After tossing and turning all afternoon, Luo Zhou finally returned home.
Not wanting to go through the trouble of cooking, he ordered a set meal from a roadside restaurant.
The waiter soon delivered the dishes: twice-cooked pork, stir-fried eggplant, potatoes, and green peppers, and hot-and-sour soup. Luo Zhou ate his fill.
After resting for a while, he brewed a pot of green tea and began cultivating.
The cultivators of Green Ridge City—even people like the Woodworm Devil and Gu Shanhe—cultivated the three basic Body Tempering techniques of the Heaven and Earth Dao Sect: the Baiyang Body Refining Technique, Green Profound Body Refining Technique, and Purple Heavens Body Refining Technique.
After Body Tempering advanced to Qi Refining, they would at most switch to the Baiyang Qi Refining Technique, Green Profound Qi Refining Technique, or Purple Heavens Qi Refining Technique.
But Luo Zhou was different. Aside from the three basic Body Refining techniques, during the Body Tempering stage he had also cultivated the Black Nether Body Refining Technique and Brown Scale Body Refining Technique taught by an outer-commandery Dao academy.
Each of the five Body Refining techniques had seventy-two forms. Anyone who mastered forty-nine forms of one technique was considered successful in cultivation and might awaken their innate spirituality!
Luo Zhou had begun cultivating at the age of seven. After eight years of painstaking cultivation, he had mastered all three hundred and sixty forms of the five Body Refining techniques, one by one.
In truth, the Luo Family were not native to this place. Their lineage had some foundation and had once produced a Golden Core ancestor. They had been one of the Heaven and Earth Dao Sect's cultivation families.
But the family later fell into decline. The ancestor died, and over several hundred years, the family splintered apart. His parents eventually ended up here.
No matter how dilapidated it became, the family still had some foundation. They possessed the manuals for all five Body Refining techniques and Qi Refining techniques, as well as secret inheritances.
The secret inheritance stated that anyone who mastered all three hundred and sixty forms of the five Body Refining techniques would inevitably give birth to acquired great spirituality.
In truth, this was no great secret. Everyone within the main branch of the Heaven and Earth Dao Sect knew it.
But mastering all five Body Refining techniques was as difficult as climbing to heaven, with countless obstacles.
The Dao academy's rules stated that mastering forty-nine forms of one technique counted as great achievement. Wanting to master all five techniques to that level was simply impossible.
Luo Zhou had discovered this during his cultivation as well. Reaching the forty-ninth form of each Body Refining technique was exceedingly difficult.
For six years, he had failed to complete forty-nine forms of even one technique. Yet during his cultivation, Luo Zhou gradually discovered the mysteries of the five Body Refining techniques.
These five Body Refining techniques secretly contained the Way of the Five Elements.
Baiyang represented metal, Green Profound represented wood, Black Nether represented water, Purple Heavens represented fire, and Brown Scale represented earth.
The mutual generation and overcoming of the Five Elements was common knowledge in his previous life.
Following the cycle of mutual generation, Luo Zhou first practiced Green Profound, then Purple Heavens, then Brown Scale; first Baiyang, then Black Nether, then Green Profound again...
Wood was the beginning of the Five Elements; water was their end; earth was their center.
Wood generated fire, fire generated earth, earth generated metal, metal generated water, and water generated wood...
Form by form, never rushing ahead. The Five Elements moved in harmony, mutually generating and overcoming one another.
After two years of this, his progress became astonishingly rapid, and he encountered no more obstacles.
The bottlenecks and barriers that had once plagued him seemed not to exist at all. He broke through them all with ease.
Thus, sixty-eight days ago, he had completely mastered all three hundred and sixty forms of the five techniques.
In truth, once any one of the five techniques reached forty-nine forms, acquired spirituality would begin to emerge. But Luo Zhou had forcibly suppressed it all, refusing to awaken.
Only after he had gathered all three hundred and sixty forms did he awaken!
That was how he obtained the ability Rewarding Good and Punishing Evil!
After completing one Greater Celestial Circuit of the three hundred and sixty forms of the five techniques, Luo Zhou let out a long breath and wiped the sweat from his body.
He drained the green tea, which had already cooled.
After resting for a while, Luo Zhou took out piece after piece of Spirit Wood from the cabinet.
Spirit Birch Wood, a specialty of Great Xuan Mountain, contained a trace of spiritual energy and could be made into all kinds of staffs and clubs. Each piece cost around fifty copper coins.
It grew everywhere on the mountain and was sold throughout Green Ridge City. Some wealthy families even used it as firewood.
He took out a piece of Spirit Birch Wood about four feet long and three inches thick.
Luo Zhou inspected it carefully, took out the Wood Carving Knife, and slowly worked it down. Gradually, he shaped the Spirit Birch Wood into a straight Short Spear three feet long and one inch thick.
The Short Spear was covered in various runes, all carefully carved without the slightest deviation.
He had to prepare the Dragon-Slaying Thrust before going out to hunt dragons tomorrow!
Luo Zhou silently circulated the divine ability, Dragon-Slaying Thrust...
"Double Radiance and Jade Dawn, profound brilliance opens and illuminates, distant and deep is true insight, shining with the essence of the Seven Treasures, one thought dispels calamity, forever joined with the Most High, turning to offer the Yellow Radiance, the sun's splendor born from emptiness, the Great Cavern's True Precepts, the Darkly Perceptive Demon King..."
He silently recited the incantation as a strand of Gu Shanhe's Geomagnetic Qi stored in his dantian slowly began to circulate.
The spiritual energy gathered upon the Short Spear, and the two quietly merged as one. The Short Spear gradually became crystalline and translucent.
A year's worth of True Essence cultivation fused into the Short Spear. It quietly shortened, becoming two feet and one inch long.
Luo Zhou let out a long breath. It had not shattered. He had succeeded!
He took out another piece of Spirit Birch Wood, made another Short Spear, and once again infused it with Geomagnetic Qi.
After a long while, he succeeded again!
Smiling, Luo Zhou tried merging the two Short Spears into one. Under the circulation of his Dragon-Slaying Thrust formula, the two spears fused into one.
It merely became shorter, only two feet long!
Luo Zhou refined a third Short Spear and fused it into the first two. It became even shorter, measuring one foot nine.
He then refined a fifth one, but unexpectedly, this one shattered with a crack.
A strand of spiritual energy dissipated just like that, and Luo Zhou's heart ached.
By rights, this kind of refinement required the Qi Refining realm.
However, through Rewarding Good and Punishing Evil, Luo Zhou had obtained the true qi of Qi Refining cultivators, allowing him to refine the Dragon-Slaying Thrust across a major realm.
Before, when he had not killed the Woodworm Devil cultivators and obtained their true qi, he had used Broken Spirit to refine it. That had hurt even more.
He continued condensing. This time, the condensation succeeded and merged into the Short Spear, bringing it down to one foot eight...
He failed once more afterward, but Luo Zhou successfully condensed nine Short Spears. They all merged into one, becoming a crystalline, translucent Short Spear javelin one foot three inches long!
The Short Spear that had killed Gu Shanhe had been made this way!
Only, of Gu Shanhe's forty-seven strands of spiritual energy, thirty-six remained.
But there were still fifteen strands of other true qi in his dantian.
Counting the Geomagnetic Qi, his dantian contained four types of special spiritual energy.
Geomagnetic, Heavy Dust, Three Eyes, and Water Tide!
Heavy Dust came from the Yellow Earth Devil, Three Eyes came from the Eye-Eating Devil, and Water Tide came from the Crocodile Dragon.
Looking at the one-foot-three-inch, crystalline and translucent Short Spear, Luo Zhou was delighted.
This was his foundation, his killing move, his Dragon-Slaying Thrust!
With this Dragon-Slaying Thrust, Luo Zhou could kill Qi Refining cultivators while still in the Body Tempering realm and slay the five devils.
In truth, the divine ability Dragon-Slaying Thrust could kill across realms. The explanation was very simple.
A completed Dragon-Slaying Thrust was like the firearms of his previous life.
In his previous life, as long as one had a gun, even a child or an old man could easily kill a strong man.
Having a gun was not enough; one also needed to aim. Luo Zhou's aiming was the spiritual Keen Dharma Eye.
Then there was a trait like pulling the trigger: Four Bulls' Strength.
During battle, within thirty feet, he would circulate Dragon-Slaying Thrust, use the Keen Dharma Eye to lock onto the opponent's left and right eyes, throw with Four Bulls' Strength, and activate the refined Dragon-Slaying Thrust.
Once activated, the Dragon-Slaying Thrust would instantly transform its radiance into energy, fire out, and pierce its target, impossible to block or evade.
Nine years of spiritual energy would erupt in a single point of radiance, transforming into the most terrifying damage. A Qi Refining cultivator's Qi Shield could not withstand it, so it would pierce the eyes and blow apart the head!
Just like firing a gun in his previous life, it killed with a single strike!
The divine ability looked marvelous, endlessly fantastic, but after understanding it, it was plain and unadorned, exceedingly simple...
The divine ability Dragon-Slaying Thrust had come from Wang Heyu.
Only, Wang Heyu's spirituality had been the ability Full-Power Eruption. After Luo Zhou obtained it, it had unexpectedly evolved into the divine ability Dragon-Slaying Thrust.
Perhaps this was a divine ability hidden deep within Wang Heyu's bloodline. His current strength was insufficient, so its outward manifestation was the ability Full-Power Eruption.
What Luo Zhou had obtained was the divine ability Dragon-Slaying Thrust hidden deep within his bloodline.
He let out a long breath and once again began refining a second Dragon-Slaying Thrust.
This time, everything went as if the gods were helping him. He did not fail even once.
The second Dragon-Slaying Thrust was complete, and twenty-seven strands of Gu Shanhe's Geomagnetic Qi remained.
Luo Zhou brought over two intact pieces of Spirit Birch Wood, made them into an Eyebrow-Level Staff, and hid the refined Dragon-Slaying Thrust inside.
Not a trace was revealed!
Everything was finished. All that remained was to go out hunting dragons tomorrow!
There was one more matter as well: waiting for the Punishing Evil reward at midnight.
He waited in silence. After tossing and turning for most of the night, midnight soon arrived.
"Luo Zhou, I sense a spirit committing evil. Punishment shall be administered!"
"Rescuing children and punishing an evil father—punishing evil is itself an act of good!"
"Rewarding Good and Punishing Evil complete. Reward!"
In a daze, Luo Zhou felt a power descend from the heavens and pour into his body.
Could it be Bald Old Wang's haircutting ability?
His whole body trembled. In a daze, he felt countless ocean tides and towering waves surging forth, destroying all things wherever they went!
"Water..."
"Waves, whirlpools, vortexes, raging currents, breakers, floating, flowing, surging, tides..."
"Overturning Rivers and Seas, towering waves reaching the heavens!"
"Rewarding good!"
"Reward: the ability Vortex Guard, one of the nine abilities that make up the divine ability Overturning Rivers and Seas!"
Luo Zhou was dumbfounded. He had never expected to obtain a second divine ability apart from Dragon-Slaying Thrust.
No, it could not yet be considered a divine ability. It was only one-ninth of a divine ability.
Bald Old Wang was just like Wang Heyu. There were secrets hidden deep within his body!
Before you continue