Cultivating Both Inner and Outer Arts

The aberrant organ Feng Buzhi chose was—skin.

In fact, Shadow had once mentioned skin as an aberrant organ.

According to Shadow, blood, skin, and bones were all powerful aberrant organs that might appear at the fifth Abyss Altar.

If he truly did not want to go to the fourth Abyss Altar and turn his brain into an aberrant organ, then choosing one of these three aberrant organs at the fifth Abyss Altar would also be excellent, with vast room for future growth.

As for why Feng Buzhi chose skin as an alternative to meridians, it was all because of another martial art practiced by Damo—Vajra Indestructible Divine Art.

Muscle-Tendon Transformation Classic was an internal art, while Vajra Indestructible Divine Art was an external art.

After giving it considerable thought and weighing Muscle-Tendon Transformation Classic against Vajra Indestructible Divine Art, he had originally decided to discard Vajra Indestructible Divine Art.

But now, it seemed that he could choose both Muscle-Tendon Transformation Classic and Vajra Indestructible Divine Art in this world.

Not only that, he might be able to choose even more martial arts.

Damo had not appeared out of thin air. Feng Buzhi had a vague feeling that before Damo, he had even more ancient past lives.

If he could awaken those more ancient past lives, then his soul could bear more eeriness.

The only pity was that he currently sensed no sign of awakening whatsoever.

Without dwelling on it, Feng Buzhi soon rose and headed toward the fifth Abyss Altar on the western side of town.

After climbing down from the town wall, he arrived at the Mist Forest in the night before long.

The number of Goblins in the nighttime mist had greatly increased, but as long as one did not remain in one place for too long, these Goblins would not immediately swarm in to attack.

Feng Buzhi had no intention of slaughtering them either. Using his sonar ability to avoid these monsters, he successfully arrived at the location of the fifth Abyss Altar in the mist about half an hour later.

Like the other four Abyss Altars, this place was shrouded in maze-like mist that was sometimes thin and sometimes thick.

The whispers contained within this mist were not loud, but they could easily make people lose their way. Once people entered it, they would always stumble out in a muddleheaded haze.

Besides that, the mist could block monsters. Once they entered it, monsters would immediately stop their pursuit.

According to rumors near the plaza over the past few days, several of the town's exploration teams had recently made frequent use of this property of the mist around the Abyss Altars to kill many Goblins.

Without lingering on old memories, Feng Buzhi passed through the mist surrounding the Abyss Altar and saw the altar itself.

Though it was called an altar, it did not look like what people imagined—not a magic circle covered with all manner of strange and bizarre objects.

It was more like an abandoned building. More precisely, it was a two-story structure occupying roughly three hundred square meters.

Though the building had fallen into disrepair, its design was still rather exquisite, and strange patterns were carved into its walls.

Inside the building's main hall was a black crystal of roughly the same material as the Town Crystal. To obtain eerie power, one had to touch this crystal.

Of course, that was only how the building appeared on the material level.

To ordinary people, dark crimson hues would occasionally emerge on the building, and sometimes those crimson hues would continually pulse. The inner hall was even filled with dark crimson color, while the black crystal gave off an unfathomable, mysterious feeling.

But in Feng Buzhi's eyes, the sight here was completely different.

The Subtle Realm could interpret eeriness. In Feng Buzhi's vision, the building's walls appeared to be forged from flesh and blood, while a gigantic, eerie eyeball floated above it.

Before Feng Buzhi could even approach the altar, the eyeball had already locked onto him.

And as Feng Buzhi gradually neared the Abyss Altar, a mouth suddenly formed on the altar building's flesh-and-blood wall, and that mouth spoke to him.

"Do you want power?"

"I do."

"Do you want power?"

"I do."

"Do you want power?"

"Mhm."

"Do you want power?"

"I don't."

"Do you want power?"

"..."

"Do you want power?"

The words spoken by the mouth formed from the flesh-and-blood wall were filled with temptation, seeking to lure Feng Buzhi into touching the altar and obtaining eeriness.

But this mouth seemed to possess no intelligence. No matter how Feng Buzhi answered, it only repeated the same words.

"Looks like this Abyss Altar can't communicate."

Feng Buzhi murmured softly. After pondering for a moment, he sat cross-legged.

Before formally touching this altar, he decided to contemplate it for a while longer.

Soon, Feng Buzhi closed his eyes.

Even with his eyes closed, under the effect of the Eerie Whisper, an image of the flesh-and-blood wall still appeared in his mind.

But without the support of vision, the image in his mind changed somewhat. The surrounding flesh-and-blood walls seemed to become distorted.

Feng Buzhi thought of something and covered his ears with both hands. The eerie whispers still poured into his mind, but all other noises vanished.

And the image in his head underwent another subtle change. The distorted flesh-and-blood walls seemed to begin slowly wriggling.

"Could it be that I need to block out the five senses? Sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, the sensation of temperature, the sensation of gravity..."

Feng Buzhi spoke softly. He lowered the hands covering his ears, relaxed his body, pressed his tongue against the roof of his mouth, and began to empty his mind...

Near the mist boundary on the southern side of town, while Feng Buzhi was contemplating at the fifth Abyss Altar on the western side of town, the bearded Pei Chao faced the most perilous battle of his life.

Hunting Green-skinned Dwarves in the mist with Feng Buzhi had been dangerous before, but whenever it came down to the wire, Feng Buzhi would save Pei Chao's life.

Later, after his strength improved, ordinary Green-skinned Dwarves could no longer threaten him.

But this time, there was no one at all by Pei Chao's side who could help him.

After Feng Buzhi left, the bearded Pei Chao practiced chopping in a nearby clearing, striving to lay his foundation even more firmly.

After all, according to the plan Boss Feng had made for him, he would be going to an Abyss Altar in a few days to fuse eeriness into his body.

Because chopping in place was not very satisfying, and night had already fallen, Pei Chao decided to enter the mist and find Green-skinned Dwarves for real combat.

After ten days of uninterrupted training, Pei Chao's strength was already incomparable to what it had once been.

Though he could not break through his limits like Boss Feng, countless trials between life and death, combined with dozens of uses of [Basic Cultivation Assistance], had strengthened his physique by at least half.

According to Boss Feng, if his original strength had been 13, then his current strength should have reached around 20.

Even if he hunted Green-skinned Dwarves at night now, as long as he did not continue for too long, there would generally be no problem.

However, just after Pei Chao had killed five Green-skinned Dwarves, a tall figure appeared in the mist. It looked like a tiger walking upright, stood around 2.5 meters tall, and was incomparably muscular.

By the time Pei Chao realized what was happening, this Tiger Man had already attacked him. Caught completely off guard, he only had time to slightly raise an arm in defense before the Tiger Man sent him flying with a slap...