Bloodline Purification Art

Kenna took a thin booklet from inside his clothes.

"Ian, I have fulfilled my mission. This is the Bloodline Purification Art you wanted, though the price was rather steep—sixty magic stones."

Ian was overjoyed. He did not mind that it was not a Memory Crystal. Other apprentices would find it difficult to learn from a book, but he had the panel, so that was not an issue at all.

Ian gave Kenna an extra potion, carefully put away the booklet, and did not open it immediately.

After putting away the potion, Kenna suddenly remembered something.

"Ian, do you still remember Leica? He heard about you becoming a Potion Master from somewhere and wants to meet you too."

The Leica Kenna mentioned was also one of their former neighbors.

Ian had rarely dealt with him. He only knew that Leica had lived there for a long time and was vaguely the leader of the surrounding area.

The man had yet to break through to Advanced Apprentice. It seemed he was getting anxious and wanted to obtain resources from Ian as well.

"We'll talk when I have time. I don't want to take on too many private commissions right now."

Ian did not mind having more channels, but cultivation still had to come first. Too many private jobs would take up a great deal of time.

"Wade, has there been any movement from the Shadow Society lately?"

He was somewhat worried. Ten days had passed; there was no way they had not noticed anything at all.

"I only heard some rumors. The Shadow Society seems to be planning something major recently. They're exploring some ruin."

Wade did not dare be certain either. These were all hearsay and might not be accurate.

Ian suddenly understood; it seemed the rumors about the ruins were likely true.

He had also quietly looked into Nolan. This man was one of the Shadow Society's founders, and many apprentices worked under him.

After Kenna and the others left, Ian took out the booklet and carefully read through it. When he finished the last page, the panel recorded the spell.

[Bloodline Purification Art: Not Initiated (0/100)]

Ian took some magic stones and left for the Beast Trading District in town, intending to buy some other beast blood to practice with first.

Magic Beast blood had many uses. Enchanting, Alchemy, and other fields all required it.

After crossing several streets, he saw black sewage flowing across the ground, while a foul smell filled his nose.

The display boards of the stalls on both sides were casually propped atop piles of stones, displaying all kinds of goods for sale.

"Freshly slaughtered Four-Horned Antelope! Going cheap!"

"Fresh Wind Demon Wolf hearts! The finest medium for cultivating wind-element spells!"

"Blood from an intermediate Magic Beast Bloodthirsty Wild Boar. Ten magic stone fragments per pound."

Ian paused and stopped before the stall.

"A Bloodthirsty Wild Boar hunted this morning. The blood is still fresh. Buy some, sir."

The stall owner was a heavily bearded Intermediate Apprentice. Rough-looking and burly, he enthusiastically promoted his goods to Ian.

"I need a large quantity. If the price is lower, I'll buy it all."

Ian did not know any bargaining tricks. Being straightforward was best.

"Sir, I have over a hundred pounds here. If you take it all, ten magic stones will do."

The bearded man seemed sincere enough, and Ian agreed to the deal without wasting words.

After paying the magic stones, he easily carried away a large leather bag. Now, he only wanted to get back quickly and initiate the purification art.

After returning home, Ian stored the blood away first, then went to the potion room.

On the cleaned workbench, Ian carefully dripped a small portion of blood into the Resonance Crystal Vessel.

The Resonance Crystal was an auxiliary piece of equipment in the potion room that could amplify bloodline fluctuations.

Following the first stage of the Bloodline Purification Art, Bloodline Perception, Ian began cultivating.

After quite a while, his spiritual power finally guided the spell forward in a stumbling manner, extending it into the crystal vessel.

The instant it made contact, his spiritual control was not precise enough. With the slightest lapse in attention, the Fluorite Plate supplying energy dimmed, and the faint resonance effect ended.

[Bloodline Purification Art proficiency +1]

Ian frowned slightly as he looked at the considerably dimmer blood inside.

"The consumption is a little too high!"

He had not even gotten a feel for it before the fluctuations in the crystal vessel had stopped. Fortunately, the panel helped, allowing faint traces of experience to flow into his mind.

"Keep grinding. At worst, I'll just spend more magic stones."

Five days later.

In the potion room, Ian's hair was disheveled and his face was full of exhaustion.

This Bloodline Purification Art was far too difficult, and it consumed magic stones at an alarming rate. Over five days, he bought Magic Beast blood four more times, each purchase larger than the last, spending a total of 120 magic stones.

"No wonder Kenna never learned it. He probably couldn't afford to!"

Ian had originally wanted to exploit a loophole and buy ordinary beast blood for practice.

It was not completely ineffective, but there were too few extraordinary genes in the blood. The spell's progress crawled along like a turtle, so he had no choice but to give up.

After all, this was the Bloodline Purification Art.

Now, he could cast the spell relatively completely and sense the information within a bloodline.

The next step was to use spiritual power to guide the purification art and extract the extraordinary genes of the Bloodthirsty Wild Boar.

Ian's spiritual power was like a pair of clumsy hands, attempting to grasp the extraordinary bloodline revealed within the vessel.

He had gone through this process more times than he could count over the past few days.

Suddenly, the crystal vessel on the workbench began to tremble faintly. The Energy Supply Module beneath it rapidly consumed magic stones, and the room's temperature began to rise.

"Bzz..."

An unnatural flush spread across his face, as though he were wrestling with the Bloodthirsty Wild Boar. Sweat began to bead on his forehead, only to evaporate into mist before it could fall.

"Stop... I have to stop!" Ian realized he was on the verge of losing control.

But the violent bloodline energy had already become like floodwaters breaking through a dam.

With a bang, the blood exploded, and a cloud of crimson mist rose above the vessel.

[Bloodline Purification Art proficiency +1]

"Whew..." After wiping away his sweat, Ian secretly breathed a sigh of relief.

[Bloodline Purification Art: Initiated (0/200)]

"Though I failed, I finally initiated it. That wasn't easy!"

Ian did not know that an ordinary apprentice would need at least one or two years to initiate this special spell.

He poured all the little remaining Bloodthirsty Wild Boar blood into the vessel.

This time, it was as if his spiritual power had been lubricated. He controlled the spell with unparalleled smoothness, slowly extending it toward the blood in the crystal vessel and covering it...

After a while, a bright crimson Blood Essence shot out with a whoosh.

Ian caught it in one hand and examined it repeatedly beneath the light.

The Blood Essence was crystal clear, about the size of an egg and shaped like an irregular polyhedron. If magnified and examined closely, one could see extremely fine threads drifting gently inside.

This was only preliminary purification, and it contained many impurities. Aside from brewing potions, it could not be used for bloodline transplantation.

The subsequent refinement was the real focus. The Rock Bear was an advanced Magic Beast, and extracting its bloodline was even more difficult than extracting that of the Bloodthirsty Wild Boar. The process was also much slower.

Ian refined all the Rock Bear blood he had stored into Blood Essence.

Fortunately, with the panel's support, he still did not fail even once. In total, he obtained eight Blood Essences the size of goose eggs.

"One portion of Blood Essence can make ten portions of Rock Bear Potion. I wonder whether I can initiate it."

He had longed for the Rock Bear Potion for too long. At last, he could begin brewing it.

"Let's begin!"

He first heated the potion's base solution, Oak Distillate, until it boiled, then reduced the heat and kept it at a gentle simmer.

He added Thornbark that had already been ground into powder and simmered it for fifteen minutes until it turned dark green.

He added Magic Catalytic Powder and stirred it gently until evenly mixed.

Then he added the separated slices of Blood Essence...