Chapter 41: Strength I

Three choices.

It was rare for Lin Hui to hesitate like this, but at this moment, he truly paused, his eyes fixed on the text floating in the blood-red mark.

‘I’d better check the time required first.’

He clicked on the detailed information of the three evolution branches one by one.

‘1 – Clear Wind Sword Style Perfected Version.

Required Resources: One steel sword, one year of stored energy.

Required Time: One year.’

‘2 – Clear Wind Sword Style Purgatory Breath Version.

Required Resources: One steel sword, five years of stored energy.

Required Time: Five years.’

‘3 – Clear Wind Sword Style Arctic Whisper Version.

Required Resources: One steel sword, five years of stored energy.

Required Time: Five years.’

“As expected…” Lin Hui sighed inwardly. Looking at it this way, he basically had no choice but to pick the first one.

The other times were too long. Five years was simply too long. Aside from the Perfected Version, the cost-performance ratio of the other two routes was too low.

Without hesitation, he started by splitting the moves, evolving from the first stance of the Clear Wind Sword Style.

Since the end result would be the Perfected Version of the Clear Wind Sword Style anyway, evolving it piece by piece was more cost-effective.

‘Formless Wind Direction: Clear Wind First Stance Opening Move. Evolvable Branches: 1.’

‘1 – Boundless Wind Direction: Perfect Form of Formless Wind Direction.

Required Resources: One steel sword, five days of stored energy.

Required Time: Five days.’

Looking at the new prompt from the blood-red mark, Lin Hui felt much more comfortable.

Compared to when he first strengthened a single move of the Seven-Section Quick Sword, one move of the Clear Wind Sword Style now only required five days. This improvement was immense.

This was likely because his daily total energy capacity had increased, and simultaneously, the difficulty of comprehending and learning the Clear Wind Sword Style had decreased, reducing the time to just five days.

Moreover, with such a short time, he could flexibly pause the blood-red mark midway to temporarily evolve other things, which was much more convenient than evolving the entire Clear Wind Sword Style at once.

Immediately, he confirmed the start of the evolution without hesitation.

The blood-red text slowly blurred, then transformed into a countdown for the evolution of the first move, Formless Wind Direction.

After confirming, Lin Hui stopped looking at it and closed his eyes to rest.

But just as he closed his eyes, he heard the swishing sound of his master practicing the sword in the outer hall.

“Dad, are you going to sleep or not? Practicing sword this late at night?!”

Senior Sister Vivi’s voice drifted from outside, tinged with helplessness and a hint of anger.

“Soon, almost done, almost done!” Daoist Mingde’s somewhat excited voice could be faintly heard.

“…” Lin Hui was speechless.

He hadn’t expected his Perfected Version sword technique to impact his teacher so greatly—something the previous Seven-Section Quick Sword hadn’t done.

Closing his eyes, he pondered the reason while gradually drifting into sleep.

He slept until dawn.

Early the next morning, just as the mist cleared.

Lin Hui got up and quickly ate breakfast: a vegetable and meat flatbread made by Senior Sister Vivi. Then, carrying a water skin and other prepared items, he left his teacher’s house and went to the Clear Wind Taoist Temple’s rear ground for morning practice.

Xiaohu and Little Fatty also arrived at the rear ground at the same time. Seeing Lin Hui approach, they quickly bowed.

“Good morning, Senior Brother!”

“Good morning, Uncle Lin!”

“Good morning to you too. Today we continue practicing the Seven-Section Quick Sword from before.” Lin Hui patiently began guiding the two on the basic training methods again. After correcting them slightly, he proceeded to perform ten rounds of Body Tempering on his own. Then, he sheathed his sword and left the rear ground early, before Vivi and the other students arrived.

Today was the time he had already informed them about—going to the Mist Zone for cultivation.

Carrying his sword and a cloth backpack filled with prepared items, Lin Hui strode toward the path behind the temple.

Going straight through the small woods along the path, he soon arrived at the spot where he had previously visited and carved “I was here.”

Ahead was one of the entrances to the Mist Zone.

Just as Lin Hui was about to enter, he suddenly saw two figures, one tall and one short, standing not far away to the right in the woods, whispering in front of the mist.

They were an old woman and a young woman, seemingly a master-disciple pair going to the Mist Zone for experience.

This combination was actually quite common in the Mist Zone. Plus, since this was one of the relatively safer entrances in the surrounding area, many people came here to enter.

Lin Hui had encountered similar groups when he came scavenging before, so he wasn’t surprised to see them now.

Both were female. The older one had a hunched back and a face full of wrinkles, holding a refined iron black cane, exuding an impressive aura.

The younger one had a cold, stern face and exquisite features. She held a short knife in each hand and wore brown leather armor. Her legs were wrapped in tight black leather pants, and her lower abdomen was protected by silver-gray diamond-shaped skirt armor. Her equipment was quite complete—much more formal than the lightly dressed Lin Hui.

Lin Hui saw the two, and they naturally noticed him as well. Their gazes shifted and looked over.

Their eyes met briefly and then separated; neither side intended to communicate.

“Teacher, that person is entering the Mist Zone without even preparing armor. Such confidence suggests his strength must be extraordinary.”

“Or he could just be poor,” the old woman said abruptly. “Actually, there are quite a few ordinary martial artists who go into the Mist Zone to get rich. Especially recently, after our martial artists from Xingdao came to seize the market.”

“Alright, I’ve said what needs to be said. This time in, be careful of the several types of monsters I warned you about. Remember, your goal is to collect and hunt monster materials as much as possible. Materials are the most important proof for your assessment after returning to the family. This concerns your ranking in the family succession,” the old woman instructed.

“Yes,” the young woman nodded solemnly.

Swish.

Not far away, Lin Hui’s figure plunged into the mist. When the two women looked over again, he was gone.

Before long, the two also entered the Mist Zone from their position and disappeared.

---

Hiss!

In the gray mist, a giant eyeball with a mass of gray tentacles for legs rushed madly toward Lin Hui.

The giant eyeball was entirely dark red. Its thick corneal surface was stuck with a large amount of dark yellow secretion, much of which dripped down wetly like mucus.

The entire eyeball was the size of a human head, and with the tentacles growing underneath, it was nearly two meters tall. It ran silently and relatively fast.

Puff!

Getting close, the eyeball suddenly split open at the bottom, shooting out a jet of pitch-black, highly toxic mucus.

The mucus flew out like an arrow toward Lin Hui.

Even before contact, one could see the black mucus emitting wisps of white smoke and smelling incredibly foul.

‘Thousand-Legged Eyeball. Mainly attacks by spraying toxic mucus. It self-destructs the moment it is killed, covering a radius of three meters. The explosion splatters toxic liquid, which is extremely corrosive and must not be touched.‘

The teachings of his teacher Mingde naturally surfaced in Lin Hui’s mind.

This monster looked fragile, but its danger level was actually the highest among the four surrounding monster types.

‘Fortunately, although the danger is high, a black crystalline body inside the core of the Thousand-Legged Eyeball is very valuable. It is an important supplementary ingredient for concocting many tonics, worth one thousand to one thousand four hundred qian a piece.‘

In Tuyue, there were martial artists who were truly broke and came to hunt monsters to subsidize their household expenses. If efficiency was high enough, after deducting the consumption of Tranquility Incense, one could earn quite a bit by killing desperately for a day.

However, below the Internal Force Realm, the danger was still very high because, aside from internal force protection, other protective gear wasn’t very effective against Mist Zone monsters.

Especially against highly toxic monsters like the Thousand-Legged Eyeball.

Lin Hui watched the venom shooting from the eyeball and leaned slightly to the side, dodging it perfectly.

The venom splashed onto the ground behind him, instantly corroding a basin-sized pit in the gray-black mud and emitting a large amount of pungent toxic smoke.

‘Theoretically, with the Thousand-Legged Eyeball’s speed, attack, and defense, I previously needed at least dozens of breaths to circle around and find a flaw for a one-hit kill. But now…‘

Lin Hui raised his hand. The Clear River sword unsheathed silently, silver light flashing.

Chii!

His figure brought out a series of afterimages, instantly passing through the Thousand-Legged Eyeball and appearing behind it.

Immediately, with a puff, the entire body of the Thousand-Legged Eyeball stiffened in mid-air and swelled up violently, about to explode.

But this swelling didn’t last. Like a leaking balloon, splash, all the venom inside scattered onto the ground.

A black crystal the size of an adult’s fist rolled out from within.

Lin Hui flicked his sword tip, moving the crystal aside to roll out of the venom, and then picked it up using a prepared leather bag as a barrier to put it inside.

Carrying the bag, he continued deeper into the Mist Zone.

‘The power and speed of the Perfected Version of the Nine-Section Quick Sword are truly far, far superior to the ordinary version…‘ Lin Hui had used the Nine-Section Quick Sword against enemies before, but the blood-red mark hadn’t finished evolving then, so he couldn’t achieve this kind of decisive effect.

But now, only one sword strike was needed.

His movement and sword speed were already completely beyond the monster’s ability to react.

Having easily killed a Thousand-Legged Eyeball upon meeting it, his confidence surged. He quickened his pace and rapidly searched for wandering monsters in the surroundings.

This area was the territory of the Thousand-Legged Eyeballs. In a short while, the leather bag in Lin Hui’s hand held nearly thirty black crystalline bodies.

This meant fully thirty Thousand-Legged Eyeballs had died under his sword. And the Clear River sword, worthy of being a high-quality item gifted by his teacher, showed no signs of corrosion despite constantly being stained with toxic mucus. With just a gentle shake, the mucus was thrown off.

Dragging the leather bag weighing over twenty kilograms, Lin Hui first stored it in his teacher’s temporary wooden hut, then emptied the bag and continued hunting in the surroundings.

However, after encountering Thousand-Legged Eyeballs repeatedly, he had to expand his hunting range.

Because his purpose in coming here wasn’t to hunt for money, but to test where his limits lay.

Soon, after constantly expanding his circling range, an hour later, having continuously sent spoils back to pile up in the wooden hut, Lin Hui expanded his hunting circle again. Near the high-risk Yanshan area, he finally encountered a monster different from before—a strong, mutated Mist Barbarian.

In the gray mist.

By a dried-up stream, Lin Hui held his sword and watched the tall body slowly approaching in front of him, his expression turning solemn.

It was a strong humanoid monster, two and a half meters tall.

Its skin was gray-black, covered with a thick layer of black keratin resembling scales. Its upper body had four arms, each holding a crude spiked wooden club.

‘A variety I haven’t encountered before. A four-armed Mist Barbarian. Classified according to Harmless, Nuisance, Dangerous, and High-Risk… I don’t know what level this is. Maybe I can find some good materials…‘

Lin Hui cautiously observed the opponent’s movements.

(End of Chapter)