Shortcut (Seeking Collection)

Inside the military camp.

Zhong Shenxiu gazed at the Heavenly Show System, pondering slightly. "The Heavenly Show Points have filled up a bit more. Looks like that last stunt counted as a minor show..."

With a thought, streams of data appeared:

[Consume 1 Heavenly Show Point to upgrade Profound Yin Soul Control Fragment?]

"Yes!"

[Profound Yin Soul Control Fragment upgraded!]

[Profound Yin Soul Control Fragment: Second Layer]

This time, he was prepared and endured the changes brought by the Profound Yin Soul Control Fragment.

He even suppressed the Vengeful Spirit stirring restlessly within him.

Although he was confident he could summon this Vengeful Spirit, controlling it would be far from satisfactory—no different from losing control entirely.

Zhong Shenxiu focused his mind, and some hidden memories from that village surfaced.

"Just as I thought... Tian Bufeng was cursed with bad luck because I accidentally killed him. This Vengeful Spirit can't be released either; once it's out, it goes berserk, and while it's out of control, my memories get hazy..."

This loss of control was what he hated most.

This time, with his Dao arts advancing a step, he didn't let the Vengeful Spirit seize the chance to cause trouble.

Instead, he even gained quite a few memory fragments.

At that moment, Zhong Shenxiu closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he was seated before an ancient, long table, upon which lay a parchment scroll.

"The Felix Family wants to endure; some necessary preparations must be made... Hide away a portion of the noble bloodline... Besides that, leave behind a few treasures..."

'He' picked up the quill beside him and focused intently on sketching a map across the parchment.

Suddenly.

This legendary count's face twitched.

His whole body trembled as he stared into the surrounding darkness.

On the bookshelf, volume after volume seemed to come alive, writhing and emitting hoarse, rasping sounds.

From the darkness came a faint, dense noise, as if tiny insects were crawling and squirming.

Then, one by one, eyes opened.

Some were cold and indifferent, others brimming with madness.

From outside the window, a crimson glow had seeped in, unnoticed.

"Our Lord..."

The count immediately knelt: "I have sinned. I confess..."

His lips mumbled, emitting a sound unlike human speech, confessing the struggles within his heart and his fear of the nation's destruction.

"Great Gate of Ten Thousand Doors..."

Boom!

The moment Zhong Shenxiu 'comprehended' the first line of the prayer, he jolted awake, cold sweat beading on his forehead. "Again... that feeling that if I keep going, disaster will surely strike..."

His body was nearly immobile, and he had to regulate his breathing for a long time before regaining some mobility.

His thoughts felt frozen solid.

Only after half an incense stick's time could he begin to think gradually.

He buried the matter of that 'Gate of Ten Thousand Doors' deep in his heart, daring not to dwell on it.

"That legendary count seemed to have sensed something. He made some preparations for the fall of his nation."

"Perhaps... even he himself was part of those preparations."

Zhong Shenxiu pressed a hand to his chest.

A living legend, once dead, might not retain legendary power.

But even preserving a fraction of it would be enough to throw the entire Fufeng Protectorate into chaos.

Not to mention that the count had prepared other measures.

For instance... a particular method of sacrifice.

Ordinary prayers or invocations—such a Great Existence might not respond.

But with the addition of a specific bloodline, coupled with a special ritual, the chances of that Existence taking notice would greatly increase.

Such a ritual was extremely dangerous, but it would inevitably yield something.

This was the capital for the count's descendants to rise!

"I wonder if those treasure locations have been dug up by anyone. If not, I could go dig them up myself—that would be a huge fortune too..."

Zhong Shenxiu silently committed several locations to memory.

He gazed out the window at the twin moons, pondering for a long while before entering samadhi to cultivate.

Before fighting for his life, everything else was illusory.

"The Profound Yin Soul Control Fragment at the second layer still can't do anything to that Vengeful Spirit... but compared to the first layer, there's some progress..."

Zhong Shenxiu sensed that even now, if he released that Vengeful Spirit, he would inevitably lose control again, lose his memory, and create terror.

But within his body, he could still barely borrow the spirit's power.

And that Vengeful Spirit, in life, was a Fifth-Rank Legend from the West!

Although the systems of the East and West differed, and their strengths varied, a Legendary expert from the West could roughly be equated to the Core Formation Stage in the Eastern cultivation system!

Of course, a dead Legend might not retain Legendary power.

"But even one rank lower, it still has the strength of Third-Rank Gangsha, or even Fourth-Rank Divine Ability!"

"And I, only at Xiantian right now, if converted to the Western system, would probably be a Second-Rank Plain Warrior?"

Zhong Shenxiu's mind stirred.

He looked inward at himself, and suddenly a patch of darkness appeared before his eyes.

In the darkness, a figure emerged, wearing an ornate formal suit with two rows of golden buttons running down, like a high-society noble attending a Western banquet—only... it had no head!

The Headless Count!

In reality, Zhong Shenxiu's skin turned slightly pale, losing its color, and his entire body seemed to lose its vitality, becoming a corpse.

If he continued further, he would release this Vengeful Spirit, and it would begin killing indiscriminately.

Of course, there was a certain pattern to it.

Generally, although he couldn't control it, because Zhong Shenxiu's subconscious was present, whoever ranked highest on his hate list would be the first to suffer.

"This is also a backup plan. The day I'm pushed to the brink, I'll let it out!"

"But for now, I can't continue!"

Zhong Shenxiu forcibly halted this transformation and switched to cultivating the Spiritual Turtle Breathing Technique.

As he entered samadhi and looked inward, he could see a Spiritual Turtle Breathing Diagram, centered on his dantian, constantly expanding outward.

Within that diagram, specks of light seemed to correspond to the various acupoints on his body.

These were the thirty-six barriers that the Spiritual Turtle Breathing Technique needed to break through. Each breakthrough made his true qi denser, and breaking through thirty meant reaching the Great Perfection of Xiantian.

Originally, with his newly cultivated, shallow Spiritual Turtle True Qi, breaking through even one or two acupoints was extremely difficult.

But now, Zhong Shenxiu mobilized the Vengeful Spirit's power, and only felt his dantian turn cold. The Spiritual Turtle True Qi, wrapped in the spirit's eerie force, broke through ten acupoints in one go!

This method of breakthrough was too brutal and violent. He instantly felt a tearing pain in his meridians.

But in the blink of an eye, because his body had transformed into an icy corpse, his meridians instead became stiff and tough, enduring the strain.

Night ended, and dawn broke.

Zhong Shenxiu leaped to his feet and struck out with a palm.

From his palm, a stream of white qi emerged, shooting three feet into the air before slowly dissipating.

"Xiantian True Qi, leaving the body by three feet. Have I reached the Great Perfection of Xiantian in a single night?"