Chapter 83: Swordlight
A paw came swiping down which forced Xu Min to retreat further back while another beast came jumping at him from the back. Holding the sword in his hands, Xu Min was not in a position to wait. He jumped forward, but just at that moment, he felt a beast land on his back as teeth and claws sunk into his body. Fortunately, he managed to throw off the beast with a burst of his internal energy.
While one beast attacked, the others were not idly looking on; instead, they tried to get behind Xu Min to attack his back as well. Xu Min had switched out the bow in his hand for his large sword. Apparently, these beasts were not dumb. Upon seeing this massive sword, they understood that attacking from the front was most likely going to get them killed.
Blood was streaming down Xu Min's back.Even so, he did not feel hopeless as he constantly turned around trying to face the beasts.
Taking one step forward, Xu Min caught his breath before he lifted the sword in his hands and roared loudly. Jumping forward at his highest speed, he slashed down his sword.
Although his sword was capable of absorbing the energy of beasts and humans, beasts were considered external practitioners. They were incapable of using stances. Thus all their internal energy roamed within their bodies. Xu Min needed to cut through them to absorb their energy.
His attack was lightning swift. Although the beasts were fast, they were no match for Xu Min's speed. He managed to successfully deliver a killing blow to the smallest of the beasts before he once more jumped forward to avoid leaving his back vulnerable to the other beasts who were pouncing at him.
Sighing, Xu Min was unsure of what to do. No matter where he moved, the remaining four beasts were capable of attacking him. The fight would only get worse as time went on. He had to constantly clad his entire body in Qi to protect it from the hard claws and teeth that grabbed onto him time and time again.
Xu Min stumbled forward as he sensed two beasts jumping at him. A small grunt escaped his lips as he once more steadied himself by taking one step in front of him. Once more, the Qi within his body erupted and burst forward like an energy ripple, forcing the beasts to withdraw as they were hit. He turned around and noticed the red eyes of the beasts pool up with bloodlust; their entire beings were clearly ready to rip Xu Min to pieces. Nevertheless, Xu Min was not willing to let them.
Xu Min swung his sword around, making a pattern in front of him that looked like the number eight. As his sword moved through the air, it started humming. The blade that was originally covered in blood from a beast he cleaved in half started to shine brilliantly.
"I am not going to be beaten by something as annoying as you guys!" Xu Min growled. Jumping towards the beasts, he completely disregarded his own safety. He opened his mind, allowing himself to become one with the world once more. He could feel every single movement made by these beasts, now avoiding them was easy. He started pouring the Qi within his body into his sword. With a swipe, a sword light appeared and shot into the head of one of the beasts, causing its head to explode as it slumped to the ground.
Xu Min no longer held back. Although he could become one with the world around him, he did not wish to fully rely on this ability. He understood that these trials within the Blood Pagoda truly required him to use his every ability in every situation.
Only now did Xu Min understand his true mishap with this battle. Starting battling with the bow had put him at a disadvantage. Although he had managed to understand and learn the abilities of the elf he had absorbed, he was not used to fighting with the elf’s abilities. If he had started with his sword in his hands, he would have finished the fight already.
"No use in regretting now," he mumbled to himself. He once more swung out his sword. This time he managed to decapitate one of the beasts. His sword was constantly gaining momentum as he kept swinging it in a specific pattern. He would faint weaknesses when he advanced and wait for the beasts to attack. Then he would dodge and use this opening to behead the beasts.
Another beast soon succumbed, and after Xu Min switched to his sword and used his ability to become one with the world. The battle became one-sided once more, and when the final beast was killed, Xu Min instantly sat on the ground.
He did not enter cultivation but instead started to think about the mistakes he had committed in the previous fight while also urging his internal energy to heal his wounds.
"Although I managed to learn every ability from the elf and can use them as were they my own, my body is not used to using these attacks; my attack patterns are not used to fighting like this. By trying to force a style I am not used to, I put myself in an unfavorable position, a position where I even got injured." Xu Min mumbled to himself.
"Although I can make use of these memories and the abilities they grant me, I need time to work on them. I should not have been in such a rush. I should slowly and fully understand and perfect these attacks. It is not often I have as good a possibility as I do now, being in the Blood Pagoda and all, so I should really use the time wisely."
"The elf gave me all his memories, and amongst these memories were not only the ability to use bow and arrows but also external martial arts. I have never heard about sword attacks like these before. I only heard about stances, so to be able to practice these, my ability should rise dramatically."
Nodding his head, Xu Min felt excitement deep within. He had to calm himself before he managed to sit down and enter a meditative trance, allowing for his internal energy to once more reach the peak condition and his wounds to heal.
He was seated down with his legs crossed with his sword lying on his lap. A few hours went by before he finally opened his eyes once more and stood up. The previously serious wounds on his back had almost vanished, and the internal energy he had used in the battle had all been restored.
Xu Min flicked his hand, and a bow appeared in his grasp. With another flick of his hand, Qi left his body and took the shape of an arrow, after which Xu Min started training his archery. He would keep shooting at specific targets. Though his aim was accurate at the start, he soon found that it was not easy for him to get used to the bow and arrows.
The bow needed a firm but gentle hand, and it was completely different from his usual experiments with the sword. Nonetheless, soon he became more and more proficient in using the bow. His hands became swifter and swifter in their ability to shoot out one arrow after another.
Although he was becoming much better at using bow and arrow, Xu Min was not satisfied until he felt that the bow had become an extension of his hand. He ended up spending a full three days before he was satisfied.
In these three days, he had not rested unless he had used up all the energy in his body to create Qi arrows and could only continue his training by taking a moment to recuperate.
After finally feeling perfectly in tune with the bow, Xu Min stood up once more and looked at the sword in his hand. This sword had been with him for a long time, and he was thankful that it had been by his side through all this time. It had saved his life more than once.
This sword had many secrets that Xu Min could not know. Even so, he felt that it had become a companion of his, and he felt invincible when he wielded it.
Lifting the sword above his head, Xu Min closed his eyes and allowed for his own Qi to enter the sword. Following the memories from the elf, he used the Qi to create one sword light after another, which shot out from the sword and entered the walls, the ground, and the barrier around the platform Xu Min was standing on. It was clear that these points of impact had been demolished.
However, as soon as they had been broken, they strangely enough repaired themselves as soon as the chips had been broken off the wall and the floor. Seconds after, it seemed as though none of the destruction had ever taken place.
"Humph, a mortal like you managed to break the ground in this Blood Pagoda?" The formless voice once more appeared. This time sounding slightly startled; nonetheless, Xu Min knew that his performance was not something outstanding. It was just that the voice had severely underestimated him for being a human cultivator.
"I never expected to break the floor, senior," Xu Min said humbly and honestly. His response caused the formless voice to let go of another snort, but he said nothing more. The Blood Pagoda once more descended into silence. Xu Min then focused on the new martial arts attacks that he had learned from the elf.
The first attack was the sword light attack he had just used. What it did was infuse the Qi from his body into the sword and then launch an attack. The Qi would connect both sword and energy and make a beam of light as sharp as his sword at point-blank range that could be used to attack from a distance. The speed with which the sword light shot out was outstandingly swift, and one needed to be very fast to avoid it. Looking at this sword light, Xu Min guessed that at least a five or six-star Warrior would have no way of avoiding it completely when it was launched.
Xu Min worked on this attack for a full week before he could control the sword light a hundred percent. The more he trained, the more his Qi took on a sword-like quality. Soon he could even dispatch a sword light without the needing to combine it with his sword.
Having perfected this attack, he once more sat down on the ground and started meditating and reconnecting with the memories of the elf he had absorbed. The elf's memories were filled with many beautiful scenes. The world they had lived in had been so beautiful and fertile; forests were all over, and within these dense forests cities were built into mountainsides, in the depths of valleys, and even a few were situated underground.
Although Xu Min was amazed by these beautiful scenes and his heart felt a strange tranquility while thinking about it, he forced himself to continue through the memories until he reached the memories concerning the elf’s martial arts. He had to ensure that he became strong enough to manage the next many experts he was to meet within this Blood Pagoda. If he could reach the five-star Warrior rank, then he would become a lot closer to his goal of revenge, enabling him to protect himself in the remainder of the Immortal Valley Ranking.
Examining the martial art memories, Xu Min found another martial art skill named the ‘Crescent Moon Cut.’ This was a skill that could only be used at night. It borrowed the power of the moon to generate energy that could enter the sword and enhance its power significantly. Coupled with this Crescent Moon Cut was the Rising Sun Slash, an attack which was very similar and borrowed power from the sun. However, these two attacks both required either the sun or the moon, and currently, Xu Min was within the Blood Pagoda, so he could not use either of them. Instead, he kept scouring through the memories until he finally found something useful.
"This is good," his entire face lit up in excitement, "exactly what I needed; this Devouring World goes perfectly with my sword!"