Lingyu Water Control Art (Seeking Continued Reading)

"Axie, go ask the clan chief whether they've found any new fragments."

The young man standing guard at the cave entrance hurried away after receiving the order.

Unable to make heads or tails of it, for now he could only pin his hopes on obtaining more fragments.

If they could piece together most of the entire Iron Wood Boat, making the beast patterns upon it more complete, perhaps inspiration would strike him.

A burly man strode into the cave.

"Old Clan Uncle, have you found anything?"

"No. Witchcraft is a mystical art, born from the divine abilities of Great Wilderness Variants. How could one possibly understand it just by looking?"

The burly man was Huang Yun, the clan chief of the Shanghuang Tribe.

"I've already sent Huangshi and Huang Shang out, one south and one north, to search. Once they find new fragments, they'll swiftly send them back to the tribe. In these parts, no one can compete with our Shanghuang Tribe."

"Mm."

The old man nodded. "We still need to find the place where the Iron Wood Boat shattered as soon as possible. If we can find whoever sailed it, perhaps we can locate the true witch's remains."

From the beast patterns pieced together from the Iron Wood Boat fragments, it was enough to tell that they depicted a Great Wilderness Variant known as the Lingyu.

Only the Ling Yu Upper Tribe used the Lingyu as its tribal emblem.

Yet the Ling Yu Upper Tribe lay more than ten thousand li from here. Even if an Iron Wood Boat from the Ling Yu Tribe had shattered, the odds of it drifting along floodwaters to the nearby wilderness were slim.

There was only one possibility: an Iron Wood Boat of the Ling Yu Tribe had broken down somewhere in the nearby wilderness.

"Don't worry. I've already sent people to look. If a witch from the Ling Yu Upper Tribe truly died nearby, then any witchcraft on them will certainly be ours. Looking across these lands, other than our Shanghuang Tribe, who else is qualified to command witchcraft?"

A blazing light shone in Huang Yun's large eyes. The difference between upper tribes and lower tribes lay not only in martial arts, but even more so in the Witchcraft Legacy.

The Shanghuang Tribe had stood for over five hundred years. Obtaining a Witchcraft Legacy had been the cherished wish of generations of Tribal Witches and clan chiefs.

Blazing Flame Tribe.

Inside the cave, Shen Can lay on a stone bed with his eyes closed.

You invested another thirty years. Repeatedly copying the beast-pattern diagram, your heart followed your will, and you caught a thread of spiritual essence like a swimming fish.

This thread of spiritual essence complemented the runes you had previously comprehended, as though it had been wrought by heaven itself.

Fifty years later, following that spiritual essence, you wrote out the second rune as naturally as water flowing into a channel.

The two runes intertwined like rippling waterlight, waves rolling and shimmering.

Shen Can opened his eyes. As his thoughts stirred, his lifespan was: 1011.

Deriving witchcraft truly was difficult. All told, he had already spent more than three hundred years of lifespan in fits and starts.

Yet it had been worth every bit of it. Two witchcraft runes—or perhaps witchcraft characters—were now vividly imprinted in his mind.

Now that the results had been confirmed, it was time to go all in.

"Sacrificial Cauldron, give me a thousand years."

Within the three-legged Sacrificial Cauldron, the phantom sat cross-legged. A sound rose within his thoughts from the unseen.

Stubborn fool, you've started being stubborn again.

You invested one thousand years of lifespan, wishing to derive a complete water-controlling witchcraft art.

You had already grasped two witchcraft runes and caught part of the mysteries of water within the witchcraft characters. Following that mystery, you continued your derivation.

The entire process was dull and intricate, but your goal remained firm. Whenever your mind grew restless, you copied the beast-pattern diagram.

Heaven never fails those who persevere. The third, fourth, and further witchcraft characters... were continuously derived by you.

As the number of witchcraft characters grew, the water spiritual light you sensed became ever more resplendent.

...

You derived the ninth witchcraft character. The nine witchcraft characters lined up in a row, yet they began to change. Amid glimmering ripples, all nine moved together and automatically rearranged themselves.

After the rearrangement, the nine witchcraft characters linked together. Faintly, a bizarre wilderness beast appeared before your eyes—human-faced, fish-bodied, and four-legged.

At first glance, you felt that this mystical wilderness beast was hollow all over, possessing only a frame, with nothing inside its belly.

You immediately realized that you had seen the beast-pattern diagram on the Iron Wood Boat fragments. It was like part of the fish body of the wilderness beast before you, except the bizarre wilderness beast before your eyes had not yet grown scales.

Congratulations. After spending five hundred and seventy-three years, you successfully comprehended the Lingyu Water Control Art.

Inside the cave, Shen Can thrust his hand directly into the large earthenware jar he used for drinking water.

The water in the jar turned into a stream, winding around his wrist.

As he raised his hand, the water stream coiled around his wrist like a transparent little snake, crawling up to his shoulder and beginning to wander over his body.

Manipulating water currents was merely a minor trick. Witchcraft contained far too many transformations; different arrangements of witchcraft characters gave rise to different mystical effects. He had long understood this after so many years of derivation.

It had taken more than three hundred years to comprehend a single witchcraft character, and five hundred and seventy years to comprehend one witchcraft art—nearly a thousand years of lifespan in total.

But Shen Can felt that all of it had been worthwhile.

Looking back now, it seemed simple only because he had mastered it.

He had a feeling that the so-called Lingyu Water Control Art was an enormous system, and he had only unearthed a tiny corner of it.

He had only initially derived one witchcraft art. The Lingyu witchcraft characters numbered more than nine; the somewhat hollow Lingyu phantom was enough to prove that.

It was not that the Lingyu was hollow, but that what he had derived so far could only vaguely form the Lingyu's phantom.

"Lingyu... it really is something from an upper tribe. To drift over from such a distance, these upper tribe things are really tough enough to take a beating."

Shen Can's thoughts returned to the Iron Wood Boat itself.

Something from the Ling Yu Upper Tribe—no wonder the Shanghuang Tribe had come twice to threaten and tempt the tribe. He now believed even more that the Shanghuang Tribe might have obtained more Iron Wood Boat fragments.

The more fragments there were, the more beast-pattern diagrams they would bear. If he had more beast patterns, comprehending them would not consume so much lifespan.

Perhaps the Shanghuang Tribe also had someone comprehending the witchcraft upon them. He just did not know whether their talent was as good as his, a genius's.

After gathering his thoughts, he walked out of the cave.

Dawn was nearly here. It was time to tidy up for the ancestors, and after that, he still needed to inspect the tribe.

As long as the plague did not disperse, he could not let down his guard.

He also wondered how long the clan chief intended to keep everyone quarantined.

"The clan chief is quite the old schemer too."

Facing the morning sun, Shen Can muttered softly as he walked out of the ancestral temple cave.

Though he muttered, he was not complaining. Rather, he was delighted beyond measure.

From the Iron Wood Boat fragments to storing beast blood and quarantining the clansmen, it was clear that the clan chief had long guarded against outside scrutiny.

He handled matters with seasoned skill.

At noon, Shen Can emerged from a quarantine cave. As he gazed into the distance, he suddenly saw someone approaching from outside the tribal grounds.

Squinting for a closer look, he saw that it was Huo Shan.

Only then did he recall that he had not seen Uncle Huo Shan for a month.

As the tribe's reserve Heavenly Vein and the hunting team leader second only to Huo Tang, Huo Shan had not shown his face in the tribe even once during the more than month since the floodwaters receded.

What had he been doing?

He raised his head again and looked at Huo Tang above the tribal grounds, standing there like a wife turned to stone awaiting her husband's return.

"There's something fishy."

Muttering that, Shen Can returned to the ancestral temple, picked up the lunch Huo Xian had prepared, and wolfed it down.

After eating, he returned to West Ear Cave and began practicing the Kui Ox Fist.

"You're saying that the other nearby tribes were all incredibly lucky, and not a single one suffered a large-scale assault from plague insects?"

Inside the cave dwelling, Huo Tang looked at the travel-worn Huo Shan, who had just returned. His face was filled with heartache, helplessness, indignation... all manner of emotions tangled together.

The plague-curing witch medicine had kept the tribe's strength from diminishing in the slightest.

On the surface, three new Mountain Openers had appeared; in secret, six more Mountain Openers had appeared.

That was equivalent to doubling the combat strength of the tribe's Mountain Opener realm martial artists.

He had sharpened his blade until it gleamed menacingly, yet... how had there been no bargain left to pick up?

Stroking his chest, Huo Tang took a long while to recover.