Sister Quan followed the 'Mysterious Stranger' into the Sect Shop.

Wrapped in black bandages, under a black shirt with long sleeves and black gloves, the odd figure had a massive black robe with a raised hood hiding his face. Mysteriously.

A thin hand passed a jade slip to Sister Quan, who sighed. "Fine."

Again, a wave of purchases were made. Odd items, rare items, and all kinds of odds and ends were purchased with little care. The entire time the 'unknown man' stood silently, watching the chaos unfold.

Eventually after quite a while, he (OR SHE!?) absently began wandering away, heading back towards the Orphanage with many guards (Over fifty!) keeping watch.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Quan returned looking incredibly tired to her old apartment... and passed through the tunnel torn into the floor of her living room. And through the tunnel below that, so on and so forth until she reached the ground floor and accepted the nondescript cloak from a ghost-like guard. "I have the purchases."

The armored person nodded, and guided the now disguised Assistant on a meandering path that eventually left the Sect and led to a medium sized Restaurant.

On the third floor, she opened the private dining room and blinked.

Adam was holding something he called a 'fork' and was making odd noises. "Here comes the airplane!"

Little Tianshi was grumbling. "I'm notta baby Da. I can eat myself! On my own! I'm a big girl!"

The boy smirked. "Well, big girls need to eat more or they will shrink up and poof."

Her eyes went wide. "NO! I don wanna poof!" Her mouth opened. "Ah eat it!"

Some sort of beet mixed with herbs was gently placed in her mouth, making her chew like it was a mission from heaven. Adam chuckled as he used his free hand to pat her head. "Well done! And good food like this will help you grow big and strong."

Daww.

Sister Quan caught herself before doing anything embarrassing and gave a light cough.

Adam grinned! "How did it go?"

She moved to the other side of the table. "The decoy and eighty-nine guards are now back at your old room, and no one seemed suspicious. It was a bit tricky to swap rings with her though, your decoy had small hands."

He sighed. "Can't believe I looked that unhealthy those few weeks ago."

Oh, he had already ordered for her! How sweet. "You looked worse, that Decoy weighed a few stone more than you did on your last public visit... it should show you have been healing and improving without letting them know your current status."

Adam glanced at his muscled limbs. "I guess... most people can't triple their muscle mass by directly converting food I suppose."

She hummed. This steak was marvelous! "You also grew taller, your bones doubled in density, your stature is no longer bent over, your walk is steady and unhindered... the changes were significant BEFORE you hit Fourth Order." She paused. "Right, and they think you are still a Second Order Warrior like the decoy. That will be a more useful disguise than all the rest of it."

He gently cleaned a bit of mess his drunken little girl made. "Well, I gave her enough contribution points to keep spending freely as a distraction for a long while... I'm sure people will focus her way instead of noticing us heading off."

Some sort of pudding? She paused. "How many points did you provide for this scheme?"

He waved her off. "A few hundred thousand, by the time we get back I will have received it all back and more. That's why I donated the rest in my accounts to the Orphanage, can't use it since we aren't here."

She... huh. "Adam, you do know your other accounts had several million points, correct? And that the Orphanage normally receives around three thousand donation points a year or so?"

He blinked. "Huh. Wonder what they will spend it on." He took a bite himself, the bread was pretty awesome here. Should have caught the name. "Well, at least the points will be useful rather than sitting in my account gathering dust or whatever. Now, ready to talk about our journey?"

She grinned, trying one of the noodle dishes even as she nodded.

Adam absently created a surface with 'Qi Forms', as long as he used Binding energy it wouldn't catch on fire or whatever. That energy was REALLY odd. Carefully he spread out some maps and some documents. "Right, I happened to absorb a bit of information (all of it) about the types of lands found at the various mission sites. That is what convinced me to chose a mission heading here."

She leaned forward as Adam pointed to a fairly distant area of the map. "This is the 'Ash Forest', a massive area full of lava flows and fire energies that slowly formed under a forest. The trees there are mostly charcoal and ash, but can still sprout and grow and thrive in that odd environment... I think little Tianshi would benefit examining that area and I can handle the dangerous environment easily enough to keep us safe."

She saw him glance at nothing... probably the ten guards still following them. No wonder there were several dinner plates set up further down the table.

He pointed. "Officially, the Sect wants us to verify rumors that a fairly rare flower, the ash blossom, might have been located within that region. Unofficially, even if we find something, we need to either stay in that area or go elsewhere for at least two years."

Adam pulled some sort of gourd from his belt, pulling the cork and taking a light sip... that made his lips, throat, and exposed upper chest glow BRIGHT blue. "Ahh... that tastes pretty good. Anyway, my personal goal is to take advantage of the location. Gather some spiritual energy for my Martial Spirit, process some into other forms, find any treasures. I also want to modify these storage rings. Make some that can be used to hold living plants or creatures, maybe a portable farm..."

His vision drifted off. "Eventually find someone with soul bound equipment I can study... hopefully they would be a bastard so I can do some experiments without having to feel guilty or let good opportunities slip away. Still need to test some of those medical techniques... Well, I have no doubt someone will be stupid enough to fight us at some point. Cultivation requires dedication, not common sense."

A tug on his sleeve had him smile. "Still hungry?"

Little Tianshi pouted. "I don wanna poof. Hungy."

...This would be awesome blackmail material. Sister Quan idly wondered if she had a family... would it feel like this?

It wasn't a bad feeling. Not at all.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam hadn't really noticed how large his ever increasing Cultivation Cells had made him... but uh. Yeah, tall. Almost a foot taller than most people, with muscles to match. He had just been distracted by hard work, interesting new data, and a dizzy little girl who needed a bit of attention and care.

But now that he had seen what his 'Decoy' had to look like, he realized this needed some set limits.

Before getting started for the day, Adam sat in a meditative pose and focused.

'Flesh of the Avatar.'

Cells were forced into 'Storage Mode' and tightly packed against and within his skeletal structure, even as the amount of material grew as he commanded his body to compress. Both easier and harder due to how his body now had conceptual protections that attempted to ignore anything trying to change them. Thankfully his 'Flesh of the Avatar' ability was able to work around the issue pretty easily.

It didn't hurt, even as his nerves were shortened a bit as his body shrank into itself... but it did feel odd.

If needed, he could get rid of these stored cells... but he still had lots of room in his body to store the preserved material. And if he was injured, he now had enough emergency mass to just... fill in any wound. Should be useful.

A blink had him checking 'Recursion'. Huh... having a smaller body meant the cost of repairing the deeper layers went down significantly. So that was another vote for him not to be ten feet tall or whatever. For now, maybe an inch or two above Sister Quan's height should be fine.

No impurities, this was just a bit of restructuring... so Adam was able to easily get up, adjust his clothing to his slimmer size, and spend an hour or two modifying the carry-chair to still be supported even if his body was a third shorter than before.

After all, there were a few hours before the rest of his group (Minus guards) woke up... and uh. Well, he needed to shorten his sleeves. And pants. And... wow, he did NOT think this through.

Sister Quan opened the door later. "Good Morning Ad... What happened to you!?"

The boy chuckled. "Ah, I felt a bit too tall and decided to shrink down a little. Really should have done this before getting so many clothing sets."

She sighed. Right, it was Brother Chongsheng Adam, she should just get used to things like this. "Pass me those robes, I can help with the sewing."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

They had checked out and left the massive, massive city in the distance.

All of them were already heading South for some time at the moment that little Tianshi woke up.

She blinked... confused. "Da, why you short?"

He looked over his shoulder. "We are traveling, so I am now travel sized."

...Nope. Her bleary mind was unable to catch up with that. She held both hands forward. "Gimme rock."

A blue smiling Rockette settled into her arms. "Good rock. I love you, rock."

Back to sleep.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The plan was simple enough. Leave the Sect, sneak out of the city, get to one of the towns South of the area and join a caravan train. With the Sect itself distracted, no one should notice another small family unit (He was dragging a little girl with him) wandering around with a few guards who had hidden their clan affiliation. Not quite the stereotypical 'Silky Pants Young Master' scenario, but not uncommon either.

It was a bit of a surprise though when the trio of visible travelers saw their path blocked... by non-cultivators.

Just... normal bandits.

Adam didn't know how to respond really. The bandages should hide his glowing throat, right? "Good afternoon. Can I help you gentlemen?"

The mass of muscles and weaponry snorted. "Damn right you can. Drop anything you got of value and I might let one or two of you live. Depending of course."

The twenty or so men behind him were snickering.

...Adam tried to ignore the ten invisible experts all face palming.

These bandits were... uh. A mixed group. Most looked like beggars, but also had VERY expensive weaponry... so it was clear they dressed like that to hide from pursuit or to blend in with more innocent homeless when preparing an ambush. Or maybe it was just to avoid being recognized later if one of their victims survives or escapes.

All were well fed, which made the hobo look less convincing. All had massive muscles.

But none were cultivators.

...Little Tianshi could take them down without training. As a Tier One Warrior enhanced by Binding energy, she was far stronger than her cultivation base suggested. And Sister Quan could now melt metal into goo easily, human flesh was nothing in comparison.

No, treat them as a legitimate threat. Don't slip up because of how laughable the situation is.

Adam coughed. "Ah... I feel I must suggest you reconsider your actions. I may not look like a threat, but I have certain abilities that would be very troublesome if you attempted to put me down."

The loud laughter implied they were... not convinced. He sighed. "How about a compromise? Your leader against me, if I die or lose than everything I own you can take, my hidden guards won't act against you after the fact." Glancing at his Disciple he nodded. "As long as you don't touch my companions that is."

The man with two swords the length of a person snorted. "Invisible fighters, right. How about we just chop you in half and sell your women as sex toys when we get done with them."

...It appears that negotiations have broken down.

Adam sighed, gently settling little Tianshi's chair down. "Da?"

He pat her head. "Back to sleep, little one. I need a few minutes to practice my martial arts."

She blinked... "K."

And rolled over, snoring. Sister Quan gave him a meaningful glance, but also joined the girl to the side.

The larger man was beginning to lose his smirk, a frown darkening his face. "Boy, just kneel down and I will at least grant you a swift death."

Rockette, please redirect any power directed towards the girls.

'Ding.'

Right.

The men had been spreading out, ensuring no escape paths. "Enough of this, just stab the bastard so we can get to the good parts."

'Recursion' activated? Good.

Lower center of gravity, hop step forward, thrust...

A massive CRUNCH filled the air, the guy with a metal rod launched backward while his body folded over the claw attack, the crackle of broken ribs covering his desperate attempts to gasp. Even as his insides twisted and tore itself into mash, his expression was more shock than pain... until he smashed into the man behind his position, the blade meant for Adam tearing into his friends side as they collided.

Adam was already moving forward, left hand crushing a shoulder, right one gripping a blade as it tried to cut his hand. The wound created however just flowed away as soon as the boy released the weapon, his other hand having snagged the bandit's neck and HURLED the entire body at the stunned cluster of people further away.

His right foot SMASHED the fallen man's leg as he moved forward, twisting his hip to better angle another claw like grip into another man's chest... then INTO it, smashing the cavity open.

Adam paused for a moment, trying to sling the gore off his hand.

This was going well.

Unfortunately, his pause in movement allowed enough time to pass that the remaining victims had time to scream. How loud!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

There, much more quiet. A quick application of 'Heat Resistance' onto ONLY his equipment and clothing, a short burst of Blue energy fire... good, clean! Bit of an odd smell and a small amount of ash floating away, but at least he didn't have a red coat of paint.

He blinked... "Right, I had questions."

A few steps had him reach the only survivor, the man who acted most like a leader.

Well... he was alive at least. "Sorry that took too long."

He was trying to whimper, but the shock of losing arms and legs had probably made it hard to focus, even if Adam was kind enough to cauterize those injuries.

Still, things to do. "Yes, now that we have a bit of time to talk, I had a question or two. Seems to me like you have done this kind of thing before... and that you may have a 'guest' or two at your base. Just in case, would you kindly let me know where your base is located?"

The following conversation was a little hard to translate, but Adam smiled as he absently snapped the mans neck. "Wonderful."

Sister Quan had moved away from the area at some point, but he caught up quickly enough. "Everything safe here?"

The hidden guards nodded. "Good. Sister Quan, do you mind a slight detour? I want to make sure these bandits didn't have any captives."

The man interviewed implied there were none, but that dude wasn't exactly the most trustworthy person.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Yeah, the bandit dude lied. Thankfully, ten experts and Rockette's energy sensing ability helped them find the cave system fairly quickly.

Lots of goods, several bodies... no survivors.

They buried those found, took the materials that had some worth, and then Adam collapsed the cave mouth with some directed 'Pierce' and 'Strike' applications. Using his Battle Qi to empower those strikes had not only sliced through the stone but caused those areas to quickly soften and melt into molten goo... this wouldn't be an easily used base in the future.

Thankfully, Sister Quan had distracted his Disciple easily enough... she just thought they were exploring the countryside.

Which they were, technically.

By the time they reached an actual town, Adam felt emotionally drained. Some part of him had kind of looked forward to saving some people... but the Bandits clearly were looking for 'new meat' BECAUSE they had run out of victims. Bastards.

Some of the stolen money from the dead muggers had gone to buy a room at the Inn, Sister Quan eventually being convinced to sleep on the bed while Adam and little Tianshi snoozed on some fur rugs found in the cave loot.

Maybe next time he shouldn't be so kind when Bandits were involved.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

He jerked. "I'm up! I... what?"

Sister Tianshi was blinking at him. "Master? Why are you in my room?"

She paused. "Wait... is that Sister Quan?" A blink. "No, this isn't my room. Or your room. Whose room IS this!?"

Adam looked at his arm, covered in black impurities. "Ah." He sat up slowly, noticing the now ruined fur rug. Ah well. "Congratulations on reaching Second Order Warrior, my Disciple."

Her face went blank. "What?"

Adam frowned at the rug. "Maybe we can clean this? Ah well, it was stolen in the first place anyway, no big loss."

..."What?"

He looked up, curious. "Don't you feel that stuff?"

Disciple Tianshi blinked... and looked down. At the black sludge infusing her clothing and coating her skin. "AHHH!"

Sister Quan, who had left at some point, came back in. "I brought cleaning supplies!" She pointed at Adam. "You, out. Get cleaned, we girls need some time."

Adam sighed. "Alright, and I'll make sure the hidden guards don't stay in this room like some perverts."

The little girl instantly blushed bright red... probably. It was a bit hard to see through the gunk. "WHAT!?"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Tianshi and Sister Quan were talking upstairs, which was fine. They had paid for the inn's room for a day, why not use it.

Adam flickered the green fire between his fingers, Rockette watching fascinated from his shoulder.

Little Tianshi's Green energy flame was... fascinating. 'Purification' couldn't improve it much, and he wasn't able to find any floating around, but now that his Disciple was sober again it was easy enough to ask for a sample.

His Martial Spirit was currently able to store 10,000 times the initial storage space available internally, or 10,000 units. At this point, Adam had her storing one unit of every energy type discovered, using 'Growth' to build them all up to 10 units each, then having any overflow gathered sacrificed to 'Growth' so it would build up the two (Now three) energy reserves: Growth, Blue, and now Green energy.

If he found enough trace energy types, he may need to reduce the 'reserve' elements down to five units each instead of ten... but for now, his Shard was still hungry for more. Using 'Research' became more rare as he ensured 'Growth' was working at full speed.

Well... mostly full speed. Some small number of units of overflow energy was being converted into Blue energy... and transformed into liquid goodness in Adam's travel gourd. The larger one, as uh... well, the small one exploded.

Turned out that converting Binding energy from gas into liquid was... VERY explosive. When he had time, another gourd, and enough Green energy built up... THEN he would make little Tianshi her own drinking flask of awesome juice.

Then again, he had only tasted Blue energy liquid. Stuff was releasing stupid amounts of heat, but his body loved that juice... his Cells had experienced strange shifts as something within them was enhanced. 'Research' wasn't exactly clear WHAT was being improved, only that it was beneficial. And since the juice was tasty, why not have a sip every now and then?

...If Sister Quan found out he was slowing his personal progress to make an awesome energy drink, she might get a bit angry. At least the stuff was too strong for anyone to dare drink it but him, the temperature was astoundingly high when the liquid was exposed to air. Mmm.

The inn itself was nice enough. Few cultivators, none powerful other than the hidden guards. Then again, people with any notable skill moved to the city near the Burning Sword Sect for better access to resources. At least here the food was mostly tolerable and the rooms relatively clean.

That said, they had a long way to go... Adam wanted to stop by some local stores and get some extra supplies before trying to find a caravan to join.

He winced as he bit into some... very very well cooked something or other.

...Damn it, they should have taken the cook with them when he left. That woman may only be a Sect servant, but she was a goddess in the kitchen.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Tianshi rocked back and forth on the bed. At least she was clean now. "I. Am. So. Embarrassed."

Sister Quan chuckled as she helped the child change. "Nothing to be worried about, we all understand. I also expelled a lot of impurities when reaching a new Order." Not THAT many, but then again her method was less beneficial than Adam's 'Essential Cultivation Method'.

She pouted. "But... Damn the memories keep popping up..." Her eyes grew HUGE. "Did... did I ride around in a giant metal throne? That was a hallucination, right?"

The older woman's giggling was NOT reassuring. That had to be a fever dream or something, her Master was too tiny to carry something like that around anyway.

She tried to focus... "I... I remember Master being there... and you... and a garden? A fancy meal... Something about monkeys that Da... I mean master was training against? Then salsa everywhere. Maybe a party?"

A blink. "Why was I hugging a rock all day!?"

...The explanations took a while, her slowly resurging memories making it a odd conversation.

She blinked. "But why did we leave?"

Sister Quan sighed. "Look, if the person making those drinks had not been YOU, thus aligning the resulting energies into a mess compatible with your system... you would have died."

Huh?

The woman nodded. "You were not sober at the time, but when Adam found out that Elder Gu forbid me from informing him and blocked me from acting, that he had hid your condition in an attempt to stall an uncomfortable response... well."

Sister Quan looked serious. "Remember how it felt when Adam broke through to Fourth Order? All that energy pushing down, then vanishing and leaving everything dry?"

She nodded.

The woman glanced away. "He was... very angry when he found out you were in danger. For a moment, it felt as if the sky had opened, glaring down on us. No one could move, all energy seemed to vanish, his tattoos stopped pulsing. His eye nearly burned through his eye-patch... and uh."

Silence.

Sister Quan patted her shoulder. "Point is, he tried to stay calm. He learned what he could, spent a lot of time watching over you... but when he decided to leave no one stopped him. He was pretty much leaving the garden because when someone as powerful as Elder Gu failed to take care of you, Adam's Disciple, and risked your life in the process? Well, it was an unacceptable situation."

Ah. "But... I was alright?"

She sighed. "We couldn't know for sure. Your body was absorbing the excess power, it is how you broke through to Second Order, but it made you... very erratic. I can't TELL you how happy I am that you haven't suffered mental injuries or other issues..." She seemed to be holding back tears. "I... I was very worried, little one."

Little Tianshi didn't fight against the older woman's fierce hug.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Squint. "Is that one of them magic rings or whatever?"

A sigh. "Molin, just... no. First of all, I'm still not sure those are real."

The other man waved a hand. "Ma told me so, it has to be real."

Li grumbled. "Shuttup. Second, if it WAS real, that means two things." He held up some fingers. "Either he is a powerful high Order Cultivator, and could kick our asses and toss our gang out to the guards... or he STOLE it from a powerful high Order Cultivator, and is even stronger than that."

Molin chewed his lower lip. "Yeah, Yeah I get that, I do... but what if like..."

God, this was going to be one of those days. "No."

Molin waved a hand. "Like, hang on. Maybe like... two Xiantian Cultivators fought to the death or something and that dude just... looted them."

Could he afford more wine? Probably not. "So your theory here, if I am following you correctly, is that some random guy was close to TWO powerful dudes, who ignored him, killed each other, and then he had the balls to rob them both? Ignoring any possible traps or poisons or whatever."

Molin shrugged. "Sure."

Li wanted to slap the moron. "Right, if he is THAT ballsy, THAT lucky... then he probably has found rare talismans and stuff that could instant kill our entire team."

The man's eyes lit up. "Oh! You're right, he might have all kinds of stuff!"

...That wasn't the point, damn it. "NO. Don't just think about how valuable that shit is, think about how someone cornered by a bunch of us would decide to explode rather than die while letting us take everything. I didn't help form our gang just for ONE PERSON to wipe us out. Hell, you ain't even sure that piece of junk is an actual storage ring at all!"

The pair paused when the boy under surveillance absently made gold coins appear out of nowhere to pay his bill.

...Shit. "Molin... Look at me. LOOK!"

The man barely tore his eyes off the shiny. "Hmm?"

Li GLARED at the idiot. "I wont argue about him possibly using slight of hand or not, I WILL argue that you should look more closely at the REST of what he has."

That at least got attention, albeit greedy attention. "What!? Did you see something else?"

He winced. "SHH! Look at his robes, his pants and shirt and shoes. Notice anything?"

A blink. "Uh... no?"

Damn it Molin, work with him here. "They are new. Clean. High Quality. NOT. LOCAL. DESIGNS. People like that who flaunt wealth like this are either really, REALLY powerful, protected, or are fat lambs for slaughter. The fact that he is only Fourth Order Warrior makes me MORE suspicious, not less. Damn situation seems to be DIRECTLY TARGETING US."

Molin smiled. "I do like lamb chops."

Li gripped the man's shoulder. "We ain't that lucky, Molin. We ain't NEVER been that lucky. Nothing in our lives have been this lucky. When you see a pile of gold in the street, you GOD. DAMN. RUN. I can't SPELL trap any more clearly than this. If I was sure you would do this moronic stunt on your own and not drag my people into it, I would be half tempted to just let you go kill yourself over that fancy purse."

Seeing a bit of logic return to the greedy man, he sighed slightly in relief. "Not to mention, we couldn't sell that ring to anyone without someone powerful noticing, and we couldn't use it in our work without some OTHER greedy shit targeting us. Valuable stuff that we can't sell or use is NOT ACTUALLY VALUABLE."

Had that worked? He seemed to be listening.

Li turned back to his colder food, feeling... so tired of this shit. Last week Molin nearly attempted to knock over a caravan carrying medicine. If the massive number of experts protecting the treasure wasn't deadly enough, that was a SECT PROTECTED product... even a victory would have only brought down the wrath of heaven, not that victory was remotely possible without some very powerful cultivators of their own.

Ever since Molin reached Fifth Order Warrior, he had been... so cocky. So over confidant... attempting to rein him in had become a frustrating chore.

Mid bite he paused.

Shit, that moron had ran off hadn't he?

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam grinned when the girls came down. "Morning again!"

Sister Quan pushed the little one forward. "Good morning! What is on the agenda?"

Aww, the tiny one was doing that awkward 'I am embarrassed but don`t know how to handle it' thing. Best ignore it for now. "Buy a few more supplies, now that little Tianshi is able to tell us what she needs... then head over to the mercenary guild and find some work that heads south. I think we are fine financially."

He absently gave little Tianshi a few head-pats as he continued. "The major thing we need to look for is some additional clothing sets for little Tianshi here, now that she can give opinions on the styles and types of material she feels happy with."

Seeing the girl look a bit confused he handed over a manifested Rockette and pulled out her ride from his ring. "Here you go. Would you like to ride around or walk?"

She squeaked. "That backpack-chair thing was REAL!?"

He grinned as she blushed bright red, the random people turning towards the loud noise. "Yep! Even better now that I had some down time to fiddle with it. Iron framework, cloth and padding for the inside, curtains and covering to keep you cool, a few Formations here and there to ensure privacy and projectile protection..."

Well, it actually redirected any attacks into the person carrying the thing by redirecting momentum, but his body could handle that.

She whined. "I can't believe this is real! How can you even carry me with all that metal in it!?"

Adam lifted the vehicle easily. "Cultivation Base finished off enhancing my muscles, right now it is conceptually improving my tendons and reaction time. Combined with the 'Gentle Rebirth Body Cultivation Technique' my body isn't half bad."

A few background women in the crowd absently nodded, looking at his compressed but well defined muscles.

The girl pushed away the chair... which did nothing, the thing was still mostly metal and she wasn't strong enough to budge it. "No, I am a full Disciple and I can handle a bit of walking. Hell that would be so weird."

Adam vanished the object back into his ring, ignoring the crowds gasps or whatever. People were impressed by stupid shit, he was used to this kind of situation by now. "Then let's wander about, get lost, ask for directions, then eventually get stuff done!"

He still tossed the girl up onto his shoulders despite her weak protests. Little kids got tired easily, super muscles or no.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Shopping in this Realm was odd. The Sect Store was not the exception Adam had expected, but the norm: Customer service individuals, most of the product materials hidden away with a few shown examples, and the highest quality shops had levels that needed either certain cultivation base advancements reached, internal customer reward card ratings, or raw political power to even access. Money alone wasn't enough.

Also, those bandits so recently robbed (And extinguished) had clearly been storing funds up. These few gold coins bought a LOT of low quality stuff, not that Adam let his Disciple get away with trying to go cheap to prevent 'causing problems' for her master.

Like he cared about money, his life tends to gather the stuff accidentally.

He nodded. "Sister Quan, ask them to make a few dozen copies of her purchases and find out how long a rush order would take. We can wait a few days, clothing won't be so easy to find or take care of once we head out."

Little Tianshi looked overwhelmed, but gratefully grabbed the conversation line that didn't involve buying her MORE things. "Where are we heading?"

A glance at the guards... who made some hand gestures. No one listening, good. "In the short term, south. Far south. I'll give more details when we are less likely to have witnesses or spies or whatnot, but the landscape there seemed likely to benefit both of our cultivation bases, if that gives a clue."

Their conversation paused though when three of the guards vanished and Adam felt... oh.

He smiled, teeth somehow slightly sharper. "Little Tianshi, Sister Quan seems to have met some new and interesting people!"

Scooping the girl up onto his shoulders, he strode with a long stride. "Why don't we go say 'Hi.'"

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Quan had already summoned her Three Eye Crow Martial Spirit, and soul transformed even as she dodged. She felt the hot feathers forming over her skin as armor, her body becoming fast and light... and then sped towards the apparent leader of the group that was trying to encircle her.

A spin... "Crow Flame Palm!"

Her palm roared with flames, but the masked man before her had summoned some sort of tortoise Martial Spirit, and a blue gem like shield formed in his hands. "Glacial Shell!"

Her momentum was lost dodging a side attack, the group not really qualified to injure her but certain able to wear her down. "This is a terrible mistake!"

The man snorted, his shield shifting to stay in the way. "You may also be Fifth Order, but you clearly haven't focused on combat. Just give up, we only want the child's ring and we can both go our separate ways."

The dozen or so fighters paused when a calm voice spoke up... behind them. "If you wanted my jewelry, you are asking the wrong person."

A squawk made the fight pause fully as the group shifted focus... and saw a massive giant of muscle being dragged over the dirt by a fairly short boy. Whatever the muscle guy wanted to say was unclear, but his coloring made it obvious that breathing was a desirable outcome.

Molin's eyes were wide. "Shit. Damn it... this might be bad."

The mass of muscles was idly tossed with one hand... hurling through the group and taking out some lower powered grunts. The tiny girl riding his shoulders may be wide eyed... but she DIDN'T look concerned. A Second Order Warrior surrounded by Fourth and a couple of Fifth Order Warriors with no fear?

Shit shit.

As the boy approached, everyone quickly realized that their energy levels were becoming unstable. A couple of the weaker ones still conscious were forced to drop their strengthening techniques, and Molin could feel his soul transformation costing more and more Qi to support.

As the group prepared to attack and then hopefully escape... an out of breath voice broke the tension. "Young Master!"

...What?

Everyone turned as another shabby man dashed into the alley... and dropped to his knees before Adam. "Young Master, I am glad our welcoming committee has found you in time!" A glare had various weapons put away before he turned back with a smile. "Young Master, my people have a quaint backwater tradition of celebrating new meetings with a jovial exchange of pointers! Your female companion probably misunderstood the situation with our poorly trained young Molin, please let me offer recompense."

Molin awkwardly shifted his shield technique, scratching his leg. "Uh... Li?"

The RAGE in the glare was... yeah, he will shut up now.

Smiles returned. "I am afraid our last festival for another young master drained many of our resources, but I do have some small object of appreciation, please take this tiny token in memory of our meeting."

As the guy handed over an odd object with old markings on it, He carefully backed up without turning away. "Again, wonderful to find you this day! And if there were any misunderstandings I will personally handle them!"

A spin. "MAGGOTS MOVE! We have taken enough of Young Master's time." A VERY fast hand motion had a thin blade embedded in a guy's thigh when he tried to talk. "Oh, it seems some of you have some boo boo's after that light exercise, everyone help each other back to the 'Welcome Young Master' building."

He grit his teeth when no one moved. "Base. Now."

The alley was suddenly mostly empty, the turtle guy still confused... and Sister Quan finding the situation humorous. Little Tianshi was just confused, and Adam hadn't stopped staring at this so called 'Molin'.

Li walked forward, whispered something FURIOUSLY into the man's ear, and turned with a smile even as the guy pouted and dropped his soul transformation. "Again, Young Sister, Young Master, my mentally challenged friend has suffered many head injuries and despite dedicating his life to religion and helping the unfortunate, occasionally misunderstandings do occur from time to time. I have it FULLY under control, you have my assurances."

The guy blinked. "But Li, I was going to... EUGH!"

And... he was on the ground, a blunt rod from SOMEWHERE firmly embedded in his gut. "Like I said, mental issues. I'll just be getting out of your way, no worries over any injuries your light tussle may have had, please have a fabulous day!"

...And they were gone.

Adam blinked. "Did... Did I just get paid for almost smashing a gang by the gang itself?"

Sister Quan chuckled. "More intimidation, the sharp teeth and flaming eye had an impression. That and throwing that one guy a dozen feet or so with one hand."

He paused. "Of course I did it with one hand, little Tianshi might have fallen off if I used two."

The girl in question was confused in general. "Why were they all wearing those bags on their heads?"

Quan hummed. "I think they were supposed to be masks. To protect their identity I guess."

Adam... was done with this. "Whatever, did they interfere with your shopping Sister?"

She shook her head. "They didn't really have time, you got here very quick." She dropped her soul transformation, the feathers fading away like Qi constructs. "And it will take a couple of days because of how many sets of clothing you asked for."

Tianshi blinked. "Wait, how much clothing did you buy!?"

He... wasn't sure. "I guess... fifty or something full sets? I got distracted a few times, may be more."

Sister Quan found the little Disciple's horror amusing.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Thankfully Adam had gotten little Tianshi her own spatial ring, as uh... yeah, he bought her a lot of clothing.

Both for now, as she grows, and so forth. With duplicates.

Her pout was adorable.

Anyway, the trio made their ways to the mercenary guild and prepared to enter.

Adam hummed. "Right, you two hid your rings?"

A couple of nods. The girls had necklaces to store their rings on, while Adam kept his on his finger... being targeted would theoretically keep those two safer.

He glanced to the left. "And you guys are hiding, correct?"

The ten guards looked depressed, but nodded that they were trying to hide themselves.

Adam grinned, and turned to the open doorway. "Well, let's go say hello then!"

The building was huge! A row of counters with assistants on the left, a bar on the right, further back were areas for clients to wait, spaces for people hoping to be hired, and so on. In the FAR back of the massive strucutre was another exit, with various spirit beasts being held in stable stalls to be used as beasts of burden, to pull caravans, or to act as mounts for owners or their customers.

And uh... that was a problem.

Cultivators, as Adam had noticed several times, were almost spiritually blind. Barely able to detect the energy in the air, only just able to judge someone's cultivation level. To them, A Fifth, Fourth, and Second Order Warrior had just walked into the room, the many hidden guards unnoticed.

Spirit beasts however were closer to nature, to their base instincts. They didn't judge spiritual networks to determine strength, they could detect spiritual energy directly.

When Adam stepped into the room, every beast froze. The constant buzz of whistles, roars, creaks and groans all fell silent. As one, EVERY BEAST turned to stare at the child.

Or more accurately, the power stored within Rockette.

The Elder's bird hadn't acted like this... then again, that bird had probably seen some serious stuff in the past. These creatures are unlikely to even meet a high level Xiantian Warrior, much less a Saint or whatever Adam's Shard felt like.

Conversations paused, then stopped. Arguments took a break. Men and women sweet talking each other turned to find the threat.

Adam waved. "Good morning everyone!"

Silence.

...Tough crowd.

Shrugging, Adam walked to the nearest desk, ignoring the crowds moving away from him and the slightly frantic attempts at spirit beasts to retreat further into their various stalls. "Good morning! I and my party are looking to join a Caravan, if it is heading in roughly the right direction."

The unlucky woman who didn't look busy enough in time carefully moved with caution. "I... am unsure if you will be welcome, Young Master. Caravans require beasts of burden to move their products... and you seem to have made an unfavorable impression on the ones in here."

Adam nodded, unknowingly helping the woman to relax when he didn't react badly to her opinion. "I get that, and it may be an issue... but on the other hand." He pointed at the creatures. "If TRAINED spirit beasts act like this, how do you think WILD spirit beasts will behave?"

A pause, as the many eavesdroppers considered having a child along that made beasts flee in terror instead of attacking in swarms.

Several people ran off to inform their caravan leaders... that ability alone may be WORTH the annoyance while traveling.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The Guild Master watched from his hidden room. "Well, now we know why all the beasts have been acting odd these last few days."

One of the more powerful mercenary leaders hummed. "I can detect a few guards of high strength... which means that there are likely one or two I can NOT detect, knowing my luck." He nodded. "My people won't be accepting him. SOMETHING odd is connected with that child, and that always turns out messy in my opinion."

The Guild Master snorted. "Look at the messengers being sent out, I'm sure that group won't lack travel options. Still, no reason not to build up a bit of good will..." He waved a servent over. "Have their fees waived, and offer good service and a meal or two." He ignored the woman's bow as she exited the room. "If I don't know what is going on, I want the people involved to think nice things about me. No reason for risks."

The leader watched the stables. "Even the Stage Four and Stage Five beasts are wary of the child. I better go ensure my people don't waste their lives trying to push the kid around or something."

A fine wine was being carefully poured for the waiting Guild Master. "Better be quick, I won't have the death of your men messing up my facilities. Cleaning blood is infuriatingly tricky sometimes."

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

They were on the road!

The path to adventure, the wild expanse of nature! Clouds in the blue sky, grass everywhere!

...It was surprisingly boring.

Adam's party was on the last Caravan wagon, which had turned into a surprising boon for the entire troupe as the various beasts were VERY EAGER to go faster and escape his presence. They even had to take a few extra breaks at first to prevent injuries, but at least the animals were motivated to GET AWAY FROM THE THING BEHIND THEM.

Ahem.

Little Tianshi got bored within minutes of the actual journey starting (This was some sort of textile supply Caravan, had cloth bolts, raw materials, and tools), and Sister Quan wasn't far behind.

Because, even motivated with being followed by a Qi monster like Adam, this travel method was slow. Adam could walk faster, probably.

The main benefits was having guides that knew the local dangers and pathways, being able to relax, and having people to talk to along the way. Well, talk to if they were not convinced that Adam was secretly some high level Spirit Beast in human form. Again, this was very possible. Seventh Grade and higher Beasts got very intelligent.

That said, long stretches of watching the same terrain pass inch by inch gave plenty of free time.

Adam turned the rock with odd patterns on its side. "Nope."

Sister Quan blinked. "But it looks so mysterious!"

He sighed. "The rock itself IS old, but the carvings were all done within a month or so and then aged with chemicals to make it look ancient. If we hadn't scared that guy out of his pants I'm sure he would have pawned this off on someone for a profit, then left to go make more." Quite the clever gang leader, really.

Little Tianshi held her hands out and Adam passed it over. "It still LOOKS awesome Master!"

He nodded with a grin. "I know! I'm tempted to go back and interrogate that guy and see if he can teach me how to make squiggles look this cool without actually binding to any stray concepts. I know I am stealing this stuff the next time I add surface gibberish to Formation tools I make." Half the reason Adam didn't bother to try and recreate advanced technology here? Lots of tiny parts may invoke dozens of concepts, making most machines time bombs. Which could ALSO be useful, just not in the intended way. That this odd pattern DIDN'T attract various concepts was very interesting.

The wagon currently being ridden by the group was modified by Adam, after he bought all the contents within from the caravan. Shoved all that junk into his ring, pulled out some metal, wood, and cotton, and got to work.

The framework was now reinforced with the stronger and higher quality metal, he created a second bottom structure inside the wagon with some basic springs to reduce jostling and jolting, the inside surface and walls now had used some of the purchased cloth bolts and Adam's cotton to form protective pillows over most exposed areas and curtains to keep things (Light and bugs) out of the way.

Externally, it was visually identical to the other wagons... internally, the trio was slowly examining the random things Adam had bought from the Sect Store while the ten Guards kept an eye open outside.

Sister Quan lifted one of the spare space rings. "Why buy so many storage rings anyway?"

Adam glanced at the pile. "They are useful, and I want to tear a few apart and see if I can duplicate or improve them." 'Research' had suggested he wait till they were closer to their destination, as a few rings were going to explode in the process of study no matter WHAT he did. Best get away from witnesses. "The plants on the other hand will have to stay in storage so they won't die or something. If you notice any more seeds or saplings or whatever, let me know so I can move it all into this ring over here."

Tianshi hummed as she examined a pile of Talismans. "I've heard of some of these, but never thought I would get to touch one myself. I think this one creates a shield if someone tries to attack you?"

He glanced over. "Ah, that one creates a bubble of lightning. Meant more for close quarters offense than defense, although it would move most metallic weapons off course and could save your life."

It was... relaxing. Dump a pile of stuff, slowly sort them into various rings in a way that mostly made sense. Better than riding at the front of the wagon and watching all the various spirit beasts flee in terror and the grass just... sit there. Growing. Also, less dust in here.

As mentioned before, this Plane was BIG. Traveling at high speed in one direction could have a Cultivator spend one's entire life without finding anything, if you were unlucky. There were even spatial gates and stuff to jump massive distances when large Sect competitions occurred, or for those from more powerful areas to use when they looked for outside students to bring home. Higher Realm Cultivators could fly or even teleport of course, but he had very little data on that topic so far.

Point was, it was going to be weeks before reaching the next town. That was... just something Adam had to accept. At least until he desigined some sort of vehicle to ride or fly at higher speeds or something. Or found a spirit beast that wasn't terrified of the raw power at his disposal.

Sheesh, if creatures acted like this NOW, how badly would they react when he hit Xiantian or Saint Realm? Hopefully they would be so overwhelmed by the stored amount that it would roll over to 'Don`t Care' again. Or they would have difficulty noticing WHERE the power was stored, or maybe he could hide the energy better... or something.

Having a flying spirit beast did sound neat though. Or learn to do it himself.

Then again, what were the chances a guy with a Martial Spirit rock could fly?

'Ding.'

Adam rolled his eyes. Well, yes, EVERY Saint could abuse that space/time ability they gained to fly or float or whatever. He meant a more natural flight.

...Should he be concerned that Rockette was looking interested?

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Tianshi tried to calm down on the custom cushion Da had created in the wagon. It was soft, almost TOO soft and relaxing... trying to meditate and focus on Cultivation was risking her falling over and taking a nap.

Reaching Second Order Warrior had resulted in several changes. Her Betel Nut had grown slightly in her heart... but more importantly, her roots had expanded. The older roots had several lines grow more thick and powerful, while a much thinner network of root hairs had connected her 'spiritual network' (as Da called it) even closer to her Cells.

Cultivating now made her body feel refreshed. And even when NOT cultivating, being exposed to heavy amounts of energy allowed that power to filter its way into his heart and convert into more Green energy for her use. Which was good.

She still followed the 'Essential Cultivation Method' of course... but the meridian routes were already established and being supported by her root network. Forget having to concentrate, she was COMPLETELY able to advance her foundation by just shoving energy into her body to be redirected by her Martial Spirit. Her discussions with Adam about his next creation however, the 'Houtian Realm Fourth Order Essential Cultivation Method', showed that her roots were already there too... just needing energy build up to stabilize the routes.

Then again, Da said it was fine, so it was fine. It also saved her when she went on the world's worst power high and embarrassed herself half to death. The memories were STILL randomly popping up over time.

Oh god, had she sucked her thumb back then? Please no, that would be SO not mature.

Right, back to cultivation.

She didn't have her energy circle set up, but Adam was able to just recreate the effect thanks to how strong he was now... if anything, it was easier than before as she could just open her network and pull in the raw power for her roots to work with. The downside with having so much automation to her advancement was the ease of being distracted. Or just mentally wandering away on various odd subjects.

When it got too bad Sister Tianshi spent free time walking her older Sect Member through her own attempts at applying 'Gentle Rebirth Body Cultivation Technique' (Version 2.3218), with some success. Sister Quan's progress was MUCH slower than her own, and there was a few issues where the impurities expelled almost overflowed the small tub Adam had provided (Where had he even PURCHASED that? Or was it hand made?).

Thankfully, being at the end of the caravan meant it was easy to get rid of the sludge and keep the smells away from the others.

Still, they kept Adam out of the area. It was embarrassing enough to be covered in gross slime without a guy being involved, even if Sister Quan had been there when Adam had been spewing filth everywhere.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

His eye pulsed.

...Someone WASN'T fleeing in terror. Or to be more accurate, something.

A light tap of the foot had Adam flung to the side by a dozen or so feet, his movements empowered by his Battle Qi even as he internally verified that 'Recursion' was activated. Another tap and he was further into the rocks... and at the creature.

...It was a tiny blue lizard. Very tiny. Like... pencil sized torso and a couple more long.

So. It wasn't so much a very brave monster waiting in ambush, but more a very weary, thirsty, hungry, unable to move lizard.

Aww, it had cute little whiskers.

That's it, he was gonna keep it.

Carefully lifting the thing from the odd herb it was wrapped around, Adam moved back to the still moving wagon. "Little Tianshi, could you please put some water in a small bowl? Also some food." Rockette had vanished from wherever she had been and appeared on his shoulder. Energy check... wow, that is pretty strong. Nature based energies. "Best prepare some vegetarian snacks I think."

Sister Quan blinked as he passed her. "What did you find?"

He carefully held up the lizard. "Look! He's got little whiskers!" It was a he, right? Adam didn't check.

Her eyes grew large. "It is ADORABLE! Look at those little feet!"

Adam moved into the back area of the wagon... and Tianshi was cultivating away, dead to the world. Her hair had settled down into a rich black like her Martial Spirit's roots, the lucky girl not glowing like Adam or covered in tattoos or scars. "Little Tianshi?"

She blinked. "Ah?" And sat up straight. "NO! I'm awake Da!... I mean Master." Aww, the blush.

He held his hands forward. "Look what I found! A whisker lizard!"

Her now green eyes blinked. "A what?" Then she focused. "Oh! Oh it's precious! Can I hold it?"

...But ADAM wanted to hold him! With his widdle legs and whiskers.

Damn it, he was going to have to be the mature one here, wasn't he? "Of course, girl. Now be careful, he is very weary and we need to be careful when feeding it so it doesn't hurt itself."

Maybe... sigh, maybe he should give it to her. Because he was too manly to have a cute little pet, but his girl was old enough for some responsibility. Eventually.

Halfway through carefully handing over the mostly lethargic lizard, it suddenly glowed bright green... and vanished.

...What?

Tianshi was even more confused. "Did... Did I drop it?"

Adam was... concerned. "I don't think so? Don't move for a moment." Rockette?

'Ding.'

...Huh. "Can you show me your right arm?"

The girl's confusion turned to... well even more confusion as the two examined her new bright green tattoo of a lengthy whiskered lizard that was wrapped around her right arm from her shoulder down to her wrist.

...Huh.

She blinked. "He says he is from the East. And that he wants to be my partner because I represent Spring."

Adam suddenly cursed. "Sister Quan is going to blame me for this, isn't she?"

The curtain snapped open, a suspicious Sister suddenly glaring at them. "Blame you for WHAT, exactly?"

He gave a wide, innocent smile. "I got our little Tianshi a pet! And I think it won't need to be potty trained?"

Her gaze swept the room... but was less fierce. "I assume the cute whisker lizard? Well that's not so bad. Did you set up a cage for it?"

He casually pushed Tianshi behind him. "Sort of! He won't wander away and will be easy to keep clean and I certainly didn't accidentally give a tattoo to the little one and I am going to shut up now."

Yeah, he was going to get blamed for this.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam whined. "Just a few minutes! I'm sure I can figure out how to turn things and people into tattoos, wouldn't that be cool?"

Little Tianshi was not convinced. "No. No experiments on Mr. Whiskers."

Sister Quan was giggling now that she knew Adam hadn't accidentally exploded or, worse, taught his DISCIPLE to do the same. "Didn't you buy a weapon or two that can do the same thing?"

Adam waved her off. "They cheat, stupid things. Storing yourself in an internal dimensional space is EASY, what Whiskers did is amazing! He is ACTUALLY INK right now, not just a fancy picture linked to some other untouchable space!"

His short Disciple stomped. "Mr. Whiskers is already asleep Da... Master." Aww, an adorable blush! "I mean... uh. Yeah, he's asleep."

He tried to look dignified. "My dear, a little lost sleep is nothing in the grand, never-ending quest towards scientific science!" He reached. "I want to poke your whisker lizard, gimme."

She leaned away. "No."

This... was going to take some advanced negotiation skills.

...He had those, right?

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam was stuck outside the wagon, sitting in the 'driver' spot.

Not that it mattered much, the Spirit Beasts pulling the wagon (Looked like hairy cows) were the oldest and most sedate ones the Caravan had... even if they were still VERY EAGER to get away from Adam's whatever-he-was.

It wasn't like he was going carve Mr. Whiskers up or something. A few pokes shouldn't hurt anyone!

...Then again, the creature was clearly not normal. And if an energy scan with 'Research' exploded the cute thing, he would have been in a LOT of trouble.

Just in case, Rockette was riding shotgun up here with Adam, scanning around. With his Martial Spirit actively looking, his Domain spread wide and low, examining the massive area around to find other beasts that felt similar to Mr. Whiskers... or at least, to find animals that were not actively fleeing in every direction.

...Seriously, one poke and he could have done all kinds of things. Maybe even store random crap as tattoos, like a storage ring but with style. On the other hand, who would want tattoos of their clothing or whatever? Well, sure there were people who went nude and tattooed fake clothing onto their skins to try and get away with it, but that couldn't be a COMMON fetish or clothing would be more expensive.

Wow this trip was boring. Wish something neat would happen.

...Like that massive number of hidden cultivators ahead. THAT is interesting.

After a brief pause... Adam sighed, and lept towards the lead of the Caravan. Bored or not, he would have to warn the head merchant about this.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The bandit leader stood from grass. "Where. The HELL. Are my targets."

One of his minions moved off to smack some heads around. Worthless morons, if he didn't need some meat to hurl at the grinders of battle this mass of weaklings would have died hours ago. Eventually one of the less useless ones came back. "Dey went east."

He blinked. "What?"

The one eyed bandit nodded. "East. Changed directions 'round an hour or so."

His eye twitched. "And why, exactly..." Calm. Don't kill the man until AFTER you get the facts. "Why was I not informed 'an hour or so ago'?"

The moron shrugged. "Xian brothers got drunk, the Zi brothers fell asleep, and I don't know where Quin went."

Just...

He nodded. "It happens. How far did the Caravan drift east before they began heading back our way?" He saw a glazed expression. "How long till they get here at the river pass?"

Nothing out east after all, they HAD to come back.

The soon-to-be-butchered man shrugged. "Never."

The leader paused. "But you said they diverted east."

He shook his head. "Nah, they ain't whatever. They going east. Ain't stopped either."

How incompetent can one person be!? ...Wait.

"Point for me, the direction they were going."

The man pointed west. Towards the OTHER river passage. The one where he WASN'T set up.

Right. "Gather your people together so we can plan our next steps."

That way the blood will be easier to hide once the 'planning' is done.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam was frustrated AND bored now.

Detecting an army would normally lead to some awesome fighting, maybe some loot, an interesting adventure or something.

Detecting an army literally hours away led toward going a DIFFERENT way.

And THIS particular side route would add on a week to the travel time.

So now Adam got no awesome fight AND was stuck out in the middle of nowhere for even LONGER.

How did doing the right thing lead to slow, agonizing good decisions?

Whatever. He had other things to do. Boring, useful things.

Over the last few days, when not subtly trying to poke Mr. Whiskers, Adam had been exploring the more interesting sides of life. Battle Abilities... or to be more accurate, 'Qi Tricks'. A whole library of abilities that were mostly done automatically or were so weak that they were considered useless by others.

Using Qi to keep your clothing clean, and to make it dry faster? Or enhancing your underwear so it won't rip off your body when you leap forward during battle? Or the really subtle stuff, like how excess hair automatically gets evaporated by excess Qi during battle... which is why NO ONE in this Realm needed hair cuts. If the Hair was too long or not in style, your own energies would consume the excess automatically at some point or another.

The number of documented and UNdocumented Qi tricks were enormous. Even Sister Quan had a few that she did without thinking, like coating her boots in energy to keep mud and dust from sticking to her shoes. A more powerful version of this was why the really powerful people seemed to always be clean, even if they only bathed once a week or longer. Only impurities seemed to have no problem passing through Qi barriers... and 'Research' was really confused as to why.

Maybe your own materials are ignored by your own subconscious cleaning field?

Water wouldn't make your clothes wet for as long as they should be either. The natural field of energy a Cultivator resonated with made things just... slowly move away from their bodies. 'Research' helped a lot here, the difference was small... but if a cultivator stood next to a normal person and both got soaked, the cultivator would dry off minutes faster.

With a sigh, Adam leaned back on the wood bench, the shaggy cows tugging along. This WAS doing something... but not the cool, explosion and testing type of stuff. This was the nitty-gritty boring bits that were always needed when exploring new ideas.

Still, needed to be done. And his own abilities had been ever so slightly improved during this... fairly boring work.

...Yeah, let's go do something fun.

Throwing the jade slips into the back of the wagon for the girls to use (An updated list of abilities and methods and a whole new set of slips with 'Useful Tricks' in it), Adam moved away from the Caravan and... got ready to run.

Let's see if he could contribute to the Caravan's food supply.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Tianshi giggled as Mr. Whiskers lifted his head from her skin, still chewing on a small ball of Green energy. "He says my energy is more pure than anything he has found before, and that the quality is so high he won't need to find more spiritual herbs."

Sister Quan cooed as she pet the thing. "He looks so much smaller than when in his tattoo form."

Hmm. "He's young, very young. His parents sent his siblings into the wild, those who survive would be strong enough to one day grow into the sky."

The woman's hands were petting his head. "Grow?"

She shrugged. "His people are very close to nature. Normally they would bind to a herb, bush, or tree and become partners... like Dryads did with trees in legend. He was quite surprised to find a tree that moves."

Sister Quan paused. "A what?"

Tianshi pointed at her heart. "My Martial Spirit. It is really compatible with him... even now, my roots have been forming something like a cave for Mr. Whiskers in my spiritual network. When he sleeps in there, my energy feeds him and he refines my energy. It is... stronger now. Thicker. Still gas though."

It was HARD to describe the changes Mr. Whiskers made to her energy. It felt more wild, sturdy... it was interesting.

Sister Quan was in the middle of cuddling both the child and her new pet when a thin jade slip smacked into her head. "ADAM!"

A distant voice. "I'm going hunting! Be back soon!"

She grumbled and recovered the information slip... "That boy, acts like any time relaxing is time wasted." She glanced at one of the Jade slips... and sighed. "Like this. All he had to do was relax, watch nature, keep an eye out for danger... and he builds an entire library of easy to use Qi abilities."

A WHAT!? "Can I see!? Please!"

The woman laughed, still rubbing the sore point on her head. "Of course, little one. I recognize some of these as versions of existing tricks I mentioned to your master earlier... they weren't this simple and easy to remember though." She blinked. "In fact, I think the Qi needed to use these skills was cut in half... or more. Huh."

Blah blah blah, awesome special abilities designed by Master! Tianshi dove at the other jade slips, aiming for the 'completed' green ones.

...When Sister Quan called them a library, she wasn't kidding.

This one slip had thousands of abilities, set aside in tiers. The bottom most abilities needed almost zero control and no power... but were rigid and unadaptable. The highest tiers would be tricky for Tianshi to learn herself... but could do all kinds of nifty things.

Barriers against rainfall (Or blood splatter), tricks to preserve items or food for certain lengths of time, purification and analysis tricks for water (or food, no reason to get poisoned), this... this is the kind of stuff a Sect could be founded on!

She blinked. "Am... Am I allowed to see all these?"

Sister Quan sniffed. "Besides the Sect leader, you may be the ONLY one qualified. And that one you have is only one slip from this collection of twelve." She held up another green slip. "THIS one has abilities so complex I can't even read them, and they do stuff so insane that I hope they have only theoretically been used."

...Her Master was awesome!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Silence.

His domain was thin, a wire wide sheet that floated over the land. Trees and underbrush was no obstacle, his senses examined the energies detected.

There, a bit far but detected.

Carefully he bent the domain around his target. The creature was large, but its sensing abilities just... slid over Adams body. And continued, unmolested. And according to 'Research', stripping the energy out of air particles would drastically reduce the ability for these creatures to use innate abilities to detect others as well.

Hopefully.

Adam was... not stealthy. It took four or five tries alone for him to realize that he was a VERY loud person when walking around. Even now he was cheating, as pulling the energy out of the area around his feet really restricted the sounds being made... even if it did leave an obvious trail, what with it killing plants in the shape of his footsteps as he moved.

The blade in his right hand was a 'Qi Forms' blade, impossibly strong and thin and sharp. According to 'Research' it was an amazing stealth kill tool!

According to real life, accidentally slicing a tree trunk in twain wasn't stealthy at all. 'Oh, I suppose a section of the woods collapsing is nothing important at all! Better eat more grass!'

Yeah, if only he was that lucky.

THIS wasn't a herbivore hunt... Adam was pretty sure with all his precautions this massive wolf/boar thing covered in vines KNEW HE WAS HERE... but also that it planned on ambushing Adam, the ambusher.

Well, wouldn't Pig-wolf be shocked when the ambushed ambusher becamed the abmushee for the ambushed ambusher!

Uh. Hang on, that sounded better during the planning phase.

The massive armored face with sharp wooden tusks suddenly SLAMMING in Adam's direction forced him to adapt a little!

With a leap he... failed to clear the creature at all, as it stabbed foot long wooden tusks into his torso. DEEP in his torso, 'Recursion' found it two layers deep inside his body. Where it stuck.

With a heavy grunt, Adam forced a smile. "Caught ya!"

You may be a peak late-Grade Six Spirit Beast, but ADAM had a really sharp sword! Let's see you try and dodge from THIS distance!

His blade sliced down with a vengeance towards the neck, the head Adam was... currently attached to, which was unable to shift out of the way! He just ignored the many vines trying (And partially succeeding) in piercing his flesh as the thin blade was manipulated and extended to slice the spine and... well, everything important looking in the neck region. As quickly as possible because this hurt and was gross.

As the massive head fell to the plain's floor (And forced the tusks DEEPER into his torso, wonderful), Adam got to enjoy a brisk but warm bath as the massive corpse stood over his body, bleeding everywhere.

...Just lovely.

Now, after pushing this massive chunk of meat-wood out of his conceptual spine, Adam could search for that beast core Rockette detected in its skull. And collect the monster itself for food purposes.

He twitched HARD... pulling out the tusk actually hurt AGAIN with each layer of 'Adam' he pulled it free from. Just... marvelous.

At least he had the Battle Qi to heal this mess and the storage ring to carry the meat back to the Caravan. After finding a stream to clean himself in.

A glance at his now bright red attire... might be best to find a river instead. He had to have soap in ONE of these rings.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam glared at his still bloody clothing.

So... lessons learned.

First, he was not stealthy enough to be an ambush predator.

Second, Adam had NO IDEA how to use a sword. Right now it was just something super sharp and strong to cut things, not an elegant weapon of choice.

Third, hunting for food is hard.

His whole fighting style, the one he used on the bandits and practiced for so long... it just smushed things. And after rebuilding his muscle system to better support that new fighting style, his ability to jump and dodge needed to be refined... or just trained from scratch. At least with his new muscles, if he had smashed that wolf-boar with full power, the power would have smushed all the good parts into goo!

He winced... then again, the creature was a peak late-Grade Six Spirit Beast, normally hunted by Sixth or Seventh Order Warriors. Stronger or not, as a Fourth Order Warrior... there was a significant chance that a full on smash would be ignored. His stupid sharp and strong sword really was a cheating method to victory.

Also, his guards might have freaked out a little at his body being impaled, especially as his crappy attempt at stealth had WORKED on those same guards, leaving them behind on the hunt. Even now, the five guards were half watching for attackers and half tracking Adam so he couldn't sneak away again.

Sigh.

Anyway, back to the learned lessons... Spirit Beast blood, at least from strong Spirit Beasts, is full of wild Qi. And is hard to repel, hard to clean, and hard to extract from clothing. He COULD yank that Qi out with Rockette's help, but since he was messy already it might as well act as an opportunity to improve his various Qi Tricks at the same time.

Although his attempts to FORCE the issue was risking the removal of ALL dyes from his outfit. If he went through with this, Adam would be stuck wearing pure white, which would make future stains even MORE obvious.

His thoughts were interrupted by his rapid arrival back at the Caravan. "Little Tianshi! I require your attendance for a short lesson."

Adam carefully extracted the creatures head and body from the storage ring, even as people from the Caravan came to take a look. His Disciple stumbled out of their vehicle (it was a bit odd climbing out of a vehicle with a bouncing floor), and... sort of stared at the massive, wagon sized corpse Adam was standing beside.

He walked over. "You know how to make Qi Forms, correct?"

A weak nod.

He grinned. "Can you make something like this?" A quick flex of Battle Qi and his hand held a 'blunt' carving knife. Sadly not flexible, this Qi form was SO blunt that it would hopefully NOT slice through the bones and stuff while trying to carve off the meat.

The little girl still seemed stunned.

Adam waved his hand. "Hello?"

A squawk made him flinch as Sister Quan got a better look after leaving the cart. "Is that a Grade Seven Spirit Beast!?"

He flinched only a little. "NO! It... it's only a peak late-Grade Six Spirit Beast! Maybe even a mid-Grade Six Spirit Beast!"

The older woman was tapping her foot. "Did you at least get HELP when hunting this!?"

Damn it. "Maybe?" Rockette counted as 'help', right!?

He slumped when his traitor guards didn't back him up.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

While the beast was carved up (The body was FAR less tough now that the creature couldn't actively enhance its form with Battle Qi), Adam ended up being forbidden from hunting any Spirit Beast above Grade Five. It was probably a fair restriction, considering that normally a team of around four or five Cultivators would attack Beasts with a grade BELOW their strongest fighter to stay safe... the concept of a Fourth Order attacking a Grade Six Beast (No, it really was!) seemed to be unusual.

To keep everyone (Sister Quan, he didn't care about the rest and little Tianshi felt he could do anything) happy, he was hunting the boring way.

Extend his Domain, form double ring 'Qi Forms' around the creatures neck, bind both rings with 'Vice', form a blade 'Qi form' over the neck between the gap, apply 'Strike'. Bam, more meat for the group and all the fun sneaking around (badly), hunting down prey... all that was sucked out of it.

Remote execution was more a job than the romance of hunting in the wilds. Did improve the food situation though, so... whatever. Spirit Beast meat was supernaturally good too! Even the finest seasoned steak tasted like nothing when compared to a fire roasted slab of spirit beast, even without salt. Adam had to remove some of the spirit energy so little Tianshi could eat the powerful stuff without consequences, but even so it was very juicy and delicious.

His concerns however turned out to be misplaced. Little Tianshi's root network allowed her body to handle the overly powerful Wild Qi almost automatically, sending it to her Martial Spirit for conversion without damaging her body in the process! Not so much so for the rest of the people on the journey though, so removing spiritual power from the meat became one of Adam's side jobs when harvesting the stuff.

'Qi Forms' made terrible carving knives, one should note. Unable to bend and follow the muscle fibers and boundaries in the beasts, and if he wasn't careful the overly sharp blade would just slice everything apart without issue, ruining the cuts of meat. Worse, neither little Tianshi nor Sister Quan could duplicate his blade creation trick.

Sister Quan got closest, but her 'Qi Forms' sword was... basically a baseball bat. It required far more spiritual sensing and energy manipulation to use the advanced abilities Adam had created for himself, those same tricks which were NEEDED to form this 'super sword' in the first place.

After all, he could use all his abilities nearly subconsciously at this point... creating those swords on the other hand took some effort or it would collapse.

Time... time crawled. And blurred. And Adam fell into a bored stupor, waiting for this stupid trip to be over.

Idly he began working with 'Research'... eventually he needed to understand space and time.

And right now, he had nothing better to do.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Tianshi pet Mr. Whiskers in the back of the wagon. "I think Master is getting depressed."

Older Quan sighed. "He needs to learn not to wander away without support! If he wasn't so stupid powerful even a Grade Four Spirit Beast would be able to crush him a dozen times over. Not to mention he started killing so many beasts that the Caravan was running out of space for the meat."

She glanced out of the curtain, watching Da glow odd colors as ripples showed in the air. "But... he went really quiet."

Sister Quan slumped. "I know, but I don't know what else to do... I am just trying to be the responsible one." She lethargically returned another jade slip. "If I don't say ANYTHING when he does something dangerous, won't he just push the boundaries further? He might not even notice the boundaries in the first place."

Well... maybe.

Still, watching her Da just... glaze out and stare into nothingness was a bit scary. Like he was mentally leaving the world rather than stare at the endless plains they traveled. Every night she made sure to come up with SOMETHING to bother him with, to make him act normally for whatever time she could before he faded again into blank stares.

With a sigh, she went back to studying the jade slips. She wasn't going to try and learn ALL these so called 'Qi Tricks', she wasn't that talented, but she was searching for abilities and skills that were flexible, adaptable. Things that she could use in every day life, so that some level of Qi Manipulation training could be accomplished just from daily life.

A skill to stir liquid, while great for cooking and metallurgy, was DEADLY when applied to the blood in a human body. The trick to repel filth, if used correctly, could repel low level Qi attacks as well... These skills ranged from silly to deadly with little to no warning, to the extent that Tianshi had to study ALL these jade slips to carefully choose which abilities to learn, practice, and polish.

Her master's advice had been wise: Learn a few things and master them, or you will be paralyzed by choices and end up gored by a wolf-pig-thing.

...It may not have been the most pithy advice, but he had been VERY motivated when giving it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Brute force 'Research' like this was slow, unrewarding, and painfully long-term.

But it DID progress! So... so slow.

Right now, Adam was forcing his Battle Qi into various patterns and with distributed density, allowing 'Research' to chart how much energy was needed to rip open reality scars, what shapes did so the most efficiently, how to repair these tears in existence, and so on and so forth.

Most of these rips were so tiny they needed his full spiritual sensing just to detect their collapse after formation, forget detecting the holes themselves... but he struggled onward. Step by step, however tiny, was still progress earned.

He paused. "Oh thank god, there's a town nearby."

Well, hours away, but that was SO DAMN CLOSE!

Adam jumped vertically, forming 'Qi Forms' and using 'Vice' to create platforms as he climbed higher and higher... A LARGE town! No, a major city, with walls and stuff!

Good, he needed to either find a faster method of travel or to take some time and build a custom wagon. Something he could Cultivate in, with space for others, a kitchen, an actual modern style bathroom... No one should have to use 'Qi Forms' to make toilets. So eww.

With a sparkle in his eyes and a skip in his step, he dashed down to inform the girls. And technically the ten guards who kept hanging around doing nothing.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The gate guardian looked at the Caravan.

Then back over the hundreds of expensive looking high quality Spirit Beast skins stacked and draped over the wagons.

And the one wagon filled with cleaned Spirit Beast bones.

...Was that a wagon just full of Spirit Beast TEETH!?

He turned to the leader of the troupe. "So... been hunting?"

The man winced. "It is... complicated. Is the local mercenary guild likely to be purchasing raw Spirit Beast Materials via bulk?" He looked at the people who decided walking was worth the hassle as long as they could store expensive beast parts in their wagons. "Because we have a bit of excess."

The guard gave a dry look. "'Excess' is when you have enough bits left over to make sausage. This on the other hand is more of a 'New Supply Source' situation."

He sighed. "I wish... the one who hunted all these is an odd man, who has his own plans... otherwise I could retire and just let him empty the outlands of walking treasure." Probably would bring trouble if he DID agree to hang around though. Life was like that sometimes.

The guard hummed... but let them in.

Anyone who could kill hundreds of massive Spirit Beasts... well, not like a guard could stop him. If he wanted to shake someone down for some personal coin, there were less terrifying people to hassle. Not to mention, if they sold all that meat HERE then the cost of food would drop and the quality would slam through the roof.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

The Caravan leader tried to split the profits again with Adam, but he had better things to do.

People! Shops! Something besides boring plains!

Along the way here, SEVERAL times Adam had detected interesting places and things... but the girls didn't want to force the Caravan to deviate and Adam wasn't allowed to wander away without them. So even when cool things COULD have happen, he had been forced to sit around and slowly deconstruct the barriers of everything.

Right, traditionally he needed to find a restaurant, have some sort of misunderstanding or conflict with some rich jerk wandering by, then get hunted by a super powerful asshole who didn't care about facts and only wanted to defend family. He couldn't help but grin with anticipation!

He left the girls in charge to negotiate with the Caravan leader about whatever he was talking about, and started looking around.

Like several cities, this one was clearly not planned. It was a fortress that slowly expanded as resources were collected and building new areas was needed. None of the roads or alleys were straight or logical, some damaged areas were clearly dilapidated and dangerous, and the smells...

Well, no reason to mention the smells.

Life! Things to do! It was a breath of (don't smell it) 'Fresh' air!

Now, where to find some food and hopefully cause a bit of a ruckus. After weeks of grass watching, a ruckus was just what the doctor ordered!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Asking around for the 'Rich Young Master' from the biggest background who was known best by the town led Adam to the 'Treasured Delights' restaurant.

He had been assured by several people that when it came to big and well known, no one beat Lui... and that he ate at this particular restaurant religiously.

Something felt off about it though. People were phrasing stuff oddly and giving Adam some strange looks, strange to the point where he actually noticed them.

The building itself was nearly normal, a four story structure with the name out front, etc. However, there was... a contraption attached to the back of the fourth floor. A contraption so convoluted and large that it was visible from the FRONT of the place, even with Adam standing in the street.

Metal and wood framework, pulleys everywhere, and from what Rockette could detect there were even some simple Formations to reinforce the structure... to HEAVILY reinforce the stupid thing.

Also, it looked like two businesses behind the restaurant had been destroyed to make room for the 'whatever-it-is'.

Confused, Adam stood in line to enter the place. The locals didn't even glance at the gear and rope monstrosity attached to this high class establishment, which showed how easy it was to get used to something if you lived near it for years.

The stolen gold from the bandits got him in, a bit of a bribe allowed him to head up to the fourth floor (He just HAD to see this in person), and another bribe kept the staff happy as Adam idly ordered random dishes and waited for the arrogant young master to show up and justify him doing something about something.

Seriously, this world was a bit of a dick to anyone without power... the chances of someone rich but physically weak NOT abusing his abilities was unlikely. Then Adam could start a bit of a mix-up without moral issues, maybe test some of the experimental stuff on a few cultivators, yadda yadda.

Though honestly this trip may be worth it for this salad alone.

Seriously, Adam was NOT a salad guy. Ignoring the high price for low volume ratio, on Earth the flavor came from the oils and dressings, only the highest quality restaurants raised greens that had some actual flavor to them. It was normally considered a good idea to toss something actually GOOD into the salad to make up for that failing, like berries or meat or so forth.

This though?

No salt. No oils. No vinegars. Seriously, no seasoning at all. Just... some clean green leaves of something sort of like lettuce.

But this was a CONCEPTUAL salad. Herbs, or in this case this fake lettuce, that had soaked slowly with spiritual energies. Not just a handful of random leaves either, this salad had individual samples of a dozen plants, each with complimentary natures that reinforced both flavor and the quality and purity of the energies held within.

The actual ORDER of the leaves overlapping was INTENTIONAL.

Did this even count as cooking? No heat was applied, clearly. But the knowledge needed to balance a meal like this, when it was clear with each bite that human hands had barely interacted with this dish AT ALL... It took high skill levels. As far as Adam could detect, each leaf and stem had only been moved once... from the growing plant to this serving dish. It would require these plates with preservation Formations to be sent to the farms directly to assemble the structure first before sending them to the restaurant to be served.

And it was clear, that it had been done TODAY... before they even knew if it would be sold. Asking the waitress (A beauty with grace) about the situation revealed more... if Adam HADN'T chosen this dish, nor any others, it would be tossed away, or given to the staff. The standards of quality dining was VERY high here, and Cultivators fought to become employees just so they could enjoy meals like this salad if they went unordered.

Another bite of salad and Adam watched with fascination as over a dozen muscular (And oiled) men did a strange routine.

It wasn't a dance show or something, it was a complicated display of coordination as ropes were pulled, wheels were cranked... and one section of wall was slowly being opened like a door. Exposed behind it? A complicated ramp, with moving parts... and distant, heavy breathing.

Brother Lui, presumably, had his own entrance.

On the fourth floor of this high quality establishment.

This restaurant was SUPER fancy, to the point where the menus had no pricing (If you had to ask, you couldn't afford it), there was no seasoning (Our Chefs determine your favorite ratios of seasoning DURING your meal, and will adjust accordingly), and there was no silverware (Use the same utensil twice!? What if the flavors mix!). Even the table cloth was replaced between courses... how much was this gold worth!?

Adam was never great with money, but had honestly assumed that the pile of coins taken from the bandits had been less valuable than this... but so far even the couple coin tip he gave to the waitress had made the woman nearly swoon from shock!

...He glanced at the salad, as more men began changing shifts as the ropes were adjusted. They would be heading out into the wilderness later... meals like this would be rare if not impossible, and gold is worthless when out there alone cultivating.

With a nod and another bite, Adam decided to bring both girls here once he was done causing trouble... uh. Looking around. Yeah.

Cultivators should be easier to fight than wild beasts too, he determined. Even high level Cultivation experts were not as physically strong as Spirit Beasts, even if they had far more variety with attacks and skills. The beasts cultivated as a side note, enhancing their forms with combat and consumption... Cultivators relied far more on spiritual energy.

And Adam could handle a fight involving spiritual energy.

He couldn't help but smile as his table was cleared, the cloth replaced, and a high quality steak was presented. This WAS seasoned, though lightly with pepper, salt, and powdered garlic... but the raw energy contained in this Spirit Beast dish enhanced the entire delicacy with conceptual tastes. Juices seemed bright and clear of impurities as they glistened on the pink meat, the seared crust granting a light smoky smell... the coals used to cook this had been covered with some sort of spiritual plant fragments. A light press... and the steak barely wiggled as his provided knife slid without issue and exposed even more warm and fragrant meat.

The serving girl was acting more like a personal aid, directing the timing for dish exchanges, watching Adam to see his reactions so seasoning changes can be decided, and determining which wines would go best based on his hunger levels and which dish was currently being consumed.

His current glass (His last five being replaced) had a different, heavy, smoky red wine... it was almost as rich as the steak, yet had a light after taste that brought memories of fresh fruit on a cool day. Combined with the meal, it dipped heavily into a savory bath before gently relaxing in a cool mountain stream.

Adam was really looking forward to the next twelve courses.

A loud BANG made everyone look at the massive gate now opened in the back wall of the fourth floor... and the person there.

...What?

Adam stared blankly as what could only be described as a massive mound of human flesh began... wiggling out from the gate.

Slowly. Wiggling.

An abnormally normal voice (Shouldn't someone like this be super high pitch or a baritone?) echoed from the door. "Oh dear. I do believe I am stuck again!"

A separate waitress was standing next to the gate. "Our deepest apologies, Young Master Lui. We shall expand the guest ramp again by tomorrow."

One hand exposed to the air (So small!) waved. "No no, my attendants will arrive shortly! I'm sure I can make do with this current size for at LEAST another five days or so."

The woman smiled widely, not that the man (Mountain?) could see it. "It is no trouble at all, Young Master. Your usual will be prepared and warm when you have been extracted."

Watching the pile of flesh wiggle was... unusual. "HA! I freed my left foot on my own! I say Attendant Sheng, this new exercise program is showing GREAT progress!"

The woman stayed by the side. "Young Master, your Attendants haven't arrived yet... though I am sure they are on their way."

More 'Young Master' began to flow out of the ramp gate. "Well I won't compliment him again, it would go right to his head. Most of my people still argue about my pursuit of high cuisine as it is, I don't need to encourage my followers on that topic."

A (relatively) tiny head, covered in sweat, escaped the gate. "Ah! So good to see you again, Miss Agen. Your restaurant has always been the highlight of my day, you know!"

Oh. So she WASN'T just another waitress. Still, owner of this place or not, her smile lit up the room. "You flatter us, Young Master. Please, enjoy the first few appetizer courses while we wait for your people to arrive."

Adam was a little stunned to see more food than his entire meal so far begin to pile up on the five tables set up near the ramp. With many more servers holding heavy dishes of food waiting to get into the room, clouds of hot and fragrant steam filling the air with each step.

...It was like watching a train wreck.

Piles of food just... politely vanished.

The (massive) man Lui somehow shifted his tiny limbs together, his fat layers easily moving out of the way in strange motions. It was clear that this massive body was crafted and carefully honed to more easily consume high quantities of food... but his high refinement had him delicately take tiny bites, not a drop of sauce lost nor a crumb of bread dropped.

If it wasn't for the high rate of speed at which the man ate, Adam would be fooled into believing this guy was too sophisticated, too high class, too refined... far more so than someone like Adam could hope to emulate.

Watching a wall of human use delicate motions to make an entire, slow roasted (Was that liquid smoke added?) and perfectly seasoned pig served on a massive bed of near glowing white rice... just... vanish...

Adam blinked. "I am impressed."

His waitress nodded. "Young Master Lui has dedicated his life to cultivating the Dao of Consumption. He believes that experiencing high quality dishes allows him to understand the hearts and minds of the highly talented chefs who inspired those dishes... and that by comparing those meals he could determine some form of absolute flavor. A taste so objectively delicious that no one would deny its perfection."

Uh. When exactly had this woman replaced his steak with a pork roast?

His eyes paused, seeing the fatty meat glisten like edible jewels in the light.

...Might as well try a few bites.

She continued without concern. "Young Master Lui created our restaurant to train his own team of personal chefs, while he paid many mercenaries to find new and exotic ingredients and recipes across the plane. It can take over four months just for our people to correctly duplicate the discovered dishes, and years before they can be enhanced enough for our Young Master to examine directly. We have an entire staff of expert food critics and tasters, none as talented as Young Master Lui, who ensure that the final products are at least worthy of being critiqued by his golden tongue."

He glanced over... nope, that tongue was red. Must be metaphorical gold... which made sense now that he thought about it.

...Was Adam supposed to have fun attacking a guy enjoying some sort of high quality pasta dish? Worse, he was polite to everyone and... well. He didn't so much have a team of fighters or whatever, but more an army of support staff.

Would this make him feel happy, if he was to attack a random fat guy? Much less this one dude, who took 'fat' and dedicated his cultivation future to it!

It took a certain level of dedication to an ideal, a goal, for someone to throw away dignity, handsomeness, and the ability to stand up... all for a dream.

Adam squinted. Actually, WAS Brother Lui standing up right now? It was near impossible to tell.

Point was, a guy dedicating his life like this was... a bit impressive. And interesting. And someone Adam would want to talk to.

Not randomly smash into something. Damn it.

Seriously, in a world with slavery, under-age abuse, rape, misogynistic viewpoints, etc... he had to stumble into the one guy who considered food more important than a long life, women, or competition. Though he was certainly a famous, 'big', rich Young Master. Sigh.

That's it, he was going to talk to the guy. And if he wasn't a dick, even try and be friends.

A glance at his meal... He took another bite of his roast, noticing that the glistening pork slice was chilled with some sort of Yin energy to better balance with the pure white potatoes.

Maybe after another dish or two. THEN meet the massive man eating his fourth roasted turkey/bird/thing.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Lui chuckled as he saw his people (finally!) climbed up the fourth floor. "Attendant Sheng! I wonder if you would like to try this new tuber found in the wailing sea? There is an aspect of spice that I am having trouble defining."

Attendant Sheng was massive in a 'Pure-Muscles-Only' way, but in general was a great companion and a lifelong friend to Lui. That didn't mean he was willing to indulge this Young Master, sadly. "I'm sorry, but I am on a diet."

Lui snorted. Of course he was. "Don't try that, I've seen your other meals. How can you stay strong and protect me with only a few pounds of food a meal? Don't you need strong bones and all that?"

Sheng sighed. "Young Master, please try to remember what life was like before you reached Seventh Order Warrior."

He winced. Back then he had let SO MUCH FOOD go to waste, unable to follow his dreams due to stupid human anatomy and body weakness. Forget a few pounds of food, he hadn't even been able to drink a few gallons of wine! So much wasted time. "I... I suppose. At least have a few rolls and gravy, you are just muscle and bones!"

These dishes were from farther to the west than last weeks, but not from an area unknown to Lui. One had to always double check interesting finds, to see if further mutations or recipe adjustments made locally could lead to some high level of consumption for himself! Once found an entire new dish, a paste made from fermented fish and local berries, which helped him find a whole range of flavors never experienced before!

Beautiful Miss Agen hummed. "I have yesterday's income report prepared, ready for review at any time..." She raised an eyebrow.

He snorted. "It is NOT about the profits, but about the experience! The food itself is god here."

She nodded. At this point it was a common routine between the two. Then again, there was a reason he chose her to manage his finances and (More importantly) the ingredient acquisitions.

Oh, it was time for the soup courses!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

In the end, Adam left. Something about watching a huge mountain of a man try to stuff himself into a (relatively) tiny ramp gate made Adam just... want to go home. Or at least back to the girls.

That had not turned out ANYTHING like he had expected. It... it felt more than a little frustrating! What were the chances that...

A blade slid into Adam's throat.

It made him smile.

NOW things were back on track!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Quan settled in the Inn's room. Little Tianshi was rolling on the nice clean bed, tossing a lazy Mr. Whiskers into the air to land on pillows every now and then. Rockette was... sitting there. On the table. Seemed happy enough.

Another explosion, loud maniacal laughter, and the distant screams... it was all slowly becoming part of the background.

Little Tianshi sighed. "I thought we would be leaving already."

She hummed. "Well, Adam stumbled on a... a bit of a issue, as I said." Getting a knife in the neck counted, surely. "And he just wants to make sure he cleaned up the people responsible."

Another explosion. Tianshi sighed. "But it is not a very CLEAN way to clean up, is it?"

Depends on how you look at it. "At least he has gathered quite a bit of funding for our trip. And a whole lot of captives got released."

Then again, some of the Gangs Adam was tearing apart were probably sponsored by rival guilds or whatever, so this massive and growing pile of loot may piss some powerful people off. Again, Adam saw no issue with that. His statement is that with no witnesses, there was no problem.

Another explosion.

And Sister Quan could have gone for decades without seeing someone be forced to absorb too much unrefined Spiritual Energy, Thank you very much.

That type of death was dreadful. And then they exploded. Violently.

She held back a sigh. At least there was very little property damage so far, the gangs being hunted tend to have headquarters in pretty low end neighborhoods so far. Which made the piles of possibly stolen loot even more odd, considering how poor their 'customers' were.

A loud grinding noise full of splinters and rock fragmentation was ignored. Because not her problem.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam caught his hand on fire, removing another layer of blood and... stuff.

Things were going well!

Lots of loot, several people freed or given medical treatment, and a target rich environment for his various frustrations.

Right, the medical stuff first. Giving someone too much nutrients kills just as quickly as draining a person's body of them. It was an entertaining few kills determining the safest method of 'feeding' someone and the fastest (but survivable) speed. Took a few corpse explosions until that little trivia was nailed down.

He was going to have to write an entire chapter about how dangerous his healing method was though, and adjust the more powerful abilities to have a few extra safeguards. Turns out substituting your patients body with chunks of your own can go badly if you don't do things correctly. Worse case, an experiment had his 'healing' attempt to replace the dude entirely, as if 'Not being Adam' was a sickness to fix.

Also also, 'being Adam' REQUIRES Rockette. The body who tried to get things done without her ALSO exploded.

Anyway, 'Research' was very happy with so many test subjects requiring no safety measures. The medical library he was going to give Sister Quan after this had tripled in size already, with all kinds of interesting facts and 'Things not to do' filled out.

In retrospect, some bits of data were obvious. There were entire lectures about how dangerous Cultivation could be (Even when doing things CORRECTLY), so shoving five years worth of cultivation into a body within three seconds... well, it was messy.

Fire fixes everything though, when you use enough of it.

Whistling as he walked through the blue flames, Adam kept an ear open for any captives that may be hidden away while he explored the most recent gang base. The first one, the one belonging to Stabby McKnifeUser, had been fairly small and boring. Adam had only explored a third of that place before another, DIFFERENT gang had burst in to kill everyone and take over the territory.

Then they tried to stab Adam with a cutlass.

Things had escalated from there, really.

He paused, mid-step.

...Crap, how big was this fire!?

Adam dashed back into the flames and began forcing it to submit, using pressure waves of spirit energy to direct the flames away from the fuel.

Crap crap crap, this may be the worst area in town but it was CONNECTED to the rest of the city! It didn't matter how cool he looked walking through curtains of blue flames if those same flames destroyed the inn or damaged that awesome restaurant!

As he madly moved around and forced the rubble, flames, and what corpses hadn't been evaporated already into a massive pile for control, Rockette had formed her body nearby and was enjoying the warm evening, the blue flames melting the surrounding stone and creating something like a kiddy pool of molten rock for her.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam was knelt before Sister Quan. "I'm sorry."

She smacked his head with a paper fan little Tianshi had made. "Sorry!? Sorry is 'I didn`t return to the inn like I promised'! Sorry is 'I made you stay up all night out of concern'! Sorry is NOT demolishing half this city and having the leaders submit to your rule!"

He nodded. "I am really, REALLY sorry."

Little Tianshi piped up. "What does that mean, anyway? The submission thing that one guy did."

Sister Quan snorted. "That 'One Guy' was a Xiantian Warrior, one who used this situation to submit to the Burning Sword Sect as an outside affiliate. I'm sure he LOVES the opportunity to get better support and resources." Her gaze returned to the boy in front of her. "Though it may be due to SOMEONE destroying half. The. City."

Adam glanced to the side. "It wasn't half. It was... maybe 43 percent. And I blame most of that on the fire."

She sighed. "Right, the fire." Another loud smack with the paper fan. "STOP SETTING EVERYTHING ON FIRE!"

He nodded. "Yes Elder Sister, most forgiving and generous of our Sect, whose kindness moves the hearts of devils and understanding swallows the sea."

Another smack. "And no simpering! You are a powerful young man who has accomplished a lot for our Sect, you should act like it!" She sighed, falling into a chair. "I'm more worried that someone will connect you with your 'Burning Sage' identity. You know, because you keep burning everything."

Adam looked proud. "I left no witnesses!"

The fan smacked loudly again!

Sister Tianshi hummed. "I'm not sure how you got hurt in the first place, aren't the guards supposed to protect you from stuff like neck stabbing?"

Adam nodded. "Yeah, but I had them guarding you two instead. Losing a limb or being stabbed in the head isn't really that dangerous to me."

Sister Quan GLARED. "You did NOT test that today."

He blinked. "Of course not." That would be pointless. "I tested that before leaving the Sect. Can't risk being surprised on the battlefield."

...Oh shit, she did NOT look happy.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Little Tianshi tugged Sister Quan's sleeve. "Is... is this really alright?"

The older woman snorted. "That boy is VERY impatient. A bit of restraint would greatly improve his own future growth."

She glanced back at the sad, moping figure of her Master. "But... he really did seem sorry."

Quan sighed. "Sorry? I doubt he entirely knows why what he did was wrong. Sure, he paid a fee and didn't burn down unrelated areas or hurt random people... but medical experimentation? Ignoring the shadow powers supporting these gangs?" She glared backwards. "STABBING YOUR OWN BRAIN!?" Turning back to the child, she smiled. "Some of these things require a bit of time before they can be forgiven."

The woman ignored the 'I only stabbed it a little!' from behind them. "If I don't penalize this boy now, when the dangers are low and the risks are not vital... he may fall astray of a dire situation LATER with no chance of recovery. What if some of those gang members had been forced to join to protect family? Or if all other forms of coercion had led them to a life of evil?"

The little girl gasped. "Did... did that happen!?"

Sister Quan sighed. "No, Adam spent a disturbing amount of time injuring and healing people until he knew their situations." She glared back at Adam again. "Right, NO TORTURING PEOPLE TO SEE IF THEY ARE INNOCENT!"

Adam pouted. "I admit, that one was a bit over the line, but after the first thirty or so people I did make that truth and lie detection ability!"

The responsible woman frowned. "You did that because torture took too long and was unreliable, NOT because it bothered you."

He blinked. "Yes?"

She pointed. "Back to the time-out corner. You are just lucky that first gang was mostly rapists and slavers."

Adam grumbled as he turned back to the corner. "This is about the innocent people thing again, I just know it."

Little Tianshi frowned. "Da, you can't hurt innocent people."

The man smiled! "You called me 'Da' without blushing!"

...What?

The girls face went brilliant red. "...Eep?"

She dove for the covers and wrapped herself up like a burrito. That didn't happen. None of this had happened.

Sister Quan's voice seemed chirpy. "She is just so precious! Now, you. BACK IN THE CORNER."

Adam sighed. "Yes oh gracious Elder Sister Quan."

Tianshi ignored everything... but couldn't help smile a little. Da didn't seem mad at all with her calling him that.

Just... Why was it so embarrassing!?

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Five shadows sat in room.

Normally, this would be due to security concerns.

Currently, it was due to some unnatural force suppressing ignition in this entire section of the city.

The tallest shadow sighed. "What are our losses?"

A side one shifted his notes... tried to use his Qi to make a light... and gave up, reporting from memory in the black room. "Twelve gangs were dismantled, the two thieves guilds were spared as was the commerce gang. The other assets involved with people trafficking, wet work... all gone."

Another shadow grumbled. "Can't see my own nose. How long is this ability going to last!? That bastard did... whatever this is hours ago!"

The darkness sighed. "Our spies recorded that it should lose power in a few days. Most of the slums are being evacuated, as cooking and fire in general just... isn't possible."

One of the older shadows growled. "None of my light generating tools work here. Can't even bring IN a fire from elsewhere. Had to shit in the dark like a moron."

Another shadow snorted. "If my bounty wasn't so high I could just 'acquire' a new base in the unaffected city sector. A murdered family or two wouldn't be noticed, and I wouldn't keep stumbling into things."

The original speaker winced. "Right, I would highly suggest NONE of our people leave for now. Especially those with more... violent histories. The spies report that the target responsible for all this mess is both powerful AND unconcerned about consequences. Blackmail or kidnapping the Target's associates would just set him off, not gain us leverage. Our analysts agree the best thing to do is to lay low."

Another shadow growled! "And what!? Sit here in the dark like frightened children!? Let me eat the fucker!"

All noises and agreements were cut off by a cold voice. "The Target tortured 'God Armed Gar' and then caused him to explode. In public. With witnesses."

...The crowd went silent.

The cold voice continued. "Even though he was hiding his cultivation as an Eighth Order Xiantian Warrior, he was unable to retaliate. His Battle Qi vanished when he tried to escape... and yet the one assault, the ONE successful attack focused directly into the boy's chest... only exposed a strange glowing rock surface under his flesh and skin."

Dimly, this room felt like a grave. "His attack was accurate, successful, and ignored. His Martial Spirit was dispersed when summoned, his attempts at escape foiled, his torture was both unusual and able to easily penetrate his defenses..." A cold breeze. "And his death... pathetic and identical to the many disposable minions."

The night was cold. And though unable to see each other, the shadows quietly agreed.

It was best to sit here in the dark.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Adam held little Tianshi on his shoulders as he led the way. "Right, I spent a lot previously coming here, but you will COMPLETELY forgive me after trying their vegetable pate! It tastes like thirty herbs I could recognize, but the spiritual energy was carefully regulated to match my Cultivation Level."

Sister Quan humphed. "Forgiveness aside, you did make this place sound amazing."

The girl on his shoulders was confused. "What is that thing on the outside of the restaurant?"

Adam grinned. "That? Well, I don't want to spoil the surprise. Wait till we get a table."

They got near the 'Treasure Delights' restaurant as he continued. "Just wait till you meet 'Big Lui'. That man has ambition! I think he will leave an impression."

A couple of bribes got the group up to the fourth floor without problem, a quick conversation with their waitresses (Three, one per customer) about cultivation levels and flavor preferences, and the food began to arrive!

Little Tianshi was thrilled. "So sweet! I didn't know you could MAKE ham this sweet!"

Adam hummed. "Caramelized meat is something I didn't see much when eating at the Sect, but I haven't traveled far yet. No idea if this is just a dish that I missed or if it is due to Young Master Lui's concerted efforts finding new methods of food preparation."

His personal waitress hummed. "Young Master Lui's people found this method of meat preparation near the Zinth region, where it was used as a partial step during meat preservation. This most recent method of enhancing the sweetness was developed by four of our dessert Chefs, tasked with transforming every dish into a sweet variation as their mission." She nodded. "They have had much more success than the team attempting to make savory versions of every dessert."

He nodded as well, enjoying an odd dish that reminded him of tacos. A muffin made of sweet cornbread, filled with ground beef, seasoning, tomatoes, sour cream, lettuce... coated with cheese that was broiled to seal in the juices and flavor. Basically a Mexican muffin, though none of the ingredients were called that and most were enhanced with spiritual energy.

Still, he could send the idea to Chef Boro later. A hollow cornbread muffin filled with taco ingredients, sealed with cheese? Worth a shot, really. Would it taste this good without the enhancement of conceptual deliciousness though?

Sister Quan was too busy with her third variety of salad. "I can't believe how each salad compliments the last one! This one even has fresh blackberries, where would you even find those this growing season!?"

Her personal eating assistant spoke up. "The ingredient Formations have time manipulation patterns to ensure that the ripe products are available as needed, though it cost Young Master Lui many favors and much resources to construct. He would not allow nature to stand in his way to discovering 'True Flavor.'" She tilted her head. "Your assigned team of chefs suggest you try some our our grilled 'Seven Eyed Bass' as your next course to better accent the berry dressing on this dish. Care to try?"

The elder Sister Quan sighed. "Yes, and thank you." She glared at the boy enjoying a fork full of some sort of root vegetable. "Fine, you are forgiven Adam. But we will STILL have a conversation later about appropriate levels of force used before AND after battle."

Adam grinned mid bite. He KNEW this was a good idea!

Both girls paused as numerous muscled men, many oiled and glistening and all only wearing VERY tight shorts, began filling the room.

Sister Quan slowly shifted to glare at Adam. "Brother Chongsheng Adam. Did you bring your little Disciple Tianshi into a restaurant with a male strip club?"

Adam blinked. "No?"

The helpful assistant nodded. "Yes, I am sorry Young Miss, but if you wish to see such things your meal selection will have to be altered. Matching wine to that particular situation is difficult depending on what course you are on." She glanced at a slightly confused little Tianshi. "Also, the little one is a bit young to appreciate such things. We do offer musical accompaniment with your meals if desired?"

Adam's eyes widened when he saw Sister Quan's look. "WAIT! Those guys are ONLY here to assist Young Master Lui's arrival!"

The woman's gaze went blank. "...He needs a dozen hunky men to show up and eat lunch?"

He nodded solemnly.

So did the three female staff members.

Sister Quan blinked. "Huh. And why are they oiling each other?"

Her assistant gave an innocent smile. "Those muscles make it difficult to get oil in all those... hard to reach areas."

Adam winced at the renewed glare... and caught the amused look of the staff.

Well, at least SOMEONE was having fun.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Young Master Lui smiled widely. "Nice to meet you! Miss Agen, please provide them closer seating."

The woman smiled. "Of course, Young Master."

Moments later, Adam and the girls were seated within two tables of food to the overly large man. Said girls were still a bit... overwhelmed at the man's entrance to the room. At least they were not complaining about the mostly undressed muscle men. The overweight guy paused to drink three bowls of soup before continuing the conversation. "My people say you cleaned up my city for me yesterday."

Sister Quan blinked. "Your city?"

Lui nodded. "Built the place so my chefs and their families had somewhere to live. As well as their assistants and staff, of course."

Adam hummed. "One would think to use better fire resistant materials."

Young Master Lui chuckled, his many folds wiggling. "I DID. Nothing belonging to MY people was damaged. No, the issue is with some of the criminal element wanting to build close to my property, but being unwilling to invest in the structures built. Even our low income housing uses high quality materials, saves me money over time not having to fix stuff up or risk infernos."

Little Tianshi blinked. "Wait, you knew they were there... And that they were bad guys!?"

Miss Agen nodded. "There will always be a criminal element to society. We attempt to ensure there are as few as possible, and try to direct them to the more acceptable types of crime... but the talented young man beside you helped accelerate our 'Spring cleaning' plans safely."

Lui sighed. "I had people taking down targets for hours last night as they tried to escape the fires. The numbers were far greater than our internal estimates... I think some actor was working against us in secret this time."

Adam grinned. "So... burning everything down was a good thing?"

Young Master Lui gave him a humorous look. "Well, it was helpful. I still don't like my city being on fire."

Tianshi grinned. "Sorry Da, you are still in trouble."

He pouted. "You eat your vegetables young lady!" Sigh. At least she was happy to comply, the fruits and such were divine here.

Turning back to Young Master Lui he grinned. "I actually desire to arrange a bit of a transaction with Young Master Lui, if you are interested."

The massive man paused before finishing off another chicken. "Oh?"

Adam held up a jade slip, before it was taken by Miss Agen. "Best to keep my identity secret, but I am well known by my people as a prodigy when it comes to designing martial arts, battle attacks, and abilities. I would like to exchange these methods for a list of recipes you deem of equivalent value. I am headed to a land without fine cuisine."

He raised an eyebrow. "Oh? And I would be the one to establish how 'valuable' your work is for trade? What if I find them to be worthless and offer nothing?"

A gasp from Miss Agen had the large man pause as they turned to her. She looked shocked. "It would be best for Young Master to examine these personally."

Amused, Lui accepted the jade slip with a smile. His tiny hand moved through the fat rolls and he quickly examined the contents... and froze.

A massive, near uncountable library of abilities and techniques.

Methods to create temporary counters, to cleanse ingredients, to act as a sink, as knives, as molds for baking, and more...

Skills to slice, pound, grind, mix, fold, stir, boil, cool, freeze, and beyond...

And aside from all that, the skills difficulty to learn and flexibility when utilized ranged from trivial to beyond impossible. There were dozens of versions and variations of each ability, and only the skill of the learner held one back from such unbelievable feats like stopping time to ensure each part of the meal would be optimum for serving or searching the history of a particular ingredient to determine its origin!

There were even a dozen or so Cultivation methods DESIGNED to assist Chefs and assistants when cooking, planting, harvesting, hunting, or gathering.

Young Master Lui turned awed eyes toward the young man... and saw the nice lady face palming.

Sister Quan groaned. "I TOLD you Adam, your abilities are enough to set up a new Sect! You can't just hand them out like candy! Didn't we talk about this?"

Adam hummed. "I want these recipes. I feel like getting them in trade for this is worth a couple of hours of effort on my part."

Lui's eyes quickly met Miss Agen's gaze, the pair stunned... but VERY eager.

Flavor would wait for no man, when opportunity was properly prepared one had to be ready to consume that chance!

He gave Adam a huge smile, while eating a small cake. "Mr. Chongsheng, I believe you should talk a little with my financial adviser, Miss Agen. I'm sure we can come to an agreement quickly, as soon as a few of these abilities are verified."

For a man like him who had been carving a future dedicated to cooking, this was like receiving coal in winter!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Little Tianshi frowned as the wagon moved onward. "But why did we have to leave so quickly?"

Sister Quan sighed. "Because your Da basically established a food based Sect so close to the Burning Sword's main territory. Thankfully Young Master Lui has no issue working with other groups, and his new Sect doesn't really compete with normal resource use... hopefully it won't cause too many problems." She glared. "Still, we were too flashy back there and had to move on."

Adam sighed. "I still say relying on all those medicines and pills and stuff is a weakness. If Elder Cho hadn't rushed us I would have remade ALL the cultivation methods more efficient like that. At least they can get around SOME of the issues thanks to my cultivation circles."

Little Tianshi hummed. "My Martial Spirit root network doesn't need active cultivation now. Mr. Whiskers made a cave like area in my network, and I can just pass him any energies I find! He purifies the stuff, and my Betel Nut can transform that pure energy into my Battle Qi with no problems!"

Adam glanced at the girl. "Can't I just... poke Mr. Whiskers a little bit?"

The adorable girl ignored him. "So why aren't we going with a Caravan now?"

Sister Quan sighed. "Had to leave too quickly. Plus, normal issues like not finding herbs, water, or wildlife to hunt are not an issue with Adam's help. He also scares away most spirit beasts..."

Tianshi hummed. "Shouldn't the guards handle that?" She blinked. "Wait, are the guards still around? I haven't seen them in forever!"

Adam glanced at the escorting ten fighters. "Just because they are quiet... and hidden... and honestly don't do anything..." Oops, they looked depressed. "Doesn't mean they are not around. And they are really helpful making sure you two are safe!"

His daughter unknowingly stabbed them in the heart. "So they are useless."

Sister Quan made it worse. "Just because they fail at protecting their only official target and have contributed in no fashion so far in other ways, does not make them... uh." Damn, that was harsh. "I suppose they are useless." Oops... that was worse.

Adam coughed. If these two nice girls made these hardened warriors cry, he would both feel guilty for bringing it up AND be the only witness. "Anyway, having no witnesses other than us means I can do more useful stuff that would be hard to explain."

The blinked before his Disciple spoke up. "Like what?"

Adam pointed at the newly purchased Four Eye Flame Bulls. "I'm going to teach our rides how to cultivate."

Both girls turned toward the slow moving, grass cud chewing bulls. Steam gently evaporated as they pulled the wagon along.

Sister Quan frowned. "Are... are you sure? Until a Spirit Beast reaches a certain level of power, they are not exactly intelligent." She glanced at their dull, glazed eyes. "And even if this species were known for being clever, these particular two don't seem to be top examples of brilliance."

The pair of Bulls quietly chewed as they tugged the vehicle along.

Adam grinned. "Normally... well no, you are completely and one hundred percent correct they can NOT cultivate in any fashion right now." Had to go with something near brain dead so they wouldn't freak out being near Rockette all the time. "But I have a work around!"

Little Tianshi was wary. "Is this something related to torturing innocents again? We said no to that!"

He paused. Dumb animals didn't count, right? Even if they did, they were too delicious for him to go vegan or something. "Of course not!"

Adam handed a jade slip to the skeptical looking Sister Quan. "This section of the medical library I worked on shows how to stimulate someone else's body into working a cultivation method, to allow people in a coma to hopefully become strong enough to accept higher levels of treatment. The fourth section after that has methods to force a patient to apply a body reinforcement method like my 'Gentle Rebirth Body Cultivation Technique' (Version 3.0103), so parents could have children too young to cultivate still acquire benefits from the method."

He ignored the stunned (And possibly a bit horrified) look Sister Quan developed as he continued. "I'm going to make this breeding pair of Four Eye Flame Bulls healthy, regress their age by a few decades, enhance their bodies through the Rebirth Technique, then have them cultivate my 'Houtian Realm First Order Essential Cultivation Method'! I am nearly 100% positive they won't explode."

Sister Quan looked sick. "After seeing the notes of your previous tests, I can see why you are confidant."

Adam waved away little Tianshi's sudden glare. "Again, no innocents were harmed during the testing of my new abilities." Those other horse and lizard Spirit Beasts owned by the gangs had been evil too, right? And all of THEM lived since he experimented on their owners first. Even if a few creatures required being put back together afterwards.

He idly checked on the Rebirth process, which was MUCH slower than required so the two bulls wouldn't freak out. Converting the two beasts fully into Cultivation Cells was a great first step in general! Each cell converted gave 'Research' more samples to determine what optimal DNA patterns should be used, and the control his abilities gave over the process thanks to 'Flesh of the Avatar' meant that once conversion was complete changing the creatures fertility and physical age would be simple.

THIS version of his skill was developed with an optional 'control' method included. Thanks to the modified 'Gentle Rebirth Body Cultivation Technique' (Version 3.0103), these creatures would be turned into something similar to bound familiars. Not that those existed here. Contracted Spirit Beasts?

Point was, they would be able to grow, become more powerful, gain and retain sentience, even develop full and mature personalities... but their body Cells would be perfectly willing to kill themselves at Adam's command if the creatures decided to start eating people.

Safety first, after all.

Little Tianshi frowned. "You are NEVER getting permission to poke Mr. Whiskers."

He blinked. WHY!?

His pout and attempt at convincing his Disciple to change her mind was interrupted by Sister Quan. "What is our next stop while heading towards the 'Ash Forest'?"

Adam sighed. "If we head straight to one of the next towns I can sense..." His domain, when restricted to a thin wire, could detect things QUITE far away now. "Well, it would take a couple of weeks to a month depending on our pacing."

He grinned. "But it will take us longer than that. I can feel a few places with high levels of Heaven and Earth Spirit Energy that I want to check out and possibly consume, and I am getting REALLY close to Fifth Order Warrior."

Quan glared at him. "It hasn't even been a SINGLE. YEAR. Since you started cultivating."

Adam sighed. "I know, but I've been busy. Thanks to Rockette though, I've stored up enough energy in her to handle at least a couple of advancements..." Sigh, so many distractions. "Anyway, it will take a while to get these bulls converted, and Rockette can handle that process easily enough... I'm going to take a nap. Haven't technically slept in like... four days now or something."

He waved the girls off and went into the back of the wagon to the padded sleeping area.

His body may be able to handle the strain, but the mind did funny stuff after enough sleep deprivation. Colors taste weird.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Actually achieving Fifth Order Warrior was a bit of a letdown, really.

No light show, no awesome new abilities... his body just carved a new meridian route following the binding path holding his spiritual cord network together. Impurities were purged, and this time the conceptual reinforcement made his ligaments and tendons stronger, more flexible, and able to react faster. He was also significantly more flexible, which... was neat? It did allow faster reaction times and quicker (therefor more powerful) attacks.

More useful however, his personal domain now reached an 18 meter radius from his heart (about 60 feet, or 120 feet diameter), and his energy storage skyrocketed up to a million units. Which was going to be annoying to fill without draining the local area dry.

Oh, and Rockette cracked a little and grew larger. She was a bit larger than head sized now. It would be interesting to see how her second evolution stage at Seventh Order worked out.

All in all, without the fun experience of breaking through the 'barrier' between Third and Fourth order, it felt more like a bathroom break considering how terrible he smelled covered in filth. The comparison made it even more awkward considering that he had ten hidden guards watching him the whole time. Those perverts.

There was also a BIT of an argument about how to be environmentally friendly after he attempted to fill Rockette's massive reserves with local energy, killing all plants within a few dozen feet in seconds. So now, to keep Sister Quan happy, he mostly harvested energy directly above the party as they traveled and wasn't allowed to 'Drain all spiritual energy dry like a vampire' from an area without asking first. If anything, this should HELP people in the area when cultivating, as that mess up in the sky contaminated energy near the ground fairly often with all kinds of odd stuff. Keeping it all to himself was really just helping society. Yeah.

Thankfully he had other things to do now, and he was MUCH more mellow after those two days of continuous sleep!

Converting the Four Eye Flame Bull bodies with 'Gentle Rebirth Body Cultivation Technique' (Version 3.0103) was going smoothly. Having weeks to work on the method, there was now a basic filtering process built into the Technique that he was testing. It wasn't perfect, and had more than a bit of junk energy slip by the cracks compared to the purity of his more refined cultivation circles, but it was now able to accept energy for conversion while still allowing the animals to pull the wagon. Which was good enough.

Adam was also cheating however by forcing the right TYPES of energy near the animals at the same time as they pulled the group along. The male beast was most compatible with Earth related energies, the female preferred Nature or Plant energies... not sure if that was a species thing or not, but Rockette was storing away some purified samples of both for 'Growth' to increase the supply reserves.

With Rockette shoving the correct energy at the beasts (Still slow moving), the area they moved through was similar to a personal holy land, cultivation wise. It was a bit hard to tell from their dull reactions, but they seemed happy enough with their situations.

As their bodies changed, Adam was also trying to slowly modify them internally at the same time. For creatures this old, there were MANY hidden wounds or badly healed issues... as well as parasites and minor scars. Cleaning those out alone should make a big difference, even ignoring some of his other actions.

It was also going to be interesting to see the effects of applying the 'Houtian Realm First Order Essential Cultivation Method' on the animals.

From most of the Cultivation Methods Adam had examined so far, all of them sacrificed some feature or nature of Cultivation to enhance other ones. For example, one method didn't reinforce the body at all but focused only on the thumb on the right hand. It was a fast method to progress in (Since you ignored everything else) and came with some impressive techniques (Sky Puncturing Heaven Crushing Finger! Woo!), but the downsides came later.

Without the other, 'useless' areas covered by Adam's technique... well, cultivation breakthroughs with any another method were brutal. Attempting to temper the entire rest of the body at every stage WHILE breaking through AND not dying was... tricky. It also made the resulting foundations weak, as they were frantically finished at the last second.

So someone following Adam's method would never be as fast, as strong, or as smart as someone following a specialized Cultivation Method... but in return, they would be foundationally solid, not posses any glaring obvious weaknesses, have very few if any difficulties when attempting to break through cultivation barriers, and at any point could change to a different method! Since the core sections needed had been supported along the way of development, there were no penalties when trying to adapt to someone else's cultivation heritage or a newly found secret skill.

Thus, these Four Eye Flame Bulls (Shouldn't the female be called a heifer?) would become more solid, with a firm cultivation foundation... but hopefully won't randomly mutate a bunch of odd features like wings or something.

They WOULD mutate, however. After all, Adam had full control of their cells. And he was GOING to improve these creatures.

Not for their benefit (Well, maybe a little), but for HIS.

His conversion process revealed that these beasts had many odd parts inside, and 'Research' was carefully suggesting minor tests to try and determine changes that matched Adam's desires.

First problem: Food.

It was natural and normal for most Cultivators to need more meals, large quantities, and rare herbs or treasures.

But these were cows. Adam didn't want to pay for that.

Also, more food meant more poop.

So no, that wouldn't do. 'Research' had already determine methods to increase the strength of the creatures teeth, tongue, throat, and stomachs. The original four stomachs was to be reduced to two: The first to strip out spiritual energy, shoving any excess that could damage the creatures into the organs that generated those spirit flames on the Spirit Beast's back as well as being usable through their breath attacks.

This would SIGNIFICANTLY reduce the chance of his cows exploding if they ate an undetected 10,000 year old ginseng herb or something.

THEN, after getting as much benefit as possible from the stripped out energies, the mash of material would enter the second (And LAST) stomach, which was becoming so enhanced that not just organic material, but even certain types of minerals (Not just salt, but more standard rocks) could be dissolved and used by their bodies. Even the weaker metals could be used, although being processed by the Spirit Beasts would likely modify the conceptual nature of the materials. This Plane was crazy like that.

Most of the waste left after THAT would go through a special organ that attempted to smelt the remains using some of the originally harvested spiritual energy. This didn't make the gunk suddenly useful or anything, just burned off a portion to reduce waste volume.

Theoretically, depending on the Four Eye Flame Bull's health and diet, they shouldn't have to poop but once a month. And no need for urination, liquid waste was pretty easy to reduce thanks to that flame processing gland.

How would this affect the species? Frankly Adam didn't care that much. It also freed up a lot of space inside the animal, which wasn't that surprising.

For animals like cows, their food normally had little nutrition, was hard to digest (Four or more stomachs after all), and there was a lot of material inside the animal needed to support that complex structure.

By drastically reducing the number of chambers, the size of each, and the amount of resources the enhanced organs needed to thrive... well, a good fifth of the Bulls mass was now free space for other organs to use... Or for the entire animal to NOT use, at which point Adam would shrink them a bit. Which would reduce energy expenditure and increase efficiency and blah blah blah.

Point was, these beasts may be on fire more often than usual... but they would be able to eat any available plants (and trees and some rocks), would nearly never have to poop, pee, or sweat, and would waste far less energy just standing around or pulling Adam's cart! Probably smell better too. Like a campfire or something.

Plus if anything went wrong, their 'doctor' would be nearby to make sure no one exploded and ensure that Adam himself didn't get in trouble.

Idly, Adam used his continuing leisure time relaxing in the wagon while designing other modifications and making other changes.

The fur was already fire resistant (It had to be), but it didn't take much to make that same fur longer and able to collect and direct spiritual energy towards the first stomach. Should reduce hunger and partially make the cows 'solar powered', or at least 'spirit powered'. Didn't add any nerves or anything, so the creatures could still be shorn for fur collection without causing issues.

This new material should make some interesting clothing and rugs or whatever too, since they would be spiritually conductive materials. It could be longer than usual too, since overheating was NOT an issue for an animal always on fire. Seriously, what an interesting creature!

Eye enhancement was a bit of a hobby of Adams. Losing his OWN eye had him focusing on the issue. A vision to work towards. Something to look forward to. A goal, to enhance vision up to unseen levels!

...Sister Quan was glaring at him. Could she hear his puns even in his OWN damn head now!? Seriously, just because Adam maniacally chuckles every now and then doesn't mean he was making some sort of diabolical plot or something. She can't prove it anyway. INNOCENT!

Back on point, the bulls original, damaged by age eyes were slowly converting to beyond prime quality. Nothing too extreme, they needed time to adjust to these changes so they wouldn't panic. These eyes were just... very very accurate and maybe gained a bit of spiritual energy detection. Should make it easier for the animals to find energy filled food, food Adam wouldn't have to pay for.

A little optimizing for the other senses (Adam cared less for those), and some enhancements to the bone structures... just a few changes everywhere.

Though Adam WASN'T going to enhance the TASTE of the animals. Researching it, yes, but until they got some pigs or something Adam didn't want to be tempted by super delicious, pre-seasoned cows that could be whole roasted without issue. No pooping (And most organs being reduced or enhanced) meant that cleaning them would be pretty much optional... no reason to make a beast of burden into a feast of burden.

He was in the middle of trying to enhance the skin toughness under the fur (Distribute impacts and resist stab wounds without reducing sensitivity) when he felt a sudden SPIKE in spiritual energy in... that direction. To the left of their current path, and way off in the distance.

Adam grinned. "Girls! I think a heavenly treasure just formed over there!" Turning these bulls was an adventure, until he got around to increasing their IQ they were a bit dumber than bricks.

Sister Quan slowly climbed out the wagon, yawning. "Sorry, we were having nap time." Daww, little Tianshi had on adorable onesie pajamas. He hadn't known those were a style in this Realm!

Little Tianshi didn't look awake. "Is it far away Da?" Mr. Whisker's head popped out of her arm, looking in the same direction as the energy pulse... interesting.

Adam nodded. "A few miles, but my domain can reach there if I form it into a beam shape. It isn't a fire or nature type treasure, not from what I can feel, but it should still be fun to go see it!"

FINALLY the animals turned the right direction. Adam hummed. "And if it turns out to not be interesting I can just harvest the thing for energy. I am not looking forward to filling my reserves when I hit higher cultivation levels, it won't be long until I can store more spiritual energy than this Realm possesses."

Sister Quan NOW looked wide awake. "What?"

He hummed. "Yeah, at every major breakthrough like when I hit Fourth Order, my power storage space is squared." Seeing the confusion... how advanced was math here? "Right, to square something means that you take an amount of something, and for each one OF those items, you get a new batch of stuff equal to the amount you started with. So uh... with five apples squared you would take the first apple, then get five, then the second apple, then get five, and so forth. In the end, you would have twenty five apples instead of the five you started with."

Tianshi still seemed sleepy. "That happens every time you improve?"

He shrugged. "It will only go up a hundred times each step until my next barrier."

Sister Quan was... not able to process this. "How... how many apples will you have before that barrier?"

While trying to force these STUPID BULLS to stay on target, he blinked. "You mean, before I square them?"

She nodded, and Tianshi had fallen into her lap and was asleep now.

Adam did some mental math. "Ah..." the phrase '100 million' didn't really exist as a numerical value in this world, or if it DID then he didn't know the terms. "A hundred times a hundred times a hundred times a hundred apples." Yeah, that didn't sound right. "If you tried counting up to that number of apples, saying one number a second with no breaks... I think it would require 3 years, 2 months, 1 day, 13 hours, 46 minutes and... something like 40 seconds."

It was a bit quiet.

Sister Quan just... sort of stared into the grass they passed.

She sighed. "I can't grasp it that easily... But that amount would go through that... apple thing you said?"

He nodded again. "Yeah, after the next barrier breakthrough Rockette should be able to store 10 quadrillion units of energy, or 10 million billion..." Yeah, Sister Quan wasn't recognizing either of those words. "Uh... back to the time thing, if you said one number per second it would be um." Crud, this math was harder. "3 million centuries, 16 million years... and uh, another 898 thousand years... and there would be another 148 years..."

Adam saw her blank look. "Uh. It is a really big number, trust me." Yeah, this using time trick fell apart quickly. Best not to mention that when he reached Tenth Order Houtian Warrior, he would have 10 raised to the 44 units of energy storage space. If they were in Earth's Realm, that would be 2.3 times 10 to the 26 TIMES the age of the entire universe. Yeesh.

He cleared his throat. "My point is, I will fairly quickly get to the point where I don't need apples anymore." And where trying to fill Rockette's internal energy storage would require consuming a few Planes worth of energy, or a few dozen planets. Or billion. Yeesh, best find another solution before it got to that point.

Moving away from... whatever the hell they had been talking about, Adam clapped! "Now, let's put that awkward mess behind us and find that whatever it is that we are heading towards!"

Tianshi grumbled from her lap bed. "I don't want that many apples."

Aww, so cute!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

This cave was creepy as hell.

It unnaturally thrust its entrance from a flat area of the plains, with black smog slowly drifting from the too-dark opening. A gray powder, like bleached bones that had been tainted, covered the soil leading to the entrance. Despite the bright sun, it felt unnaturally cold the closer the group approached.

Yeah, no. "Little Tianshi, I will need you to guard the wagon until Sister Quan and I return."

Far more awake now, the little one looked a bit stubborn. "But... I want to see the treasure!"

He pointed. "Scary haunted cave." Pointed to her. "Adorable little Disciple. Just... no. Not until you are strong enough to throw this wagon at least."

Her eyes widened... "I can do that!?"

Sister Quan shrugged. "It's made of wood, and even I can toss a few of the smaller trees around. The impressive feats happen later on, such as carving up mountains and stuff. One of the Elders back in the Sect got in big trouble doing that." She examined the small seven year old. "...You may have to grow a bit first."

She pouted. "Can't those guards watch the wagon?"

Adam absently walked to the cave. "Probably, but I want someone responsible out here to protect my mutant cows. Also, this place may try to eat you or something... if I thought she would listen, I would insist Sister Quan stayed here too."

The older woman paused... and looked at the suddenly darker cave. She wasn't strong enough to handle the crazy stuff Adam was doing ALREADY, if this was possibly more dangerous than that she could die without finding out how or why.

The idea that Adam could go through the same level of danger and possibly not even NOTICE, much less face consequences, was a bit disheartening. "No... no, Adam brings up a good point. I will stay behind too." She glared at nothing. "But most of your guards WILL follow you for support."

Adam tried not to snicker, considering the guards she was trying to glare down were actually behind and to the left of the angry woman. "I guess I will bring along three, I am not sure I can protect more than that easily." Seeing their expressions, he coughed. "Not that these big strong guards NEED protection. Even if the energy being released from this cave seems pretty deadly to most forms of life and all that."

...They still didn't look happy. Meh. "Now, you guys pick the three most powerful or most expendable members of your team and follow me!"

SOMETHING in there felt very interesting!

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Only a few steps into the cave and the bones started to appear. Initially small, like from rats or other tiny animals, no flesh could be found on the many corpses that grew ever more dense the deeper they traveled into the darkness.

Torches could barely throw any light down here, the cold spiritual energy suppressed it heavily. And this energy was insidious. Heavy Yin energy components, laced with something... necrotic. It almost smelt of decay, with a hint of darkness and the void. Rockette was now riding on Adam's shoulder, carefully collecting samples and ensuring the sticky energy didn't begin infesting the guards.

Adam's body didn't care about it. The Blue energy was like acid to this strange fog of power, and while the gas felt tingly as it tried to rot his skin, his Cultivation Cells were strong enough to ignore the issue. It would require a higher concentration of power before his body would begin to rot away. Or even take damage.

Still was chilly though. It was clear that the bodies out here had been from Spirit Beasts drawn by the huge source of power, unsuspectingly infected by the strange energy being emitted, and rotting away into more white sand.

It wasn't until the group had traveled VERY deep that they began to see skeletal structures damaged by conflict.

SOMETHING down here was apparently worth fighting to the death over, and a large portion of surface creatures had been attracted to their death in pursuit of it.

The first human skeletons was found by the team thousands of meters below ground... and either due to age or the corrosive power in the air, it was heavily damaged. Looting it revealed a storage ring full of rare bones collected from the many Spirit Beast skeletons this person found along the way down here... though clearly they had been unable to detect how dangerous the energy in the air was. None of the other human skeletons they found had anything interesting on them... this one corpse likely looted the rest before dying on his way out of the cave.

Speaking of which, aside from the other rings and some coins and stuff, the rest of this guy's ring contents had either been tossed aside to make more room for the rare bones or this person was just poor in general. No identification could be found either... so the group moved on, keeping the ring. There must be SOME massive profit to make with all those rare Spirit Beast parts.

And yes, Adam was forcing the guards to carry the morbid thing, along with other neat stuff they found on the way. At least they would be useful instead of quietly following him everywhere.

There were no side paths... this was clearly not a natural cave. And at this depth, the rock had been corroded by the icy tainted Yin energies... many minerals and rocks had a dim glow to them. Some purple, some green, and strangely enough a few rocks were actually glowing with a black aura. To be honest, Adam hadn't realized black COULD glow.

These mutated stones became more and more common until the entire tunnel became a tube of bright green stones with purple and black highlights. The materials themselves were much harder than one would expect after being saturated for who KNOWS how long by these energies, and Adam wouldn't risk touching most of the strange moss-like plants that survived down here if he could help it.

He did have a guard collect a few samples though. Mr. Whiskers may recognize them, as he had a strong ability related to nature.

Eventually the winding tunnel opened up into a massive cavern, walls covered in claw marks as the many beast corpses had fought down here for control of the area... though nothing down here was alive anymore. A cold black mist showed how thick the tainted Yin energy was... and in the center of the cave was a very shallow pool of liquid.

He would say it was water... but water shouldn't glow green like that. It was colored like toxic sludge, but cautious prodding with a long bone showed it flowed like water normally would.

It also dissolved the bone itself.

Hmm. Glancing at his guards, the lead one stepped forward. Adam pointed. "Any ideas?"

They nodded. "This seems to be a Yin spawning pool, a naturally occurring treasure that can help condition those with extreme Yang bodies or enhance the many feminine cultivation methods out there. It can enhance the spirit and soul, and tends to raise the intelligence of Spirit Beasts that consume it."

Ah... he didn't know the lead guard was a woman.

...Hadn't she watched him bathe!?

God damn perverts. 'We need to guard you' my foot.

Adam glanced at the bones. "Well, this particular pool doesn't seem to be working correctly. Unless the Spirit Beasts given higher intelligence were smart enough to get the hell out of here, unlike us."

Well, best be safe.

Rockette's Domain filled the cave system... and expanded back up the winding spiral tunnel they had came down through. As his control reached the surface... all the energy vanished into Rockette's internal storage, a strange feeling of loss suddenly hitting the group as the power vanished.

Adam stumbled. "Wow! That had a kick." Apparently some of the corroded bones had begun converting whatever energies their former bodies had produced into more of that strange black mist, sucking all that spirit energy away caused most of the skeletons in the room and outside to collapse into white dust. What a mess.

The pool still glowed green... but the energies felt different.

More refreshing and minty, less rotting and... no.

Even as Adam watched, the pool shifted from the soothing nature green back into an acidic nuclear color. The powers slid into darker and darker shades as the energies began to rot, to decay, to spoil...

Adam's eyes slid closed. "There... there is something WITHIN that Yin Pool. I think whatever it is that showed up in there IS the treasure, not the Yin pool itself." There was a point a bit off center in that shallow liquid that was tainting the rest of the area, infecting and spreading.

He moved close to the pool, having Rockette continuously drain that section of the cave as spiritual energy was constructed.

...There was a black stone, the size of a walnut. It almost seemed to pulse inside the liquid, with dim swirls of gray energy spilling into the Yin pool surrounding it. Without a thought, Adam walked into the pool, ignore the conceptually cold liquid soaking his pants, and picked the stone up.

A spike of necrotic energies began corroding his palm, causing 'Recursion' to expose jagged edges of blue crystal as his body was damaged layer by layer.

Fascinating.

The object itself wasn't a storage device or a generator of this strange energy... it was more a conceptual gate of sorts.

Attempting to use his spiritual senses to connect with the object still boring into his palm suddenly exposed instructions... this was a conceptual treasure forged by some master in the past!

These were mentioned in the legends back in the Sect. Some Treasures when made by powerful people or Sects would gain sentence, be able to choose their own masters, and reach a fundamentally higher level of experience.

If lost or destroyed, existence itself would cause these things to spawn back on the Plane somewhere, once it has had enough time to gather enough conceptual energy to be reborn from its own legend.

This was apparently called the Asura Stone... and it wanted him to do a basic binding ritual?

Adam took his other hand, forced Cultivation Cells forming his blood to drip out onto the stone, and imprinted his spirit signature onto the object that was even now slowly dissolving his flesh.

The change was instant!

The stone in his palm began to feel ever more cold as the black energies stopped flowing away. Adam absently repaired his many wounded palms (it burned through several conceptual levels of his 'Recursion' already), and began to review the information the treasure had passed into his mind. Well, more like 'Crammed into his brain matter'.

This stone was a connection. A portal to a realm where powerful demigods called 'Asuras' fought all day and night for dominance. Benevolent Asuras called Aditays constantly struggled to the death against the malevolent Danavas, the two powerful sides creating constant conflict.

Their death and continuous rebirth for further battle was creating powerful Death and Underworld spiritual energies, and this stone would allow people in this Plane of existence to access the spiritual energy spillage from that sealed Realm full of conflict and chaos.

A thought had the black stone... converting into a solid black ink tattoo of a circle on his right palm, were the wound had been. In this form, he could feel it nestling within his own spiritual network... how odd. Another thought had it return to rock shape.

According to the history Adam had been exposed to while connecting with this object, it was first formed by a powerful Necromancer, during an expensive and massive sacrificial ritual designed to create a soul container or phylactery, one more powerful than any known variety of its kind! Instead, the monster undead spellcaster had formed this strange open connection to a realm with abundant Death energy, usable as a source of fuel for his dark works.

He still murdered people and stuff for his rituals ANYWAY, because according to these memories he was an asshole. Point was though that this Asura Stone increased his powers and reduced his energy costs when doing magic.

Karma still got the bastard in the end though... He detected the 'Death' spiritual energy easily enough, but missed the 'Underworld' energies completely. The two were similar... but the Underworld power was able to enhance spiritual beings. To empower them and increase their resistance to mental attack.

Spiritual beings like the massive number of vengeful ghosts that constantly haunted this Necromancer ass who killed thousands for various rituals.

Anyway, once the Necromancer got consumed by hungry spirits, the Asura Stone was found and destroyed by heroes after a few decades of accidentally melting flesh and spawning wandering skeletons. From then on it would pop up again and again in history, and according to these memories would eventually be found forcing an area to decay, get destroyed, and one day be reborn again.

Unlike many of the more famous treasures, this one did not come with special attacks or cultivation methods... it was just a connection to a realm where demigods fought for reasons they probably forgot eons ago. Maybe if the Necromancer had more time to try and improve his creation... he had after all gathered absurdly expensive materials to make what he THOUGHT would be his soul jar. Necrotic Silver, Haunted Gold, Corpse Gems... literal mounds of rare materials and desecrated treasures had been spent on forming this one small stone. But time was one thing he did not have.

This 'unfinished product' didn't even allow much control... you could decide to restrain the Death and Underworld energies... or not.

That was it.

No wonder most people would rather destroy the thing rather than let someone ELSE set off a local disaster. In fact, the only reasons skeletons and (eventually) zombies were not walking around was because Adam had been in the area. If he had shown up a week or so later, these many corpses would have begun an endless hunt for flesh... a nasty surprise for the locals.

While Adam had no real use right now for Death energy OR the spiritual power of the Underworld... well, Rockette was more than able to utilize 'Growth' to harvest that power, convert a portion as fuel, and convert the rest into other energy samples. Of course, the more powerful the new target energy type was, the more Death and Underworld energy must be sacrificed to produce it... but all this new energy was just waste or excess, the runoff caused by massively powerful beings fighting all the time. It wouldn't run out, and using it all for his own purposes was nothing but profit!

A thought had the black circle appear on his palm... hopefully 'Research' could examine this new data source instead of focusing on Mr. Whiskers to figure out how to bind objects to one's spirit and soul as ink. In the mean time...

A pulse. The stone was fully activated.

Again, black energies flowed from the tattoo in his hand. While it COULD be directed externally into others or objects to force rot and decay, Rockette was directing it into his Shard herself, using it to fuel Growth.

Now he could increase the sample sizes of all the discovered energy types stored there, then have her use 'Growth' once the source materials were built up to increase his internal storage of Blue energy, Green energy, and the two energies those Four Eye Flame Bulls needed.

Unfortunately, 'Binding energy' couldn't be grown directly this way. He had THOUGHT it could be, and believed he had done so in the past... but it turns out that ALL his binding energy was collected after interacting with his Domain or after being stripped away from other energy types. Seriously, 'Binding energy' acted so strange.

Another pulse of pain went up his right arm, even as the rotten flesh instantly healed. Annoying.

Oh, and his guards were here. "Sir... are you alright?"

Adam frowned. "Oh, the black rock with poisonous gray energy thing?" This damage was a necrotic affect from the Death energy. Underworld energy on the other hand was actually pretty beneficial, he could already feel it stabilizing his Spiritual Network and soothing some rough edges of his own soul. But this Death energy... "I think the raw power of death is not healthy for my body."

He nodded, ignoring their expressions. "Yeah, its killing parts of my arm as I pass the energy to Rockette's spiritual connection in my heart. And a bit of rotting in my shoulder and some veins... yeah, this is pretty bad."

Adam began moving out of the Yin energy pool, grateful to be out of the conceptually cold liquid trying to melt his legs even as Rockette ensured all traces of the other, more dangerous energies were cleaned out of the area. "You guys should go bring the girls down now, I put all the deadly stuff into my hand so it should be safe. Just in case though, I am going to take a bit of a break over here and adapt to the stuff with my Gentle Rebirth Technique. Rotting flesh hurts."

Shouldn't take long, he just needed to have the Rebirth Technique examine his arm to find which Cultivation Cells adapted best to the additional sources of power and spread the solution out to the others. Much faster than the initial conversion method... he should probably document this as an 'Energy Adaptation Method' to include with the Gentle Rebirth Body Cultivation Technique's next version.

He paused.

None of the three guards had moved.

Adam raised an eyebrow. "Well? I'm going to be a bit busy forcing my body to ignore the energies of death, ONE of you can go make sure our friends get down here safely."

Sheesh, these people seriously needed to learn how to adapt to the odd stuff. His life seemed full of it.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

Sister Quan SHOULD be angry about Adam apparently finding a cave of death and descending to put the worst of it inside his own hand... but it seemed something he would do. Perfectly in character, really.

So for now, she and little Tianshi were relaxing in this wonderful Yin pool. Adam had said something about having cleaned it so it wouldn't melt people, but she felt more calm ignoring comments like that.

Little Tianshi was pouting. "Mr. Whiskers says he doesn't want to join us, something about cool guys and yang pools and relaxing lava baths or whatever."

The cold energies seemed to pierce directly into her sore muscles and calm her headache. Sister Quan sighed. "Yang spiritual power tends to be both hot and match many masculine features. larger muscles, virility, raw strength. Yin energies like those found in this pool are cool, focus on feminine features, slenderness, flexibility, the arts..."

The girl looked confused. "What's virility?"

Sister Quan patted her head. "It means be quiet and enjoy the lovely energy pool while we wait for Adam to fix whatever that stuff on his right arm is."

Seriously, his entire right arm seems to have grown its OWN tattoo pattern, a strange network of thin black infection veins that were expanding over his body. He seemed fully in control and perfectly happy with the situation, but then again the woman wasn't sure that child would be unhappy even if he was on fire.

Strike that, Adam seemed to spend most of his LIFE on fire. If anything, that was a positive situation for the strange boy.

Anyway, SHE couldn't stop the situation, and the short conversation with the lead female guard (Who knew they could talk?) had cleared up a lot.

A massive bone pit full of corpses, Adam came down, cleaned it up, found some sort of black stone of death or evil... and was now trying to eat it with his hand. Or something.

~~~Broken Adventure~~~

This Asura Stone was... fascinating.

The more his body adapted to the dangerous energies being emitted... the more types of energies it was able to release. 'Rot energy', 'Decay energy', 'Shadow Corruption energy'... not to mention the forty or so poisonous energies that were randomly included.

After adapting his Cells to the first few dozen, his Cultivation Flesh adapted... and forced his strange near black tattoos to spread over his entire body. Every inch of his flesh was now covered with hair thin lines of energy, ones that continuously adapted to the ever increasing poisons, corruptions, and profound energy sources being introduced into his body.

Instead of his flesh rotting away as it tried to adapt, all the dangerous stuff was being shoved into his tattoo network. It spread out the damage, let his body adapt far more efficiently without causing any one portion of his flesh to be too damaged or generate any pain...

But now he had tattoos everywhere. Strange ones that made patterns that hurt to look at too closely, that seemed to shift and move.

Four hours later, and he had adapted enough to make the lines mostly stay still.

Two hours after that, and the width of each tattoo line was vastly reduced, most patterns now composed of lines as thin as a hair.

...He won't say how long it took to force those tattoos to match his skin color.

It was hard. VERY hard. And every new poison or corruption energy from the Asura Stone would pulse a black wave of color (if it was a new poison) or a silvery sheen (if it was a new high energy type).

Adam sighed, resting on a mound of white powder... Spirit Beast bone powder was surprisingly comfortable.

Still, he couldn't wait until his body stabilized again. He didn't want to walk around like a glowing strobe light.

The worst part? While the variety and range of energies was ever increasing, the overall energy AMOUNT was constant. This Asura Stone had a sort of built in limit... or maybe it was limited due to his Cultivation foundation.

Either way, he could only get a certain amount of energy per second, no matter how many strange types composed it.

Sigh... this was going to slow his cultivation progress again, since he needed to let Rockette build up a sample of each new energy he was adapting his body with.

Dang it.