Fifty Years of Cultivation (Please Keep Reading)

Luo Wen gave a bitter smile. "This time, we've probably committed a grave taboo of officialdom—acting beyond our rank and trying to bring down our own direct superior. No one in a position of power likes subordinates like that."

He had known all this at the time.

But between Wei Fan and Wei Qingyuan, he had no choice but to pick one. And if he had not chosen Wei Fan back then, Wei Fan would probably have chopped him to pieces and claimed that he was colluding with demons.

Even if their merits were acknowledged symbolically, the City Lord was bound to dislike their attempt to deal with their own immediate superior.

If people like them were promoted, who knew whether they might one day turn around and plot against him as well?

Wei Fan nodded lightly. Naturally, he understood all that too. Those who played the game of officialdom loathed subordinates like this.

"I don't care about any of that. But the City Lord didn't punish Wei Qingyuan at all and even let him remain the East District's clerk. I overestimated the City Lord's sense of fairness."

Wei Fan was not surprised by this.

The problem had originated with the City Lord himself; otherwise, the demons in Cloud City would not have run so rampant. Perhaps the City Lord himself was colluding with demons.

Besides, regarding the E Shen Gang, the only evidence was that Wei Qingyuan had asked Luo Wen to look after his Lu Tianming. There was no proof that Wei Qingyuan himself was also colluding with demons.

After serving as a clerk for more than a decade, Wei Qingyuan's relationship with the Cloud City Lord might not have been limited to that of superior and subordinate. It was perfectly normal for Wei Qingyuan to come out unscathed.

No matter how much they did, Cloud City was ultimately the City Lord's personal domain. You could only rise if he allowed it, and only fall if he ordered it.

"No matter. If he keeps his post, then he keeps it. As long as we do everything by the rules, there's no need to fear him."

You may not be afraid, but I am. You're a military officer, while I'm a civil official. It's completely different.

Luo Wen left with a heavy heart, feeling that his future was pitch-black.

Wei Qingyuan would not have many ways to make trouble for Wei Fan, but he had plenty of ways to make trouble for him.

And Wei Fan would eventually enter the Demon Suppressing Division, while he would have to remain in Cloud City. Their paths were fundamentally different.

Mirror Lake Technique (Not Initiated)

Current Cultivation: 102 years

Wei Fan did not dwell much on Wei Qingyuan's affairs and quickly began studying the Mirror Lake Technique.

Like Three Yuan Return to One before it, the Mirror Lake Technique was also a special type of inner cultivation method, specifically used to broaden the dantian. As for how much it could broaden it, the manual said that depended on one's individual potential.

For those with poor potential, the dantian could only be expanded by twenty or thirty percent. For those with exceptional potential, expanding it four or fivefold was possible.

Of course, the process would take a long time. Those with a family background or inheritance generally began cultivating inner methods that could broaden the dantian from the moment they produced their first strand of true qi.

"Good thing I have a cheat!"

"My dantian can only hold ten years of cultivation. If I can broaden it two or threefold, it'll be able to hold twenty or thirty years of cultivation. I wonder if it can expand that much."

"Ten years of cultivation—add it to the Mirror Lake Technique!"

Following his usual practice, Wei Fan first poured ten years of cultivation into it. The panel began to flicker:

10 years of cultivation deducted. Adding to the martial art Mirror Lake Technique!

In an instant, the true qi in his dantian began to circulate, like ripples suddenly stirring the surface of a tranquil lake.

After cultivating the Mirror Lake Technique for one year, the Mirror Lake Technique reaches completion. Your dantian expands, and its true qi capacity increases by 30%.

After cultivating the Mirror Lake Technique for two years, your dantian expands, and its true qi capacity increases by 30%.

After cultivating the Mirror Lake Technique for three years, your dantian expands, and its true qi capacity increases by 30%.

...

Wei Fan could not help but rejoice. After just one year of cultivation, his dantian's true qi capacity had increased by thirty percent. In other words, it could hold an additional three years of cultivation.

At the same time, his lower abdomen, where his dantian lay, began to grow hot and swell, expanding as though it were being inflated.

But before he could celebrate for long, the increases displayed on the panel began to change, and the degree of expansion of his dantian rapidly weakened.

After cultivating the Mirror Lake Technique for five years, your dantian expands, and its true qi capacity increases by 20%.

After cultivating the Mirror Lake Technique for seven years, your dantian expands, and its true qi capacity increases by 10%.

After cultivating the Mirror Lake Technique for ten years, your dantian expands, and its true qi capacity increases by 10%.

Mirror Lake Technique (Complete)

Current Cultivation: 92 years

"Expanded by more than double. My dantian should now be able to hold over twenty years of cultivation."

This was actually close to his limit.

Even if ordinary people cultivated martial arts that broadened their true qi capacity, they would at most cultivate them for ten years or so. They would not keep cultivating indefinitely, because breaking through to the Acupoint Splitting Realm became difficult once they grew older.

But this was not a problem for Wei Fan. As long as the Mirror Lake Technique could still broaden his dantian, he could continue adding cultivation to it.

He kept adding more. In the end, he poured a total of eighty years of cultivation into it before stopping, only when the Mirror Lake Technique no longer had the slightest effect on him.

Mirror Lake Technique (Complete)

Current Cultivation: 22 years

"My dantian is now roughly five times as broad as before."

The results of eighty years of cultivation delighted Wei Fan beyond measure. His dantian could now hold more than fifty years of true qi.

The prodigies Ning Xuan spoke of in the Demon Suppressing Division had dantians only about this size.

In other words, in terms of the quantity of True Qi, he was on the same level as the Demon Suppressing Division's top geniuses—not much weaker than them.

"If I fought the Tiger King again now, I could kill him with a shock using only ordinary martial skills, relying on this True Qi that has increased fivefold."

It made perfect sense to judge whether someone was a genius by the True Qi capacity of their dantian. After all, bringing a martial skill to perfection took far too long.

Take Dragon's Roar Sky Shattering Finger, for example. He had poured twenty years of cultivation into it before reaching perfection. Even someone more gifted than him would need at least seven or eight years to perfect it.

And in that amount of time, a true genius would already have broken through to the Acupoint Splitting Realm. Dragon's Roar Sky Shattering Finger at the True Qi Realm would no longer be of much use.

Martial skills had to be constantly replaced. Only True Qi was eternal.

"If I hadn't cultivated four body-tempering martial arts and forged such a powerful physique, my dantian could never have expanded to this extent!"

People used to say body-tempering martial arts were fiercer than True Qi, but now that might not be the case.

For ordinary people, the strength to wield ten thousand jin with one arm was indeed more formidable than someone at the True Qi Ninth Level.

But if someone at the True Qi Ninth Level had a dantian containing the equivalent of fifty or sixty years of True Qi, they could slap a body-tempering martial artist with ten thousand jin of strength to death.

Even if his body-tempering cultivation now reached twenty thousand jin in one arm, the killing power of his flesh still could not compare to True Qi.

"Chief Constable, something's happened!"

Wei Fan opened his eyes and saw Liu Chengzhou and Hu Qing.

Something had happened?

Wei Fan's brows drew together slightly.

Hu Qing's expression was grave. "Someone from Three Mile Hamlet came to report a case. Today, demons entered the village and ate three or four people. Should we go take a look?"

Besides several streets within the city, Wei Fan's jurisdiction also included some villages outside the city. If anything happened in those villages, it was his responsibility as well.

Five Mile Village, for instance, had previously fallen under Li Shen's jurisdiction. It was now under his control too.

"Grab your weapons. Let's go!"

Wei Fan picked up the saber at his waist and took the lead outside.

Demons and the yamen had an unspoken understanding. Even when demons ate people, they generally snatched them away quietly at night and took them back to their dens. It was rare for them to openly show themselves in broad daylight.

They were simply being too conspicuous, and might attract the killing gods of the Demon Suppressing Division.

"We should bring more people. There's a good chance this is connected to the Tiger King, meant to lure you out of the city!" Hu Qing warned.

She could think of it, and Wei Fan naturally had the same suspicion.

But his accumulated cultivation was nearly used up, and he was worried that no demons would come for him to kill. Why would he fear such things?

If this was aimed at him, then he had even more reason to go. Otherwise, every additional death would add another blood debt to his name.

"No need. Just you two. If even I can't handle it, bringing anyone else along would only send them to their deaths."

Once outside, Wei Fan saw the man from Three Mile Hamlet who had come to report the case—a middle-aged man of around forty named Tian Qi.

Taking the man with them, the group headed out of the city.