Chapter 7: Spirit Embryo Wall
Translator: Ninetales Editor: Ninetales
The devil ape erupted with fury and started chasing after Qin Mu. However after a few steps, it realized that its speed was inferior to Qin Mu’s because of how large it was. Such a humiliation enraged the devil ape. It uprooted tree after tree, running its hand along the length of one and getting rid of its branches before throwing it like an enormous spear.
"Die, young’un!"
The bare tree trunk flew through the air at an astonishing speed, clearly carrying an extraordinary amount of force. However, the ape’s throw wasn’t accurate, so the trunk crashed and landed several yards away from Qin Mu.
The devil ape became even angrier and wanted to throw another tree spear, but Qin Mu had run off into the distance. It no longer had a target to vent its anger on, so all it could do was beat its chest repeatedly.
Senior Brother Qu quietly called out to the other youths. "That devil brat’s cultivation is definitely inferior to ours, and his injuries must be worse than mine. There’s no way he’ll be able to go far."
Pushing himself to his feet, he grunted as intense pain wracked his chest. He was afraid that many of his ribs had been broken by the devil ape’s strike. However, he believed that if Qin Mu could withstand a blow from the devil ape, he could endure it as well.
He just hadn’t expected Qin Mu to be that strong.
Qin Mu’s cultivation definitely wasn’t weak. His vital qi lacking attributes was the only reason he couldn’t display his full potential.
Despite his young age, if one were to compare their cultivation, Qin Mu certainly wasn’t weaker than any of them... including Senior Brother Qu!
Taking a detour around the devil ape’s territory, the youths eventually found Qin Mu’s trail again. Just as Senior Brother Qu said, Qin Mu had been heavily injured by the devil ape as well, having no choice but to reduce his speed to the point that they could catch up.
However as they continued to chase Qin Mu, they discovered that Qin Mu’s speed gradually increased as if his injuries were no longer an issue.
"This little devil must have some miraculous healing medicine!"
The hearts of all four youths sank. Senior Brother Qu had consumed medicine that their sect had given him but it clearly wasn’t an effective as Qin Mu’s ‘medicine’. Seeing how quickly Qin Mu’s speed had risen, they inferred that his injuries were definitely healing at a rate visible to the naked eye.
This kind of medicine made their eyes and hearts burn with greed.
"The medicine in our sect is not of the highest quality. If we manage to catch that devil brat and seize the recipe of that miraculous medicine from him, our masters would definitely be pleased and reward us greatly!"
However, contrary to what they thought, Qin Mu hadn’t consumed any medicine. Instead, he simply inhaled and exhaled as he ran, circulating the so-called Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique that the village chief had taught him, the one that he didn’t know was actually the most common Daoyin Technique.
Cultivating with the Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique as he ran for his life, Qin Mu made a new discovery. He realized that his vital qi became more active as he ran. The speed of its circulation became even faster as well!
This was different from what he had been taught. The Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique that the village chief had taught Qin Mu always required him to meditate and control his breathing. Qin Mu had learned to circulate the vital qi and nurture it, using it to condition his body.
Over the course of the last ten years of cultivation, Qin Mu had followed the village chief’s instructions on cultivating the Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique to the letter. Now, however, he had discovered that it was better to run while cultivating the technique.
Qin Mu dashed forward as fast as possible, and the circulation of the Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique became faster, nurturing and improving both his innate speed and the constitution of his body!
In addition to that, wave after wave of vital qi flowed through Qin Mu’s organs, limbs, bones, and even the tendons between his muscles and bones, cleansing them over and over again.
Qin Mu’s ruptured organs and broken bones, which he’d sustained from the devil ape’s strike, recovered with each cleansing wave of vital qi.
Senior Brother Qu and the others thought that he was relying on a high-quality medicine, yet never would they expected that was just relying on the unreliable Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique.
Qin Mu eventually realized that his vital qi couldn’t reach a certain part of his body—the space right between his eyebrows.
Between his eyebrows was space the width of a finger.
Vital qi could not reach this space. Although his vital qi could pass under his scalp and wash over his skull, cleansing and strengthening both of them, it would come to a stop every time it reached the center of his brow. It was as if there were an invisible wall there, blocking his vital qi from passing through.
Whenever he directed his vital qi to rush the wall, something even stranger occurred.
Qin Mu could hear a mysterious voice.
This voice sounded as if it were coming from high in the sky, as distant as the nine heavens above. It sounded melodious and divine, resonating like the voice of a god passing down a heavenly decree.
Every time this voice resounded, Qin Mu’s vital qi would retreat like an uncontrollable tide and ignore the space between his eyebrows.
"Could this be the Spirit Embryo Wall?" Qin Mu said inadvertently.
Qin Mu was confused. Village Chief and the other inhabitants of Disabled Elderly Village had explained Walls and Wall Breaking to him. Walls were the things sealing the treasures in warrior’s body, while Wall Break was to break the seal and attain the treasure inside.
However, they hadn’t told him which part of the body the Spirit Embryo Wall was or how to break open the Spirit Embryo Wall.
What Qin Mu didn’t know was, it wasn’t that Village Chief and the others didn’t want to tell him any of this. There actually weren’t any techniques for specifically breaking through the Spirit Embryo Wall in the entire world.
A person with an ordinary human body and a person with a spirit body was on two intrinsically different levels
A person with a spirit body will have been born with an innately unsealed Spirit Embryo Wall, putting them in a class above everyone else. The Spirit Embryo Wall of an ordinary person, on the other hand, would be sealed off, relegating them to a lower class. People with spirit bodies were aloof, remote, and rarely cared about the needs of the ordinary people.
Although martial practitioners still emerged from among ordinary people, Village Chief and the others had never heard of any of them unsealing their Spirit Embryo Wall. As a result, they didn’t know how a normal human would break through it.
As vital qi rushed at the invisible wall located at the center of his eyebrows, Qin Mu continued on his frantic escape. Every time the mysterious voice rang out, his vital qi would automatically recoil from the wall. Even though he was currently wasn’t able to break through the wall, Qin Mu was patient and believed that he would succeed eventually.
Qin Mu didn’t plan on revealing this discovery regarding the Overlord Body Three Elixir Technique to the elderly of the village. He decided that he would surprise them after succeeding in breaking through the Spirit Embryo Wall.
It was just hard to tell whether it would be more of a surprise to them... or more of a shock.
As Senior Brother Qu and the four other youths continued to chase Qin Mu, they grew progressively more worried. The little devil ahead of them hadn’t just recovered from his injuries—his speed had increased even more!
Now that was terrifying. It meant that, even as Qin Mu ran for his life, his cultivation was also improving!
Although his increase in speed was slow and gradual, it was still terrifying!
Cultivating had a set of rules that anyone and everyone needed to follow. Even when one succeeded in breaking through, any progress in their cultivation needed to occur slowly, over time, not all at once. Everyone had to cultivate for several days, or even months, just to bring about the smallest improvement in their cultivation.
In spite of these universal rules, they could clearly feel the cultivation of this little devil constantly getting stronger. It terrified them!
Luckily, Qin Mu was originally inferior to the five youths. Even though his cultivation was currently improving, there was still a gap between them and him.
However, catching up to him would be no easy feat for them. Since he had suffered at the hands of the devil ape, Qin Mu had become much more careful and would make sure to avoid the territories of the strange beasts.
Whenever Apothecary brought Qin Mu out to gather herbs, he would tell him that strange beasts were very intelligent. That each of them had their own territory and would leave signs to indicate that. Those signs would include things like a tree stripped of its bark, bones buried in the ground, beast skulls on wooden stakes, or traces of urine. As long as one saw such signs, they would be able to just avoid the beasts.
When Qin Mu had encountered the devil ape, there had been a mark of a gargantuan fist indicating the area was its territory. Qin Mu had accidentally rushed into its territory because he had missed that sign. Since he was now being more careful, he wouldn’t make the same mistake.
However, even he didn’t accidentally trespass on a strange beast’s territory, many would still venture out of them to search for food, filling the Great Ruins with danger.
Qin Mu eventually found his way to a swamp where he saw two strange beasts having a territorial dispute. The beasts battling each other were a Cockscomb Snake-neck Snow Condor and a Poisonous Swamp Dragon Python. The former created gale winds with a sweep of its wings, its huge body soaring through the air. The latter writhed through the swamp below, causing havoc and destruction with its long body.
Before Qin Mu could even enter the swamp, the hurricane of force caused by the two giant creatures swept him away. Upon landing, he came face to face with a herd of startled bison that almost trampled him to death.
"I keep getting farther and farther from the village…"
The realization made Qin Mu’s heart sink.
The five people behind him were still chasing relentlessly, making it impossible for him to return to the village. However, even more frightening than that was the fact that…
—The sun would be setting soon!
Qin Mu and Granny Si had left the village right after noon. Now that the sun would start to set, darkness would soon fall. If he couldn’t make it back to the village before that happened, he would face great danger!
"The sky's getting dark, Senior Brother Qu!"
In the distance behind Qin Mu, Senior Brother Qu and his companions had also noticed the setting sun.
The youth that Qin Mu had kicked away wore an uneasy expression. "Master said that the Great Ruins were cursed. That they would become a forbidden region when the sky went dark. We need to get back to the village, which has the protection of the stone statues! Otherwise... the only path left is death!"
Senior Brother Qu shook his head. "It’s too late to turn back now. As far as we’ve gone, we won’t be able to return to village before nightfall. The darkness is as dangerous to the devil brat as it is to us. We have no choice but to see where the little devil is going to hide!"