Caiyu

In his mind, countless lines of muscle and bone intertwined and shifted.

Jiang Ding practiced his sword, its gleam bright as a snowy arc.

He was practicing the Eagle's Takeoff Sword Art, the foundation of martial arts. With his high comprehension lending support, he progressed rapidly, and his spine occasionally tingled faintly.

Those of poor aptitude and impoverished households were not without a chance to turn their fortunes around.

Others could only become proficient in the Fledgling Eagle Takes Flight Art. If you could cultivate it to minor achievement, major achievement, or even perfection, you could catch up to—and even surpass—those with exceptional aptitude.

The nine sword forms flashed past one by one before finally returning to the Hidden Sword Style.

"Not bad."

Zhang Dingjun watched from the side for a while, then said with interest, "You brat were wasted being born in the Immortal Sect. In another world, you might have become a wandering hero whose name shook the land."

The Fledgling Eagle Takes Flight Art was one thing—passable, more or less on par with his classmates.

But his practical swordsmanship was somewhat terrifying. Zhang Dingjun was almost too embarrassed to say that Jiang Ding's ability to seize opportunities was nearly on par with his own, even with his Ninth Level Qi Refining divine sense assisting him.

"You're joking."

Jiang Ding rolled his eyes at him. Unlike the other students, he held no fear toward this instructor. "With my Five Spirit Roots aptitude, where besides the Immortal Sect would give me even a sliver of a chance?"

"You still haven't given up on ascending to immortality? This road is too difficult..." Zhang Dingjun sighed softly.

For a mortal to become immortal, even in the Immortal Sect, only the very best and most outstanding few prodigies were qualified. Though Jiang Ding was not entirely mediocre either, but...

"Keep it up! Even if you miss the college entrance examination, there have still been people who successfully cultivated immortality."

Zhang Dingjun encouraged him.

Ring...

Not long after, at twelve o'clock, the fourth dismissal bell rang. Zhang Dingjun left first, while the other students returned to school or went home if they lived nearby.

"Here."

Li Junhao handed Jiang Ding a campus card with a mournful face.

"What do you want? Do you need me to pick you up?"

Jiang Ding was not surprised at all. From now on, teaching robots would strictly supervise this fellow's forty kilometers. Unless he wanted to drop out, he had to carry out the instructor's orders.

"One duck leg, shredded pork with green peppers, and a bowl of the cafeteria's free seaweed egg-drop soup. I'll take the bus back myself."

"Alright."

After saying goodbye to Li Junhao, Jiang Ding squeezed onto the bus back to school with his classmates.

Lunch, then a midday nap.

After two ideology and morality classes, it was time for the training room.

Jiang Ding stared at the pale blue screen before him, a trace of delight appearing on his face.

[Name: Jiang Ding]

[Student Number: 1246215]

[Realm: Bone Refining Realm Peak]

[Previous Training Subject: Sixty-eighth Set of Eagle's Takeoff Sword Art (Proficiency 51%)]

Compared to two days ago, the Eagle's Takeoff Sword Art had surged by 19%. At this rate, he would reach minor achievement in at most two weeks. By then, his Bone Refining progress would accelerate significantly, and breaking through to the Inner Qi Realm would no longer be a fantasy.

One had to know that this was no ordinary martial art from the jianghu, but an Immortal Sect cultivation technique. It was even more difficult than most low-level cultivation techniques and spells, and practicing it with a mortal body raised the difficulty by another great step.

As far as Jiang Ding knew, not a single person in the class had cultivated the technique to minor achievement.

The reason they were ahead was, first, that their aptitude was better than Jiang Ding's, and second, that they supplemented themselves with all kinds of tonics and even spirit pills. Naturally, their cultivation progress differed.

"Two more vertebrae have finished being tempered..."

Jiang Ding looked again at the pale blue line-drawn figure beneath the panel.

Just as expected, among the twenty-four vertebrae, five lumbar vertebrae, one sacrum, and one coccyx had already been tempered. Only twelve thoracic vertebrae and seven cervical vertebrae remained. Once he completed the entire Bone Refining Realm, he would naturally break through to Inner Qi.

There was no such thing as a bottleneck.

So-called bottlenecks were merely a lack of understanding, or problems with the muscles, spine, old injuries, and the like. One did not train enough without realizing it, and thus became stuck at a certain realm.

With an Immortal Sect cultivation technique and the Array Spirit Computer's assistance, such a situation naturally would not exist.

After calming himself, Jiang Ding drew his sword and cultivated with the Array Spirit Computer's assistance, silver sword light dancing and flashing.

This was actually an immense opportunity, equivalent to a Deity Transformation Great Expert's avatar's avatar's... avatar personally guiding his cultivation. Otherwise, given the terrifying difficulty of the Eagle's Takeoff Sword Art, whose effects were comparable to creation itself, ninety-nine percent of youths in the world would not even be able to enter the gate.

Thus, even though cultivation techniques occasionally leaked out, other cultivation worlds simply could not replicate them.

After eating with Jiang Yuan, Jiang Ding locked himself in his room, put on his equipment, checked his medicine and drone battery, and picked up the Panoramic Helmet.

After hesitating for a moment, Jiang Ding set it down and switched to contact lenses.

"The helmet is too conspicuous..."

The light dimmed, then brightened. Before his eyes were once more vast emerald mountains in the early morning, birds chirping noisily.

After routinely collecting more than a dozen unknown plant specimens, Jiang Ding continued exploring outward.

He could accomplish nothing alone.

He needed resources to speed up his cultivation, and he needed manpower to collect specimens. For that, he could take a little risk.

Through the drone's view, the terrifying sight of nearly a hundred people searching the mountains did not reappear. The forest had returned to its original tranquility.

"Hmm?"

Jiang Ding's gaze sharpened. He stopped at one corner of the image and tapped to enlarge it.

A white speck appeared on the screen and rapidly grew larger. A woman in a white dress lay unconscious by the riverbank, her face deathly pale. No one knew where she had drifted from. Shrubs by the river had caught her, preventing her from floating farther downstream.

A large patch of her clothing over her chest was stained red with blood, and her dress was tattered.

"Is she dead?"

Jiang Ding thought silently.

This world did not seem particularly safe.

The woman was three or four kilometers from here. It was possible she had held her breath underwater for a long time and thereby escaped the pursuit of those men in black.

This woman may have information about the outside world that I need.

Also, she seems Severely Wounded. That's good. It means she has no strength to resist and will be easy to control. If she bears hostility, I can kill her directly... But that wouldn't be good, would it? Killing people is against the law.

Jiang Ding pondered.

No.

It was not against the law.

The Immortal Sect Law clearly stipulated that Outer Realm Living Beings who attacked Immortal Sect Citizens were to be sentenced to death. This was one of the most fundamental legal provisions.

Jiang Ding gripped his sword hilt and stopped hesitating.

He proceeded carefully along the way, constantly watching for targets that the drone might overlook. Fortunately, nothing unexpected happened.

Grabbing her dress, he lifted her without much effort and laid her on the ground.

He touched her forehead. It was icy cold. Her belly was slightly swollen, and there was a terrible wound at her waist, so deep he could almost see her internal organs. It was blackish and emitted a fishy, rotten stench. She had obviously been poisoned.

But upon closer inspection, her chest still rose and fell faintly, moving only once every few seconds.

"She's still alive!"

Jiang Ding no longer hesitated. He cleared the foreign matter from between her mouth and nose, found several stones to prop beneath her abdomen, and pressed repeatedly on her chest with both hands using emergency medical procedures.

Every Immortal Sect Citizen was a potential soldier, and all received training in this sort of battlefield first aid.

Several minutes later,

"Bleurgh!"

Gong Caiyu suddenly vomited up a mass of things—water plants, half-raw meat, and some sticky sludge that ran down her neck.

She barely opened her eyes and saw an unfamiliar youth continuously pressing on her chest.

"Pervert!"

Gong Caiyu's face flushed instantly. Drawing upon the last thread of her inner force, her left hand casually found a sharp stone.

"Oh?"

At that moment, the Youth in Green Robes looked at her.

There were no threatening words, much less any killing intent. It merely seemed as though certain legal provisions had begun operating, about to enforce matters entirely in accordance with the law—small things that an Immortal Sect Citizen ought to do.

A chill ran through Gong Caiyu's heart.

"Pervert... where?"

Her little hand unknowingly moved away from the sharp stone. Revealing an exceptionally sweet smile, she looked around in surprise. "Young master, I just saw a pervert, but I can't find him now. Did you see him?"

Jiang Ding looked at her indifferently without speaking.

"Since you didn't see him, then forget it."

"Young master, thank you."

Gong Caiyu pressed her hands together and said, "Thank you for saving me again."

"Mm."

Jiang Ding sheathed his sword.

He grabbed the hand she had lowered and sensed it for a moment.

"Ah..."

Gong Caiyu cried out but did not resist, turning her head aside.

"Your heart and pulse are both very weak... Your condition is terrible." Jiang Ding released her hand. "Can your inner force expel the poison from your body and stop the bleeding?"

He regarded her as something like an injured female classmate and had no messy thoughts whatsoever.

"No... I have no strength..." Gong Caiyu circulated a little inner force, despair appearing in her eyes. Calmly, she said, "My meridians are severely damaged, my inner force is nearly gone, and I have been poisoned by the Golden Saber Sect's Corpse Rot Poison. I am going to die. Thank you, young master, for saving my life."

"My Seven Profound Sect has a thousand-year inheritance. I never expected that today it would..."

"Eat this."

Jiang Ding interrupted her self-pity and tossed her the oral version of Yunnan Baiyao. "Try it. You're dying anyway."

It truly was just a try.

Yunnan Baiyao was a widely used medicine. It could treat external wounds, detoxify, kill bacteria, and had all sorts of effects, but each was ordinary, and its effectiveness was difficult to judge.

Unless it was a spirit pill.

But Jiang Ding only had one. It was the Heavenly King Life-Preserving Pill his mother had bought with half a year's wages. He could not possibly give it to a stranger.

If Yunnan Baiyao had no effect, then that would be her fate.

"Thank you for your kindness, young master."

Gong Caiyu showed a sweet smile and said softly, "Unfortunately, the poison has already entered my bones and blood. It is beyond all hope... Ugh..."

For someone near death, every second was a lifeline. Seeing her still prattling on, Jiang Ding said nothing. One hand pinched her cheeks while the other opened the Yunnan Baiyao oral solution and poured it into her mouth.

Gong Caiyu only felt a warm current melt into her abdomen and spread through her limbs and bones. Her numb meridians and the wound at her waist actually began to feel faint stings of pain.

"What miraculous medicine is this?"

Gong Caiyu's eyes widened. She had never heard of it.

Jiang Ding shook his head, put away the medicine bottle printed with its trademark and instructions, and slipped it into his pocket.

He guessed that perhaps, in this world, it was an entirely new antidote. The pathogens had no resistance to it, so its effects were especially good.

After all, the Immortal Sect cultivated immortality.

"Rest and heal."

Seeing that she was about to say something else, Jiang Ding waved to stop her.

This person had intelligence value. He was bestowing favor to ensure that the information she provided in the future would be more accurate.

Gong Caiyu gave him a grateful look, sat cross-legged, closed her eyes, and restored her inner breath.

Jiang Ding stood, took out a small shovel, and walked toward a little herb he had never seen before. He carefully brushed aside the soil and dug out every strand of root bit by bit.

After digging up one plant, he went to seek the next.

The sun gradually rose, sunlight falling upon his face as beads of sweat reflected the light.

After digging for over three hours straight and seeing that the cross-legged woman on the ground had yet to awaken, Jiang Ding walked to the river's shallows and silently stood still.

Like a statue, he did not move for more than ten minutes.

Clang!

Suddenly, a streak of sword light flashed and pierced straight through an arm-sized carp. No matter how it struggled, it could not escape.

"Resources are so abundant."

Jiang Ding sighed. With a light flick of his sword, the carp flew into the air. Three more streaks of sword light flashed; scales, gills, and entrails flew away, and he casually scraped off a handful of black membrane.

He skewered the carp with his sword, then found a dead tree as thick as a bowl and dragged it back.