the construction-work on the northern continent never stopped. the martyr’s palace was also parked there at the moment, undergoing the next stage of modifications.
everything about the place was good; the only problem was the shortage of manpower. currently, it was only inhabited by the highbeards and some of song zining’s technicians. building a wars.h.i.+p required thousands of technicians at the site alone, and countless more for the production of parts and facilities.
to solve this problem, song zining had pa.s.sed on a large number of orders to imperial workshops. moreover, he had bought the first batch of parts from available stock, s.h.i.+pping some to southern blue, and the higher-end equipment to the northern continent.
no one else knew about this except those with the bird"s eye view of the overall situation.
after looking through the list, qianye highlighted several dozen resources, saying, “s.h.i.+p these to the warehouse outside the city, i have use for them.”
the manager said, “sire, these resources are required for the wars.h.i.+ps currently under construction. the merchant groups produced them according to our order, there is no extra.”
he was implying that these things had a purpose—it was free now, but that didn’t mean there was extra.
qianye waved his hand, saying, “it’s already decided, i have use for them. also, prepare a few sets of crystal transformation arrays and fifty sets of crystals.”
manager song was shocked. “t-this means we won’t be able to build a wars.h.i.+p. the remaining goods won’t be enough to build a single vessel.”
“use what you have at the moment, and do what i tell you to!”
seeing that qianye was insistent on his decision, the manager stopped arguing and stood to the side. at this point, a general from the mercenary corps said, “sire, the weapons and equipment the seventh young n.o.ble had left are still in the armory, ready to be s.h.i.+pped. what do you want to do with them? shall we distribute them?”
after some thought, qianye said, “pick a batch of loyal people from dark flame and form an elite squad of around five hundred people. distribute the equipment to this group and leave the rest in the armory. i have use for it.”
“yes, sire.” the mercenary head was somewhat puzzled about what qianye wanted to do, but he didn’t dare question the decision. he merely affirmed the order and left to accomplish it.
qianye felt somewhat distressed. the instruction to surrender reduced losses for southern blue, but it was also a missed opportunity to see who was loyal. dark flame had a fair number of members at the moment, but it was hard to tell how unified they were.
currently, however, qianye had more important matters to take care of. as such, everything here would have to continue as normal except for forming an elite squad.
the remaining days saw him cooped up in his room, not taking a single step out.
his small courtyard would often light up with flashes of lightning, raging sandstorms, and a surging ancient aura. a beam of sanguineous light would shoot up into the sky, reaching hundreds of meters in height.
no one knew what secret art qianye was cultivating, but none dared approach after witnessing its grandeur. a wisp of stray aura from a cultivating expert could be lethal to an ordinary person.
qianye’s room was an absolute mess with broken things everywhere. the strangest part was the fact that some of the wood had started to rot, almost as though they had lived through centuries. there was a hole in the roof, and the floor was filled with potholes. little zhuji was curled up in a corner, trembling as she stared at qianye with eyes full of excitement and terror.
qianye stood at the center of the room. there was a small gap between his feet and the ground as he hovered with a book in his hand. that large rhomboidal gem on the cover was exceptionally eye-catching.
the book of darkness had actually materialized and appeared in qianye’s hands. the pages were still replaying the evolution of the cosmos and the vicissitudes of the universe. qianye concentrated for a long while before shaking his head. “it’s still not enough. this degree of origin power evolution isn’t something i can grasp. i still need to work on it.”
a boundless aura emerged from his body as he closed his eyes. before long, bulging green veins appeared all over his body, erupting into a spray of b.l.o.o.d.y mist!
qianye fell to the ground with a violent jolt. he inhaled deeply with a wry smile, absorbing all the blood back into his body and rapidly healing the breaks on his skin.
“i can’t. not to mention controlling the origin power, just trying to imitate the concept is too much to bear. this body is too weak.” qianye glanced at himself helplessly.
his ancient vampire const.i.tution had little compet.i.tion even in the entire evernight world, perhaps only the awakened bloodline of an arachne royalty like basil could surpa.s.s it.
at the thought of arachne, qianye turned quickly toward little zhuji. he had no idea what bloodline the la.s.s had descended from, but she was outrageously powerful. if all arachne were like her, the human race could forget about fighting and just wait to be wiped out. hmm… that wasn’t quite right, either. the internal power balance in the evernight council would be in chaos way before the human race would be affected.
since she was of a young age, the little girl had yet to reveal her arachne-form body. qianye would’ve suspected her race had he not seen her crawl out of an arachne egg.
“zhuji, come here.”
the little fellow trembled all over when she saw qianye waving at her, and approached reluctantly.
qianye stretched out a finger. “bite.”
the little fellow stared at the finger for a long while. finally, she bit down with a fierce glint in her eyes.
by the time she had bitten down, the finger was nowhere to be seen. her pearly white teeth struck one another, sending sparks flying in all directions. this was followed by a loud pop as a flick landed on her forehead.
the powerful flick sent her head swinging backward and left her dazed.
“so careless. you need to be starved as punishment.”
the word starved triggered a change in expression. she stared fixedly at the finger as though it were the bone of a wild beast.
“this looks tasty, this looks tasty…” the girl muttered as she pounced over at several times the speed.
in the blink of an eye, qianye was surrounded by afterimages of zhuji as she attempted several different attacks. meanwhile, qianye’s finger moved about as though it were everywhere at the same time.
little zhuji had attacked countless times in the blink of an eye, much like a cat chasing a b.u.t.terfly.
her hunting instincts were gradually brought out, and she grew closer and closer to qianye. a sudden feigned pounce caused qianye’s finger to change direction, which she bit down with a twist of her body!
“crack!” following a sound akin to shattered gla.s.s, the little girl shot back to the corner of the room with a miserable cry. she covered her mouth with her hands and almost looked like she would cry.
qianye looked at his own hand and saw a row of deep tooth-marks, all of which had been produced by zhuji. there was a strange metallic sheen on his hand, with specks of starlight roaming about.
he shook his head helplessly. “if you were any bigger, you would’ve bitten off a piece of my flesh.”
little zhuji made sounds of protest with her mouth still covered.
this bite was so painful that her face had turned pale, and there were traces of blood between her teeth.
the metallic l.u.s.ter on qianye’s hand dispersed, and his skin gradually turned black and lifeless. a sanguineous flame lit up on his arm and stretched to his hand, burning away all the blackened skin. even his skeleton became visible after the dead flesh was burned away. afterward, wiggling new flesh slowly grew back to form a new hand.
qianye moved his new flesh about, saying, “powerful, but also comes at a steep price.”
this was a new secret art called the fallen star immortal body, named after comets that could survive a tribulation of fire. the secret art was hidden in the bloodmoon empress li had gifted him. it appeared naturally after qianye had gained full grasp of the dagger. cultivating the fallen star immortal body required millennial fragrant wood as a catalyst, something that was extremely hard to come by. however, bloodmoon’s sheath was made from this millenial fragrant wood.
even the messenger, eunuch yang, was deceived by the many disguises. all of this had to have a special purpose.
this fallen star immortal body originated from the martial emperor and was a secret inheritance that would never be pa.s.sed on to outsiders. no one knew how empress li had obtained it and why she would pa.s.s it to qianye. the correlation was neither too big nor too small. the imperial treasury had enjoyed a thousand years of acc.u.mulation—one secret art was nothing compared to the countless treasures. on the other hand, leaking an imperial inheritance was a great crime worthy of familial extermination.
channeling the fallen star immortal body would turn one’s flesh into a material similar to comets, bringing its strength to the peak. even zhuji couldn’t bite through qianye’s skin after he had used this art, hurting her own teeth instead. from this, one could see just how powerful the art was. this peerless art must’ve played a big role in the martial emperor’s ability to maneuver freely against a mult.i.tude of evernight experts.
on the other hand, the fallen star immortal body had stringent requirements. one would need the millennial fragrant wood as a catalyst, using it to activate the body’s vitality. at the same time, it would turn part of the body into the wood attribute and subsequently reduce the pressure of the art.
even though qianye possessed the wood, cultivating this art still put immense strain on his body. from what qianye understood of the imperial experts, he could tell that basically no one else could cultivate it successfully. in fact, no one had cultivated this art following the martial emperor, not even those of imperial bloodline.
the fallen star immortal body was one of those extremely powerful imperial arts with strict requirements.
qianye possessed an ancient vampire const.i.tution as well as the millennial fragrant wood, so he was able to cultivate it successfully. after trying several times, he found that the secret art was extremely powerful, and even a divine champion going all out might not be able to break through. channeling the art, however, caused irreversible damage to the body. basically, the flesh would fall apart after the art was stopped.
hence, the fallen star immortal body was a method for dire situations, where one would need to rest for a good while after each use. qianye could shorten the recovery period due to his regenerative powers, but he would still need rest nonetheless. the more one channeled this art, the greater the tissue damage, and the longer the rest time involved.
using it too much would surely hurt one’s const.i.tution. even an ancient vampire could hardly withstand constant degeneration and regeneration of flesh. otherwise, why would they need to sleep so long in the blood ponds?
qianye thought things through while waiting for his flesh to grow back. history stated that the martial emperor possessed miraculous cultivation and that his combat strength might even exceed the founding ancestor. however, his life was not a long one. it truly made one wonder if this was related to the fallen star immortal body.
now, with the addition of this secret art, empress li’s reward was way too great.
qianye meditated on the matter, trying to figure out what he did that was worth such a boon.