Non-Contact Scanning

Night settled slowly over Wutan City.

Su Chen sat cross-legged on the only broken wooden bed, eyes tightly shut.

Before him lay all the spoils he had traded a fortune for today.

Qi Gathering Powder, brimming with pure medicinal energy; a black-tier soft armor that shimmered with a faint glow; and two ancient scrolls recording the Boiling Blood Art and Wind-Following Step.

Nine hundred gold coins had vanished in a single afternoon, squandered down to the last one.

In return, he had gained a weighty sense of confidence.

He didn't immediately begin cultivating a Dou Qi technique.

A meal had to be eaten one bite at a time, and the road had to be walked one step at a time.

Before officially setting foot on this thorn-strewn path of cultivation, he had to deal with the greatest temptation hanging over him—or, perhaps, the greatest threat.

His mind sank into that familiar Void Space like a spill of quicksilver.

The entire space was utterly silent.

Only the ancient Stone Platform at its center was different from before.

A phantom pointer, formed from countless mysterious runes, glowed with a faint white light and stubbornly pointed toward a certain direction in the city.

It pointed toward the Xiao Clan.

It pointed toward the Heavenly Flame.

Su Chen's consciousness hovered before the Stone Platform, perfectly still.

The battle between fear and greed had already ended in his heart.

All that remained was a hunter's coolness and patience.

Going straight to Xiao Yan would be no different from seeking his own death.

The mysterious powerhouse lurking within him was a sleeping prehistoric leviathan. Any rash approach would bring a fate worse than death.

But...

Who said a hunter had to approach its prey?

A bold plan had been brewing in his mind all afternoon.

He was going to carry out a... non-contact scan.

"Activate."

At his command.

Vmmm—

The entire Stone Platform blazed with light.

The tip of the phantom pointer suddenly flared even brighter, like a radar, silently releasing a special wave that transcended the material dimension toward the direction it had locked onto.

Su Chen poured his entire mind into it.

He was like a top-tier hacker trying to break into an ancient server guarded by the strongest defenses.

His spiritual power became probing tendrils. Guided by the pointer, they crept cautiously toward the "Lighthouse" that represented the Heavenly Flame.

The process was extremely taxing on his mind.

Su Chen's face paled at a visible speed.

* * *

Over the next several days.

Su Chen fell into a highly regular routine.

During the day, he left the dilapidated little courtyard and wandered around Wutan City, like a genuine, idle young man.

But he never went near any marketplace, nor did he visit any bustling district.

He had only one destination.

The remote back mountain behind the Xiao Clan estate.

He never ventured far in. He simply found a secluded spot in the woods on the outskirts and stayed there all day.

He was the most patient of hunters, waiting for his prey to enter the perfect range.

At last, on the afternoon of the fifth day.

His chance came.

Within his consciousness, the pointer that had always aimed toward the depths of the Xiao Clan estate suddenly moved.

Slowly, it turned toward the back mountain.

And it drew closer and closer.

Su Chen's heartbeat missed a beat.

He immediately reined in every trace of his aura. Like a boulder, he blended into the ancient tree behind him.

He sank his mind entirely into the Stone Platform.

Through the pointer's "radar," he could clearly "see."

A slender young man walked alone to a secluded cliff in the back mountain, sat down cross-legged, and began the same dreary cultivation he practiced day after day.

It was Xiao Yan.

And the dazzling Lighthouse representing the Bone Spirit Cold Flame lay dormant within his body.

Closer than ever before.

Su Chen almost stopped breathing.

Now!

"Begin scan!"

He drove his spiritual power to its absolute limit.

Boom!

The light on the Stone Platform surged in an instant!

The tip of the pointer erupted in a blinding radiance. Invisible threads of spiritual power spread out like a vast net, descending over Xiao Yan by the cliff.

Yet just as those threads were about to touch Xiao Yan's body—

A pressure, faint but bone-chillingly cold, swept through Xiao Yan's body without warning!

It wasn't aimed at anyone in particular.

It was more like a sleeping dragon rolling over unconsciously in its dreams.

But that single movement—

Every thread of spiritual power Su Chen had sent out froze and shattered in an instant!

Pfft!

In the real world, Su Chen jerked against the tree trunk. A mouthful of blood spilled uncontrollably from the corner of his lips.

In his consciousness, an enormous storm erupted.

The entire Stone Platform shook violently, as though struck by a devastating blow.

"Th-that's... so strong!"

Su Chen's consciousness was filled with horror.

That had been nothing but the soul's aftershock, unconsciously radiating from the other party!

If he woke and launched an attack...

Su Chen had no doubt that his soul would be ground to dust in an instant!

Cold sweat soaked his back.

He forcibly suppressed the shudder deep in his soul and didn't dare make another reckless move.

He recalled his plan.

Non-contact scanning.

He didn't need to break in. He didn't need to touch anything.

All he had to do was "receive."

Like standing at the foot of a mountain and receiving the light emitted by a Lighthouse at its summit.

It would be faint and slow, but... completely safe.

He steadied his mind and activated the Stone Platform again.

This time, he no longer tried to "touch" his target with spiritual power.

He switched the Stone Platform from "active scanning" to "passive reception" mode.

Vmmm—

A massive vortex, composed of countless runes, slowly appeared at the center of the Stone Platform.

Like a black hole, it began to generate a strange suction.

It no longer released any waves outward.

Instead, it began to capture, drag, and pull into the Void Space, strand by strand, the faint aura the "Lighthouse" itself emitted—a trace so slight it could scarcely be noticed, scattered through the world around it.

The process was extremely slow.

If active scanning was like harpooning a whale,

then Su Chen was now using the finest net to sift through an entire ocean, just to collect the insignificant scales shed by that whale.

One strand.

Then another.

The tiny motes of light that carried the essence of the Bone Spirit Cold Flame seemed drawn by some irresistible force. They crossed the distance between spaces and streamed ceaselessly into the rune vortex.

The moment they entered the space, the Stone Platform broke them down, turning them into the purest runic data representing their fundamental nature.

Then the data began to gather slowly upon the Stone Platform.

Su Chen focused every ounce of his attention and didn't dare let himself be distracted.

His spiritual power poured away like a breached floodbank.

His face changed from pale to a sickly yellow, utterly drained of color.

Time seemed to lose all meaning.

Who knew how long had passed?

Perhaps the time it took to burn a stick of incense.

Perhaps an hour.

Just as Su Chen felt his mind was about to be drained completely and his consciousness began to blur—

Ding!

A clear chime, as though ringing from the depths of his soul, suddenly exploded through the Void Space!

Su Chen's consciousness jolted.

He forced himself to focus and looked at the Stone Platform.

There, at its very center,

the countless motes of light and runic data he had spent all his strength capturing and dragging in had been analyzed and reorganized by the Stone Platform.

At last...

They had come together into an extremely blurry outline.

It was a flame model, no bigger than a fingernail, pale from tip to base.

It had no temperature and no physical form.

It was merely an illusion composed of pure data.

But its shape, its structure, and the energy properties within it—"extreme yin, extreme cold, capable of tempering the spirit of all things"—

had all been perfectly reproduced by the Stone Platform!

The first step of the plan had succeeded!

"Ha... ha..."

Su Chen abruptly withdrew from the Void Space.

He gasped for air as if he had just been hauled from the water. Violent dizziness made his vision go black again and again.

The aftereffects of excessive spiritual exertion surged over him like a tide.

But he couldn't spare them a thought.

There wasn't the slightest hint of fatigue on his face.

Only a frenzied joy he could barely contain!

He looked toward the distant cliff, where Xiao Yan remained seated in cultivation, eyes closed and completely unaware that he had just been subjected to "data theft."

Then he looked inward at the pale flame model in his consciousness, a symbol of infinite possibility.

An even bolder, even more reckless plan began to grow wildly in his heart.

The Rock Fire Seed was only an appetizer.

Next, he would present all of Wutan City—even the entire Jia Ma Empire—with a gift no one could refuse...