Strange Changes

By nightfall, Ning Fa could no longer hold himself back. He was desperate to find out what exactly had happened to his body, so he used his recovery as an excuse to return home.

Inside the alchemy room.

In the stillness, the sensation of spiritual energy from all around flowing toward him like a gentle breeze became even more distinct.

Ning Fa could also clearly sense that his perception of Thunder Spiritual Power had grown far sharper, reaching an astonishing degree.

He even felt as though he were a sovereign, while the Thunder Spiritual Power around him was like his subjects, surging desperately toward him and cheering joyously to welcome their king.

The feeling was truly strange and wondrous.

Ning Fa was thrilled. Something must have changed in his body.

He first used his inner sight technique, but everything in his Dantian was normal, and the incomplete Thunder Rune Pattern did not appear.

After some thought, Ning Fa began circulating the Mana within his body according to his cultivation technique.

This time, a change finally occurred. The Thunder Rune Pattern appeared within his Dantian once more.

What left Ning Fa dumbfounded was that the originally incomplete Thunder Rune Pattern had actually become whole!

The Five-Colored Thunder Runes of varying forms within the pattern connected with one another, intertwining along profound and mysterious trajectories. It was unfathomable in the extreme.

Ning Fa could hardly believe it.

The thing he had always yearned to accomplish had somehow been completed while he was unconscious!

Moreover, Ning Fa discovered that at the five corners of this circular Thunder Rune Pattern, there seemed to be spirit patterns shaped like a White Longsword, a green tree, a Black Long River, a crimson fireball, and a Yellow Hillock.

However, these spirit patterns were faint and indistinct, as though they were merely phantoms. On closer inspection, electric light flickered across them, and they seemed to be formed entirely from countless bolts of lightning.

Ning Fa's heart jolted, and he immediately thought of the dream he had had before.

By now, he was no longer completely ignorant of cultivation. He vaguely guessed that the longsword, tree, long river, fireball, and hillock represented the powers of the five elements: Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, Earth.

Furthermore, the five elements in this pattern appeared to be deeply connected to lightning. These five symbolic objects seemed to have all been transformed from lightning.

Ning Fa could not help wondering: what exactly was this Thunder Rune Pattern with its five elemental symbols?

Could it be that every cultivator with a Lightning Spiritual Root possessed such a thing within their body?

Ning Fa was doubtful. After all, his previous self had read quite a few ancient records and looked into accounts concerning cultivators with Lightning Spiritual Roots.

Although cultivators with Lightning Spiritual Roots were rare, many had appeared over the tens of thousands of years of history, so there was no shortage of related records.

Yet Ning Fa did not remember a single text recording that cultivators with Lightning Spiritual Roots possessed such a Thunder Rune Pattern within their bodies.

Ning Fa once again realized that he was not merely someone with an Incomplete Lightning Spiritual Root. His body seemed to hold no small secret.

Then he grew excited. No matter what, this Thunder Rune Pattern should mean that his Lightning Spiritual Root aptitude was quite good.

Previously, the Thunder Rune Pattern had been incomplete, so he had been deemed to possess an Incomplete Lightning Spiritual Root. Now that the Thunder Rune Pattern had become whole, did that mean his Lightning Spiritual Root had become normal?

Coupled with the strange changes in his body and his astonishing sensitivity to the Thunder Spiritual Power around him, everything seemed to confirm it.

At this thought, Ning Fa could not help becoming wildly excited.

Then he suddenly remembered something and hurriedly looked at his right arm. That faint white mark was still there.

Ning Fa let out a long sigh of relief. Strictly speaking, this was his greatest trump card.

He activated the scroll. A flash of white light appeared before him, and the Mysterious Scroll unfolded once again.

Ning Fa immediately noticed something unusual. The scroll seemed somewhat different now; the white glow it emitted had dimmed considerably.

Of the three Mysterious Patterns originally on the scroll, only One Dao Mark remained. The other Mysterious Patterns had not vanished completely, but they had faded until they were nearly invisible.

Even the sole remaining mark had dimmed significantly.

Ning Fa was alarmed. What was wrong with this scroll? Why did it look as though it had been sucked dry?

This scroll was his lifeblood. Seeing such a negative abnormality naturally frightened him greatly.

He no longer had the mind to study the complete Thunder Rune Pattern. He hurriedly took an Essence Replenishing Pill from his Storage Bag.

Under Ning Fa's tense gaze, nothing initially happened on the Mysterious Scroll. Then a cluster of white glow slowly emerged, though it was visibly much thinner than before.

The white glow began flickering continuously, but it seemed feeble and listless. Gradually, the image of that Essence Replenishing Pill appeared on the scroll.

Then the white glow extended, and images of seven spirit herbs appeared as well.

It seemed to be the same as before, but the process was several times slower.

Seeing that the Mysterious Scroll could still be used, Ning Fa let out a long sigh of relief.

But as he looked at the scroll's current wilted state, he immediately connected it to the Thunder Rune Pattern within his body, which had become complete.

Ning Fa's eyes lit up. He immediately guessed that, while he had been unconscious, the Mysterious Scroll had finally completed tracing the Thunder Rune Pattern back to its origin, which was why the Thunder Rune Pattern in his body had become whole.

Moreover, the process appeared to have consumed far too much of the Mysterious Scroll's energy. Its current lack of energy was likely why it looked so listless.

Those Mysterious Patterns seemed to represent the scroll's energy. Of the original three marks, only one remained. It had probably consumed sixty or seventy percent of its energy.

With insufficient energy, the scroll now seemed to be struggling somewhat when tracing things back to their origins.

Perhaps it was even more than that. Ning Fa faintly felt that the other two marks should represent higher-tier energy.

Just as spirit items in the current cultivation world were classified into first, second, third, and fourth tiers.

If that were truly the case, then it had not merely consumed sixty or seventy percent of its energy. It had exhausted all of the scroll's high-tier energy, leaving only this lowest-tier energy behind.

Considering the heaven-defying effects of the Mysterious Scroll, the fact that the Thunder Rune Pattern in Ning Fa's body could consume so much of its energy undoubtedly proved how extraordinary it was.

For example, Ning Fa had previously used the scroll to trace the spiritual ingredients of Essence Replenishing Pills back to their origins hundreds of times, yet the Mysterious Patterns had not changed at all. It seemed that doing so did not consume the scroll's energy in the slightest.

As for why the Mysterious Scroll had suddenly been able to restore the Thunder Rune Pattern to completeness, Ning Fa guessed that it might be related to the heavy blow his Dantian had suffered.

That seemed to have been the turning point.

He vaguely remembered that after his Dantian had received that heavy blow, the incomplete Thunder Rune Pattern had suddenly appeared and undergone a certain transformation.

Ning Fa could not help sighing. Misfortune and fortune truly depended upon one another.

Had his Dantian not been attacked, perhaps it would have taken him a long time to successfully trace it back to its origin with the Mysterious Scroll—or perhaps he would never have been able to do so at all.

But looking at the dispirited Mysterious Scroll, he began to worry again. Assuming it lacked energy, how was he supposed to replenish it?

Judging from the heaven-defying abilities it had displayed, ordinary things were probably utterly incapable of doing so.

Fortunately, the Mysterious Scroll still appeared capable of tracing pills back to their spiritual ingredients. It merely took longer than before, but only in comparison to the past. He could completely accept that amount of time.

Ning Fa let out a long breath and put away the scroll.

His eyes gleamed. Next, he would test whether his cultivation aptitude had truly changed after the Thunder Rune Pattern became complete.

Although he had already keenly noticed the astonishing increase in his sensitivity to spiritual energy, he still needed to test it to set his mind at ease.

He immediately sat cross-legged, formed hand seals, and began circulating the heavenly cycle according to his cultivation technique.

It had been fine before, but the moment he circulated the technique now, he felt as though his body had become a whirlpool on the surface of the sea. The Thunder Spiritual Power around him surged toward him madly, rushing frenziedly into his body.

Ning Fa circulated only one heavenly cycle, yet he felt that the spiritual energy he absorbed was equivalent to what he had gained from several days of meditation before. This cultivation efficiency had increased by dozens of times.

He was ecstatic. If things continued like this, could he directly attempt a breakthrough to the Qi Condensation Mid-stage?

Without further hesitation, Ning Fa circulated ten more heavenly cycles, gathering within his body an enormous stream of Mana far greater than anything before, so vast that it even made his heart tremble.

He guided this stream of Mana into his Dantian, but what puzzled him was that this time, he did not feel any obvious bottleneck.

Just as he was confused, the stream of Mana seemed to have received a summons. Beyond Ning Fa's control, it flew toward the Thunder Rune Pattern in his Dantian.

The Thunder Rune Pattern was like a bottomless abyss, completely absorbing the stream of Mana.