A Sha Weapon Slays Ghosts, Unlocking Free Proficiency Points

"Idiot!"

The corners of Liao Jun's mouth slowly curled up in a mocking smile.

Trying to fend off a ghost with his hand—wasn't he courting death?

Sensing movement behind it, the specter abruptly turned around, switching its target from Liao Jun to Qin Ming.

In its perception, Qin Ming, who practiced Horizontal Training Martial Arts, had richer Qi and blood, making him more enticing!

"Screee!"

The specter let out a strange cry and pounced at Qin Ming.

It was extremely fast. Before it even came close, Qin Ming felt a chilling Qi he knew all too well, as though it were trying to bore into the gaps between his bones. The closer it got, the stronger the chill became!

So these Ghost Entities are behind the chilling Qi in the Ghost Fog!

Qin Ming understood in an instant.

As the specter closed in, Qin Ming spun around and viciously cleaved down at it with the pig-slaying saber he had readied.

"Slash!"

The instant the pig-slaying saber struck the specter, Qin Ming felt as though he had hacked into a piece of tough cowhide.

It was full of resilience.

But as the Qi and blood surged within him, Sha Qi gathered on the pig-slaying saber. With a wet slash, it actually split the specter in two!

"What?!"

Liao Jun, who had been waiting to sit back and enjoy the show, suddenly widened his eyes until they nearly popped out of their sockets.

Ghosts were incorporeal. How could one be struck by a saber, let alone cleaved in two?

Just as I thought!

Qin Ming thought to himself. He was not particularly surprised by the result.

The pig-slaying saber in his hand had been passed down through the Qin Family butcher shop for at least a dozen generations. It had killed countless pigs and accumulated an extremely dense amount of Sha Qi.

Ordinary blades were indeed useless against ghosts, but the pig-slaying saber in Qin Ming's hand was an exception. The Sha Qi on it was enough to tear apart a ghost's spirit body!

That strike had greatly boosted Qin Ming's confidence.

After the specter died, its spirit body, cleaved in two, turned into an intensely cold chill that rapidly burrowed into Qin Ming's body.

"Hiss!"

Qin Ming instantly felt as though his Qi and blood were about to freeze solid. At the same time, the panel appeared before his eyes of its own accord, with several large black characters added to the bottom line.

[Free Proficiency Points: 100 (can be allocated freely to anything except internal arts)]

Slaying a single specter had actually given Qin Ming a hundred proficiency points. More importantly, these were points he could allocate freely!

That meant that as long as he had enough martial art proficiency points, he could take a martial art he had never practiced from beginner to the Perfection Realm in an extremely short time!

It was something ordinary people could scarcely imagine.

At that moment, there was no fear left in Qin Ming's eyes. To him, those wandering ghosts were countless proficiency points he could allocate freely.

But before killing those ghosts, there was someone else he had to deal with first.

"Embroiderer, you and Brother Wang's group find somewhere safe first. Don't go too far."

Qin Ming set down Embroiderer, whom he had rescued.

Dimly sensing what was coming, Liao Jun no longer dared to watch the show. He brought his whip down hard.

"Hyah!"

Liao Jun drove the horse into a mad gallop, but visibility in the Ghost Fog was too poor. With the carriage moving so fast, a wheel struck a rock before he noticed it. With a crash, the entire carriage flew sideways before slamming heavily into the ground.

Liao Jun was thrown head over heels, his head spinning. Without time to think, he scrambled to his feet.

Meanwhile, Qin Ming had already chased after him, saber in hand.

Without another word, Qin Ming struck with his saber, swiftly stabbing it into Liao Jun's chest and twisting it hard.

"You!"

Liao Jun gripped Qin Ming's hand tightly, his eyes full of unwillingness.

"You... dare kill an official of the imperial court?"

"I don't care what kind of official you are. Whoever provokes me, I kill!"

Qin Ming spoke coldly and struck Liao Jun on the forehead with a Fire Sand Palm, sending him on his final journey.

Two specters, drawn by the smell of blood, rushed over one after the other. Qin Ming gripped his pig-slaying saber and killed both ghosts as easily as chopping melons and vegetables.

His freely allocable proficiency points increased by another two hundred.

"Exhilarating!"

Qin Ming laughed, then took the offensive with his pig-slaying saber, hunting down Ghost Entities.

"That brat has a Sha Weapon! Kill him first!"

The remaining specters noticed and swiftly surrounded him.

"A Sha Weapon? How could a little place like this possibly have a Sha Weapon?"

The female ghost in the red dress was startled.

A Sha Weapon was an extremely unusual weapon. Only after slaughtering tens of thousands of living beings did a weapon have the slightest chance of developing Sha Qi. Only when that Sha Qi gradually grew denser and accumulated to a certain degree could it become a Sha Weapon.

Such an unusual weapon inflicted immense damage on ghosts and demons, especially ghosts.

Ghosts had no physical bodies, so Sha Qi inflicted even greater damage on them, even proving fatal.

"Kill!"

With the Perfection Realm's forty percent speed bonus, the pig-slaying saber in Qin Ming's hand moved as fast as lightning. He slew three specters in succession and wounded two more. Their spirit bodies hissed as wisps of bluish smoke rose from them.

These specters were quite ordinary in strength. With a pig-slaying saber in hand, even someone at the Mid-Stage Skin-Refining Realm could slay them. It was only because of their unusual forms that even Flesh Refining Realm experts could do nothing but flee when they encountered them.

Fire Poison can hurt them!

A thought stirred in Qin Ming's mind.

The Fire Poison of his greater mastery Fire Sand Palm could actually harm these ghosts, though clearly, the damage was not fatal.

[Ninth-Rank Martial Art: Fire Sand Palm (225/1000), greater mastery]

[Free Proficiency Points: 600]

"Kill!"

Qin Ming lunged forward and activated Cook Ding Dissects the Ox, slaying the two wounded ghosts. His free proficiency points increased by another two hundred, reaching eight hundred!

Fire Sand Palm, add points!

Qin Ming shouted inwardly. His free proficiency points were swiftly emptied, and at the same time, the Fire Sand Palm line changed.

[Ninth-Rank Martial Art: Fire Sand Palm (perfection)]

[Proficiency Points: 25]

Unlike his Life-Bound Martial Art, the Pig-Slaying Saber Technique, reaching perfection in Fire Sand Palm meant he had cultivated it to its limit, with no room to advance further.

Qin Ming's bare palms rapidly turned red before his eyes, like branding irons heated red-hot.

He casually struck a specter with his palm, and Fire Poison erupted at once. Flames sprang up all over the specter's body, making it bare its teeth and grimace as it retreated with a scream. By the time the Fire Poison dissipated, around a tenth of the Yin Qi in its body had dissipated as well.

Qin Ming came to a realization.

These ghosts were probably very low-level Ghost Entities.

Although he had cultivated Fire Sand Palm to the Perfection Realm and its Fire Poison had grown much more powerful, it did not seem capable of posing a fatal threat to them. Its killing power was far inferior to the pig-slaying saber's.

Only if he struck more than ten palms in succession, stacking the Fire Poison until it completely wore away the Yin Qi in their bodies, might he be able to scatter the souls of the Ghost Entities.

"Father! How is Qin Ming hurting those Ghost Entities? Aren't ghosts incorporeal?"

Huo Lan and the others stared, dumbfounded by the sight.

"The pig-slaying saber in his hand must have accumulated Sha Qi over many years, so it has a suppressive effect on Ghost Entities. As for his palms, it looks a lot like Fire Sand Palm, but Fire Sand Palm is only a Ninth-Rank Martial Art. How could it hurt Ghost Entities?"

Even Huo Zheng could rack his brains and still not figure that out.

It never even occurred to him that Fire Sand Palm could have reached the Perfection Realm. As far as he knew, he simply could not believe anyone would waste precious cultivation time on a Ninth-Rank Martial Art.

"Master."

Li Shengnan asked quietly, "Can you tell what's going on?"

Pei Heng said nothing. A look of uncertainty and suspicion flickered in his eyes, and his face twitched with a hint of disbelief.

He was knowledgeable and experienced, and could dimly make out what was happening.

"If I'm not mistaken, Qin Ming must have cultivated Fire Sand Palm to an extremely high level."

"What level? Greater mastery?"

Li Shengnan's heart skipped a beat.

"Perfection."

Pei Heng's voice trembled slightly as he said the word. Even he found it hard to believe, but the truth lay before his eyes.

One hallmark of Fire Sand Palm at the Perfection Realm was that both palms turned red like branding irons. The heat alone could scald a Mid-Stage Skin-Refining Realm martial artist to death within three breaths, to say nothing of the Fire Poison inherent to Fire Sand Palm. Even someone at the Perfected Skin-Refining Realm could not withstand it!

"Perfection..."

Li Shengnan's mind went blank.

"How interesting. I never expected a little genius to turn up in this tiny Qingshan Town. A fire-attribute Ninth-Rank Martial Art at the Perfection Realm, plus a Sha Weapon—no wonder you managed to kill my Ghost Slaves."

The woman in the red dress gave a strange giggle and floated soundlessly behind Qin Ming.

"Junior Brother, look out behind you!"

Qin Ming had long since sensed something amiss behind him. Holding the pig-slaying saber in a reverse grip, he suddenly slashed backward.

The female ghost giggled and retreated with the motion.

The pig-slaying saber brushed past the tip of the female ghost's nose. The Sha Qi and Yin Qi collided repeatedly, until both finally dissipated.

"Such powerful Sha Qi!"

The female ghost's gaze was drawn to the pig-slaying saber in Qin Ming's hand, and a trace of wariness appeared in her eyes.

The Sha Qi on the saber was several times denser than she had imagined!

The denser the Sha Qi, the greater its killing power against ghosts!

Qin Ming gripped the pig-slaying saber tightly, his expression grave. He did not dare underestimate her.

Those specters were remnant souls without human forms and had little offensive power. They could only possess people and devour their Qi and blood. He could casually kill a specter with one slash, but he was not confident he could deal with the female ghost before him.

"Young man, your Qi and blood are very rich. Have you been practicing Horizontal Training Martial Arts?"

The female ghost giggled. Her laughter was deeply eerie, seeming to worm its way into Qin Ming's ears from every direction.

Qin Ming's head soon grew heavy and muddled. The world spun around him, and he staggered, unable even to stand steady.

Several streams of intensely cold Qi took the chance to burrow into his body. Qin Ming felt as though all the blood in him were about to freeze solid. His hands and feet no longer obeyed him, and his teeth chattered from the cold.

It was the specters and the female ghost. They were all possessing Qin Ming now, greedily devouring his Qi and blood.

"Brother Qin! Brother Qin!!"

Embroiderer's broken cries reached Qin Ming's mind.

"Little Junior Brother!"

"Junior Brother, wake up!"

"Em... Embroiderer.

Senior Sister."

Qin Ming's eyes flew open, and he recovered his senses.

Sensing that his Qi and blood were rapidly draining away, Qin Ming immediately realized what was happening. His face twisted fiercely. "Possess me and devour my Qi and blood?"

He raised both hands and struck his own chest more than ten times with Fire Sand Palm. Fire Poison quickly spread throughout his body along his meridians.

"Aaaah!"

Ghostly wails and howls came from within Qin Ming as the Fire Poison scalded the Ghost Entities, making them scream.

"Junior Brother!!!"

Li Shengnan and Lu Liu were horrified, as frantic as ants on a hot pan.

"Don't panic. He's trying to force the Ghost Entities out with Fire Poison!"

Pei Heng said in a low voice.

But after getting a taste of the benefits, how could these Ghost Entities come out so easily?

Seeing that Fire Sand Palm could not force the Ghost Entities out, Qin Ming raised the pig-slaying saber, turned the blade toward himself, and stabbed it into his abdomen without hesitation.

"Puchi!"

The Sha Qi on the pig-slaying saber instantly poured out through the wound.

"Boom!"

Sha Qi surged. Several specters were ground out of existence amid their screams. With nowhere to hide inside Qin Ming, the female ghost took the torrent of Sha Qi head-on. She let out a piercing wail and was forcibly blasted out of his body.

With just one strike, more than half the Yin Qi in her body had dissipated. Her spirit body was so weak that it looked even more as though a gust of wind could blow it out.

"Qin Ming, was it? I'll remember you!"

The female ghost stared fixedly at Qin Ming, her eyes filled with hatred and fury.

Not only had she gained nothing this time, but she had also been gravely wounded by the pig-slaying saber's Sha Qi, and every Ghost Slave under her command had been killed. Her losses could be called disastrous.

The female ghost quickly withdrew, and the Ghost Fog dissipated with her departure.

She was badly hurt, and Yin Qi was still leaking out of her. She had to heal immediately, or her very foundation would be damaged and her soul would scatter.

That stab from Qin Ming had nearly killed her.

"Brother Qin!"

"Little Junior Brother!"

After the Ghost Fog dispersed, Embroiderer and Li Shengnan rushed over.

Qin Ming was badly injured.

He had put his full strength into each of the more than ten palms he had struck himself with. The accumulated Fire Poison had erupted, making Qin Ming's body temperature frighteningly hot, and all the Fire Poison remained inside him.

"Master! Please save Little Junior Brother!"

Li Shengnan was so frightened that her face turned pale.

"Brother Qin, Brother Qin! Wake up!"

The moment Embroiderer touched Qin Ming, she pulled her hand back from the heat, several blisters forming on it.

Pei Heng's expression was grave. After examining him carefully, he shook his head. "The Fire Poison has penetrated deep into his organs and meridians. He can't be saved."

Hearing this, Embroiderer's face went deathly pale, as though struck by five bolts of lightning.

The others gathered around as well, an unusual glint flickering in some of their eyes.

If they remembered correctly, Qin Ming had a large number of banknotes on him!

If Qin Ming died, wouldn't those banknotes be left without an owner?