Extracorporeal Circulatory System of the Meridians

Liu Jing fell silent for a moment, then raised his cup and drained it in one gulp.

"I understand. Nephew-disciple Luo, you intend to know yourself and your enemy, don't you? To deal with Evil Cultivators, you really do need to understand these things. If not for the Strange Treasure my master bestowed upon me this time, I would have nearly suffered a setback as well.

There's no problem with reading them, but under no circumstances should you try cultivating them out of curiosity. Once you take the First Step, it will be difficult to turn back."

As Liu Jing warned him, he handed over two Jade Slips.

"Two? Does this evil art come in upper and lower volumes?"

Jade Slips could store a vast amount of information. If a cultivation technique required two Jade Slips to contain it all, it was undoubtedly a massive work.

"One contains the evil art known as the Sha Devouring Technique, while the other contains that bloody secret technique cultivated by Evil Cultivators. Since I, Liu Jing, have chosen to trust you, I will trust you completely. Take both Jade Slips."

Touched, Luo Hong accepted the two Jade Slips and cupped his fists in salute.

"This junior will certainly not betray Martial Uncle's trust!"

After the meal, Liu Jing continued treating Li Xiaowan's injuries, with Li Xiaoqing helping at his side. Yu Ying, meanwhile, was busy repairing the Diamond Bell.

Seeing that no one would disturb him, Luo Hong sat atop a large boulder in a secluded spot outside the village. He pressed the Jade Slip recording the Sha Devouring Technique to his brow and extended his divine sense to read it.

Only after studying it for half a day did Luo Hong let out a long breath and open his eyes, looking somewhat disappointed.

Just as its name suggested, the Sha Devouring Technique required its practitioner to absorb Earth Fiend Turbid Qi and refine it into Magic Power with special properties, allowing them to control Earth Fiend Turbid Qi to a certain extent.

Moreover, unlike Spiritual Qi, which could nourish a Cultivator's Physical Body, Earth Fiend Turbid Qi was harmful to a Cultivator's Physical Body. Prolonged exposure would shorten a Cultivator's lifespan.

Thus, the Sha Devouring Technique contained many Evil Techniques that used blood sacrifices to forcibly extend the practitioner's life.

No wonder few Cultivators throughout history had touched Earth Fiend Turbid Qi. This stuff really could kill you.

"What a pity. I had originally planned to take advantage of Earth Fiend Turbid Qi's ability to generate intensely negative Spiritual Pressure. By placing a mass of highly condensed Earth Fiend Turbid Qi at the center of the Spiritual Qi within my body, I could create an enormous Spiritual Pressure differential, forcibly draw Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi around my body, form immense External Spiritual Pressure, and thereby raise the Internal Spirit Pressure within my meridians. That would usher my Spirit Pressure Cultivation Great Method into a new era where it no longer needed Pills.

But now it seems that if I really did that, the Earth Fiend Turbid Qi would probably kill me first!

Even if there were a way to resist the harm caused by Earth Fiend Turbid Qi, it was not something a Qi Refining Stage cultivator with barely a century of life could afford to research.

For now, the only use of Earth Fiend Turbid Qi is to create a negative Spiritual Pressure environment for certain experiments."

Putting away the Jade Slip of the Sha Devouring Technique, Luo Hong listlessly began reading the other Jade Slip. Before long, his expression changed dramatically.

First came wild delight, then confusion, and finally intense excitement!

"Truly, flowers planted with care refuse to bloom, while willows planted by chance grow into shade! This secret technique called the Blood Burning Totem actually contains the secret to constructing an extracorporeal meridian circulation system!"

According to the Jade Slip, cultivating the Blood Burning Totem was an extremely painful process.

A Cultivator had to force their own essence blood into specific meridians. After circulating it through one Cycle within the meridians with Magic Power, they would force the essence blood out of their body, forming totem-like Spirit Patterns.

The moment Luo Hong saw this process, he felt something was off. After thinking it over carefully, wasn't this just woodblock printing?

A Cultivator's essence blood was the ink, the meridians were the printing blocks, and the skin was the paper.

This secret technique used a simple and brutal method to imprint the entire meridian circuit onto the body's surface, creating a set of artificial extracorporeal meridian circuits.

This... this was simply brilliant!

What made Luo Hong tremble from head to toe was naturally not the secret technique's crude, brainless imprinting method, but the line of thought provided by its creator.

To Luo Hong, it was no different from pushing open the door to a new world!

Because no one understood better than he did that the Silver Runes hidden within the meridians were the root of all mysteries. He was capable of researching more advanced totem Spirit Patterns!

"Phew... Don't get too excited yet. Let's examine the secret technique more thoroughly."

Besides the specific cultivation method for the Blood Burning Totem, the Jade Slip recorded several points to note before cultivation. Luo Hong summarized them.

First: the secret technique could be cultivated in stages. Several meridians could be refined at a time, and once they were ultimately fused into one, it would reach great completion.

This was quite a good concept. It greatly expanded the range of cultivation stages to which the secret technique could be applied. More importantly, it left ample room for growth. Luo Hong liked this design very much and decided to copy it for himself.

Second: once a stage had been cultivated, the totem would operate on its own, and the practitioner would be unable to stop it. If they could not replenish what the totem required, the totem would backlash against them.

Not being able to control the switch was idiotic. This was probably the fundamental reason those Evil Cultivators had to drink human blood every day. This had to be improved.

But why did this problem arise?

It was actually easy to understand. He had previously compared meridians to factories, so he would continue that analogy.

A Cultivator's meridian system was an incredibly complex factory. As long as it found the right production line and fed in the correct materials, it could accomplish almost anything, and it possessed a complete management system.

The totem's imitation was far more pathetic. It was like a Cultivator building a small factory overseas in a place difficult to control. Not only could it produce only one kind of product, but none of the management was willing to go there, leaving it entirely out of contact.

Since the last instruction it received before losing contact was to produce at full capacity, it frantically took orders and worked nonstop.

At that point, the main factory could only keep supplying it with materials. Once this exceeded a certain limit, the main factory itself would be dragged down by it.

It was a very easy concept to understand.

"A switch must be added to the totem, otherwise the risks are too great." Luo Hong had just written this down in his notes when his thoughts wandered further, and he added, "If possible, add an overload switch as well, to handle emergencies."

Third: keeping the totem activated for too long would drain the practitioner's essence blood dry, resulting in certain death.

Because this point contained the word "death," Luo Hong considered it most seriously.

The totem's usual function was to accumulate the energy needed for activation through its constant operation.

When activated, the totem would operate in reverse, rapidly converting its usual accumulation into the practitioner's temporary Mana Limit, thereby temporarily increasing their cultivation.

The Evil Cultivator who created the Blood Burning Totem had chosen essence blood as the stored energy. That was truly incredibly foolish.

Of course, perhaps he had no other choice. He probably thought it was good enough to have something usable.

If Luo Hong were choosing, he would certainly choose something that was easiest to replenish and least conspicuous. After all, it was a secret technique.

Hmm... Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi seemed quite suitable.