Read Rise Of The Worm Sovereign Chapter 261 - Meeting The King? online for free - AllNovelFull
Shirong recognized who that voice belonged to and even Lin Wu did.
"Ah! He really did jinx himself. To meet this man just upon entering the royal palace, tsk, tsk…" Lin Wu said.
"Minister Du Yang, what a pleasure to meet you," Shirong said, forcing a smile onto his face.
This was the very man that had dared to involved Shirong in his plot and was the one being assisted by his first, third and fifth brother. Shirong himself was the second child of the current patriarch of the Ji clan.
There was a year's difference between him and his elder brother who was the first born. Shirong had been able to come out on top due to his capabilities and had been chosen as an Heir. The other sons had lost, but it was evident that they would not give up this fast.
While they could not act openly since the clan rules forbid them; they could still makable plots against Shirong to suppress him and weaken him. But they had miscalculated that Shirong would not take this lying down.
They did not know that Shirong had the Immortal Crystal Armament, Lin Wu who could show him the memories who the people who it killed. If it had not been for him, there was probably no way Shirong had even thought they would do something like this.
Unlike most other clans, once the succession of the heir was decided, there wasn't much opposition from the other contenders. That is how it had been since the time of his ancestor. But it now seemed like his brothers and even his sister were not willing to continue that tradition.
Shirong doubted that even if he brought proof, there was a chance that his father the patriarch would not believe it.
'But this also means that you can't act against me openly. Even if I get rid of your pawn's what can you do?' Shirong thought to himself as his eyes showed an evil glint.
For a moment there, minster Du Yang felt goosebumps appearing all over his body and he involuntarily shivered.
'Why am I suddenly feeling cold? It's not winter and I'm a Core condensation realm cultivator for heavens' sake.' Minister Du Yang wondered.
The evil glint in Shirong's eyes faded away rather quickly as he assumed a friendly smile.
"No, the pleasure is all mine. Allow me to greet you on your breakthrough to the Nascent Soul realm." Minster Du Yang hurriedly spoke.
"Well, I'm honored to be worthy of receiving your praise," Shirong said while looking minster Du Yang right in his eyes.
"But… I think I should head on in and pay my respects to the king." Shirong added.
"Yes, yes, by all means. I'm heading there as well." Du Yang replied.
Shirong nodded his head before walking through the long corridor. After two minutes, they reached the end of it, where two large doors met them. Guards stood on their sides and they pushed open the door, seeing them approach.
"YOUNG MASTER SHIRONG OF THE JI CLAN AND MINSTER DU YANG HAVE ARRIVED!" They announced.
The king who had been listening to his advisers silently, almost fell from the throne. He had his head resting against his palm and lost his balance, but managed to not embarrass himself. Thankfully, everyone had switched their attention to the doors that had opened and thus did not see his embarrassing act.
"I pay respects to his majesty, Ling Huo!" Shirong said with a slight bow.
The other ministers and advisers did the same as was the etiquette and then sat back down.
"Finally you are here, Young Master Shirong. We have been waiting for you eagerly." The King said.
"It was the same for me, King Huo. I got a little busy with some bandits while coming here." Shirong replied.
The king's brows furrowed upon hearing his words and spoke, "bandits? Here? Near my capital?"
"Indeed, King Huo. Just a couple of hours distance from the city too. Though don't worry they are all gone now and won't trouble the masses anymore." Shirong replied, which made a lot of advisers relieved.
But there was one person who did not look fully calm. He tried to hide it and was even successful but one person had caught it.
"Hoho! So here is the root of the problem, eh? Looks like I'll get to see the action much earlier than I had expected." Lin Wu said, feeling amazed.
"I am sorry that you had to act yourself, Young master. I swear that my officers will look into it right away." The king said before looking towards his ministers.
"YES! Do not worry young master, I will personally go and verify this matter." One of the ministers sitting in the court said before rushing out of the hall.
"I'll go and write a missive to inform the heads of the various settlements." Another minister said before leaving the room too.
After that, five more minsters left the hall, citing some excuse and hurried out. They had spent quite a few years in the royal court and knew when misfortune was close to them.
After all, when it came time for punishments, it was the idle worker that was picked first rather than the one who was busy with his tasks.
"If I may speak more King Huo." Shirong said, much to the anxiety of Du Yang.
"Please feel free to speak Young master Shirong." The King replied.
"When I 'dealt' with the bandits, I happened to come across more information that I believe you would be interested in," Shirong spoke.
"Oh, and what is this information?" The king questioned, feeling interested, while minster Du Yang had now started sweating.
"I was able to coax out some information from the mouths of those bandits and learned that there is a criminal organization working right under the kingdom's nose," Shirong revealed.
The king's eyes went wide as he gripped the handle of the throne hard.
"And, which organization is this?" The King questioned.
"The shadow dagger pavilion."
The King was appalled by this information and doubted it at first. But then after thinking over it he realized that there literally was no reason for Shirong to fabricate this information.
If Shirong really wanted to go against the Ling kingdom, there were many easier ways to do it rather than this. He looked at his remaining ministers who were still sitting in the hall showing anxious expressions.
"I see… we'll look into it right away." King Huo said.
"Actually King Huo, you won't have to look far. I believe one of the co-conspirators should be right here." Shirong said with a toothy smile.
Beads of sweat dripped down Du Yang's forehead as his hands trembled. King Huo gritted his teeth and looked around the hall once again. But right now nearly every minister was in a similar condition to that of Du Yang, making it hard for him to assume.
"Do you want me to tell you who that person is?" Shirong teased.
"Please do, young master…" King Huo said in a tired tone.
Shirong did not speak but simply turned to face Du Yang.
"Would you like to say it yourself or should I do it now," Shirong said.
The thing was, Shirong didn't even know if Minister Du Yang was part of this or not. As from what he knew, the Shadow dagger pavilion had likely cooperated with the Nian Yue sect under the direction of his sister.
While Minster Du Yang and Elder Pei were under the direction of his brothers. Shirong knew that they would not cooperate on matters such as this, as they had rivalry between them anyway.
But Shirong didn't care for this. Since his sister and brothers had decided to fight for the position of the Heir this way, he may as well pool them together. As for what came out of this, it didn't matter to him.
The mess would be his sister and brothers to deal with. In fact, he hoped they would do more of this so that he could pull them deeper into his net.
'The more you struggle the more you will fall, I won't let the position of the Heir be taken from me.' Shirong thought to himself with determination.
Everyone could understand the implication in Shirong's voice and knew that the conspirator Shirong was talking about was none other than Minster Du Yang. The other ministers secretly took breaths of relief upon seeing that it was not them. Though not all of them were sure yet.
"Lies! I did no such thing, I'm being slandered, your majesty!" Du Yang protested.
He didn't know why this was being put on him. He knew about the existence of the Shadow Dagger pavilion and even had some dealings with them. But he didn't ask them to target Shirong. He was not that stupid. Sure, he had put Elder Pei on him, but not the bandits.
"Is that so?" Shirong said before flicking his finger.
~Kaboom!~
"ARGH!" Du Yang yelled in pain, as his arm was blasted apart.
Shirong had used just a sliver of his lighting attribute spirit Qi, and the result was this. Even since he had undergone the heavenly tribulation, his Dantian had a qualitative change. His affinity with the lightning attribute was now greatly increased than before.
Not only that, but there were even traces of tribulation lightning within his own, which made it leagues better than any normal lightning that a cultivator would use.
Seeing the action of Shirong, everyone in the hall was shocked. King Huo stood up and nearly shouted, but then controlled himself.
"Ah, don't worry King Huo. I have proof too, I won't just act without it. That would be quite disrespectful don't you think." Shirong said.
"You have proof? What is it show me!" King Huo said urgently.
"Here, take this," Shirong said, handing the king a jade slip.
"The king took the jade slip and used his spirit sense to check it. But just as he sensed the consents he opened his eyes.
"These are memories! How did you get it?" King Huo questioned.
"I think King Huo is erudite enough to not need an answer from me and can guess for himself," Shirong replied.
King Huo went silent for a few seconds before silently muttering, "Soul search…"
Soul searching was a forbidden technique, but its use was still permitted in certain cases. It could be said that this was one of them, and King Huo couldn't really reprimand Shirong for this either. Even if he did, no sect or power was going to take action against Shirong for using such a technique on bandits, of all people.
King Huo closed his eyes again and looked over the rest of the memories before looking at Du Yang. But now, his eyes were filled with rage and it was as if embers could be seen in them.
"YOU TRAITOROUS FOOL!" King Huo Shouted as he whipped his hand at Du Yang.
His cultivation base was at full display and now one could tell that he was no weak man. King Huo of the Ling Kingdom was at the Adolescent Soul stage of the Nascent Soul realm.
~Shua~ Shua~
Two beams of energy shot out from his arms as they hit the legs of Du Yang. Making him fall to the ground, his legs crippled.
"Your majesty, believe me I didn't do it. I would never get the shadow Dagger pavilion to do something like this." Du Yang protested between pain-filled grunts.
"MEN! Take him away for interrogation and bring in the rest of his clan, too. Then get all of his underlings and subordinates for the same." King Huo ordered.
The other ministers who were involved in law enforcement all stood up to act. These were no weak people either and were at the peak stage of the core condensation realm. While one of them was even at the Infant soul Stage of the Nascent Soul realm.
But just as they were about to reach Du Yang, a square plate appeared in his hands.
Report chapter
The people in the room were wondering what the square plate was as not everyone had seen it. But Shirong knew clearly as he had seen one before.
~shua~
Just like what Elder Pei had done, Du Yang set up a defensive barrier formation before activating the teleportation talisman.
"A teleportation talisman!" The ministers shouted, after one of them recognized it.
"Stop right now Du Yang, do not resist!" King Huo shouted but couldn't break past the barrier.
Unlike Elder Pei, Du Yang was much more prepared and had a higher cultivation base as well. He even pulled out high grade spirit stones, to supply spirit Qi to the talisman and the barrier.
One could tell from this that the man had always been ready to run if things ever went south like that had right now.
"NOT ON MY WATCH!" Shirong shouted.
The Immortal Crystal Armament appeared on his body and formed a gauntlet around his right hand. But that was not all, as an imposing pressure was released from Shirong's body that made everyone suffocate in the hall.
"The spirit Qi… I can't control it…" One of the ministers said.
Even King Huo was having difficulty with the spirit Qi in the air, while the spirit Qi in his Dantian was still able to function well.
"What is this pressure…" King Huo muttered with shock.
This was nothing but Lin Wu using his radiation manipulation innate skill in cooperation with Shirong. Using his spirit Qi to fuel the innate skill, Lin Wu could pretty much keep it active indefinitely.
Plus in addition to that, his radiation manipulation skill worked even more efficiently when it was powered with the lightning attribute spirit Qi. All that combined put massive pressure on the barrier that Du Yang had set up, such that it cracked in five seconds.
~Crack~
~shatter~
Du Yang looked in horror, as he had not expected Shirong to have become so powerful. He was confident of holding off against the king who was at the adolescent soul stage of the Nascent Soul realm, including the combined assault of the other ministers.
But somehow Shirong, who was a newly reached Infant Soul Stage Nascent Soul realm cultivator, was able to do it with what looked like minimum effort. Knowing that he was done for, madness appeared in Du Yang's eyes.
"YOU WON'T GET ME ALIVE!" Du Yang shouted as he pulled out nearly fifty high grade spirit stones.
He spat out a mouthful of blood onto the Square plate, which was the teleportation talisman, and crushed the spirit stones. A dense wave of spirit Qi that was visible to the naked eyes was released from the spirit stones and started entering the talisman at great speed.
But it was not going according to the way that the people in the hall were thinking.
"He… he's not speeding up the process, he's going to make it explode!" The King shouted.
~Weeng~
Then a scene that Shirong had witnessed before was displayed.
A black tear appeared on the teleportation talisman as it started to spread. The talisman was directly consumed and the black tear now embedded into the spatial fabric.
"It-it is a spatial rift!" The minsters yelled in fear.
~shua~
The black tear turned into a black crack and started to suck the air into it. Seeing the repeat of last time, Shirong remembered his helplessness. Had it not been for Clan Head Lu who delayed for time and the immortal Crystal Armament that suppressed the spatial right, he would have long since died.
~whoosh~
The black crack expanded and its suction force increased. The person that was closest to it was the first to be pulled towards it. Of course, this was none other than Minister Du Yang, who had an insane look on his face.
The king had a complex expression as he saw Du Yang being devoured whole by the spatial rift.
"THIS BASTARD! NOT ONLY IS HE KILLING HIMSELF, BUT HE'S GOING TO TAKE THE CAPITAL WITH HIM!" King Huo yelled in frustration.
His eyes wandered to his group of advisers and ministers, witnessing their anxious faces.
"Useless! The lot of them…" King Huo gritted his teeth as he muttered to himself.
But then a change suddenly occurred.
~tear~
~WEENG~
Just as the spatial rift had started to expand, Shirong extended his hands forward. His sleeves spontaneously combusted as a pair of emerald green gauntlets were revealed. The gantlets were long and seemed to go all the way to his shoulder, seeming connected with something more.
The two gauntlets started to glow as suppressive pressure came from it.
~whoosh~
A change occurred again, as a vortex formed around the spatial rift. This vortex was different than the air vortex that was formed from the suction force of the spatial rift though. This one was spinning in a counter clockwise and if one remembered from the paste, Shirong was using the same method that Lin Wu had used before.
The suction force of the spatial rift was reduced by a lot as the ministers could finally take control of their spirit Qi and stabilize.
"MINSTERS! SET UP A SEALING FORMATION AND ASSIST THE YOUNG MASTER!" King Huo shouted, before sprinting ahead.
He formed hand seals before creating runes in the air. Each rune was packed with power and turned into the shape of a leaf before plastering it against the vortex that was spinning around the spatial rift.
The ministers finally broke out of their stupor and hurried to assist their kings. The Nascent Soul realm cultivators among them took the lead while the rest of them supplied them with their spirit Qi.
"Yezi Sealing Formation!" King Huo chanted.
~shua~
The number of leaves started increasing and soon covered the entire vortex. Shirong had still not stopped though, and his eyes were closed now. He was observing everything with his spirit sense and focused on the suppression of the spatial Qi that was leaking out of the spatial rift.
"I won't lose out this time!" Shirong said with determination.
Report chapter
Lin Wu knew Shirong would not be able to do this on his own and thus was assisting him with it. A few suggestive thoughts here and there made it seem like Shirong was doing this all on his own.
Even he didn't realize that these subconscious suggestions were not his own and belonged to someone else. The radiation vortex eventually got stronger and the suppressive force of it also intensified.
After about ten minutes of hard struggle, Shirong was finally able to close the spatial rift and take a breath of relief. Even with his nascent Soul realm cultivation base, it had taken him quite an effort.
'If just this took up half of my spirit Qi, how much more can the potential of the Immortal Crystal Armament be extended?' Shirong wondered to himself as he wiped the sweat from his brow.
The others including the king were in a worse shape than him and directly slumped to the ground. They were drained of their spirit Qi as well and could not move for a bit.
~fizz~
The formation runes fizzed out and the Yezi sealing formation faded away. It looked rather beautiful even when disappearing as the leaves fell one by one, revealing the empty interior.
It was as if an egg had hatched but its shell was made out of leaves and its interior was empty.
The king looked at the place where the spatial rift was and then at Shirong.
"Thank you for your help, Young master Shirong. And I mean for both finding the true identity of Du Yang and also stopping the spatial rift. If it were not for you, I'm afraid we would have had a ton of causalities." The king spoke with gratitude.
Shirong nodded his head and spoke.
"Do not worry, King Huo. This was not just a problem for you but for me as well. They have been targeting me, so they must suffer the consequence. I swear I will tear them down if I discover where they are." Shirong replied.
"I'll send out our intelligence agents right away and they should have some information soon enough." The King stated.
"No need. I actually know where their hideout is in the city, but seeing Du Yang's reaction I think they must have already left by now. Try sensing it you will find the spatial fluctuations." Shirong spoke.
King Huo closed his eyes and extended his spirit sense, but was unable to sense anything. Due to the presence of the spatial rift, the entire spatial fabric of this region had been temporarily disturbed and as such he would not be able to differentiate between the spatial fluctuations.
Even Shirong only sensed it due to Lin Wu. There was a clear demarcation between the spirit Qi and radiation due to which Shirong could still tell it. But King Huo or the other mercenaries did not have the same level of expression as Shirong and thus could not tell.
"I'm afraid, my talent does not hold up to young master Shirong. Though, if you tell me where it is, I'll send my men right away to investigate. Even if they left the area, they should have left clues behind." King Huo replied.
'Oh yes. I should go and see how much more I can trouble my sister and brothers.' Shirong thought with a grin on his face.
His back was currently turned away from King Huo and thus he had not witnessed the eerie smile. If he had done, King Huo would not have been trusting enough towards Shirong.
Shirong's act of suppressing the spatial rift was deemed to be a great merit in terms of contribution to the ling kingdom and he would be hailed as a hero.
"Hmm… King Huo, I have a request from you." Shirong suddenly spoke.
"Sure, Young master do tell. I'll do my best to fulfill." King Huo replied.
"I would like this matter to be kept secret, or more accurately my involvement in this." Shirong stated.
He knew that while he would get merits for this, there was not much use to the credits. Whatever he could get with them, he either already had or could easily get from his clan. Thus it was not a novelty.
Rather hiding his involvement in this would have him hide his identity and that of the Immortal Crystal armament. Even now the people here thought of it to be a divine armor that Shirong seldom used. It was better if they didn't know the true capabilities about it so that he could have an advantage in killing.
The king thought about it for a while and found it to be reasonable.
"If you say so young master Shirong. This matter and your involvement in it will be kept secret. Thankfully, the spatial rift didn't get strong enough to destroy the hall, or there was no way the others would have been unaware about it." King Huo replied.
"Exactly. Plus, I believe this may give you the opportunity to weed out the problematic 'apples'." Shirong stated.
The king's eyes narrowed as realization dawned in his eyes.
"Young master is wise…" The King praised.
He turned to the other ministers and advisers who were still recovering and shook his head.
"Everyone that is here shall swear a blood oath to Young master, that his identity and involvement in this matter will not be revealed." King Huo ordered.
"We accept!" They all said in unison.
While some of them wanted to take advantage of this turbulent situation to play politics and gain some benefits, the King's Order and Shirong's gaze had sealed the deal for them. Neither of them were people that they wanted to offend and doing so would only spell their doom.
At least this way, they may get some benefits as the saviors of the capital.
Soon Blood oaths were sworn by each of the person and an invisible chain was formed over their hearts. If they were to break their oath, their hearts would be crushed by their own cultivation base.
Report chapter
Shirong was now looking through a building that had been recently abandoned. It was evident that whoever used the building before, left in a hurry.
This was the place where the Shadow Dagger Pavilion was residing before. Or rather one of their branches. The organization had multiple branches all over the kingdom including a few neighboring kingdoms as well.
Shirong looked at the destroyed and burned documents and furrowed his brows.
"Even while leveling they managed to destroy most of the things. What's left now is not worth much either and I doubt we would be able to find anything." Shirong muttered to himself.
Lin Wu was also looking around and unlike Shirong the system was able to sense the spatial fluctuation traces.
"System, can you approximate the location of the bandits from this?" Lin Wu questioned.
~Ding~
——
ANSWER: The system may be able to narrow down the range of teleportation to an area of about one hundred kilometers.
——
Seeing the system's answer Lin WU knew that it wasn't accurate but it was still a lot more than the previous thousand kilometers.
"Alright system, do what you do just said." Lin Wu replied.
~Ding~
——
INITIATING SPATIAL ANALYSIS: Please wait patiently.
——
After hearing this notification, silence descended in the empty hall.
'Now to wait till this part is done…' Lin Wu thought to himself as he returned his focus to Shirong.
Now that Lin Wu was in the capital city, he was far enough that the teleportation formation of the Taiji Celestials tomb would not work. The maximum range of the formation was till the Deer Wood city,
This was a safety net for Lin Wu and he kept it for emergencies when he is far away from Shirong or if he wanted to hide in a desolate place. But now this safety net was unable to work and the distance would make it impossible for Lin Wu to teleport.
"I need to get a power source for the Tomb soon…' Lin Wu thought to himself.
"Did you find anything?" A voice suddenly asked.
"Nothing of importance. Most of the things here have either been taken away or destroyed so that the members of the Shadow Dagger Pavilion stay safe." Shirong replied to the advisers that had decided to accompany him.
"These pests…" The adviser cursed.
~Sigh~
"I'll take my leave for now. You all can take over from here." Shirong said before leaving the building.
There was a cordon set to prevent the people from getting near the building. But as always, they were very interested in what was happening there, can they all gathered around the perimeter of the cordon.
"LOOK A NASCENT SOUL REALM CULTIVATOR!" Someone shouted as they saw Shirong took flight.
Since he was not using a spirit tool, it was obvious that he was in the Nascent Soul realm. This shocked the people, as there were only a few Nascent Soul realm cultivators in the capital and all of them were part of the Royal court.
Seeing one appear here meant that whatever happened here was very important. This would now become a well known matter that the people would talk about for quite a while. But Shirong did not care about it and it was up to the advisers to take care of it from here on.
His main goals had been fulfilled much faster than he had thought. In less than a day, he had met the merchant and taken the supplies, sent the letter, met the king, taken care of Du Yang and mess up his siblings' plans and finally investigate the Shadow Dagger pavilion.
Albeit the last goal was not successfully done as they had managed to run away. Shirong had not expected that Du Yang truly did have some links with Shadow Dagger Pavilion. This meant that either intentionally or unintentionally, his siblings had thrown in their lots together.
It was now evening and Shirong was meditating at one of the courtyards that had been given to him. The king was very generous, seeing as how Shirong had possibly stopped the complete destruction of the capital.
A spatial rift that uncontrollably grew was a terrifying thing. Even if common cultivators did not know much about it, the king definitely did. Usually, they did not grow like the one they saw today or the one that happened at the Deer wood city.
Most of them were unable to sustain themselves for long and would stop automatically. But the one that Du Yang had created was different. They didn't know if he knew this would happen or not, but it was unexpected.
If one was able to make spatial rifts like this using teleportation talismans, things would get difficult for a lot of them. Even Shirong didn't know of this method. He could understand it happen due to a spatial storage ring as it was a mini world in itself, but a teleportation talisman did not work the same way.
Shirong pondered on it but was unable to figure out how it happened.
~Sigh~
"I should just restore my spirit Qi for now…" Shirong muttered to himself.
Normally the king should have organized a celebratory banquet tonight, but due to the events that occurred, he had no option but to postpone them. Shirong didn't mind it either, as it gave him time to rest.
After Shirong was deep in cultivation, Lin Wu took this as his cue to leave. Leaving behind a disguise, he left the spatial storage ring and finally came out.
"Ah~ fresh air…" Lin Wu said to himself. "Now then… let's get to work shall we."
He looked around the city from the top of the courtyard and spoke, "system, scan the capital city."
~Ding~
——
SCANNER ACTIVATED: Area selected, please wait a moment.
SCAN COMPLETED: Map updated
DATA BANKS: Updated
——
"Oh? The data banks got updated just from a map scan? Seems like there are a lot of interesting things here. Better get to it then, who knows how many days I'll be here." Lin Wu said to himself before opening the map.
Report chapter
Lin Wu could see many new markers on the map which included locations of interest, positions of cultivators, and those of the beasts and spirit beasts. Overall, there were over a hundred thousand markers on the map.
Lin Wu set the filters and which only highlighted the markers that he wanted to see, but even now there were over a thousand markers on the map. Even the map itself was much larger than that of the deer wood city by about four times.
This meant that the capital's size was equal to that of four Deer wood cities. There were various buildings in the city including the temple of the three guardian beasts and even an ancestral worship temple.
Lin Wu saw a lot of markers that showed cultivators around the ancestral temple too, which was probably due to the Annual ancestral worship that was going to happen in the coming few days.
Lin Wu had been hearing the conversation of the people all this time and knew that the reason for the people coming to the capital at this time was due to that. Even at the entrance, the long line of carriages was due to the same thing.
Lin Wu's first goal was to further upgrade the system's data banks and thus he selected the places that would have books and documents. Among the selected places the one that had the most of them was the Royal Library.
It was also the closest to Lin Wu's position, and thus he selected this place. But the problem was getting there undetected. There were far too many guards everywhere and Lin Wu would have to be very careful in sneaking in there.
Though he didn't have to particularly enter the library itself, as long as he could get in a ten meter range, the system would be able to scan it.
"System, plot a safe route to the royal library." Lin Wu ordered.
~Ding~
——
CHARTING A ROUTE: Please wait a moment...
ROUTE FOUND: Activating Navigation HUD
——
The navigation pointer appeared in front of Lin Wu and he saw the route on the map as well.
"Damn, this is quite long…" Lin Wu said, seeing the route.
The royal library was about half a kilometer from his location to the west. But to go there, the route that the system had plotted was long and winding. It went through the city and then entered the ground from one of the empty plots in the city garden and then went straight to the basement of the Royal library. From there, he would have to sneak in and infiltrate the rest of the part.
~huu~
"Better get to it…" Lin Wu said before climbing down from the roof of the courtyard.
He directly dug into the ground and bypassed the formations due to having the 'key' from Shirong. He came out of the ground in one of the houses one kilometer away and then crawled on the roads while hiding along the corners.
He eventually reached the city garden, where he was almost detected by the guards.
"Hey what's there!" The guard exclaimed, alerting his companion that was nearby.
Now Lin Wu could not move nor act as there was an even greater chance that he would be seen that way. Instead, he thought for a bit and let the two guard's approach him in the dark corner along a wall.
"Huh? It's a spear?" The guard said.
The guard bent down to check closer and noticed the gleam of the spear. His eyes lit up as he realized he had found something really valuable.
"Haha! What luck! We found a treasure." The guard said to his companion.
"Are you sure we should take it? What if it belongs to someone powerful?" The companion of the guard questioned.
"If it is lying like this, the owner either threw it away or it does not belong to anyone. Besides, as long as we don't tell anyone, they won't find out." The guard said before kneeling beside Lin Wu, who was in the form of a spear.
The guard held onto the spear and tried to pick it up.
"What the hell! Is it stuck or something?" The guard exclaimed upon finding it very difficult to lift the crystal spear.
"Hey, why are you just standing there? Come help me pick it up." The guard asked.
"I don't feel good man. This does not seem right." The second guard said.
"Bah! Just shut up and help me." The first guard said in an annoyed tone.
"If you say so…" The other guard said before kneeling beside the man and putting his hands on the crystal spear.
But the moment both of the guard's hands were on the spear something shocking happened.
"What the-" Before the guard could yell, his mouth was muffled.
The second guard could not do anything either and found himself unable to breathe. The two guards discovered that the spear in their hands had suddenly become limp and was now wrapped around their mouths.
It did not stop there though as the spear then coiled around their neck, choking them. The two guards tried to move it but found it to be impossible. Not only was the grip of that spear too strong, but the weight also made it impossible for them to move.
A minute later, both the guards were unconscious and Lin Wu let go of them.
~phew~
"The old video game assassin trick really works, huh…" Lin Wu said before dragging the two men to a nearby area.
There were a few stone chairs here, along with a table.
"Ah, a perfect picnic table." Lin Wu said before setting the two men there.
He then took out a bottle from his inventory. He opened the mouths of the men and poured the contents of the bottle into their mouths before slumping their heads on the table. He then placed the empty bottle there while spraying some amount on their clothes.
"There we go. Two drunk guards, slacking on their duty." Lin Wu said while looking at his handiwork.
Report chapter
Now that Lin Wu thought of it, he realized his action reminded him of something.
"Damn… I acted like one of them tentacle aliens didn't I?" Lin Wu shuddered.
He forcefully pushed that thought away and found the spot where he was supposed to dig through. He entered the ground and swiftly made his way to the area beneath the Royal library.
Unlike the Deer wood city, there weren't many underground places in the Capital city. He didn't know if they just didn't want to do that or if there were some other restrictions on making them.
He looked at the underground layers of the map and saw that only the buildings that belonged to the royals had an underground part to them. The rest of the buildings were all built on the surface and had more floors on them for space.
"Here we are," Lin Wu said upon reaching the underground wall of the basement.
He used his spirit sense and found a suitable place to bore a hole through. The place he had chosen was right behind a large cupboard that was located in an empty room. Lin Wu created the hole easily and crawled out through the gap between the cupboard and the wall.
Though it was quite a squeeze and he ended up moving the cupboard a little forward. But after that, he would be able to easily re-enter when needed.
"Is this a storeroom?" Lin Wu said, as he took a look around.
There was old broken furniture here that was covered with dust and cobwebs. It was evident that this room had not been opened for quite a while now.
"Well… it just makes it more convenient for me…" Lin Wu said before going towards the door.
The door was obviously locked but all it took was a little effort from Lin Wu's end to open it. He looked at the keyhole and inserted a small spike into it. Then in it, the spike started growing and took shape of the interior.
~chink~
Lin Wu turned the spike and the door unlocked.
"Haha, lockpicking 100…" Lin Wu said before peeking out of the door.
The corridor was empty, but on the other end of it, a guard was standing. The guard was a cultivator and was dressed in different clothes than the city guards. These were the royal guards that served the royal family and consisted of only cultivators.
Lin Wu crawled closer and looked up at the beams going across the roof.
"Bingo!" He said to himself.
Lin Wu elongated his body and hooked on to a beam on the roof. He then pulled up his body and traveled ahead from one beam to the other. Him being able to extend and shrink his body made it a piece of cake for him.
But then Lin Wu's progress was halted when he got near the staircase. The guards here were scanning the area with their spirit sense. There were four guards here and each of them alternated between using their spirit sense. This way there was always someone alert.
Still, there was a small gap of a couple of seconds when they switched their turns. Besides, they didn't keep it focused on one place but instead moved it around just how a security camera would move.
"Hmm… aren't these people just glorified CCTV cameras?' Lin Wu thought to himself.
He waited for the guard to switch their turn and moved ahead at a lightning speed. Then when the spirit sense was about to pass over him, he shrunk his body and aligned it with the beam's length. The system also started masking his spirit Qi which made it harder to detect him.
Now unless the guard particularly paid attention to that beam, they wouldn't see Lin Wu there. Even then they would only feel that there was some inanimate object placed there. They weren't paying attention to a creature like Lin Wu, anyway.
What they were on guard about was humans or spies who may try to entire the library to steal things. Because of this, it became a bit easier for Lin Wu to sneak in.
Every time they switched their turns, Lin Wu would move one beam ahead. There were many wooden beams that went across the roof, as they supported the weight of it. They were about a foot wide and several meters long, which made it more than enough for Lin Wu to hide.
It took Lin Wu about thirty minutes to cross the area before he reached the next floor. From here on, the progress was fast as there weren't guards constantly scanning with their spirit sense.
About thirty more minutes later, he was at the entrance of the library. He had to stop here as the door was locked and there were four more guards standing there.
"Hmm… how do I go ahead from here?" Lin Wu wondered as he looked at the map.
The route shown on it was from here, and the other routes were even more risky. This was the only point of access that had the least amount of guards as well.
It was now that he noticed the decorative wooden grill at the top of the doors of the library. The grill was there for ventilation and looked like one of those antique type ones.
'Wait a minute… I can try that maybe…' Lin Wu thought to himself before getting closer.
He inched close to the grill carefully and made sure that the guards were not alerted. Finally, when he reached there, he studied the grill. He then brought his tail forward and turned it into a sharp form.
He then started to cut a part on the wooden grill slowly, making sure that no noise was made and no wooden shavings fell down. After a few minutes, an oval shaped hole with beautiful patterns on its edges was made on the grill.
But Lin Wu was not yet. He created another similar oval shaped hole on the other side of the wooden grill too, making it look symmetrical.
Report chapter
If one were to look at the wooden grill now, they would think that it had always been like this. With a little assistance from the system, Lin Wu had been able to make an elegant design.
"Well… let's just hope they don't find out about this for a while. Though they probably will find out about it after a while." Lin Wu muttered to himself before entering through one of the holes.
The hole was still a tight squeeze for Lin Wu and he almost got stuck, but then transforming his body into the organic form partially helped him get through. He did not fully transform into the organic form as he would have not been able to maintain the same size.
Lin Wu had long since learned that if he wanted to maintain his form and shape, he had to stay in the crystalline form. While he was able to manipulate his size up to a certain extent in the organic form, there were still discrepancies.
Thus the Crystalline form was the more advantageous one in aspects such as these.
After he got into the library, it didn't take him long to begin what he was here for.
"Alright system, begin the scan." Lin Wu ordered.
~Ding~
——
SCANNER ACTIVATED: Targets selected
LARGE DATA STORES DETECTED: Please wait patiently
ESTIMATED TIME OF COMPLETION: 4 hours, 21 minutes and 16 seconds
——
"Damn, that's quite a lot of time… but I guess that's reasonable considering the amount." Lin Wu muttered to himself.
He had plenty of time till Shirong would wake up and now that he had better control over Shirong by the virtue of the Backdoor function, even if he was not there, Shirong would not find out about him.
Even if Shirong checked the ring right now, he would see that the spear is still there, but if he tried to withdraw it, he would find it resiting him. By now Shirong had learned well enough that he shouldn't force the Immortal Crystal Armament to do things that it didn't want to.
Another thing was that the chances of Shirong withdrawing him were also quite less in the city. Not only was there no danger currently, but using the Immortal Crystal Armament in the open was also not favorable for him.
Since it was going to take a while for the system to scan and store all the things from the library, Lin Wu decided to take a stroll around and check things out to pass the time.
"May as well read something." Lin Wu said to himself.
The library was currently locked and no one was here, so Lin Wu could freely move around and check the books. He moved to a section that had more information on beasts, or more accurately strong beasts.
Lin Wu knew that whatever he was right now, it was the result of the unknown bloodline he had assimilated with the system's help. Even now it was not completely done and he could further obtain more and more abilities as he continued progressing it.
Lin Wu read through a couple of books for two hours but they all were normal beasts. While there were some immortal beasts mentioned in them, they weren't anything too extraordinary.
But eventually, he found a book that was very old. When he opened it, he could tell that the book was a spirit tool itself, having the ability to store a lot of information. Its pages were made out of some kind of an unknown material but they looked quite valuable.
'This book is pretty much multiple jade slips bound together.' Lin Wu thought upon seeing the massive amount of information that was in it.
"Wait, what section is this?" Lin Wu wondered as he finally looked around.
While not all books were like the one he had in his hand. About five percent of them were high quality ones similar to the one he had in his hands.
Finally, at the other side of the shelves, he saw the board hanging that read: Restricted section (Trespassers beware! You will be killed by the formation!)
"There's a formation here too? I didn't feel it… system scan for the formation." Lin Wu spoke.
~Ding~
——
FORMATION DETECTED: Blood Slaughter Formation found
FORMATION STATUS: Active
——
"Huh? Wait a minute… the reason why it didn't affect me is because… it targets humans? Looks like shitty programming saved me again… and the system also didn't consider it dangerous." Lin Wu realized.
'No wonder they didn't place any guards inside the library, they simply don't need to. The formation itself is enough for everything.' Lin Wu thought.
Returning his focus to the book at hand, Lin Wu started reading it.
"Oh my… now this is the kind of beasts I was looking for…" Lin Wu murmured.
There were many beasts described in this book and all of them were immortal beasts that were above the Immortal Ascension realm. There were even beasts that were said to be above them described here, but it didn't say what their cultivation base was exactly. All it said was that it was very high.
Most of these beasts were considered to be legendary beasts that even Lin Wu had heard of in his past life like the phoenix, flood dragons, unicorns, qilins, dragons and such. Though there were some very unique beasts in it too.
One of those beasts was a fish beast called as the Blue Ribbon Tail Sting Ray.
Lin Wu had actually heard about them in his past life too as they existed there too. But the ones mentioned in this book were in no way comparable to those. These ones were strong and could kill thousands of beasts with a single thrust of its stinger.
But that was not all, as this was but a mere basic form of the beast. The Blue Ribbon Tail Sting Ray had a powerful bloodline and when it reached a sufficient cultivation base, it would be able to further evolve.
"A Celestial Star Sailing Ray… now that sounds impressive." Lin Wu muttered in awe of its abilities.
Report chapter
Lin Wu read more about the Celestial Star Sailing Ray and found it to be very powerful. It was said to be able to soar among the stars and absorb their light for nourishment. It was also a massive beast being able to cover entire mountains with its body that was hundreds of kilometers big.
It had patterns on its body that glimmered with starlight and anyone that looked at them was mesmerized. The beast would take advantage of this and swallow the afflicted prey whole.
Its stinger was nothing to mess with either. It could shoot out condensed beams of starlight that could cut through metal like it was paper and the venom it contained was even more terrifying.
It was said that even one drop of the venom would be enough to kill an entire ocean's creatures.
Overall, it was a beast that was way beyond Lin Wu's current level. Or any beast of this world to speak of as a matter of fact.
He flipped through more pages wanting to see if there was any information about the beast whose bloodline he had. He was trying to match the features of the carapace he had seen and the abilities he had obtained from them.
But even after another hour, he was unable to find out about it.
"Hmm… either this beast is extremely rare or it is simply a new species." Lin Wu reckoned.
Lin Wu checked the time renaming for the system to finish the scan and saw that there was just below an hour left.
"Should look at other things as well…" Lin Wu muttered to himself.
He picked out a few more interesting books and passed his time until finally the system's notification was heard.
~Ding~
——
DATA SCAN: Completed
DATA BANKS: Updated
——
"Excellent! Time to head back then. I'll check the other places tomorrow." Lin Wu said before leaving the same way he had come in.
He went to the side of the doors, elongated his body straight up like a pole, hooked it to the edge of the grill and pulled himself up, before passing through the hole. He continued on ahead and carefully left the Royal library.
This time he saw that the guards had changed and the pattern in which they moved was also different.
'New shift, new patter…' Lin Wu thought.
Still, he figured out the time intervals at which they switched between their spirit sense, and finally reached the basement of the building. From there on, it was an easy route. He few mutes later he appeared in the City garden and saw that the guards who he had left there were still sleeping.
"Are they dead or something? They should have woken up by now." Lin Wu wondered.
~Ding~
——
ANSWER: The guards are in a deep sleep induced due to consumption of concentrated alcohol. The wine that the host fed the guards is highly concentrated and is made from some low grade spirit herbs and thus can affect cultivators as well.
——
"Oh… maybe I should not have wasted that bottle on them." Lin Wu said, before pushing the matter to the back of his mind.
He had seen the bottle he had taken and known there was more than just one. Even here in this city, he had seen some of the shops keeping the same bottle, OS if he wanted to he would be able to find it rather easily.
Lin Wu had to take the long winded route once again, before he finally reached the Courtyard. The reason for the long and winding route was nothing but the formations that were set up in a lot of places. Lin Wu could obviously override all of them with the help of the system if he wanted to but that would have taken a long time.
Instead the easier option was to just circle around them or proceed from the empty spots that existed between them. There was also a formation around the Royal Library of course, but since Shirong had the 'key' to the royal palace, it worked the same for the Royal library.
If Shirong were to enter the library, while he would get to the book shelves and read most books, he would also be stopped by the inner formation that protected the Forbidden area. That place would require additional permission and no one could enter freely.
Only Lin Wu, who was an anomaly would be able to something like that. The formations that worked selectively on specific creatures would likely ignore him, unless they were specially made to stop anomalies like him.
But it was the very reason why there was very little chance that he would encounter a formation like that. What could stop him though was a basic barrier formation that stopped everything. While Lin Wu was able to get past them with the help of the system, a stronger version would still block him.
Lin Wu went inside the spatial storage ring of Shirong effortlessly and continued looking through all the information that he had obtained. Not only was there information about the beasts, but there was also a lot of information about different fields, such as alchemy, formations, weapon smithing, spirit tool refinement and some obscure things.
Though there weren't any cultivation techniques in this vault.
"Hmm… they should probably in a separate vault that's located in the grand palace. It would make sense that they would keep that under higher security than that." Lin Wu surmised.
While there was a lot of information in this library, even if it got leaked there wouldn't be a dire loss. But if the cultivation techniques got lost, there was even a chance the entire Ling Kingdom dynasty would fall.
While Lin Wu was reading through the information, the system was also speeding up its speed of analysis. It had reached a shocking speed that when it was finally morning, a notification was heard. It was the notification that Lin Wu had been waiting for all this time.
~Ding~
——
CULTIVATION TECHNIQUE ANALYSIS: Completed
——
Lin Wu knew that gathering more data was the key to speeding up the process of analysis but now that it was finally here he felt a bit speechless. But this passed over quickly and he felt excited.
"What cultivation techniques are now available system?" Lin Wu questioned.
~Ding~
——
CULTIVATION TECHNIQUES ANALYZED: 1. Immortal Sky Shaker Art
2. Vital Resurgence technique
NOTE: More cultivation techniques can now be made compatible when selected individually.
——
"Alright! This is good enough." Lin Wu said feeling excited.
Even the immortal Sky shaker art was enough to increase his power by quite a lot. As for the second technique that he had seen the Vital Resurgence technique, this was the technique that Shirong had used to increase his body tempering realm cultivation.
Though the thing was this technique was useless for Lin Wu who had a superior body created by the system. But he could now pass it on to other people who he deemed worthy thus it was not entirely useless.
"Let's try and see how it works…" Lin Wu muttered before reviewing the technique.
After he was sure about all its ins and outs, he began practicing it. From what he had seen the Immortal Sky Shaker art had four levels to it overall. Shirong was currently in the third level.
The first level was when the user was barely able to start using the wind attribute spirit Qi while in the second level the user would become proficient in it. The third stage allowed one to use the Lighting attribute spirit Qi while the fourth level was the mastery over the lightning attribute spirit Qi.
Usually if one wanted to reach the fourth level of the Immortal Sky Shaker art, they would have to reach the Dao treading realm at the very least. This was also the reason why the Immortal Sky Shaker Art was considered to be a top grade technique; it allowed one to cultivate all the way to the Dao Treading realm.
Most people who were experienced with cultivation and had some level of status knew that if one wanted to reach the Immortal Ascension realm, they would have to do so on their own and no cultivation technique could help them.
They needed to gain comprehension of their own self before figuring out the way to break through to the Immortal Ascension realm. For Lin Wu though, the current situation was very favorable.
Not only was he used to Shirong using the skills of the Immortal Sky shaker art but he had also felt the Wind attribute spirit Qi every time he used skill sync. Thus when Lin Wu started practicing the technique, he gained proficiency rapidly.
~Ding~
——
CULTIVATION TECHNIQUE ADDED: Immortal Sky Shaker Art
HOST DATA: Updated
CULTIVATION TECHNIQUE: 1. Taiji Dual Unity Scripture
2. Immortal Sky Shaker Art
CULTIVATION TECHNIQUE PROFICIENCY UPGRADE: Immortal Sky Shaker Art- First level (Wind attribute spirit Qi initiate)
——
"A quick start, but it's not enough… let's continue." Lin Wu muttered to himself.
Usually, there were two aspects to a cultivation technique. The first aspect was the spirit Qi aspect that was used to increase the cultivation base of the user, while the second aspect was the Qi skills that were integrated into it.
Shirong's Immortal Sky Shaker Art: Cloud Parting Gale and Sundering tempest were two of those integrated Qi skills. Though not all cultivation techniques came with integrated Qi skill. Most low leveled ones only allowed one to gather spirit Qi and if one needed something for the offense they needed to learn other Qi skills or martial skills.
Since Lin Wu had the Taiji Dual Unity Scripture, which was of an even higher grade than the Immortal Sky shaker art, he did not use it for cultivation directly. He was intending using it to gain the affinity with Wind attitude spirit Qi for now and then Lightning attribute spirit Qi next.
In Lin Wu's Dantian, a change could be seen. Before he only had basic attribute less spirit Qi in his Dantian but now a new pool of spirit Qi was forming in it. This was the wind attribute spirit Qi that was starting to gather. His normal spirit Qi would get converted due to the Immortal Sky shaker art and would then be stored back into the Dantian forming this pool.
His cores though, were completely unaffected. The spirit Qi condensed within them could not be moved easily. Only when Lin Wu used the Radiation manipulation to the maximum was he able to drain the spirit Qi in his core to a sensitive level.
Otherwise, in normal conditions, only the liquid spirit Qi in his Dantian was used. Even the spirit Qi that freely flowed in his meridians was enough to deal with the most basic uses of his skills and he rarely needed to increase his consumption.
Little by little the pool of wind attribute spirit Qi was increasing. After about four hours, it reached a point where it was five percent of Lin Wu's entire store of spirit Qi.
~huu~
"This should be enough for now… I need to rest, the pressure on my meridians and Dantian is really getting high now." Lin Wu said to himself.
The conversion of the spirit Qi into wind attribute spirit Qi required him to follow a certain Qi circuit. Normally it should not have caused him to pause like this, but since he was not a human, this was the most that the system could do for him.
If he forced himself to continue, he may end up harming himself.
'Though the system should be able to improve it as it grows its data banks.' Lin Wu thought to himself.
He then looked at the few other cultivation techniques he had obtained over the time. But didn't feel like using any of them. They were simply far too inferior to the current ones and didn't have any integrated Qi skills as part of them either.
Practicing them would simply be a waste of the system's energy and Lin Wu's time. It was better for him to focus on quality for now, since he had to work on his cultivation base as well.
Report chapter