Chapter 272 – Devil arts power technique
Ye Xiwen’s inner state was naturally not going to be same after the crazy absorption spree.
Slowly, Ye Xiwen’s aura began to transform from that of a soldier to a general then to a king, emperor and moving closer to that of a sophist.
This was a natural outcome since he was absorbing the knowledge of a lot of people, for example, unrivaled profound scholars, Zen Buddhists, Taoist experts etc. All of them with distinct features and expertise in various fields and since each of them had reached the heavenly level of understanding in their respective fields of expertise, Ye Xiwen had to benefit accordingly by gaining essences of miscellaneous knowledge. He was just like a gluttonous person who was using mysterious space to devour knowledge and gaining from that.
He was slowly approaching the level of understanding of a sophist.
He was very much enjoying this whole mass study session. He was slowly walking inside while reading all the books in his path. He would sometimes come across two very different perspectives to the same idea, then, he would sit cross-legged on the ground to ponder about the newly obtained contradicting ideas to find out the correct one.
For example, life or death, which one is eternal? One must plan ahead for unforeseen problems or one should not give in to groundless fears, which one is correct? There were a lot of confusing and contradictory concepts in this world and Ye Xiwen needed to choose which perspective he wanted to follow.
(NT: wèi yǔchóu móu – before it rains, bind around with silk (idiom, from Book of Songs 詩經|诗经); to plan ahead; to prepare for a rainy day
Qǐ rén yōu tiān – man of Qǐfears the sky falling (idiom); groundless fears)
“Who is this insolent person that dares to peep at my kingdom?!” As soon as Ye Xiwen sent his soul search into a royal Dao book, suddenly, a huge ghostly figure emerged from it. It looked like the ghost of a majestic emperor. Ye Xiwen could see traces of uprightness and elegance, however, its cold eyes were glaring at him.
Ye Xiwen noticed from the author’s name inscribed on the book that the author used to be a great emperor of some ancient dynasty that ruled Great Yue State in the past. So, the ghostly figure apparently belonged to that emperor.
“A mere book demon like you thinks of himself as the master of this book’s world? I suggest you open your eyes and see that your book is in my hand. The source of your very existence is in my grasp. I guess that should be enough to tell who is the boss here.” Ye Xiwen sneered and said.
After surviving the baptism of the Demon Emperor’s imposing aura, now the imposing aura of no other emperor could have any effect on Ye Xiwen.
“How dare you!” The ghostly figure shouted and flew towards Ye Xiwen. It suddenly used royal fist technique to throw consecutive punches at him, summoning forth a tornado of enormous and powerful dragon qi.
The emperor must have been at a profound realm when he was alive, no wonder his ghost was so powerful in the form of a small book demon.
According to the history records, the Great Yue State had reached the peak of governance and dominance and had also become a well-known country among the ten countries of the southeast region when he was the emperor of this country.
His theory of governance was so popular that it was recorded, based on his personal notes, as rules to be followed by the other rulers in the course of history.
After a lapse of innumerable years, Yi Yuan School collected the notes and stored it up in this library in the form of a book.
This book demon’s power was clearly above truth ninth peak level, perhaps reaching Complete Truth realm.
(NT: truth ninth stage<truth ninth peak<Complete Truth<half-step legendary<legendary first stage)
“Well, aren’t you an ungrateful one.” Ye Xiwen snorted as his hand transformed into a dragon claw and went forward to grasp the tornado. He directly caught the tornado and routed it like it was nothing.
“How is this possible? Who are you are?” The book demon couldn’t believe what he just saw. His most powerful attack was easily caught and crushed by Ye Xiwen. He screamed like a scaredy cat and immediately tried to return to the book.
A book demon was in the end just a book demon, he could never transform into a true emperor he used to be.
Ye Xiwen thought of something then caught the fleeing book demon and instantly annihilated it before it could hide inside his book.
After destroying the book demon, Ye Xiwen moved towards the next book. He did not need to consume that book demon’s body as he had already absorbed the book’s essence with the help of mysterious space.
Ye Xiwen tossed that book demon’s leftover consciousness over to the little book demon who was showing him around. And suddenly, the little book demon’s cultivation level rose from truth first stage to truth fifth stage after assimilating the essence of knowledge from that dead emperor’s book demon. His timid appearance was abruptly replaced by the domineering appearance of an emperor as soon as he absorbed the majestic essence of the dead emperor’s notebook.
The little book demon was surprised but he immediately recollected himself then cupped his hands and respectfully said: “Thank you, brother.”
Ye Xiwen did not say anything in reply and continued to walk forward.
Ye Xiwen seemed like just taking a walk but was simultaneously devouring entire bookshelf worth of books at a time.
Days passed one by one and in a blink of an eye, three months had passed already.
Ye Xiwen stayed in the library for a full three months and nearly read half of the books. His reading capacity had extended to outstanding proportions. Even his cultivation level had also reached a higher level than before.
On the way, Ye Xiwen also encountered several book demons that attacked him. He never took the initiative to attack any of them because his motive was just to obtain knowledge, possibly without getting involved in a meaningless slaughter.
However, not all book demons understood his motive and considered him as an intruder. They had spent hundreds of thousands of years in those books and now considered this library as their home. Many of them were naïve and did not know that there was actually another world outside this one. Thus, whenever Ye Xiwen used soul search on their books, they did not consider it polite and basically felt like being attacked. Hence, they also attacked him and were mercilessly butchered as a result of that. Thanks to this pattern, the little book demon benefited a lot by absorbing the essence of fallen book demons and eventually reached the peak of truth ninth stage. Now, most of the times when book demons tried to attack Ye Xiwen, he would willingly step in to deal with them so that there was no longer a need for Ye Xiwen to personally act.
Ye Xiwen noticed that this world of books was predominantly run by the law of the jungle and driven by instincts of the book demons. He also noticed the little book demon was very grateful to him for indirectly helping him in leveling up. He would never get to know that Ye Xiwen did it on purpose. Ye Xiwen had gained exotic and ancient wisdom and knew the importance of having powerful pawns to be manipulated at will.
However, the good thing was that Ye Xiwen was not corrupted by excessive wisdom and power as he had consumed all sorts of knowledge, including both the advantages of evil ideas and importance of peaceful concepts of kindness and compassion. Hence, in the end, he was fairly balanced on the brim of equilibrium between good and bad, and could use knowledge from both sides to his advantage.
As Ye Xiwen continued to proceed further into the depths of this small world, he discovered something that he never thought to find them in Yi Yuan School’s library. Yes, he found books on devil arts, several secret devil books on devil power techniques. There was a huge section of the library that was fully dedicated to devil books and had basically turned into a territory, ruled by book devils.
“Jie Jie, a human has intruded into our territory, Jie Jie, he is really bold.”
“Listen everyone we are going to devour that human’s flesh and blood. He looks strong so our cultivation should have an incredible progress.”
“Kill him!”
Ye Xiwen listened to what they said and felt as if he had really walked into the territory of devils. However, they were just the book demons derived from books on devil power techniques. Of course, they did not look like other book demons as they had taken the form of real-life devils. Hence, people called them book devils.
They regarded themselves as true devils.
Fortunately or unfortunately, these book devils took birth in the devil books and had stayed in this small world throughout their lives. So, their behavior was kind of understandable considering their inherent urge for violence, supremacy, and territorial dominance.
“Brother, you have done enough for me. Now, let me deal with them and contribute a little towards returning the favor.” The little book demon said with respect. He had already started acting as a little brother to Ye Xiwen and looked up to him. Not to mention, his cultivation right now was higher than that of Ye Xiwen.
The little book demon’s battle efficiency had also reached a tyrannical level by absorbing the essences of several book demons.
He dashed forward at a lightning speed and instantly barged into the formation of devil soldiers. Although there were a lot of devils in the devil army, most of them were weak and very few were formidable enough to sustain his attacks.
The book devils did not stand a chance against him as he had not just leveled up in the last three months. By absorbing the essence of mighty warriors and legendary people, he himself had come to possess an extremely domineering and aggressive imposing aura. Not to mention, his fighting style was elegant and efficient, unlike those devils.
“Die devils!” The little book demon shouted and released a flood of terrifying Zhen Yuan that wiped out most devil soldiers in one fell swoop then absorbed their essences.
“Who dares to run wild in our territory? No one messes with devil race!” At this time, a book devil of truth ninth peak suddenly appeared from nowhere and rushed towards the little book demon. He had a huge troll-like figure and seemed like a real devil.
The two sides indulged in a violent battle and complementary waves swept out in all directions.
Ye Xiwen immediately safeguarded the devil books he wanted to study and saved them from the aftermath of the battle. He sat down cross-legged and began to scan devil power techniques and analyze them in the mysterious space.
Although devil race was infamous for terrorizing all of the ten thousand worlds, the power techniques developed by them were certainly one of the best. Ye Xiwen had been using devil wings and knew that there were a lot of other awesome devil power technique he should check out.
An ordinary expert might have to consider whether to practice devil arts or not, after all, it had a very bad reputation in the world and there were chances of self-harm if not practiced properly, but Ye Xiwen did not need to face any of such issues.
He had a favorable impression of devil power technique, in fact, devil wings repeatedly saved his life several times in the past!
Ye Xiwen believed that as long as he could make good use of a technique, the source of its origin did not matter. Not to mention, he could always get rid of the bad and retain the good elements of any technique with the help of mysterious space!