New Blood Selection Assembly

After obtaining the Blood Spirit Fruits, Li Xinge and his party raced back to Green Maple Valley.

As for the herbs in the valley, Li Family herb gatherers would naturally be sent to collect them later.

Green Maple Valley, Li Family Council Hall. The six elders sat in a row.

"Fellow elders, we gave two Blood Spirit Fruits to the Blood Spirit Flame Python, leaving fifteen. I intend to distribute them as follows."

Li Xinge spoke in a low voice.

The elders all pricked up their ears.

"I'll take six, the First Elder will get three, and each of the other five elders will get one! As for the last one, we'll leave it for an outstanding young member of the Lineage. What do you think?"

The First Elder rose to his feet first.

He clasped his hands and said, "Patriarch, this old man didn't do much to help. I really don't deserve this."

"The Blood Spirit Fruit is so precious. Giving one to a decrepit old man like me would be a terrible waste."

"The Patriarch is still young, and the hopes of the Lineage rest on your shoulders. It's most fitting for you to enjoy these Blood Spirit Fruits."

Hearing the First Elder say this, the other elders also earnestly offered to give up their shares.

Watching this, Li Xinge was deeply moved by the elders' selflessness.

A single Blood Spirit Fruit could drive people mad out in the wider world, enough to unleash a storm of bloodshed.

Yet within the Li Family, the Blood Spirit Fruit's true value wasn't the strength it could grant a person, but the precious bonds of family.

"All right, fellow elders. I appreciate your kindness, but six Blood Spirit Fruits are already more than enough for me."

"Any more would only be the icing on the cake."

"But in your hands, they could open up limitless possibilities. If the Lineage gained another Qi and Blood Realm cultivator, my burden would be lighter."

Li Xinge smiled.

The Patriarch had made his position clear, so the elders no longer insisted. They silently resolved not to disappoint his expectations.

"Patriarch, the annual New Blood Selection Assembly begins in three days. Which elder should go this time? I'll leave the decision to you."

The First Elder spoke up suddenly.

The New Blood Selection Assembly was how the Li Family recruited fresh blood from its mortal branches.

A great family with a legacy of more than two hundred years naturally couldn't have only a thousand or so members.

Over the past two centuries, members of the Li Family without cultivation talent had gradually left the mountain and blended into the mortal world, marrying and having children until they formed the Li Family's branches.

Today, the Li Family's branches numbered more than a hundred thousand!

The New Blood Selection Assembly screened the branch members for cultivation talent, allowing those who qualified to return to the ancestral grounds and strengthen the main family.

Fourth Elder Li Xuanzong, for example, was one of the finest talents to emerge from the New Blood Selection Assembly.

Li Xinge looked around at everyone.

Sixth Elder Li Yanzhao stood and volunteered. "Patriarch, let me go to this New Blood Selection Assembly."

"What do the other elders think?"

"Agreed!"

"Fine by me!"

Li Xinge made the final call. "Then the New Blood Selection Assembly is entirely in Sixth Elder's hands!"

After discussing several more important matters concerning the Lineage, the meeting finally came to an end.

The elders left one after another, eager to use the Blood Spirit Fruits' medicinal effects to break through to the next realm.

Li Xinge also chose to enter seclusion.

Six Blood Spirit Fruits would be enough to bring a qualitative leap in his strength.

Little River Town.

In the courtyard of a dilapidated earthen house.

A little boy who looked only seven or eight years old stood bare-chested beneath the blazing sun, pounding his fists again and again into a wooden dummy.

Though he was still so young, his skin was dark and his little fists were covered in calluses.

Not far away,

a middle-aged woman working at a loom gazed at the child in the yard.

Her face full of concern, she said to the man beside her, who was sharpening a knife, "Dear, the sun's so fierce. Why not let him practice later and rest for now?"

The man sharpening the knife shook his head.

He refused. "No. The New Blood Selection Assembly starts in three days. Xingzong has to break through to the Body Forging Realm within the next two days to return to the main family!"

"Dear, I don't understand. What's so good about returning to the main family? Wouldn't it be better to live an ordinary life, farming by day and weaving by night, and spend your days in peace? Poor child, he's so young and already has to suffer so much. How could you be such a hard-hearted father?"

The woman wiped her tears and sobbed.

"My dear, returning to the main family has been the wish of my ancestors for generations. From my grandfather to my father, then to me, and now to Xingzong—we've all worked toward that wish!"

With that, he set down the knife and walked over to the boy.

"Xingzong, how many times have I told you? When you throw a punch, keep your stance steady and concentrate your strength in one spot. Only then can you kill your enemy with a single blow! Why can't you ever remember?"

The man spoke with utmost severity.

Seeing his father's fierce expression, Xingzong's lips quivered and his eyes reddened. He was about to burst into tears.

He didn't understand. Other children his age got to play happily with their friends every day.

But he was forced by his father to practice martial arts day after day.

"Why are you crying? Hold it in! A real man doesn't shed tears easily!"

As he spoke, the man raised his hand to strike. The woman hurried over, grabbed his arm, and snapped, "If you're going to hit someone, hit me instead."

At the same time, she gave Xingzong a look, signaling him to run.

Xingzong's heart leaped with joy. At last, he could go play with his friends. He ran out of the house, grinning.

"You're only spoiling him."

Watching Xingzong's cheerful retreat, the man sighed helplessly.

He picked up the sharpened woodcutter's knife and slung a basket over his back.

"It's the middle of the day. Where are you going?"

"Xingzong's training takes a lot out of him, and we don't have much at home. I've arranged to go hunting in the mountains with Tieniu and the others. Maybe we can catch something to replenish Xingzong's Qi and Blood."

"You can't go. Little Four said there's a man-eating Mountain Lord roaming the mountains lately. It's dangerous."

The woman's face was filled with worry.

"Don't worry. I know what I'm doing."

Without even raising his head, the man slung his bow and arrows over his shoulder and left.

The sky gradually darkened.

The woman had prepared dinner, but the man still hadn't returned. She paced back and forth anxiously in the courtyard.

"Mother, when can we eat? I'm so hungry."

Xingzong rubbed his growling stomach, his little face scrunched up in misery.

"Wait a little longer. We can eat once your father comes home."

The woman comforted him.

Just then,

there was a noise outside the door. The woman's face brightened, and she hurried to open it.

But the person standing there wasn't the husband she'd been yearning for.

"Sister-in-law, we ran into the Mountain Lord. Brother Quan... Brother Quan, he stayed behind to cover our escape..."

The woman's vision went black, and she fainted.

"Sister-in-law!"

"Sister-in-law!"

A day later.

Xingzong sat on the steps, his eyes blank as he stared into the distance.

"Father, why haven't you come home yet?"

Xingzong murmured, though deep down he knew that his father—the man who'd been so strict yet loved him most of all—would never return.

"Ah!"

Xingzong screamed and ran to the wooden dummy his father had made for him with his own hands.

The wooden dummy he'd hated so much all those days.

He punched it again and again. His skin split, and blood appeared, but he didn't notice at all.

After letting it all out, he clutched the wooden dummy and wept bitterly.

"When you throw a punch, keep your stance steady and concentrate your strength in one spot. Only then can you kill your enemy with a single blow!"

Those words remained vivid in his mind.

"Father, I remember."

"I'll never disobey you again."

"I'll never slack off again."

"I'll grow stronger. I'll avenge you!"

"I am Li Xingzong, Li Xingzong who will bring honor to his ancestors."