With every part of his post-natal meridians fully broken through, he is able to better navigate his blood essence all over his body and sets off to level seven.
“Next is to steer my blood essence in smooth circulation and further strengthen my meridians!”
Li Xing starts pushing the blood essence in his veins, letting it course through the dermal, muscular, sinewy, skeletal, marrowy and visceral meridians before sending it back to his veins, thus completing one full circulation of his blood essence. With each full circulation of the blood essence, he is able to improve his blood force to a higher level.
“When reaching level seven, I will be able to expand my meridians and make each circulation of my blood essence faster and smoother, “Li Xing recalls what he read from The Book of Ultimate Blood.
One’s ability to navigate his blood essence is decided by how many full circulations he can make in one breath. Usually, when someone in level six blood practicing manages to make more than two full blood essence circulations in one breath, he is considered to have reached level seven, and if he manages to make five circulations in one breath, he is considered to have completed level seven and is ready to enter level eight.
Due to the varied aptitudes of the cultivators, after completing level seven, some is only able to make five full circulations in one breath, but other more talented ones can achieve more than ten full circulations.
The faster one’s blood essence circulates, the more powerful and destructive his blood force is!
Most of the times, a cultivator is able to reach level seven after completing level six, so is Li Xing. Shortly after he broke all his post-natal meridians, he finds that he is able to make four full circulations of his blood essence in one breath.
“The Book of Ultimate Blood says that the faster one’s blood essence moves, the stronger he is and the easier for him to condense his blood essence during the eighth level! What’s more, in The Book of Ultimate Martial Art, starting from the sixth move, each is much more powerful that than the previous one – the lightning smashing, the lightning bombing, the lightning kill, the lightning flicking and the ultimate lightning strike. All of the five moves require the cultivator to have extremely stronger meridians. So the fasters my blood essence circulates, the more powerful I will be!”
With that thought, Li Xing strives to bring his blood essence into more circulations in one breath.
Li Xing keeps navigating his blood essence and decides against taking any break. For a regular level-seven brave warrior, he can usually make one hundred full circulations of his blood essence every day. If he moves his blood essence too many times, there is a possibility that he will end up damaging his post-natal meridians, practically defeating the purpose of practicing.
Therefore, it usually takes a regular cultivator a very long time to complete the seventh level of blood practicing because he has to accumulate tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of full blood essence circulations to move beyond this level.
But Li Xing is no ordinary cultivator. Although his meridians are damaged after he finishes one hundred full circulations of the blood essence, he is able to recover after a very short break and go back to practicing, thanks to the Bead of Nine Yangs.
Therefore, in only an hour, Li Xing has made eight hundred full circulations and finds that the movement of his blood essence is gradually getting faster. In this process, his meridians keep getting hurt and healed.
And it’s also the process for his post-natal meridians to regroup and expand and become larger and more resilient.
With the ever-expanding and toughened meridians, his blood essence is able to move much faster, carrying with it increasingly destructive power.
Ping! Ping! Ping!
Li Xing can even hear the sound of his blood essence rapidly coursing through his body, which gets faster by the minute.
Without doubt, the practicing process is very excruciating. Luckily, all of Li Xing’s past experiences have helped to improve his tolerance for pain and provided him with the ability to endure.
One the first day of level-seven practicing, Li Xing manages to make twenty thousand full circulations of his blood essence, which is two hundred times of what an ordinary cultivator can do in a day! And on the second day, he manages to do another thirty thousand full circulations.
And he has kept practicing for all the following days.
As one day passes one after another, Li Xing’s blood essence moves faster and faster, with his meridians growing and strengthening to an incredible level. Now he can pull off thirty full circulations in one breath!
Usually, only a brave warrior with level ten blood power is able to do that.
But a level-ten brave warrior is capable of much more, even reaching as many as one hundred full blood essence circulations in one breath, and Li Xing knows he is still far behind.
“According to what The Book of the Ultimate Martial Art says, if I can do over sixty full circulations in one breath, I will be able to practice and use all the ten lightning moves. I may as well keep practicing to reach sixty circulations! This way, I’ll have a better chance at staying alive in a dangerous situation.”
So Li Xing carries on with his practicing.
Another week passes.
As Li Xing keeps practicing, a bring light suddenly bursts from his body, as a huge circle of blood essence as thick as ten centimeters surrounds him with a blindingly blood red light and a buzzing sound in the air.
“Finally, I can do sixty full circulations!” Li Xing is excited to find that he has completed the seventh level of blood practicing! From level six to level seven, it only took him twenty days.
Now Li Xing can clearly sense that he has become more powerful. As he steers his blood essence and swings his hand in the air, there immediately follows a loud popping sound.
“I wonder how much my blood force is now. Ten dou, or twenty?” One dou equals ten thousand jin (five thousand kilos) and twenty dou equals two hundred thousand jin.
But since there is no blood ruler at hand, there is no way for Li Xing to know for sure.
As he only has three months, Li Xing hates to water any time, so he immediately starts the eighth level, which is condensing the blood essence!
After one completes level seven, his blood essence becomes denser, but in order to reach level nine, or the Congelation of Dan (the ability to congeal one’s blood essence at will), he still needs to further condense his blood essence to a certain high level, which is what the eighth level of blood practicing is all about.
The key to the eighth level is the ability to condense the blood essence at will, which requires much stronger meridians or else, one can easily fail and never be able to push through.
The ability to condense the blood essence varies among the cultivators, with some able to condense two times the amount of his normal blood essence, some able to condense three times, and others four times.
“Legend has it that someone managed to condense thirty times the amount of his normal blood essence and that person became an unconquerable master in Tianyuan Isle. I wonder which level I can reach.”
The higher level one reaches in the ability to condense his blood essence, the higher chance of him achieving the Condensation of Dan and the Congelation of Dan.
But every coin has two sides. If one condenses his blood essence excessively, he will risk losing control of his blood essence and once his blood essence ran rampant, his body would explode.
As Li Xing practices, the manhunt is underway in all the thirty-five towns and cities. However, no one has found any traces of Li Xing or even heard about him over the past ten days.
At the local marquis’s mansion, Wang Yang throws a furious kick at the servant kneeling in front of him, howling, “Useless! Why do I still keep you now that you have failed a simple task of founding a person in ten days?”
“Yang’er, keep your cool.” At the moment, a middle-aged man dressed in an embroidered robe and a jaded belt paces into the room. He is tall with broad shoulders, a narrow waist and looks fairly handsome.
Wang Yang immediately stands up and says respectfully, “Father!”
This man is Wang Zixing, one of the thirty-six local marquises, who controls thirty-five towns and cities and is also an on-site disciple of Qiyun Sect.
After sitting down, the man says, “That Li Xing is too insignificant to be worthy of so much trouble. Stop making such a big fuss about tracking him down.”
Wang Yang says with a grudge, “Father, I wouldn’t be able to get over it if I don’t kill that man.”
Wang Zixing says, “Wouldn’t it be easier to just wait for him to show up in three months? If he fails to show up, he would prove that he is a total coward and isn’t worth your trouble at all.”
His words make Wang Yang think clearly and after a moment of hesitation, he nods in agreement, “You’ve thought this through better than I did, Father. If Li Xing shows up again, I will definitely get rid of him in case he becomes an enemy, but if he is in hiding forever, I won’t need to waste my time on that loser.”
Wang Zixing nods with satisfaction, “Yang’er, you’ve grown up under my protection and haven’t experienced any setbacks all these years. Inevitably, you would become a bit reckless in dealing with issues. From now on, you must learn to think twice at all times about what’s worth doing and what’s not, so that you can get everything done in the simplest and most straightforward way possible.”
Wang Yang nods along before asking, “Father, do you think we need to teach Three Chivalries Garden a lesson?”
Wang Zixing responds, “I will leave it to you. They need to learn their lesson so that everyone in all the thirty-five towns and cities will know that no one can challenge the local marquis’s authority.” Narrowing his eyes, he continues, “You’d better keep paying close attention to that one issue recently.”
After being reminded, Wang Yang raises his eyebrows and says with a serious face, “Rest assured, Father. I’ve already put up an army by mobilizing enough manpower in all the thirty-five areas. We’re ready to take action at any time.”
Wang Yang nods, saying, “We have to keep other sects in the dark and do it secretly.”
Wang Yang gives an assuring smile, “Actually, I’ve been secretly planning for that important matter in the pretense of tracking Li Xing down. If I used to fail you in small ways, I would never disappoint you on anything important!”
Wang Yang laughs and says, “Good!”
Meanwhile, in Three Chivalries Garden, the sons of three families are holding a get-together.
Attending this small event are Li Jie, Li Jue, Li Fei, Li Zheng and Chen Xia, among others who all sit in a pavilion surrounded by a beautiful man-made lake.
Li Jie snorts, “Looks like that Li Xing has bolted, just like I thought he would. A man like him would never be bold enough to steal women from the prince.”
Li Fei follows laughingly, “I believe Li Xing must have fled far, far away from the thirty-five towns and cities controlled by Wang Zixing.”
Li Zheng vents his grudge by saying, “Wang Yang has mobilized all the manpower in the thirty-five areas to hunt Li Xing down. He must really be furious.”
“Unfortunately, Three Chivalries Garden has been dragged into this,” Li Fei spits out angrily. “And what’s the matter with Chen Xue and Chen Shuang? How could both of them like that loser…” His voice is somehow automatically lowered with that “loser” comment as he realizes that Li Xing can no longer be characterized as one.
With every part of his post-natal meridians fully broken through, he is able to better navigate his blood essence all over his body and sets off to level seven.
“Next is to steer my blood essence in smooth circulation and further strengthen my meridians!”
Li Xing starts pushing the blood essence in his veins, letting it course through the dermal, muscular, sinewy, skeletal, marrowy and visceral meridians before sending it back to his veins, thus completing one full circulation of his blood essence. With each full circulation of the blood essence, he is able to improve his blood force to a higher level.
“When reaching level seven, I will be able to expand my meridians and make each circulation of my blood essence faster and smoother, “Li Xing recalls what he read from The Book of Ultimate Blood.
One’s ability to navigate his blood essence is decided by how many full circulations he can make in one breath. Usually, when someone in level six blood practicing manages to make more than two full blood essence circulations in one breath, he is considered to have reached level seven, and if he manages to make five circulations in one breath, he is considered to have completed level seven and is ready to enter level eight.
Due to the varied aptitudes of the cultivators, after completing level seven, some is only able to make five full circulations in one breath, but other more talented ones can achieve more than ten full circulations.
The faster one’s blood essence circulates, the more powerful and destructive his blood force is!
Most of the times, a cultivator is able to reach level seven after completing level six, so is Li Xing. Shortly after he broke all his post-natal meridians, he finds that he is able to make four full circulations of his blood essence in one breath.
“The Book of Ultimate Blood says that the faster one’s blood essence moves, the stronger he is and the easier for him to condense his blood essence during the eighth level! What’s more, in The Book of Ultimate Martial Art, starting from the sixth move, each is much more powerful that than the previous one – the lightning smashing, the lightning bombing, the lightning kill, the lightning flicking and the ultimate lightning strike. All of the five moves require the cultivator to have extremely stronger meridians. So the fasters my blood essence circulates, the more powerful I will be!”
With that thought, Li Xing strives to bring his blood essence into more circulations in one breath.
Li Xing keeps navigating his blood essence and decides against taking any break. For a regular level-seven brave warrior, he can usually make one hundred full circulations of his blood essence every day. If he moves his blood essence too many times, there is a possibility that he will end up damaging his post-natal meridians, practically defeating the purpose of practicing.
Therefore, it usually takes a regular cultivator a very long time to complete the seventh level of blood practicing because he has to accumulate tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands of full blood essence circulations to move beyond this level.
But Li Xing is no ordinary cultivator. Although his meridians are damaged after he finishes one hundred full circulations of the blood essence, he is able to recover after a very short break and go back to practicing, thanks to the Bead of Nine Yangs.
Therefore, in only an hour, Li Xing has made eight hundred full circulations and finds that the movement of his blood essence is gradually getting faster. In this process, his meridians keep getting hurt and healed.
And it’s also the process for his post-natal meridians to regroup and expand and become larger and more resilient.
With the ever-expanding and toughened meridians, his blood essence is able to move much faster, carrying with it increasingly destructive power.
Ping! Ping! Ping!
Li Xing can even hear the sound of his blood essence rapidly coursing through his body, which gets faster by the minute.
Without doubt, the practicing process is very excruciating. Luckily, all of Li Xing’s past experiences have helped to improve his tolerance for pain and provided him with the ability to endure.
One the first day of level-seven practicing, Li Xing manages to make twenty thousand full circulations of his blood essence, which is two hundred times of what an ordinary cultivator can do in a day! And on the second day, he manages to do another thirty thousand full circulations.
And he has kept practicing for all the following days.
As one day passes one after another, Li Xing’s blood essence moves faster and faster, with his meridians growing and strengthening to an incredible level. Now he can pull off thirty full circulations in one breath!
Usually, only a brave warrior with level ten blood power is able to do that.
But a level-ten brave warrior is capable of much more, even reaching as many as one hundred full blood essence circulations in one breath, and Li Xing knows he is still far behind.
“According to what The Book of the Ultimate Martial Art says, if I can do over sixty full circulations in one breath, I will be able to practice and use all the ten lightning moves. I may as well keep practicing to reach sixty circulations! This way, I’ll have a better chance at staying alive in a dangerous situation.”
So Li Xing carries on with his practicing.
Another week passes.
As Li Xing keeps practicing, a bring light suddenly bursts from his body, as a huge circle of blood essence as thick as ten centimeters surrounds him with a blindingly blood red light and a buzzing sound in the air.
“Finally, I can do sixty full circulations!” Li Xing is excited to find that he has completed the seventh level of blood practicing! From level six to level seven, it only took him twenty days.
Now Li Xing can clearly sense that he has become more powerful. As he steers his blood essence and swings his hand in the air, there immediately follows a loud popping sound.
“I wonder how much my blood force is now. Ten dou, or twenty?” One dou equals ten thousand jin (five thousand kilos) and twenty dou equals two hundred thousand jin.
But since there is no blood ruler at hand, there is no way for Li Xing to know for sure.
As he only has three months, Li Xing hates to water any time, so he immediately starts the eighth level, which is condensing the blood essence!
After one completes level seven, his blood essence becomes denser, but in order to reach level nine, or the Congelation of Dan (the ability to congeal one’s blood essence at will), he still needs to further condense his blood essence to a certain high level, which is what the eighth level of blood practicing is all about.
The key to the eighth level is the ability to condense the blood essence at will, which requires much stronger meridians or else, one can easily fail and never be able to push through.
The ability to condense the blood essence varies among the cultivators, with some able to condense two times the amount of his normal blood essence, some able to condense three times, and others four times.
“Legend has it that someone managed to condense thirty times the amount of his normal blood essence and that person became an unconquerable master in Tianyuan Isle. I wonder which level I can reach.”
The higher level one reaches in the ability to condense his blood essence, the higher chance of him achieving the Condensation of Dan and the Congelation of Dan.
But every coin has two sides. If one condenses his blood essence excessively, he will risk losing control of his blood essence and once his blood essence ran rampant, his body would explode.
As Li Xing practices, the manhunt is underway in all the thirty-five towns and cities. However, no one has found any traces of Li Xing or even heard about him over the past ten days.
At the local marquis’s mansion, Wang Yang throws a furious kick at the servant kneeling in front of him, howling, “Useless! Why do I still keep you now that you have failed a simple task of founding a person in ten days?”
“Yang’er, keep your cool.” At the moment, a middle-aged man dressed in an embroidered robe and a jaded belt paces into the room. He is tall with broad shoulders, a narrow waist and looks fairly handsome.
Wang Yang immediately stands up and says respectfully, “Father!”
This man is Wang Zixing, one of the thirty-six local marquises, who controls thirty-five towns and cities and is also an on-site disciple of Qiyun Sect.
After sitting down, the man says, “That Li Xing is too insignificant to be worthy of so much trouble. Stop making such a big fuss about tracking him down.”
Wang Yang says with a grudge, “Father, I wouldn’t be able to get over it if I don’t kill that man.”
Wang Zixing says, “Wouldn’t it be easier to just wait for him to show up in three months? If he fails to show up, he would prove that he is a total coward and isn’t worth your trouble at all.”
His words make Wang Yang think clearly and after a moment of hesitation, he nods in agreement, “You’ve thought this through better than I did, Father. If Li Xing shows up again, I will definitely get rid of him in case he becomes an enemy, but if he is in hiding forever, I won’t need to waste my time on that loser.”
Wang Zixing nods with satisfaction, “Yang’er, you’ve grown up under my protection and haven’t experienced any setbacks all these years. Inevitably, you would become a bit reckless in dealing with issues. From now on, you must learn to think twice at all times about what’s worth doing and what’s not, so that you can get everything done in the simplest and most straightforward way possible.”
Wang Yang nods along before asking, “Father, do you think we need to teach Three Chivalries Garden a lesson?”
Wang Zixing responds, “I will leave it to you. They need to learn their lesson so that everyone in all the thirty-five towns and cities will know that no one can challenge the local marquis’s authority.” Narrowing his eyes, he continues, “You’d better keep paying close attention to that one issue recently.”
After being reminded, Wang Yang raises his eyebrows and says with a serious face, “Rest assured, Father. I’ve already put up an army by mobilizing enough manpower in all the thirty-five areas. We’re ready to take action at any time.”
Wang Yang nods, saying, “We have to keep other sects in the dark and do it secretly.”
Wang Yang gives an assuring smile, “Actually, I’ve been secretly planning for that important matter in the pretense of tracking Li Xing down. If I used to fail you in small ways, I would never disappoint you on anything important!”
Wang Yang laughs and says, “Good!”
Meanwhile, in Three Chivalries Garden, the sons of three families are holding a get-together.
Attending this small event are Li Jie, Li Jue, Li Fei, Li Zheng and Chen Xia, among others who all sit in a pavilion surrounded by a beautiful man-made lake.
Li Jie snorts, “Looks like that Li Xing has bolted, just like I thought he would. A man like him would never be bold enough to steal women from the prince.”
Li Fei follows laughingly, “I believe Li Xing must have fled far, far away from the thirty-five towns and cities controlled by Wang Zixing.”
Li Zheng vents his grudge by saying, “Wang Yang has mobilized all the manpower in the thirty-five areas to hunt Li Xing down. He must really be furious.”
“Unfortunately, Three Chivalries Garden has been dragged into this,” Li Fei spits out angrily. “And what’s the matter with Chen Xue and Chen Shuang? How could both of them like that loser…” His voice is somehow automatically lowered with that “loser” comment as he realizes that Li Xing can no longer be characterized as one.
