5: Secluded cultivation and sword techniques

The courtyard in the west of the city was indeed quiet.

Although not luxurious, it had everything from pavilions and terraces to small bridges and flowing water. More importantly, it was equipped with a simple Spirit Gathering Formation, and the Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi was far denser than in that dilapidated courtyard on the back mountain. For the current Ye Chen, it was already a rare paradise.

Uncle Fu brought Ye Chen to the main house, gave a few simple instructions, left some daily necessities, and then quietly departed without further disturbance.

Ye Chen closed the door, isolating himself from the outside world. He first carefully inspected the entire room and courtyard, and only truly breathed a sigh of relief after confirming there were no monitoring arrangements.

For now, safety was temporarily assured and resources were preliminarily available; it was time to put all his effort into increasing his strength.

He sat cross-legged on a futon in the quiet room, his consciousness sinking into the System space.

[host: Ye Chen]

[Realm: Quenching Body Realm Fourth Level (Peak)]

[Martial Meridians: Hand Shaoyang Meridian (Incomplete, Yellow Rank Low Grade), two others (severely damaged, not repaired)]

[Cultivation Technique: Basic Qi Guiding Art (System Improved Version)]

[Skills: None]

[System Points: 100]

[Items: marrow cleansing spirit pill (consumed), essence nurturing pill x3, Low-Grade Spirit Stone x0, repair talisman (incomplete) x0 (used)]

Looking at his status bar, Ye Chen's gaze fell on the two items: [System Points] and [Skills].

With 100 points, what could he buy in the System mall?

With a thought, he opened the System mall interface. The light screen before him shifted, presenting a dazzling array of items, but most of them were grayed out, displaying "Insufficient Permissions" or "Insufficient Points."

The area available for him to choose from was very small.

[body tempering pill]: Suitable for the Quenching Body Realm, slightly increases Cultivate speed. Exchange requires 10 points.

[Qi Recovery Powder]: Quickly restores a small amount of spiritual power. Exchange requires 15 points.

[Refined Iron Sword]: High Grade among ordinary iron, relatively sharp and sturdy. Exchange requires 30 points.

["Detailed Explanation of Basic Footwork"]: Common mundane martial arts, improves movement and evasion abilities. Exchange requires 50 points.

["Essentials of Basic Fist Techniques"]: Common mundane martial arts, increases the power of punches and kicks. Exchange requires 50 points.

Scanning these options, Ye Chen shook his head slightly. Medicinal Pills no longer had much effect on him; the essence nurturing pills were enough. He wasn't lacking weapons for the time being; that wood-chopping knife could suffice if sharpened. As for mundane martial arts, they were even more like chicken ribs to him; any combat technique he plucked from his past life's memories would be a hundred times more exquisite than these.

His gaze finally fixed on a lonely, faintly glowing option at the very bottom of the mall.

[Random Basic Sword Skill Fragment Treasure Chest (1/10)]: Upon opening, randomly obtain 1 basic sword skill fragment. Collect 10 fragments of the same type to synthesize a complete basic sword skill. Exchange requires 100 points.

(Note: This is the most cost-effective way for the host to obtain attack skills at present.)

Sword skill fragments? Collect to synthesize?

Ye Chen hardly hesitated. "Exchange!"

[Consumed 100 points, obtained 'Random Basic Sword Skill Fragment Treasure Chest (1/10)' x1.]

[Open the treasure chest?]

"Open."

The treasure chest dissipated into spots of light in the conscious space, and a diamond-shaped crystal the size of a fingernail, pale green with strange patterns on the edges, floated in its place. Inside the crystal, a tiny wisp of Sword Qi seemed to be swimming.

[Obtained: Basic Sword Skill · Wind-Thunder Sword Art Fragment (1/10)]

"Wind-Thunder Sword Art..." Ye Chen sensed the swiftness and the Explosion Concept contained within the fragment and nodded slightly. It sounded decent. Since he needed ten fragments to synthesize it, it seemed he had no choice but to complete the System tasks.

Exiting the mall, his attention returned to reality. He picked up the jade bottle gifted by Ye Qingxue and poured out a longan-sized essence nurturing pill that emitted a faint medicinal fragrance, then swallowed it.

The Medicinal Pill entered his stomach and turned into a gentle and thick warm current, quickly spreading to his four limbs and hundred bones. Unlike the domineering scouring of the marrow cleansing spirit pill, the medicinal power of the essence nurturing pill focused more on nourishing and consolidating.

He immediately operated the Basic Qi Guiding Art, guiding the medicinal power along with the surrounding Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi to temper his Physical Body and consolidate the Realm he had just achieved Breakthrough in. At the same time, that pure energy continuously flowed into the repaired Hand Shaoyang Meridian, making it even tougher and allowing it to contain and circulate a bit more spiritual power.

Time passed quickly during his Cultivate.

A night of silence.

When the first ray of sunlight of the next morning shone through the window lattice, Ye Chen slowly opened his eyes, a sharp light contained within his gaze, looking spirited.

A more powerful aura than last night emanated from him.

Quenching Body Realm Fifth Level!

With the help of an essence nurturing pill and the dense Spiritual Qi here, he reached the Quenching Body Realm Fifth Level in one go! Moreover, his Foundation was solid, and his spiritual power was pure, with no signs of instability.

"The System's improved Cultivation Technique is indeed Heaven-Defying," Ye Chen marveled as he felt the power coursing through his body. If it were an ordinary Cultivation Technique, it would have been impossible to have such efficiency with damaged martial meridians.

He stood up and stretched his muscles and bones; his entire skeleton made a crackling sound, full of a sense of power.

Pushing open the door, he came into the courtyard. The morning dew had not yet dried, and the air was fresh.

He walked to a corner of the courtyard where there was a small bamboo forest. Ye Chen pointed his fingers like a sword, his internal spiritual power surging, and made a swipe in the air towards a bamboo as thick as a bowl's mouth!

"Swoosh!"

An imperceptible pale golden burst of energy flashed and vanished.

The bamboo trembled slightly, and then the upper half slowly slid down, hitting the ground with a "thud," the cut as smooth as a mirror!

A wisp of Sword Qi!

Although its power was still weak and far from true Sword Qi projection, it meant that his control over spiritual power had reached an extremely refined level, far exceeding Cultivators of the same level.

"Spiritual power is the Foundation, but for the art of killing, one still needs sword skills," Ye Chen whispered to himself as he looked at his fingers.

He now possessed the consciousness and experience of a Sword Sovereign, but lacked a body that could perfectly execute corresponding sword skills, as well as low-level sword techniques matching his current Realm. The sword techniques of his past life were too profound; forcibly simulating them would only capture the form and would instead be counterproductive.

The System's task required him to preliminarily master a sword skill. It seemed he had to complete the [Hidden Dragon in the Abyss] task as soon as possible to get that random basic sword skill reward.

Thinking of this, he delayed no longer. Returning to the quiet room, he took out the remaining two essence nurturing pills.

"One to consolidate the fifth level, and the other to charge for the sixth level!"

He once again fell into deep Cultivate. The dense Spiritual Qi, as if attracted, continuously poured into the quiet room and merged into his body. The Basic Qi Guiding Art operated at full power, turning him into a bottomless pit, greedily absorbing all energy.

One day, two days... During this period, Uncle Fu came once, bringing food and water. Seeing that Ye Chen was in seclusion, he silently set them down and left.

By the evening of the third day.

Inside the quiet room, around the sitting Ye Chen, the Spiritual Qi formed a small vortex. The Hand Shaoyang Meridian in his body emitted a faint glow, and the speed of the spiritual power's surge suddenly accelerated!

"Boom!"

As if some barrier had been broken, a stronger aura burst out from his body, instantly dispersing the surrounding Spiritual Qi vortex!

Quenching Body Realm Sixth Level!

After continuously taking essence nurturing pills and through unremitting bitter cultivation, he finally took another step forward!

Feeling the increasingly full and surging power in his body, a look of joy flashed in Ye Chen's eyes. At this rate, reaching the Quenching Body Realm Seventh Level within a month would not be difficult!

However, just as he was prepared to continue consolidating his cultivation in one go, the System's prompt sounded in his mind again:

[Warning: Detected that the host relies too much on Medicinal Pills for advancement; the Foundation may become unstable. It is recommended to stop taking Medicinal Pills and use the Cultivation Technique to temper the Physical Body and spiritual power for three days before continuing.]

Ye Chen's heart skipped a beat, and he immediately looked inward. Sure enough, although he had achieved a Breakthrough, the condensation of his spiritual power seemed slightly inferior to before, and there was also some residual medicinal power in his Physical Body that had not been fully absorbed.

"The System is right to remind me." He immediately suppressed the urge to continue taking Medicinal Pills. "Haste makes waste; the Foundation is the most important."

He changed his strategy and no longer took Medicinal Pills, but relied purely on the Basic Qi Guiding Art to absorb Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi, circulating it through his meridians over and over again to thoroughly solidify the newly achieved Breakthrough and completely refine and absorb those residual medicinal powers.

This process was dull and slow, but it was crucial for his future path of cultivation.

On the third night of Ye Chen's focused tempering of his cultivation, he suddenly felt something and woke up from a deep state of meditation.

He walked to the window and looked out at the pitch-black night sky, his gaze sharp.

"Someone is spying..."

An extremely weak but malicious aura flashed and vanished at the periphery of the courtyard.

Trouble, it seemed, did not intend to let him Cultivate in peace.