Chapter 16: No retreat
But where would the skirt come from? Qianye tried his best to solve this problem. Shaking his head forcefully, he noticed the girls around them, and understood where the skirt would come from.
Was this how being drunk felt like? It wasn’t that bad! As he thought even more, he became full of excitement.
Song Zining and the two other youngsters seemed to be speaking about something, they would even turn to ask him a few questions occasionally. However, Qianye’s consciousness which was floating could never hear them clearly, and even if he did, he just couldn’t understand what they meant.
But Qianye still could understand the gist of it, these three nonstop buzzing house flies were asking him to drink, and drink, and drink! They also said that since Qianye was drunk, he had to accept his loss, change and dance, or they would stop him from drinking further.
Song Zining smiled evilly at Qianye as he pulled a girl closer and started to undo her skirt. The girl laughed happily without shying away, she even shook her hips for the skirt to fall faster.
But Qianye did not think he was drunk.
“I can still drink! Here, cheers!” as he spoke proudly, he rose his wine cup and poured it’s contents into his throat before taking another cup.
Since he challenged them, Song Zining and the two other youngsters did not want to look weak and also started drinking.
Looking at the sky in confusion, Qianye felt as though today’s moon moved very quickly, it was just at his right, yet now it had ran to the left side of the sky?
The night was very silent, like now it should be.
In this lonely night, Qianye could not help but yawn, he felt like sleeping now. And just as he had that thought, he laid down, his head landing on something soft, it was comfortable.
But in the next moment, his body shot up as sweat poured!
This night was not supposed to be quiet! There was a group of people bickering only a while ago, why was it suddenly so silent!?
Turning behind, he saw Song Zining in a pile of young men and women on the ground, all of them sleeping soundly and deeply.
After being dumbfounded for a bit, Qianye understood, they were all drunk.
In this drinking party, Qianye had beaten three powerful opponents by himself. After releasing all his sweat, he was finally awake.
But being awake was not good for him, looking at this messy sight, Qianye felt a headache coming. How would he clean this mess up. Carrying all eleven of these dead pigs resembling fellows back would not be easy.
At that moment, a gentle voice came from behind him: “How lively!”
Hearing this voice, Qianye’s natural instincts caused him to immediately jump up, and standing as straightly as a pen, he greeted loudly, “Teacher!”
Changjing walked out from the forest as she looked at the countless alcohol bottles littered on the ground, then at Qianye. Though she was smiling, she wasn’t truly smiling, “Did you do this?”
“This, no,” Qianye did not know how to answer. But at this moment, he felt as though the atmosphere was rather strange. Changjing’s eyes were shining particularly brightly and the air seemed to carry the scent of danger.
Looking up and down at Qianye multiple times over, Changjing suddenly sighed as the light in her eyes were controlled.
Waving her hand, she spoke rather lonelily, “Go back first, don’t mind about the matters here. Tomorrow morning, go and report to teacher Yin Ying. He will give you a week’s worth of private lessons as a reward for your results for this test.
Qianye was both shocked and elated. Yin Ying was a gun and a killing expert, to be able to be privately taught for a month was an extremely precious rewards.
Returning to his room, the spirits that filled his belly took effect and he quickly fell asleep.
When the next morning came, Qianye was awakened by the commotion from the field. Not knowing what was going on, he went over in curiosity before shockingly finding out that Song Zining and the two other youngsters were tied to the pillars, with three whip marks decorating their completely naked bodies.
The three of them were all fearsome figures that ranked in the top ten for the midyear examinations, rumoured to all be from powerful families. Now, not only were they punished together, they were hung like bared pigs for people to watch! For the children from poorer backgrounds, this was no small news, this sight of the three powerful fellows tied naked up a pillar was not something they had a chance to see normally!
Another crowd shocking news was the reason why Song Zining and the others were so savage.
It was said that they had a 3v1 drinking contest and lost completely. A sight Changjing saw while pa.s.sing by. This demonic female teacher thought that these three fellows were too shameful, and not only did she whip then thrice, she made a show out of them.
This was not a small episode that was easily forgotten in Acheron camp. And every since it happened, Song Zining never agreed to drinking with him anymore, he would always run away when Qianye even brought up the word, alcohol.
This was a regretful matter for Qianye, he truly liked the sensations he experienced that night. But without Song Zining, the status-less Qianye could not afford alcohol, not even the cheapest kind.
In the blink of an eye, three months pa.s.sed.
Song Zining managed to lit his second node and directly went to apply for graduation, and after pa.s.sing smoothly, he said his goodbyes to Acheron Training camp and left.
At that point, Qianye was still fighting against his Origin Energy waved in his training room. He only came to know about it after cla.s.s and at the same time he received a wooden box from Changjing that neatly contained four pieces of Zhu Yan Blood.
A year before, that Xulang had already graduated.
Qianye was still painstakingly charging at the barriers of Qihai Node. He was now capable of withstanding twelve Origin Energy waves, but his speed belonged to the lower middle tier amongst the children of Acheron camp.
After rounds of elimination, the remaining children were all excellent in talented and temperament. Most of the children could lead up to fifteen Origin Energy waves and above, but as the number of Origin Energy Waves increased, the pain increased in proportion as well. Therefore, the number of children who would truly withstand the fifteen Origin Energy waves did not even reach ten.
The more the amount of Origin Energy piled up, the stronger the attacks, the more the amount of Origin energy in the surroundings was taken, and the more harm and pain to the body was caused.
The Bing Yue Exercise relied on the cultivatior’s willpower and physical strength, not one could be lacked.
Therefore, in the imperial army, one’s maximum ability to withstand a certain number of Origin Energy Cycles was used to rank each other. Normally, the seventh and eighth cycles were for cowards, the tenth and above were acceptable and everything fifteen and above gave someone bragging rights. If one pa.s.sed the twenty mark, they would be able to act tyrannically in the military.
When Song Zining graduated, he was said to be able to withstand the seventeen cycle of the Origin energy waves, while a few people in the cla.s.s was now able to withstand the fifteen cycle, they were extremely close to lighting their second Origin Energy Node. In the top ten for the combined results, Qianye was the weakest in withstanding his Origin energetic waves.
However, no one knew how painful the Origin Energy waves Qianye led was. The pain his twelfth Origin wave brought comparable to the nineteenth cycle for normal cultivators!
After half a year, nine children graduated.
Qianye cultivated extremely slowly, until now, he barely managed to withstand his fifteenth Origin Energy wave, but he was still far from lighting his second node.
More children was supplemented into their cla.s.ses, their ages smaller than Qianye’s. Qianye was the youngest when he first entered the Acheron camp, and now, he was an elder member.
The supplementary students were all capable of withstanding the fifteenth Origin Force wave, they started from the same place Qianye did, but their improvement speed left him in the dust. Qianye needed three times more Origin Energy that the usual cultivation to achieve the same goal.
The later he got in the stages, the slower his cultivating speed. Qianye noticed that not only did he had to withstand excruciating pain because of his old injury, his Qihai Node’s barrier was much more st.u.r.dier than the usual cultivator’s.
If his three times stronger Origin energy were to be placed in a normal body, it would only need one wave to break the barrier, but in Qianye’s body, the Origin Energy waves’ attacks were like using a head to smash a mountain, the barrier did not even shake!
In this situation, even Chang Jing did not know what to do, she could only have Qianye acc.u.mulate his Origin Energy and have nature take its course, letting the node ignite naturally.
Just like that, when Qianye finally could withstand the seventeenth Origin Energy Wave, the barrier of his Node finally had a sign of being shaken. And at that point, Qianye was already fifteen years old, becoming one of the eldest amongst the cla.s.s.
This cla.s.s was the highest ranked one, the students that entered were all first ranked fighters that would withstood the fifteenth wave, they usually took only a few months to ignite their node and a while more to stabilise it before going to partic.i.p.ate in the graduation exam.
There was only one test in the graduation exam of Acheron camp, they had to go to the back of the mountain to hunt and kill a Spar lizards. These ten over meter long fellows had the strength of a second ranked fighter when mature.
Despite that every survivor of the Acheron camp were a talent seen in every hundred men and had survived under the cruellest training, killing a Spar Lizard with just one dagger was not easy. It was said that the death rate of students would always go up to 15% everytime they conducted a graduation exam.
It was said that every qualifier for the graduation exams were strong enough to be a commander in the imperial army, this fact showed how shocking the death rate of 15% was.
However, even though Qianye couldn’t ignite his second node, he already had sufficient strength. Despite that, he did not partic.i.p.ate, since rules were rules in this Acheron Camp, it wouldn’t change for anything or anyone.
In this period of time, Qianye did benefit here. He had gotten full marks in every lesson other than the ones regarding Origin Energy.
But Origin Energy was the core of everything. Without Origin energy, scores were nothing.
In the blink of an eye, Qianye was soon sixteen. On the night before his birthday, Qianye did not go to sleep, instead he left his room himself and came to a quiet place to sit under the moonlight.
“I’m going to be sixteen.” Qianye thought silently as he remembered the Landfill, as well as his life changing event.
Actually, Qianye did not know his real birthday, even his age was something Shihai used a special method to test out. Therefore, Lin Xitang used the day where he picked Qianye from the landfill as his birthday.
Until now, Qianye still deeply remembered the warmth and strong large hand. His world originally only had darkness and coldness, it was that very hand that brought the first ray of light into his life.
At that moment, Qianye was like a bird who had just escaped from its sh.e.l.l, he secretly saw Lin Xitang as his father. But he had never told anyone this thought of his.
Silently seated, Qianye collected his thoughts and started cultivating. On this special night, he was willing to do anything to attempt withstanding his eighteenth Origin Energy Wave. If he succeeded, he would be able to ignite his node. But if it failed, it would be impossible for the recover from the attempt’s recoil and he could simply explode and die on the spot.
Qianye had been stuck at his second Origin Energy node for too long, so long he chose to be drastic.