Talent and Cultivation Soared Again and Again

"Young Master."

Obedient as ever, Qing Lin immediately stopped controlling the two snake-shaped Magical Beasts. She walked over to Lu Yuan, rose on tiptoe, and offered him a kiss.

Lu Yuan leaned down and touched his lips lightly to hers, then turned to Xiao Yi Xian, whose hair had transformed to silver.

"I really did get aboard your pirate ship. You've been boiling me like a frog in slowly warming water."

Even though it was not the first time, Xiao Yi Xian still felt shy, and the tips of her ears reddened slightly.

But she did not refuse. She tucked her hair behind her ear, walked up to Lu Yuan, and closed her eyes.

She could not help recalling the first time Lu Yuan had asked for her help.

It had not been a long-laid plan, but a chance coincidence.

While taking a second-tier poison herb, she had discovered that the poison had actually reached the third tier.

With her Woeful Poison Body, she naturally would not come to harm, but she had still fallen asleep.

That was when Lu Yuan had kissed her, using the Woeful Poison Body he awakened afterward to draw some of the poison out of her body.

Since then, although some things had not been openly discussed, their relationship had already taken a qualitative leap.

"Nonsense." After a light kiss, Lu Yuan slipped an arm around Xiao Yi Xian's slender waist. "What frog? I won't let you talk about yourself like that."

Qing Lin's face immediately lit up with a smile. "Young Master is right," she said brightly.

"You little girl, in your eyes, what could your young master ever do wrong?" Xiao Yi Xian reached out and poked Qing Lin in the waist, both annoyed and amused.

"But Sister Xian'er really is a fairy." Qing Lin was ticklish and hurried to fend off Xiao Yi Xian's hand.

The two began playfully tussling in Lu Yuan's arms, making for a strangely harmonious sight.

Lu Yuan watched quietly, his eyes smiling, while directing part of his attention to the Fortune Catalog.

[Fortune Character: Qing Lin]

[Heavenly Snake Great Emperor Bloodline (ancestral reversion)/Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils/Dou Qi cultivation/Earth-Splitting Rock Snake/Azure Thorn Cloud Snake/Black-Winged Nether Snake]

[Advanced replication/plunder (progress: 100/100)]

[Available to activate...]

[Fortune Character: Xiao Yi Xian]

[Woeful Poison Body (awakened)/Seven-Star Dou Shi/Seven-Colored Poison Scripture...]

[Advanced replication/plunder (progress: 100/100)]

Lu Yuan chose advanced replication without hesitation.

[Advanced replication of Qing Lin complete: sixty percent of the Heavenly Snake Great Emperor Bloodline]

[Advanced replication of Xiao Yi Xian complete: sixty percent of her Seven-Star Dou Shi cultivation]

"Hiss!"

When the two forces appeared out of thin air and surged into his body together, Lu Yuan knew he had underestimated what he would gain this time.

Sixty percent of the Heavenly Snake Great Emperor's reverted ancestral bloodline rushed forth from the depths of his soul like a river that had slumbered for ages, merging with the twenty percent already integrated into his flesh and blood.

The two bloodline powers blended like milk and water, coursing through his bones and meridians as though tracing an ancient totem long sealed away. Each time it emerged, it carried a power more profound and ancient than before.

At this moment, the grade of the bloodline in his body was already approaching Qing Lin's eighty percent, the standard after the ancestral reversion of her Heavenly Snake Great Emperor Bloodline.

The bloodline power surged through his body, part of it transforming into pure energy that flowed straight into the depths of his eyes.

"Hm!?"

Qing Lin was the first to sense that something was amiss and turned to look at Lu Yuan.

A lotus mark appeared in his pitch-black eyes and began spinning rapidly. Before long, it split to form a second lotus.

The two lotuses stood side by side at the bottom of his pupils, strange light flowing around them. But it did not stop there; a third lotus flickered in and out of sight in the deepest part of his pupils.

In the end, though, it remained like a flower glimpsed through fog, never fully solidifying. Only its embryonic form could be made out.

"Young Master, you're..." Qing Lin's eyes widened.

He remembered that her young master had said only descendants of the Snake-People Tribe and humans could possess the Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils. Could her young master have the same parentage as her?

No, she had bathed her young master before, and she had not seen the snake scales a mixed-blood should have.

Lu Yuan did not respond. He felt his soul power soar, and his pupil technique had improved as well.

Qing Lin possessed the reverted ancestral bloodline of the Heavenly Snake Great Emperor, so the creatures she could form contracts with were snake-shaped Magical Beasts.

Lu Yuan had fused that power into his own body. His second ability was also contracting, but he could form a contract with any living being whose soul realm was lower than his.

"What an ability!"

Lu Yuan suppressed the delight rising in his heart and hurried to sense the Dou Qi that had suddenly appeared in his dantian.

Xiao Yi Xian was now a Seven-Star Dou Shi, and her cultivation was exceptionally pure after being tempered by her Woeful Poison Body. As sixty percent of it flowed into his Qi cyclone, it rapidly began to liquefy.

His cultivation had only just broken through to Four-Star Dou Shi, but now it began to skyrocket.

Late Four-Star Dou Shi, five-star, six-star-it swept forward like a hot knife through bamboo, only slowing when it reached seven-star.

Only when it reached the peak of seven-star did the surge in his cultivation finally stop. Just a thin sheet of window paper separated him from eight-star.

"As expected of power from a cheat, it's even more stable than what I gained by taking pills and cultivating myself!" Lu Yuan was secretly astonished.

He took a deep breath, and the two lotuses in his pupils immediately vanished, returning his eyes to their normal pitch-black color. The surging Dou Qi in his body also settled down.

"You broke through!?" Xiao Yi Xian had also sensed the change in Lu Yuan.

"Mm." Lu Yuan nodded slightly and smiled. "I told you, as long as Qing Lin's talent awakened, my talent would only be stronger than yours, and my cultivation would rise faster too. Do you believe me now?"

Xiao Yi Xian had only just entered Seven-Star Dou Shi, while Lu Yuan could now break through to eight-star at any moment.

"I believe you. The facts are right in front of me-how could I not?" Xiao Yi Xian's gray-violet eyes lit up.

Lu Yuan had started behind her but overtaken her in cultivation. Presumably, having gained the lead, he could stay ahead at every step.

Then he would naturally be able to fulfill everything he had told her back then.

If the day truly came when ten thousand poisons devoured her body, he would surely be able to help her resolve that suffering.

The dark clouds that had hung over her heart had completely dispersed!

"Young Master, you're amazing! Four months ago you were only at Sixth-Stage Dou Qi, and now you're almost a Peak Dou Master!" Qing Lin's face was full of admiration, and she made no mention of the Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils.

"You think that's amazing?" Lu Yuan smiled gently. "There's something even more amazing."

"Xian'er, call Xiao Lan over. It's time for us to leave."

Xiao Yi Xian did as she was told, letting out a special whistle that drew Xiao Lan back from where she had been playing nearby.

When Xiao Lan landed, Lu Yuan immediately called Zhang Qingqing over, and the four of them leaped onto the eagle's back together.

"Aooo~"

Xiao Lan let out a clear cry, then beat her wings and pierced through the thin mist above the valley.

"Aunt Qing, I asked you to look for fourth-tier snake-shaped Magical Beasts recently. You said you found an Azure-Feathered Flame Snake. Where exactly is it?" Lu Yuan asked Zhang Qingqing.

Zhang Qingqing sat at the rear of the eagle's back, a longbow in her hand and her back straight, her gaze constantly sweeping over the vast sea of forest below. "Xiao Yuan, that Azure-Feathered Flame Snake is already close to the depths of the Magical Beast Mountain Range," she warned.

"It's all right." Lu Yuan's gaze was firm. "If you don't enter the tiger's den, how can you catch its cub?"

If he did not dare take even this much risk, then even with the Woeful Poison Body and the Triple Jade-Green Snake Flower Pupils, he could never become a true expert.

"All right." Zhang Qingqing said no more to dissuade him and pointed out the direction.

Xiao Yi Xian immediately directed Xiao Lan to fly that way.

Danger lurked everywhere in the depths of the Magical Beast Mountain Range!