Feng Taisu stepped toward the man and grabbed him while holding the knife against his throat. He acted cautiously in case the assassin was faking his injuries. Turning him over, Feng Taisu tore off a strip of cloth from the man's robe and used it to tie his hands together. Then, he went over to the censer and picked it up. It didn't react at all, but after looking at it briefly he decided to keep it.
Looking over at the man, he noticed that he had a small bag strapped to his waste. He picked it up and took a look inside. There was a modest amount of money, enough to meet one's basic needs for a year or two. In addition to that, there were several discolored glass bottles and a plain black robe. If his guess was correct, some of these bottles contained various poisons and the antidotes for said poisons. After tossing the censer into the bag, he slung it over his shoulder.
Looking over the sorry state of the man, Feng Taisu felt pity for him. Although this man and his friends wanted to kill him and very nearly succeeded, he couldn't bring himself to finish the job when the guy was helpless to fight back. In his mind, it was better to leave him here and get away from this place. He figured he would be safe inside the Ning Clan, as nothing had ever happened to him there, aside from the constant bullying.
In fact, he suspected that the only reason he was attacked had something to do with his grandmother leaving for business recently and his own absence from the Ning Clan for a mission. This mission was a simple task involving gathering herbs from the Purple Forest, which surrounded the city his Ning Clan resided in: Purple Umbra City.
While performing this task, he had wandered further into the forest than he normally would. It wasn't supposed to be dangerous; the real dangers resided much deeper inside it. However, not long into his hunt for herbs, the three thugs ambushed him and severely injured him right off the bat. If they hadn't wanted to torment him, he would've already died. He also dropped the bag of herbs he had collected sometime during the chase. The timing of all of this was very suspicious, as bandits normally didn't frequent these parts. After all, Purple Umbra maintained a garrison strong enough to keep the surroundings clear of even large bandit gangs.
Feng Taisu suspected that the three were sent to kill him by someone. Who it was, he didn't know. To his knowledge, he hadn't offended anyone within or outside the clan. The Ning Taisu from before was very timid, and generally avoided stepping on people's toes. Even with his grandmother as clan leader, he didn't use that authority as a weapon. He thought, It seems that someone wants me dead, but the reason is unclear. Regardless, I should probably go back home. Although grandma won't be coming home soon, I'd better not risk to worrying her.
Feng Taisu bound the assassin with more cloth before leaving the clearing. Looking down at his torn and bloody robes, he decided to search for a stream where he could wash off. He also needed to recover his exhausted spiritual energy and ease the physical hunger eating at him.
After finding a stream that was a safe distance away from the clearing, the hunger and lack of spiritual energy almost overcame him. He quickly sat down in the lotus position to replenish his spiritual energy. After sitting down, though, Feng Taisu remembered that he had damaged his dantian. For some reason, the mysterious horn didn't heal it or his meridians. Frowning, he puzzled over how he was going to cultivate without being able to use either. Shaking his head, he decided to at least try to absorb spiritual energy from his surroundings. The worst thing that could happen was he simply wouldn't be able to absorb anything.
He took a deep breath and began to sense the energy around him. The Purple Forest had a decent amount of spiritual energy within it, which easily allowed cultivators and beasts to cultivate there. The density of energy would increase as one moved closer to the center of the forest, but even in the outskirts it was enough for low-ranking cultivators like Feng Taisu. There also weren't many dangerous beasts here, as they had been hunted down by mercenary groups and clans based in Purple Umbra City.
As Feng Taisu commenced his cultivation, his eyes lit up as he felt the abundance of spiritual energy around him. He began to breathe according to the low-ranking technique he acquired while training in the Ning Clan; three short breaths followed by one long breath. A small trickle of spiritual energy entered his body and made its way to where his dantian resided. However, once it reached that spot, it was like a bucket with holes. The small amount of spiritual energy simply washed over his dantian and escaped through his body back into the air around him. A faint, fragant scent enveloped the area—a product of the escaping energy.
As this sparse spiritual energy passed through his body, Feng Taisu was surprised to feel his cells reacting like sponges and greedily sucking up the spiritual energy. However, barely any was absorbed; the rest left his body through his pores. His hunger remained unchanged, causing him to feel somewhat lightheaded.
After this attempt at cultivation, he knew he wouldn't be able to replenish the spiritual energy within his body in a short amount of time. With this technique, he would be surprised if he recovered in a week. If it were before, he could spend only half an hour training to get all of his spiritual energy back. After all, his cultivation method was the lowest tier, as Ning Taisu was not able to advance past the 1st layer of Qi Gathering.
In the Ning Clan, once someone reaches the sixth layer of Qi Gathering, they will have an opportunity to test their inner energy and choose a suitable cultivation, or qi, method. The most talented individuals reach this level by the age of 12, and ones with average talent do so by 15. The strongest in Feng Taisu's generation was the 17 year old Ning Bai; he was at the 9th layer and was very close to the next great realm, Spirit Refining.
This Ning Bai was able to cultivate Qi using a water technique. This was especially beneficial for him since he had water-type inner energy. Because his grandfather was one of the elders of the Ning Clan and of the main bloodline, Ning Bai was able to cultivate a higher-level technique, a high-rank Mortal technique. Most disciples of the younger generation were only qualified to cultivate a low- or mid-rank Mortal technique.
Cultivation methods and spells were ranked in terms of power. The weakest was Mortal, followed by Earth. These ranks were further broken up into low, mid, and high quality. There was a higher rank, Heaven, but that level of technique was beyond the Ning Clan's ability to own.
The highest ranked technique the Ning Clan practiced was a high-level Earth technique. It was called Tiger's Flames of Fury, and the clan leader, Ning Taisu's grandmother, was the only one able to cultivate it. The other elders of the clan were only qualified to cultivate mid-rank Earth techniques, and even then, they had to break through the peak of Spirit Refining to do so. Before reaching that point, they could only cultivate low-rank Earth techniques or lower.
That being said, Feng Taisu's technique was nameless and barely qualified as low-rank Mortal. It was a simple qi absorbtion technique that allowed low level cultivators to gather qi without regard for the type. For anyone, it would be a disaster for them if they absorbed spiritual energy of a different type than their natural type. Thus, unless one had an obvious predisposition toward an element, they could only use generic techniques until their spiritual energy was dense enough to test for an element.
After trying to use this nameless technique and finding out that it was too slow to be of any real use, Feng Taisu was at a loss. If I can't absorb qi with this body, how am I supposed to cultivate? he lamented. The horn healed my injuries, but at the same time changed my body. And now my soul is clearly different with these memories from another life. I remember that after my body was healed, the soul fragment that belonged to Feng Taisu consumed the entire soul of Ning Taisu, and then was refined by the horn. My soul is much more powerful than it was previously.
Feng Taisu pondered for a bit longer before his eyes lit up. He muttered, "Perhaps the answer lies within the horn. With my soul like it is now, I should be able to use spiritual sense to check it out."
He focused his mind as he sat on the stream bank. The sounds of running water, splashing fish, and chirping birds flowed over him as he attempted to awaken his spiritual sense.
Before last night, he wouldn't have thought to try awakening his spiritual sense. After all, his soul was too weak to use it then. In general, one would have to reach the Spirit Refining stage to just barely use it. Prior to then, the soul was nowhere near strong enough.
As Ning Taisu, he had never used spiritual sense. However, as Feng Taisu, he had, so it shouldn't be too difficult for him to awaken it. After all, his soul was much more powerful after being refined by the horn. Feng Taisu took a deep breath and closed his eyes.
He knew that he needed to imagine himself seeing his surroundings without his eyes. His body shook as his soul trembled slightly. Within Feng Taisu's body, his soul was like an amorphous, red mass of light. Suddenly, a sliver of it bulged out, releasing an invisible force. He quickly locked onto this force with his mind and stretched it out toward the spot between his eyebrows.
This force pushed against his glabella, but there was a strange barrier there. It was like something was preventing anything from coming out of his body. Feng Taisu frowned and pulled more of the force out of his soul, gathering it up into a little blob in his head.
When he had a fist sized glob of the stuff, he willed it to push against his glabella again. The barrier gave a little but didn't break. Feng Taisu smiled, and he willed the glob to attack the barrier repeatedly. Although it didn't hurt, his body quivered as if a demon were trying to claw its way out.
After several attacks, the strange barrier bulged out and shattered like an eggshell, releasing a sharp ping. The invisible force briefly paused before flooding out from Feng Taisu's glabella and into his surroundings. After a moment, a fuzzy image of the surroundings filled his mind. He had succeeded!
