Chapter 501: Returning with a Full Harvest
Translator: Dragon Boat Translation Editor: Dragon Boat Translation
In a cave on a remote uninhabited island,
Chen Fei, sitting cross-legged on the ground, opened his eyes, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.
In the dream, Duan Muxiao had unearthed everything he had collected over the years. He even found a small box of high-grade elemental stones hidden beneath an island in a certain sea area.
Knowing the risks of being an a.s.sa.s.sin, Duan Muxiao had prepared various escape routes long ago.
If it weren’t for the Dream Entry Technique, Chen Fei would never have imagined that Duan Muxiao had hidden so many things.
And those intricate formation seals, even if others found those iron boxes, they would be unable to decipher what was inside.
“This is quite an unexpected delight,” Chen Fei thought to himself.
Originally, Chen Fei just wanted to see where Duan Muxiao came from, but he never expected to find so many valuable items waiting for him.
This was much more profitable than slaying any sea monsters.
Duan Muxiao had reached the early second stage of the Combined Aperture Tempering realm many years ago and had never given up on his martial arts training. As a result, he frequently took on missions.
All of this was in pursuit of the opportunity to reach the mid-stage of the Combined Aperture Tempering realm within the next decade.
As long as he reached the mid-stage of the Combined Aperture Tempering realm, not only would the rewards for accepting missions increase significantly, but Duan Muxiao’s status within the Death Shadow Sect would also change.
Therefore, Duan Muxiao’s wealth was extremely substantial.
Compared to the first Combined Aperture Tempering realm expert Chen Fei had slain, Guan Hongxuan, what Guan Hongxuan possessed was truly minimal. In fact, there was no comparison between the two.
Chen Fei waved his right hand, and the Qiankun Bag hanging from Duan Muxiao’s waist flew to his front.
Chen Fei had thought from the beginning that a kind-hearted Combined Aperture Tempering realm expert might give him a Qiankun Bag, and now it had actually come true.
There was Duan Muxiao’s spiritual imprint on the Qiankun Bag, which Chen Fei couldn’t open for the time being. However, this kind of spiritual imprint wasn’t as complex as the formation seals on the iron boxes; it didn’t require any specific hand seals. Chen Fei just needed to forcibly erase the spiritual imprint.
With nothing else to do, Chen Fei started to wear down the imprint using his Profound Slaying Sword.
“Hmph!”
The spiritual imprint on the Qiankun Bag vibrated, and Duan Muxiao’s nearly shattered consciousness was suddenly stirred, involuntarily letting out a painful groan.
With that groan, Duan Muxiao slowly opened his eyes.
The scene inside the cave came into Duan Muxiao’s view, making him appear somewhat bewildered. Duan Muxiao clearly remembered that he should be in an inn right now; how did he end up here?
Duan Muxiao turned his head, and at once, he spotted Chen Fei by his side. Duan Muxiao’s eyes widened involuntarily, and the bewildered look in his eyes disappeared in an instant.
He tried to move, but he found himself completely unable to budge a single inch. His body, which should have been mostly healed, was still in a state of severe injury and near-death.
Duan Muxiao was left in a daze, as the boundary between reality and illusion suddenly crashed into his mind.
He had clearly escaped from this place. He had already recovered from most of his injuries. So why was he in this condition again?
Was he ambushed by Chen Fei in the inn and brought here against his will? He had already distanced himself from the Sea Peak City, so how could Chen Fei have found him?
No, something was not right!
Duan Muxiao’s somewhat hazy consciousness suddenly cleared up a bit, and he also felt something unusual with his spiritual senses.
Everything that had just happened was fake!
His escape was fake, returning to the Death Shadow Sect was fake. In fact, nothing had happened at all, and he was still inside this cave.
Everything he had experienced before was all orchestrated by Chen Fei to make him believe.
“Grr!”
Duan Muxiao felt like he wanted to grind his teeth to dust. The joy of narrowly escaping death was something he could still remember, but now he was being told that it was all a lie.
How could Duan Muxiao possibly accept this!
*Buzz!*
The Qiankun Bag trembled slightly, and Chen Fei directly erased Duan Muxiao’s spiritual imprint on it. Duan Muxiao’s mind was jolted, and intense pain swept through his entire body.
Before Duan Muxiao could recover from this pain, a sudden chill made his skin crawl, and he opened his eyes to see Chen Fei’s silent gaze.
“Do you have any last words?” Chen Fei said calmly.
“What exactly happened just now?”
Duan Muxiao’s lips trembled slightly. To the end, Duan Muxiao wanted to know why everything had turned out this way!
“Dream Entry Technique!”
“Dream Entry!”
Duan Muxiao was momentarily stunned, and then it dawned on him that everything had been a dream.
“Hahaha!”
Duan Muxiao suddenly burst into laughter. Dream, it was all like a dream now.
In Duan Muxiao’s eyes, there was a deep-rooted unwillingness as he realized that he had given away everything he had acc.u.mulated throughout his life to Chen Fei in the dream.
How ludicrous, how absurd it all was.
Duan Muxiao had considered that he might die someday due to a mission failure, but he had never imagined that the things he had acc.u.mulated would be given to the mission target.
He would have preferred those things to be destroyed rather than given to anyone. However, today, things had turned out this way.
* Slash!*
A flash of sword energy pa.s.sed through, abruptly silencing Duan Muxiao’s laughter as his head thudded onto the ground, emitting a dull sound.
Under the Soul Slaughter Technique, a surge of spiritual essence rushed towards Chen Fei. After a moment of thought, he directed it into the Qianyuan Sword.
Since he had already upgraded the Qianyuan Sword to the level of a lower-grade magical treasure, Chen Fei thought about continuing to enhance it. However, moving from a lower-grade to a middle-grade magical treasure would require more than just slaying a few early-stage Combined Aperture Tempering realm experts; it was still far from enough.
The Qianyuan Sword trembled slightly, emitting a clear ring as it absorbed this burst of spiritual essence, improving its power to some extent.
With a wave of his right hand, Chen Fei turned Duan Muxiao’s body into ashes.
Chen Fei then left the cave, soaring into the sky the next moment, flying towards the southwest.
There were many resources left behind by Duan Muxiao, and Chen Fei naturally needed to collect them one by one. Although each location was quite far apart, the prospect of obtaining so much was more than enough motivation for Chen Fei to travel the distance.
Five days later, Chen Fei appeared in Curve Wood City in the Pohai Sea region.
In those five days, Chen Fei had traveled to nearly six different locations, meticulously collecting all the resources carefully stored by Duan Muxiao.
He had obtained 329 pieces of medium-grade elemental stones, 37 bottles of third-tier cultivation pills, and a considerable amount of valuable healing elixirs.
Not only that, besides the fine sword he had directly taken from Duan Muxiao, there was another lower-grade magical treasure hidden in various other places.
However, this lower-grade magical treasure was somewhat damaged, likely taken from someone else by Duan Muxiao.
Chen Fei had no idea why Duan Muxiao had kept this magical treasure, but it didn’t matter now. He had no interest in delving into the story behind it.
Regarding these two lower-grade magical treasures, Chen Fei planned to sell them both and exchange them for medium-grade elemental stones.
Apart from these items, Chen Fei had also acquired numerous jade slips.
These jade slips didn’t just contain martial techniques; they also included a map.
Chen Fei had carefully compared the map and realized that the locations it marked were not within the Thousand Feathers Alliance but directly outside of it.
Outside the Thousand Feathers Alliance, it was far more dangerous than inside. Not to mention the peculiar natural formations, just the monstrous beasts there were much more ferocious than those within the alliance.
The jade slip didn’t specify what the map represented, so after briefly reviewing it, Chen Fei stored it in his Qiankun Bag.
At this stage, Chen Fei had no intention of leaving the Thousand Feathers Alliance. Moreover, a single map couldn’t convey much information, and it was uncertain what lay in those locations.
It could even be a trap set by Duan Muxiao among the many jade slips.
Of course, the probability of this was quite low, as Duan Muxiao would be unlikely to trust others with these secretive locations.
Apart from the map, there were some jade slips that contained information Duan Muxiao considered important, but they held little significance for Chen Fei.
After a brief glance, he destroyed them.
In the end, what remained in Chen Fei’s hands were various martial arts techniques.
Among the seven inheritances for the Combined Aperture Tempering realm, two could be cultivated to the pinnacle of the Combined Aperture Tempering realm and contained secret methods for combining apertures. The other five could be cultivated to the late Combined Aperture Tempering realm stage, with the lowest allowing one to open over a hundred acupoints.
These martial arts techniques held little significance for Chen Fei at his current stage, but they were of great importance to the Primordial Sword Sect.
At least the disciples of the Primordial Sword Sect now had more choices. With more options available, it was easier to find a martial art that suited them, making their cultivation smoother.
However, because Chen Fei had no intention of fully practicing these martial arts, his shadow clone wouldn’t guide them in these techniques. Those who chose to cultivate these martial arts would ultimately have to rely on themselves.
There were pros and cons to this approach.
Among the seven Combined Aperture Tempering realm martial arts, there was one secret technique that piqued Chen Fei’s interest.
“Subst.i.tute Shadow!”
It allowed one to cultivate a shadow that could step in to receive a fatal blow at a critical moment.
It sounded impressive, but the key was that the Subst.i.tute Shadow had its limits. It couldn’t fully withstand attacks from high-level Combined Aperture Tempering realm experts, and the effectiveness varied depending on the pract.i.tioner’s strength.
As Chen Fei was currently in the Combined Aperture Tempering realm, he wasn’t sure how much it could withstand against attacks of this level.
Chen Fei was somewhat curious about what would happen if his shadow clone and Subst.i.tute Shadow were combined.
In addition to the Combined Aperture Tempering realm martial arts, there was also a complete Combined Aperture Tempering realm technique in the jade slips, which was the “Light Slicing Shadow Sword,” the main cultivation technique of Duan Muxiao himself.
It was a pity that Duan Muxiao didn’t even have the chance to use his “Light Slicing Shadow Sword” technique against Chen Fei and was severely injured from the start.
Apart from his main cultivation technique, there were also two secret techniques, “Coiling Sword Technique” and “Judgment Eye,” both of which were highly practical. Chen Fei planned to find some time to cultivate them.
All of these were Duan Muxiao’s lifelong acc.u.mulations, and now they all belonged to Chen Fei.
On the street, Chen Fei concealed his presence, changing his appearance, and arrived at a shop. This was a branch of the Death Shadow Sect..