Another Surprise

Wei Yang opened his eyes, his face somewhat pale and carrying a trace of exhaustion.

This kind of clash between souls was dangerous and especially taxing on the mind.

"Success." Wei Yang wiped the sweat from his forehead and said softly.

Lowering his head to look at the black scroll in his hands, he circulated the Dou Qi within his body according to the Dou Qi circulation route recorded on the scroll.

A moment later, the Dou Qi flowed to his palms and emerged from them.

The instant the Dou Qi appeared in his palms, the hawk wings on the black scroll suddenly shone brightly.

The black-purple radiance grew increasingly intense before finally turning into two tiny streaks of black-purple light that shot into Wei Yang's palms like lightning.

After entering Wei Yang's body, the two tiny streaks of black-purple light rapidly flowed along his meridians.

When they reached the meridians along Wei Yang's spine, they stopped, then forcefully began opening up new meridians.

They tore open two extremely tiny branch meridians.

These two branch meridians extended from the main meridians and only gradually stopped once they reached his back.

"Ah—"

Wei Yang clenched his teeth tightly, letting out a miserable, agonized roar from his throat.

Great beads of sweat fell from his forehead, and his fists were clenched tightly together.

The intense pain of having his meridians torn apart was truly torturous and unbearable.

"Fuck—"

Bang!

Wei Yang collapsed onto the ground and viciously smashed his fists into the floor. His eyes were red, and the veins on his forehead bulged.

Bang!

His fists struck the stone floor, sending tiny fragments of rock flying.

At that moment, every second was unbearably difficult.

He did not know how much time passed. It seemed like only an instant, yet also an eternity.

Only then did the excruciating pain gradually recede like the tide.

Wei Yang was curled up on the ground, drenched in sweat as though he had just been pulled from the water.

Huff, huff, huff—

He panted heavily. His entire body still ached faintly as though pricked by needles, leaving him numb and unable to muster even a shred of strength.

Only after resting for quite a while longer did the stinging pain throughout his body gradually fade, and some strength slowly returned to him.

"Is it finally over?"

Wei Yang slowly climbed to his feet and looked with lingering fear at the black scroll that had been tossed aside.

The black scroll was now completely blank. The hawk wings and words upon it had all vanished.

Shaking his head and no longer paying attention to the empty scroll, Wei Yang removed his sweat-soaked shirt, revealing the well-toned muscles of his upper body.

When he touched his back, he could feel that, at some point, a pair of black wing patterns the size of palms had appeared there.

The patterns were slightly raised, resembling tattoos, yet also like protruding meridian markings.

With a thought, the Dou Qi within his body circulated and poured into the pair of wing tattoos on his back.

Upon receiving the Dou Qi, the pitch-black tattoos immediately lit up, releasing a faint black-purple glow.

Whoosh—

They finally transformed into a pair of tangible black wings with mysterious purple patterns on their surfaces, slowly unfurling from Wei Yang's back.

They were a pair of black wings spanning roughly a zhang when spread open, extending from his back.

Each feather was distinct, as though they were alive, yet they also seemed forged from refined iron, carrying a metallic texture.

As he carefully sensed them, he found it an extraordinarily wondrous feeling, as if a pair of wings had truly grown from his back.

Wei Yang tried controlling them, gently flapping them.

Whoosh—

The wings flapped.

A gust of wind suddenly arose within the stone chamber, and a buoyant force appeared. Wei Yang's entire body slowly rose into the air, his feet beginning to leave the ground.

Since it was his first attempt and he was unskilled, his body swayed crookedly in the air like a fledgling learning to fly, making his movements look somewhat comical.

Wei Yang eagerly continued trying, correcting his movements and finding his balance.

Only after a long while did Wei Yang barely manage to adapt.

By then, he was steadily suspended in midair within the stone chamber, his feet about a foot off the ground, standing in the air as the black wings behind him gently flapped.

"I can fly from now on."

Wei Yang grinned. After a while longer, he finally descended in satisfaction and withdrew his wings.

Once he stopped supplying Dou Qi, the Black Wings folded away and once more became a pair of palm-sized black tattoos on his back.

He slowly stretched and put his clothes back on.

"With these wings, things will be much more convenient and safer for me in the future. Even if I encounter an enemy I can't defeat, I can fly away at any time."

"As for enemies at the Dou Wang level or above? There are only a handful of experts of that level in the entire Jia Ma Empire. Why would I go out of my way to provoke them?"

Wei Yang clenched his fists and silently sensed the surging Dou Qi within him. "Because I changed cultivation techniques, I may have fallen to Dou Master Two-Star, but my strength has actually increased rather than decreased."

"Now that I have a Profound Tier High-Grade Cultivation Technique as my foundation, I believe I can fully unleash my potential. In three or four months, I should be able to return to Dou Master Six-Star."

Before becoming a Dou Zhe, during the Dou Qi cultivation stage, a martial practitioner's body was still relatively weak and they were still laying their foundations, so there were few methods available to speed up their advancement.

Thus, most cultivators were already considered geniuses if they could raise their Dou Qi by one stage in a year.

After becoming a Dou Zhe, however, factors such as cultivation technique aptitude and environmental resources meant that a Dou Zhe's cultivation speed was much faster than during the Dou Qi stage.

For Dou Zhe with excellent conditions, resources, and aptitude, breaking through several stars within a year was not difficult.

Wei Yang might not have Elder Yao's guidance and countless medicinal pills like Xiao Yan did.

But the cultivation technique he practiced now was a Profound Tier High-Grade Cultivation Technique, three or four levels higher than the Crimson Flame Art he had initially practiced, and six or seven levels higher than Xiao Yan's Flame Mantra, which had initially only been Yellow Tier Low-Grade.

Combined with his own aptitude, which complemented the cultivation technique perfectly, the result was far more than one plus one equaling two. It was enough to offset factors such as medicinal pills and resources.

Taken together, Wei Yang's cultivation speed in the early stages would certainly be no slower than Xiao Yan's—likely even faster.

Three years from now, when Xiao Yan recovered his talent and began cultivating again from the third stage of Dou Qi, Wei Yang would already be able to leave him far behind.

That was his confidence.

Filled with excitement, Wei Yang looked around the stone chamber where he had spent nearly half a month.

Here, he had gained tremendous rewards—an enormous stroke of fortune that was enough to change his fate in these early stages.

Wei Yang took a deep breath and calmed himself.

After sorting out his thoughts, he walked to the stone table and looked at the scattered skeleton on the chair behind it.

"Senior, forgive me." Wei Yang bowed apologetically.

Earlier, after successfully changing cultivation techniques, he had failed to control the eruption of his aura, causing the senior's skeleton to scatter.

"Please wait, Senior. This junior will soon lay you to rest," Wei Yang said softly.

He walked to the chair and carefully gathered the scattered bones from the ground, piling them to one side. Then he planned to find somewhere to dig a grave.

After looking around, Wei Yang moved the chair aside.

The ground beneath the chair was cracked, covered with many spiderweb-like fissures and fragments of stone. Unlike the rest of the stone chamber floor, it was not seamless.

"Hmm?"

Wei Yang inspected it carefully and touched the cracked ground, discovering that it seemed to have once been dug open and then filled back in.

"Could this senior have buried something underneath?" Wei Yang could not help secretly guessing, a trace of excitement rising in his heart.

Dou Qi wrapped around his palms, and with his fingers curled like claws, he crouched down and began digging.

As chunks of broken stone were dug out one after another, Wei Yang soon excavated a stone pit around two chi long and wide, and over one chi deep.

It was a stone pit that had already been dug beforehand, only to be filled in and restored later.

It seemed this senior had even dug his own grave in advance?

That certainly made things easier. Once it was dug open, he could simply bury him directly.

Suddenly, Wei Yang's movements halted.

"That is!"

After digging to the bottom, he revealed the solid bedrock below.

At the bottom of the pit, an ancient-looking black ring lay quietly.

Wei Yang's eyes lit up.