Blood Demon True Technique

The mine slaves, long subjected to ruthless exploitation, finally erupted under the instigation of those with ulterior motives.

Thousands of slaves rose up together, attacking the mine guards like madmen with no regard for their lives, venting the fury they had suppressed for so long.

Yet before the heavily armored mine guards, their resistance was nothing short of a joke.

One rebellious slave after another was mercilessly cut down, as easily as slicing melons and chopping vegetables.

Though the uprising had impressive momentum, it never amounted to a real threat. Its suppression was only a matter of time.

Still, the "general" and his companions had achieved their objective.

As he watched the mine descend into chaos.

The "general," hidden in the shadows, grew visibly excited.

He laughed and told the trusted men beside him, "Gentlemen, our chance has come!"

Their breathing quickened abruptly.

The "general" had once been a noble of the Eastern Ridge Land. At the summons of the Eastern Ridge Royal Court, he had joined the war against the Great Zhou Dynasty.

However, during a battle with a cultivator of the Great Zhou Dynasty, he had suffered a crushing defeat and been grievously wounded. Although he had escaped, he had not gotten far before losing consciousness.

By the time he awoke, he was already a prisoner of the Zhou Army.

Fortunately, his lineage possessed a secret art for concealing his aura, and there had been no experts among those Zhou soldiers. His identity as a cultivator had remained hidden, allowing him to escape death by a stroke of luck.

After all, the Great Zhou Court had always pursued hostile cultivators to the bitter end, leaving none alive.

Though he had managed to preserve his life, he had been enslaved and sold off to Ascending Dragon Prefecture.

In the end, the Li Family had bought him and made him a mine slave.

To think that a dignified Qi and Blood Realm cultivator like him had been reduced to the lowliest labor in the world, and even subjected to punches and kicks from a pack of ants every few days.

At the thought of all those humiliations, the "general" could no longer conceal the murderous intent in his heart.

But this was not yet the time for revenge.

His most pressing concern was to get out of here.

Taking advantage of the chaos, the men ran toward the road down the mountain.

There was only one road down, and the Li Family had built a sturdy fortified pass along this unavoidable route.

On either side of the pass lay sheer drops of ten thousand fathoms.

Even a Qi and Blood Realm cultivator who carelessly fell would be smashed to pieces.

The men hid in the distant woods, poking their heads out to cautiously observe the situation atop the pass.

Tie Xiong looked puzzled. "General, there doesn't seem to be anyone up there?"

The "general" hurriedly looked over.

Just as Tie Xiong had said, the usually heavily guarded Silver Ridge Pass was now completely deserted.

"General, this is far too strange. Could it be a trap?"

One of his trusted men spoke with a nervous expression.

The general shot him a sidelong glance and said haughtily, "Once an arrow leaves the bow, there's no calling it back. So what if it's a trap? Unless a Qi and Blood Realm cultivator appears, who can stop me?"

With that, he strode straight out.

Seeing this, the others gritted their teeth and hurried after him.

They knew perfectly well that following the general was their only hope of survival.

The gate stood wide open. Once they passed through it, they could begin their lives anew.

Yet for some reason, the closer they drew to the pass, the more an indescribable unease stirred in the general's heart.

It felt as though some utterly terrifying being was watching him from the shadows.

I have to get out of this damned place at once.

The fear in his heart drove the general and his companions to quicken their pace.

At last...

They passed through the gate.

Before they could rejoice, however, they all stopped in their tracks.

Following their gazes.

A slender figure in blue stood on the road ahead with his hands clasped behind his back, blocking their way.

"Gentlemen, I've been waiting for you for quite some time."

A warm, gentle voice echoed above the entire pass.

The blue-robed figure slowly turned, revealing a young face bearing a faint smile.

At the sight of that youthful face, the general's heart leaped into his throat, pounding furiously.

He sensed an aura of extreme danger emanating from this young man.

He was no fool and immediately guessed the blue-robed youth's identity.

Although they had never met, his name had long thundered in the general's ears.

Many Li Family cultivators were stationed at the mine. In their everyday conversations, the person they mentioned most often was their monstrously gifted family head.

At seventeen, he had reached the Qi and Blood Realm and become the head of the Green Maple Li Clan.

When his lineage had fallen into peril, he had stepped forward and turned back the raging tide, even slaying a veteran Qi and Blood Realm cultivator in a single stroke and uprooting his lineage's century-old enemy.

The general had originally assumed that the man could hardly live up to such a towering reputation.

Only now, seeing him in person, did he understand that a great reputation was not earned in vain. This Li Family head was even more terrifying than the rumors suggested.

The general drew a deep breath.

He cupped his fist in greeting. "Han Jie of Eastern Ridge pays his respects, fellow Daoist."

"After what you've done, you hardly qualify to call me a fellow Daoist."

Li Xinge chuckled softly.

The general's heart sank, but he forced an ingratiating smile. "I had no other choice. I beg you to show mercy and spare me, Li Family Head. Once I return to Eastern Ridge, I will reward you generously."

He knew very well that he was no match for Li Xinge, so he had yielded from the outset.

But Li Xinge remained utterly unmoved.

He merely continued at his own pace. "I think this is quite an auspicious spot. What do you gentlemen think?"

At those words, Han Jie and the others' expressions turned extremely ugly.

Yet they dared not lash out and could only say awkwardly, "Please don't joke, fellow Daoist."

The smile on Li Xinge's face gradually faded, replaced by murderous intent he no longer bothered to conceal.

"I never care to joke."

The moment his words fell.

The seemingly cultured, easygoing young man's aura turned razor-sharp.

Without holding anything back, he unleashed the overwhelming pressure of the Qi and Blood Realm, crushing it down upon Han Jie and his companions.

For a moment, the winds and clouds changed color, and sand and stones flew through the air.

Only within that terrifying pressure could anyone truly understand how powerful Li Xinge was. They could barely breathe beneath its weight.

Han Jie thought that even at his peak, he probably would not have stood the slightest chance against Li Xinge.

How could such a monstrous talent exist in this world?

And why would someone so monstrous appear in such an obscure little lineage?

The pressure intensified. They felt as though their internal organs were about to burst.

His face flushed crimson, Han Jie said, "Li Family Head, I'm from the... Han Clan of Eastern Ridge. If you kill me... the Eastern Ridge Han Family..."

Han Jie's words cut off abruptly.

Li Xinge gazed without a ripple of emotion at Han Jie and his companions, who had died bleeding from all seven orifices, as though he had merely crushed a few ants.

"Forget the Eastern Ridge Han Family. Even the royal lineage of Eastern Ridge wouldn't dare come to our Central Plains to cause trouble."

Li Xinge spoke with disdain.

The Eastern Ridge Barbarians might have been making a tremendous stir in Eastern Continent Prefecture, but that was only because the lords at court were too busy fighting over power and profit to deal with them.

If they dared venture into the Central Plains, those grand dignitaries would show the savages of Eastern Ridge what a six-thousand-year-old dynasty truly meant.

Thus, Li Xinge had no qualms whatsoever about killing someone from this so-called Eastern Ridge Han Family.

[Fragment of the mid-grade heaven-tier cultivation method, Blood Demon True Technique, detected. Retrieve?]

The system's voice suddenly sounded in his mind.

Li Xinge froze for a moment. This seemed to be a first. Killing someone had actually dropped a cultivation method?

Without asking further questions, he hesitated briefly before choosing to retrieve it.

In an instant, everything concerning the Blood Demon True Technique poured into his sea of consciousness.

As it turned out, the Blood Demon True Technique had been created by a mighty immortal known as the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate.

Li Xinge did not know what realm such a mighty immortal belonged to, but anything associated with immortality was certainly extraordinary.

The Great Zhou Dynasty's Land Celestial had already lived for eight hundred years, yet even he dared not claim to have attained immortality.

The Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate had been born into a poor farming household and earned his living herding cattle for others from childhood.

Though life was hard, both his parents were alive and showered him with affection. Their home was harmonious and happy.

The Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate had thought his entire life would pass in such ordinary fashion.

Yet one day, when he returned home after herding cattle, what greeted him was not his parents' kindly smiles, but two ice-cold corpses.

His neighbors told him that his parents had been beaten to death by a dissolute scion of a powerful lineage in town, simply because they had accidentally blocked his path.

After learning what had happened, the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate neither shouted nor made a scene, as though he had accepted his fate.

But from then on, his temperament changed completely.

He began seeking instruction everywhere, willing to use any means to set foot on the path of cultivation and become a cultivator.

Time and again, however, he was coldly told that his aptitude was poor and that he was destined to remain a mud-legged peasant for life.

The Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate refused to accept it. He swore to create a cultivation method that required no talent.

Everyone around him thought he had gone mad and cast him sympathetic looks.

The Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate paid them no mind.

Three years later, the Blood Demon True Technique was born.

Seize the fortune of others for oneself; turn decay into miracles and ascend to immortality.

Those two brief phrases laid bare the true essence of the Blood Demon True Technique.

By absorbing others' blood and vital energy and converting it into his own cultivation, the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate used the Blood Demon True Technique to exact his revenge in a mere year.

He tore that lineage out by the roots, draining every last member into a dried corpse.

The dissolute scion with whom he shared an irreconcilable blood feud, however, received a rather different "fortuitous encounter."

He cut off the man's limbs, gouged out his eyes, severed his tongue, and kept him in the rice jar that had once been the most precious possession in his home.

The Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate refused to let him die. To keep him alive and well, he sought all manner of rare, precious medicines while killing people to cultivate.

In just a hundred years, the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate actually force-fed that dissolute scion enough precious medicine to raise him to the Land Celestial realm.

However, the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate's wanton slaughter also enraged numerous ancient powers.

Several mighty immortals emerged from those ancient powers.

They surrounded the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate and attacked him, fighting a battle that darkened heaven and earth.

Two mighty immortals spilled their blood across the heavens, while the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate vanished without a trace after that day.

Li Xinge saw that, after practicing the Blood Demon True Technique, the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate had taken only a few centuries to become a supreme powerhouse.

It would have been a lie to say Li Xinge was not tempted.

His rapid breathing had already betrayed him, and a trace of madness flashed through his eyes.

But soon, clarity returned to Li Xinge's gaze.

He shook his head. Good as the Blood Demon True Technique was, it was not suited to a virtuous man.

Of course, Li Xinge was no virtuous man himself.

He had simply recognized the Blood Demon True Technique's drawbacks.

Though this heaven-tier cultivation method could rapidly increase a practitioner's cultivation, it came with severe repercussions.

After all, that increased cultivation ultimately came from external power seized by force. The foundation would inevitably be unstable, since it was not truly one's own.

In his later years, the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate seemed to have been affected by these repercussions. His mind had gradually clouded until he became a killing machine that knew only wanton slaughter, which was why he had enraged those ancient powers.

Even the Blood Demon Heavenly Venerate, the creator of the Blood Demon True Technique, had been unable to resolve those repercussions, let alone anyone else.

On the other hand.

This Blood Demon True Technique was only a fragment, not the complete method. It could only take a practitioner to the Qi and Blood Realm, making it of little use to Li Xinge.

However, it would be quite suitable for training deathsworn.

At that thought, a peculiar gleam flashed through Li Xinge's eyes.