He had never slept so comfortably.
When he woke, the room was tidy, and Liu Xiange had already left.
The Clear Wine and leftover food from before his drunken stupor had been cleaned away, and a bowl of warm rice porridge sat on the table.
"I can't remember. As expected, I can't remember. That liquor was too strong!"
Fang Huai changed into clean clothes and headed for Miasma Valley. Liu Xiange, Shen Yuan, and Zhang Zhu were already waiting at the entrance.
Zhang Zhu greeted him enthusiastically. Liu Xiange tidied her Storage Bag, a faint smile on her face, while Shen Yuan looked calm and composed, as if she had never spoken of serving him for the rest of her life.
Seeing the three of them acting as usual made him feel that the events of last night really had been like flowers reflected in a mirror and the moon reflected in water—a dream that had vanished upon waking.
In the days that followed, all four of them threw themselves into gathering Killing Intent, while staying on guard against the Pei Family.
To his surprise, Pei Long never showed up. If the Pei Family members hadn't still been huddling together for warmth, he might have suspected that Pei Long had met with an accident and died.
One day, before Fang Huai had even left his room, the three hurriedly knocked on his door and told him some terrible news:
Feng Wuwang had come to Servant Valley the day before and taken Pei Long away, saying he would cultivate him.
A sense of crisis suddenly gripped Fang Huai. He had meant to lie low in Servant Valley and save up some Contribution Points, but now it seemed he had to speed up his cultivation.
When he had first met Feng Wuwang, the man had already been at the Fourth Layer of Qi Refining. After collecting the souls of nine hundred people in Sishui Town, who knew how much further he had advanced?
Pei Long might be busy cultivating now, with no time to trouble Fang Huai, but once his cultivation improved, he would certainly come back for revenge.
After pointing out several Sha Sources to the three of them, Fang Huai exchanged all his accumulated Killing Intent for Contribution Points. Then he went to the Cultivation Room, found a secluded chamber, and slipped inside.
According to the Hundred Sha Technique, to reach the First Layer of Qi Refining, one first had to develop a sense of qi, then condense a Qi Sea.
Everyone capable of cultivation had a Spirit Root within them. Spirit Roots naturally attracted Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi, and that was where the sense of qi came from.
Then one drew the spiritual qi into the body. After circulating it through the meridians for a full cycle, it would flow into the Dantian. With time, the spiritual qi within the Dantian would grow abundant enough to form a sea. Only then would one truly enter the First Layer of Qi Refining.
It sounded simple, but in truth, the proportion of servants who reached the First Layer of Qi Refining was pitifully low.
He sat cross-legged, calmed his mind, and practiced the Breathing Method, trying to draw qi into his body.
A quarter of an hour passed, and his meridians remained empty.
Half an hour passed. His fingertips began to tingle. He thought his sense of qi was finally coming, only to realize it was just stiffness from sitting too long.
An hour passed. Fine sweat had already beaded on his temples when, all of a sudden, an itchy sensation came from his abdomen.
"It's working! I've developed a sense of qi!"
Damn poisonous mosquito!
Fang Huai slapped a Flower-Winged Mosquito to death, fuming inwardly. Was his aptitude really this terrible? Or was the spiritual qi in this Cultivation Room too weak?
According to the technique, as long as he used the right method, he was sure to develop a sense of qi. Condensing a Qi Sea was the difficult part.
So how had he spent an entire hour without feeling anything?
Fang Huai refused to give up. No wonder there are so few people here. This Cultivation Room must be shoddy.
After slipping the attendant a few Miasma-Clearing Pills, he successfully switched to a high-quality Cultivation Room.
Another hour passed. Fang Huai walked out with a dark expression.
Still no sense of qi!
Unable to figure out what was wrong, he grew increasingly irritable and glared bitterly at the many disciples passing by.
Among them were servants, as well as Qi Refining disciples who couldn't afford the Outer Sect's Cultivation Rooms.
The most conspicuous was a disciple at the Second Layer of Qi Refining.
[Spirit Absorption (White)]?
[Spirit Absorption: Guided by the Spirit Root, absorb Heaven and Earth Spiritual Qi into the body]
Fang Huai's attention was caught by the disciple's tag.
Even if he couldn't develop a sense of qi and draw spiritual qi into his body on his own, couldn't he just use someone else's [Spirit Absorption] tag?
The problem was that he had never managed to exchange a White Tag before.
As his thoughts turned, the light screen blurred.
He had actually exchanged the tag, and the points he had saved for so long were instantly reduced by ten.
No wonder he had never managed it before. He hadn't had enough points.
Overjoyed, he immediately found a Cultivation Room and began practicing according to the Breathing Method.
As soon as he quieted his mind, a tingling sensation ran through his meridians. He couldn't help exclaiming, "This is what drawing qi into the body is supposed to feel like!"
At first, after drawing spiritual qi into his body, he struggled to control it, and most of it scattered away. But once he grew accustomed to it, the qi seemed to flow through his meridians on instinct, finally gathering in his Dantian.
He cultivated for six hours straight, until the [Spirit Absorption] tag faded. Only then did he leave the Cultivation Room, still reluctant to stop.
But as soon as he stepped outside, he saw the disciple at the Second Layer of Qi Refining arguing furiously with the person in charge of the Cultivation Rooms.
"Something's wrong with your Cultivation Rooms! I cultivated for six hours and switched between six rooms, but not a bit of spiritual qi entered my body!"
"Junior brother, don't talk nonsense. These Cultivation Rooms have been here for a thousand years, and nothing like that has ever happened."
"You're still making excuses? I'm reporting this to the sect!"
"Go ahead, you penniless wretch. You can't afford the Outer Sect's Cultivation Rooms, so you come here to fight servants for a spot. You've disgraced the entire Outer Sect."
"..."
Fang Huai chuckled to himself, though he also felt a little guilty toward the other man. To make it up to him, he carelessly dropped a bottle of Killing Intent.
The disciple had sharp eyes. He bent down, picked it up, and quickly left.
[Hundred Sha Technique (Fragment) Initiation: 21/100]
Fang Huai was quite satisfied.
He had previously asked around and learned from the attendants that a disciple of average aptitude needed about a hundred hours to reach the First Layer of Qi Refining.
In other words, they could only advance their cultivation progress by one point per hour.
But Fang Huai was different. He had used the tag of a disciple at the Second Layer of Qi Refining. The increased attraction of spiritual qi had let him advance his cultivation progress by twenty-one points in just six hours.
The only drawback was that he had to save up points for ten days just to exchange a White Tag once. That left him somewhat speechless.
It was already dark, so Fang Huai simply spent Contribution Points to rent a guest room and slept soundly. After waking, he ordered a few poisonous scorpions, tails still attached, and enjoyed them.
"Mildly poisonous, mildly spicy, and my mouth's just a little numb!"
Fang Huai ignored the strange looks from the other disciples, patted his backside, and left.
After putting the odds and ends he carried back in his Stone House, he returned to Miasma Valley.
To his surprise, even without using his tag-viewing ability, he could now vaguely sense streams of Dead Sha Qi at different concentrations.
So the right way to gather Killing Intent was to first draw qi into the body. As long as spiritual qi entered the body, one could sense the presence of Sha Sources.
The servants of the Corpse Sha Sect were always worried they wouldn't complete their Killing Intent-gathering quota. Even when they were lucky enough to collect a little extra, they kept it in their hands, in case they didn't have enough for the following month.
Those with spare resources to exchange for Contribution Points would prioritize buying pills or practicing the Body Forging Technique.
In their eyes, becoming a disciple at the Qi Refining Stage was too far out of reach. They might as well focus on staying alive or strengthening their bodies first.
It was precisely this way of thinking that had kept the fact that drawing qi into the body made it possible to find Sha Sources a secret.
Fang Huai found Liu Xiange, Shen Yuan, and Zhang Zhu, gathered them together, and told them about it.
Liu Xiange's eyes widened in disbelief. "You mean that if we'd been bold enough to exchange our Killing Intent for points and used them to cultivate in our first month, then, once we developed a sense of qi, we'd be able to detect where the Sha Sources are?"
Zhang Zhu was astonished too. "The right way to gather Killing Intent is really that simple?"
Shen Yuan didn't say anything, but her mouth hung slightly open, and her eyes were full of shock.
Fang Huai nodded. "That's right. If you don't believe me, try it tomorrow."
"But I don't understand," Shen Yuan asked. "I can understand why the servants keep it to themselves, but why doesn't the sect tell everyone? Wouldn't that let us gather more Killing Intent?"
Fang Huai sighed. "Tell everyone? If everyone could find Sha Sources, the death rate would indeed go down.
"But if things continued like that, the Killing Intent on the outskirts of Miasma Valley would soon dwindle. Then the servants would have no choice but to risk going deeper, only to die in the depths of Miasma Valley.
"And even if Sha Sources formed where they died, they'd be difficult to collect. The vicious cycle would continue, and the sect's very foundation might become unstable.
"So do you think the sect would willingly tell everyone this secret?"
Before you continue