Chapter 98: Rapid Improvement

In his third journey to the Scarlet Mountain Range, Su Chen’s state of mind had changed once more.

He was no longer afraid of the dangers the mountains held. On his first trip to the Scarlet Mountain Range Su Chen had the feeling that he had survived with his back to the wall, and during his second trip he had cautiously attempted to go deeper, then on this third trip, Su Chen now possessed an aggressive attitude toward the mountain range.

With seven Origin Skills and a large number of Origin Tools, as well as large amounts of resources and preparation, Su Chen was more powerful than ever before. Naturally, he wanted to accomplish even more during this trip.

This time, he was going with the intention of reaping rewards.

He directly headed into the deeper parts of the Scarlet Mountain Range. He did not circle around nor did he take any complicated route. Neither did he retreat or temporarily step aside. All he did was head straight forwards. If he saw beasts he killed beasts; if he saw demons he dealt with demons. This was the attitude of both him and Iron Cliff.

They walked into the interior for three days before arriving at the Ten Thousand Whistles Peak.

The Ten Thousand Whistles Peak was located in the southern region of the Scarlet Mountain Range and was a two days journey from the Scarlet Grand Canyon. That was also to say that this location was even more dangerous than the earlier Halcyon Gorge.

In this place, Su Chen didn’t just encounter single Vicious Beasts, but rather packs of them. Occasionally, even mid-tier Vicious Beasts would appear.

Mid-tier Vicious Beasts were equivalent to high-layer Qi Drawing Realm cultivators.

What was different was that high-layer Origin Qi Scholars could not necessarily be classified by strength alone, but the tier of a Vicious Beast directly determined its strength. Some high-layer Origin Qi Scholars might be weaker than might be imagined, but high-tier Vicious Beasts definitely were as strong as their names implied.

Thus, the difference in strength between a mid-tier Vicious Beast and a low-tier Vicious Beast was many times and could not be underestimated.

Because of this, people often used the strength of Vicious Beasts as a measurement of one’s combat prowess.

The evening that they arrived at the Ten Thousand Whistles Peak, Su Chen and Iron Cliff encountered a mid-tier Vicious Beast.

After a large battle, Su Chen successfully killed his target.

Su Chen killed the beast without Iron Cliff’s help, which confirmed that Su Chen’s combat prowess had reached the level of a high-layer Qi Drawing cultivator.

That evening, he and Iron Cliff absorbed the Vicious Beast’s Origin Energy motes. Su Chen said, “Let’s stay here.”

Iron Cliff nodded his head, then pulled out a small medicinal vial and placed it on the ground.

Beast Drawing Medicine.

He used it differently than before. This time, he was much more daring in his usage of the Beast Drawing Medicine. He used almost a third of the bottle in one go.

The effects of a third of a bottle of Beast Drawing Medicine could be immediately seen.

After half an hour, they heard faint snarls drawing closer to them.

“They’re here. There’s six of them in total – two mid-tier, four low-tier,” Su Chen laughed as he gazed off into the distance.

“There’s a lot of them,” Iron Cliff said in a low voice.

“No problem. Activate the illusion realm,” Su Chen laughed.

Iron Cliff pulled out an Origin Formation Disk and placed it in the ground.

𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

This Origin Formation Disk could create a low-tier illusion realm, trapping people in it. This would give Su Chen and Iron Cliff the opportunity to attack them. However, its price was quite expensive, and could only be used three times.

Just like in business, only when one had enough capital, could one make a greater investment and obtain even greater profits. Today, Su Chen’s backup plan was no longer simply to jump down off of the cliff onto a rope net.

With more investment would come more sophisticated backup plan, which would also allow him to withstand and deal with greater dangers.

The beast flock was drawing near. Evidently, it was a pack of Twilight Moon Wolves. The leader of the pack was one of the mid-tier Vicious Beasts.

Twilight Moon Wolves were Vicious Beasts who were much stronger at night. They were very nocturnal and were as fast as the wind. They could also unleash blade-like strikes which could be used in conjunction with their leaping attacks. They were very coordinated, and advanced and retreated as one, unafraid of death. Six Twilight Moon Wolves were even more difficult to deal with together than two or three mid-tier Origin Beasts together.

However, today, they would not be able to manifest the full strength of their pack..

The illusion realm dispersed the wolf pack. They howled out, their cries echoing out, yet they could not find one another.

Su Chen and Iron Cliff were like assassins in dense fog, walking in it as they pleased. The locked down and hunted the Vicious Beasts one by one.

There was no fair fight to be found here, and no one was bothering to temper themselves in battle. All that occurred was pure slaughter as the duo used their two-on-one advantage to kill their opponents and then absorb their Origin Energy motes.

Whoosh!

The flash of a blade.

A Twilight Moon Wolf fell over with a sorrowful cry.

Su Chen pointed his finger to the air, and Iron Cliff mimicked his movements. They began absorbing the precious Origin Energy that floated around in the air.

When the Origin Energy motes dissipated, they would walk towards another, repeating the same step.

Battle, slaughter, absorb, repeat.

Cultivation had suddenly become much easier as long as they killed lifeforms with Origin Energy. Even battle had become easier; with the Beast Drawing Medicine and the Origin Formation Disk, they exterminated a pack of Twilight Moon Wolves with no difficulty at all.

Once they killed the Twilight Moon Wolves, two more Vicious Beasts delivered themselves up not long afterwards.

They repeated the cycle until the Beast Drawing Medicine and the illusion realm disappeared. The two of them were able to kill eleven Vicious Beasts with high efficiency. Such a large number was enough to completely stun Iron Cliff.

These were Vicious Beasts, not simply large cabbages!

However, ten or so of them were essentially cut into pieces just like vegetables. Their Origin Energy had been absorbed, they were skinned, and their blood and meat were consumed.

In that moment, Iron Cliff felt that the whole thing was quite surreal, as if he was dreaming.

However, the massive increase in his cultivation base told him that this wasn’t a dream, but a wonderful reality.

The Origin Energy motes from eleven Vicious Beasts caused Iron Cliff’s strength to increase by half of a whole Yellow Star. For Iron Cliff, under normal circumstances this could normally only be accomplished after two years of bitter cultivation.

As a human Su Chen’s absorption rate was better than that of the Cliff Race, so his cultivation base increased a whole Yellow Star.

In order to obtain such a rapid cultivation increase, they had nevertheless paid a price.

Although Beast Drawing Medicine was cheaper than Beast Repellant Medicine, it still cost two hundred Origin Stones per vial. The Origin Formation Disk was even more expensive. It could only be used three times and it cost five hundred Origin Stones, meaning that every activation was roughly about a hundred sixty seven Origin Stones.

Executing their previous cultivation session cost around two hundred and thirty low-grade Origin Stones, while the hides ten low-tier and one mid-tier Vicious Beasts were not worth more than fifteen Origin Stones.

In other words, their cultivation session just now had lost them two hundred low-grade Origin Stones.

Without the appropriate capital, they would not have been able to cultivate in this way, not to mention that others couldn’t even see Origin Energy motes. Su Chen could only do this because of his wealth and his eyes.

For ten days in a row, Su Chen and Iron Cliff used this method to cultivate, and they improved at a rate comparable to having taken some precious medicinal pill.

Because they killed too quickly, every so often they would need to switch to a different location with more beasts.

Today was just like all the past days. Su Chen was able to attract seven Vicious Beasts during the effective duration of the Beast Drawing Medicine. He said, “It seems as if there isn’t much more here. Let’s get ready to go somewhere else.”

“Do we want to go deeper in, Master?” Iron Cliff asked.

Su Chen thought for a moment, then shook his head. “Forget about it. Safety is still number one.”

He did not plan on taking any more risks, so he decided to continue heading west.

At that moment, a voice filled with rage and poisonous intent suddenly cried out, “Su Chen, I’ve finally found you!”

Upon turning around to face the noise, Su Chen was somewhat surprised. “It’s you?”