Dragon Scales

Xiao Fan returned to his room and lifted a cup of water with slightly trembling hands, taking a sip...

A fear buried deep within his memories made his fingers tremble unconsciously.

It was not that he feared his elder sister that much, but the original Xiao Fan's fear of her ran far too deep.

In the original Xiao Fan's memories, his eldest sister was a devil!

From childhood to adulthood, his parents had hardly ever severely reprimanded him. They could be said to have spoiled him rotten... only his eldest sister frequently beat him, pounding him from childhood all the way into adulthood.

Thus, the original host feared neither his father nor his mother. The person he feared most was his eldest sister, Xiao Jinlan!

Every time he saw his sister, he was like a mouse spotting a cat... yet the more cowardly he acted, the more Xiao Jinlan beat him.

He truly could neither beat her nor escape her. What a miserable original host...

After Xiao Fan transmigrated here, his personality kept him from being as timid and submissive as the original host. Moreover, he had decent emotional intelligence and could always coax his sister into being happy, so naturally, he was rarely beaten.

But one thing was one thing, and another was another... through the original host's memories, he knew that when Xiao Jinlan struck, she truly had no sense of restraint!

It had been one thing when they were children. How much strength could a little girl have...

But ever since she began practicing martial arts, whether her blows hurt was no longer the only issue!

"Ah... forget it... Tomorrow, I'll go out and buy my sister something tasty to improve our sibling bond. Maybe it'll hurt less when she beats me..."

Xiao Fan muttered helplessly to himself. Although he had transmigrated here half a year ago, he had indeed interacted little with his sister, especially after becoming a gray-robed agent of the Shadow Pivot Court and spending every day away from home.

Then, Xiao Fan took out the fragmentary scroll of the Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal Ji Xuanyuan had written for him, preparing to study it carefully.

The first thing that entered his sight was the cultivation art's general outline he had seen during the day:

[General Outline

Mandated by Heaven, fortune borne upon one's body.

The dormant dragon lay silent in the abyss, its hidden scales gathering the wind.

Nine transformations shed mortality; the Purple Palace became a celestial court.

Claws seized the stars, horns braced the vault of heaven.

Qi merged with the eight wastes, veins threaded through the nine heavens.

Spirit and form shone in splendor; I myself was the true dragon!]

This time, he had made some mental preparations and stabilized his qi flow beforehand, so his qi channels did not fall into disorder as they had last time.

Yet even so, a blazing heat still surged up from his dantian!

"Phew..."

Xiao Fan immediately adjusted his breathing, guiding the heat spreading through his body with his qi flow. He circulated it through the heavenly cycle before returning it to his dantian, repeating this process until his qi flow was completely steady.

After adapting to the general outline, he began reading the contents below...

[First Realm: Dormant Dragon Awakens

Sit cross-legged in the Mingtang, let your mind sink into the Nine Netherworlds.

Resonate with the earth veins; dragon qi flowed like a river.

A hundred apertures absorbed origin qi, sinews and bones first took on draconic form.

Scale patterns faintly emerged, ambitions soared toward the clouds.]

Xiao Fan read it carefully three times and gained a preliminary understanding of the essence and key points of this First Realm... earth veins and dragon qi!

As the saying went, Heaven belonged to the gods, while earth belonged to the human emperor. Dragon qi lay hidden within the earth veins; these were the Dragon Veins of the human emperor's empire!

To cultivate the Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal, the first step was to sense the Dragon Vein, forge a connection between one's will and the earth's Dragon Vein, and obtain dragon qi.

So the question was, how was one supposed to sense a Dragon Vein?

Xiao Fan was stumped... he was not a member of the imperial family. How the hell was he supposed to know how to sense a Dragon Vein?

"Forget it... I'll first try following the cultivation art!"

First was the phrase, "Sit cross-legged in the Mingtang"... the Mingtang usually referred to the Son of Heaven's temple, a place where the emperor held major ceremonies and rituals. It was said to reach Heaven above and connect to the Dragon Vein below.

The Heaven-Bearing Hall within Great Liang's imperial palace was the Great Liang imperial family's "Mingtang."

Did cultivating the Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal require sitting in meditation at the Heaven-Bearing Hall in the imperial palace? Who could get in there?! The imperial palace was filled with experts, and that old emperor was even a first-rank Martial God.

Xiao Fan was deeply disappointed. He could not even carry out the first line of this cultivation art.

"Wait... Ji Xuanyuan did not seem to have specifically mentioned this issue. Or rather... the Heaven-Bearing Hall is the Son of Heaven's Mingtang. Even imperial princes could not possibly go in there every day to meditate, could they?"

"Could it be... this Mingtang is a broad concept? Or perhaps it is an area, an area capable of sensing the Dragon Vein, rather than merely the Heaven-Bearing Hall?"

"For instance... the entire capital?"

Hope flared anew in Xiao Fan's heart. He decided that, no matter what, he would try it first.

With that thought, he sat cross-legged, closed his eyes, and sank his mind downward. He visualized a dark abyss, responding to the second line, "let your mind sink into the Nine Netherworlds"...

Gradually, within that deep, dark realm of inner sight, a speck of golden radiance appeared, like a dragon's eye opening for the first time...

Immediately afterward, Xiao Fan felt as though needles had pierced his entire body... ten thousand needles shot through his sinews, and the pain was unbearable!

"Hiss!!!"

Xiao Fan gritted his teeth and endured it, steadying his mind. Cold sweat poured down his forehead like rain, dripping onto the edge of the bed...

Gradually, those invisible "needles" burrowed deeper into his body, sinking into his sinews and bones! The golden scale on his chest heated up, becoming increasingly scorching!

It was like a red-hot branding iron piercing his chest, making him cry out in exquisite agony!

Anyone with weak willpower would not have been able to endure even a little of it and would have already fainted from the pain... but Xiao Fan persisted. His iron will was his final foundation for surviving in this world!

The good news was that his Calamity Poison Value... had not changed...

The bad news was that the scale on his chest was becoming hotter and hotter! Who could withstand this?

Just as Xiao Fan was about to reach his limit...

System text emerged in the darkness of his inner sight...

[Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal First Realm... unlocked]

[New abilities acquired: Hidden Dragon Scales, Manifest Dragon Scales]

[Hidden Dragon Scales: Dragon-qi scales covering the body's surface. The skin becomes tough and can resist blades and swords to a certain extent.]

[Manifest Dragon Scales: Materialize dragon scales to cover the body. Impervious to blades, spears, water, and fire; however, it will accumulate Calamity Poison within the body. Excessive use carries a risk of mutation.]

Holy shit... it really could be cultivated!

Xiao Fan was overjoyed. This cultivation art was no small matter... the foundation for the Great Liang Ji Clan's martial conquest of the four seas was precisely this Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal. For over two hundred years, successive emperors had sat firmly atop the pinnacle of martial strength across the nine provinces.

The two abilities he had obtained were quite similar to the bronze skin and iron bones of the eighth-rank Iron Bone Realm... but their capabilities were clearly stronger. In particular, [Manifest Dragon Scales] added magical resistance in addition to physical defense. Of course, its drawback was that it could not be maintained for long, or there would be a risk of mutation.

If those scales mutated and embedded themselves into flesh and blood, just how painful that would be... Xiao Fan had experienced it firsthand.

Then, a new surprise came crashing in!

[Cultivation: Martial Arts Qi Refining Realm, perfected: 182/100... realm breakthrough successful]

[Cultivation: Martial Arts Iron Bone Realm, early stage: 82/500]

I'll take on ten! Xiao Fan shouted excitedly in his heart.

Of course, that was merely a joke. As he was now, let alone taking on ten people, he might not even be able to defeat his own elder sister...

"So the First Realm cultivation method of the Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal encompasses both the ninth-rank and eighth-rank levels of martial arts!" Xiao Fan suddenly understood, feeling that he had made an enormous profit this time.

Absorbing dragon qi into the body could greatly strengthen one's physique. It was broadly similar to the cultivation method of the ninth-rank Qi Refining Realm, except that its effects were much stronger!

The faint emergence of scale patterns was actually the process of further transforming into a dragon after dragon qi penetrated deep into the sinews and bones. It achieved the same result by different routes as the bronze skin and iron bones of the eighth-rank Iron Bone Realm!

The difference was that ordinary Iron Bone Realm practitioners needed to temper their sinews and bones over and over again—commonly known as getting beaten... whereas the Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal did not require that.

Not only that, the defensive capabilities of dragon bones and dragon scales were stronger than bronze skin and iron bones, especially their magical resistance, which elevated a martial artist's defensive power to an entirely new dimension!

Yet amid his excitement, Xiao Fan immediately thought of an utterly absurd question...

Ji Xuanyuan had clearly stated that only the Ji Clan imperial family could cultivate this Sovereign True Dragon Heart Seal, because only those with Ji Clan dragon blood in their veins could sense the Dragon Vein and absorb dragon qi.

No matter how ordinary people cultivated, they simply could not resonate with the Dragon Vein, much less absorb dragon qi.

So the question was...

"Why can I cultivate it?"

Xiao Fan muttered to himself, posing a question straight from the depths of his soul...