his Sea of Consciousness.
Time was tight.
The Cultivation Technique was mastered; he had to leave the Qingming Sect immediately before Xia Lengbai, this "Heavenly Dao nuke," landed, find a place to digest this harvest, and then plan his next move.
He lifted his foot, preparing to step over the threshold of the Scripture Pavilion's entrance.
However, just at the moment his toes left the ground—
Boom!!!!
A terrifying pressure, bone-chilling and majestically vast, far exceeding any Nascent Soul Stage expert in his cognition, descended from the sky without warning, like a galaxy from the Nine Heavens pouring down, instantly shrouding the entire Qingming Sect!
The mountains trembled, and all sounds were silenced!
All the Disciples in the Sect, whether they were meditating, practicing Alchemy, on patrol, or sparring, all felt at this moment as if they were being pressed firmly in place by an invisible divine mountain, to the point where even breathing became extremely difficult!
The Utility Disciples with low cultivation were even more so—their legs went soft, and they knelt on the ground, trembling!
Immediately following this, a cold, emotionless female voice seemed to ring directly in the depths of everyone's Soul, resounding through the sky and every corner of the Qingming Sect.
"The Disciple who entered the Scripture Pavilion an hour ago, walk out on your own."
The voice paused; every word seemed carved from ten-thousand-year black ice, carrying an unquestionable tone of judgment.
"Otherwise, the Qingming Sect will be buried with you."
Shen Xiao's foot, which he had stepped out, froze in mid-air.
His pupils suddenly contracted to the size of the most dangerous needle tips.
Xia Lengbai.
She had not only arrived early, but… she was early by a full eleven hours!