Chapter 9: Refined Blood

12th collected the scales that were scattered around and put them into the Hidden Fu Bag in bundles of ten. The scales were of varying sizes, and even the position on the body they came from affected its uses. For now there was no need to categorize them carefully; he only needed to collect them and put them into the Hidden Fu Bag.

He approached Luo Jie’s side and asked, “Master, what are we going to look at?”

Luo Jie excitedly explained, “We’re going to look at the Earth Dragon’s heart, haha, it’s one of the best materials for creating an Innate Fu Book. Let’s get closer……” He didn’t care at all about getting dirty so he followed Qi Nan Shan and made his way into the Earth Dragon’s torso.

12th followed suit as well.

The Earth Dragon’s belly had a strong smell of blood but it didn’t stink. The three of them went inside the opening that was made, , some of the parts needed to be forced through and because 12th had the smallest body he had to occasionally steady his Master. Luckily the Earth Dragon’s insides were very soft so it wouldn’t hurt if they accidentally tripped.

After about twenty minutes they reached the Earth Dragon’s heart area. There were countless long, thin blood vessels feeding into the heart. Fixed in the middle of the chest was a heart as big as car from his past life.

Luo Jie wiped his face, staring at that enormous heart he said, “Good job Nan Shan, make an incision in the aorta, haha, I have a feeling that there’s still some blood left in there, we might even be able to extract some refined blood, that stuff is incredibly useful.”

Once again, using the 16 Fu Purification Technique, Luo Jie extracted 27 drops of refined blood. Even though the Earth Dragon was so big he could only extract 27 drops of refined blood, however, each of these drops were about the size of an egg, like a piece of ruby. The amazing thing was that these drops of blood were not liquid, but instead were solid.

Luo Jie held a drop of refined blood and gave it to 12th, “Eat it!” he said.

12th took the ruby-like refined blood, inspected it a little and asked, “Master……. is this edible?”

Qi Nan Shan laughed and said, “That’s good stuff! It’s a shame I’m too old so can’t absorb it properly, but you 12th, you’re lucky, if you eat this you can rapidly enhance your body, it’s the equivalent to using Light Fu to enhance your strength except you rarely find something like this anymore.”

12th swallowed it whole without hesitation. It felt like he was swallowing an entire block of ice, chilling as it slid down his throat.

After waiting a while, 12th asked, “It had no effect?”

Luo Jie laughed and said, “What did you expect? That drop of refined blood will be absorbed slowly, did you think that as soon as you ate it you would be as strong as Nan Shan?”

12th laughed bitterly, he knew that he had misunderstood, so he said, “Master, could you give me four more drops of the refined blood?”

Luo Jie asked, “Why do you want so much refined blood? Given your age and body type you can only absorb one drop, there’s no point in giving you more.”

12th laughed and said, “Master, I still have four companions, haha, I wanted to give them each one too.”

Luo Jie and Qi Nan Shan shared a glance, with Qi Nan Shan agreeing, “Huh, commendable, not forgetting one’s own friends and companions at a time like this. Come on Elder, give him the four drops.”

Luo Jie reluctantly agreed. “Unbelievable……. haha, oh well, it’s good that 12th has such a kind personality. Give it to them discreetly; refined blood is only effective on children…… it’s a shame really, this type of refined blood is an essential ingredient in creating Spirit Fu.” he said as he gave 12th the four drops of refined blood.

12th happily thanked his Master and while carefully storing the precious refined blood, he asked, “Master, what about the heart? Are we going to cut it up and eat it?”

Luo Jie gave a hearty laugh, “Good joke, if we ate this heart, we’d probably be cussed to death by anybody who knew about it. This is an Earth Dragon’s heart, the best Natural Fu Heart, how could we do something like that? I am a Great FuZhou Master……. 12th, wait a while, I’ll quickly turn this heart into a Fu Heart, haha.”

12th muttered, “Too bad, I bet this heart tastes really good as well.”

Luo Jie pretended not to hear that and prepared a large bottle containing roughly 300 jin’s worth of Purifying Liquid. Giving it to Qi Nan Shan, he said, “Insert this into the heart.” He explained why to 12th, saying, “Using this we can wash the Earth Dragon’s heart and get rid of any waste substances! This is one of the benefits of being a FuZhou Warrior, for other people, even if they found such a precious heart they wouldn’t know what to do with it and would probably have done what you were thinking and ate it.”

As the Purifying Liquid entered the heart  large amounts of waste liquid followed the blood vessels and flowed out of the heart, the gigantic heart began to shrink; one after the other the blood vessels started to snap off. After being washed by the Purifying Liquid, the heart shrank to half its original size.

Luo Jie exhaled his Innate Fu Book; the Fu rose from the Innate Fu Book and merged with the heart.

12th watched as it happened; the heart shrank again until it was the size of a tank of water. Luo Jie let out a breath and said, “Alright 12th, the last step is to completely purify it in Fu Flames!”

The heart burst into flames. The Natural Fu Patterns that were on the heart became more visible as it was completely engulfed in flames. 12th took a few steps back, leaned on a wall of flesh nearby and carefully watched.

Ma.s.s amounts of black smoke billowed out, it was completely driven out by the Fu that Luo Jie used.

The heart started shrinking again, less than half an hour later, the once gigantic heart became the size of a fist, it looked just like a heart carved from crystal. Luo Jie reach out and held the heart and said, “Haha, and I receive a Crystal Fu Heart!” Carefully inspecting it he placed the Crystal Fu Heart on his Innate Fu Book, and immediately the Crystal Fu Heart disappeared without a trace, as it was absorbed by the Innate Fu Book. He happily said, “My Innate Fu Book……it doubled in power!”

“Congratulations Master.” 12th said, then he asked, “Master, what are the other organs of the Earth Dragon used for?”

Luo Jie answered, “They too are good materials, however,they pale in comparison to the heart for the Fu Heart is the best quality material for enhancing an  Innate Fu Book. It’s extremely rare…… One must be lucky, have the opportunity, must be skillful and must be powerful to obtain it. All those qualities, think about how hard it is to achieve that.”

Qi Nan Shan said, “Haha congratulations Elder, let’s get out of here, this time our rewards were phenomenal.”

Luo Jie smiled and said, “Not even a mountain can deny us the bounty that Fortune has  bestowed upon us.”

12th looked at Luo Jie weirdly, so Luo Jie asked him, “What’s wrong 12th?” To which he replied, “Grandpa Nan Shan…… Look at Master; am I hallucinating?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Master looks a lot younger now!”

Qi Nan Shan said, “You’re kidding! A Fu Heart from an Earth Dragon, once absorbed into his Innate Fu Book, will extend his life by at least 30 years. It would be difficult not to look younger!”

Luo Jie gave a gleeful laugh and said, “This is the luck that 12th has brought with him, heh. Ever since 12th became an apprentice of mine, things have gone……uncannily smoothly.”

12th started sweating profusely, Master had no reason to dote on him, and yet after hearing him say such things, he’s left speechless.

The three of them exited the Earth Dragon’s torso, standing there and looking at each other, they couldn’t help but let out bursts of laughter. The three of them were completely drenched in blood. Luo Jie yelled out, “Luo Zhan, Luo Zhan…… bring us some fresh water to clean ourselves, haha, this is too embarra.s.sing……” However there wasn’t any sign of an embarra.s.sed expression on his face. On the contrary his expressions were filled with content and joy.

Huo Bao came to 12th’s side and said, “12th, it’s time for you to train us, it’s been too long since last time.”

12th instantly developed a headache, training them wasn’t a problem; the problem was training Chen Hong…… Oh what to do? He said, “Wait a moment, call them over but let me wash first, if there’s a problem talk to them.”

Chen Hong came and filled a bucket with fresh water so 12th could wash his face. Fresh water was very hard to come by here and even though everyone brought plenty of it, the majority of the fresh water was given to the war horses. However because the war horses were now all skeletons, the remaining bit of water would be enough for everyone to use.

Leading the four companions they made their way up to the gap in the cliff. Approaching a large rock, 12th took out the Earth Dragon’s refined blood and said, “One each.”

Surprised, Chen Hong exclaimed, “Wow! What a beautiful gem!”

Chen Bing inspected the precious refined blood and asked, “What is this? What’s it used for?”

12th just smiled and said, “This is some of the refined blood that was purified from the Earth Dragon’s heart. Each of you must eat one. This thing can gradually change your body and strengthen it, haha, I got these from my Master.”

Stunned, Hong s.h.i.+ asked, “Are these Refined Blood Pearls? These are legendary treasures!” Without hesitation he swallowed it whole, commenting, “It doesn’t really have a taste, just a really cold sensation.”

Huo Bao and Chen Bing exchanged a glance and the two of them also swallowed the Refined Blood. Only Chen Hong, holding the Refined Blood Pearl while muttering, “Such a beautiful gem…… It’s so beautiful……”, was unwilling to eat it.

12th told her, “Best to eat it, there’s no point holding on to it.”

Chen Hong held the Refined Blood Pearl tightly, saying, “Let me look at it a bit more…… I’ll eat it in a bit.”

12th expressionlessly replied, “Alright then, a few days ago we began training, unfortunately, we had to postpone. Today let me train everybody.”

Chen Hong was startled, so much so that she almost dropped the Refined Blood Pearl She hurriedly swallowed the Refined Blood Pearl with an innocent expression.

12th smiled bitterly inside. Chen Hong was too care-free; he could see it clearly, but, there’s nothing he could do, since she followed him herself asked to follow him, and since he took her in, he had to bear the responsibility of training her. He said, “The good news is…… I received a rare Blood Fu, it’s more powerful than using Light Fu to enhance strength. The bad news is……I can only train two of you a day.”

It’s as if all of the strength had left Chen Hong’s body, as if her body felt like sitting down softly. She was just like an ostrich, trying to avoid the problem for as long as possible. She didn’t know why, but she was slightly afraid of 12th. Maybe it was because of that time when Aunt Chen tried to suppress 12th. Not only did she not succeed, she herself was suppressed which left her with a deeply unsettling impression. As a result, she had been afraid of this kid ever since.

In reality 12th was very kind to her; following the morality of his past life he wouldn’t put her in a difficult position and he wouldn’t ever take advantage of her, however, he himself was in a difficult position for he didn’t know how to treat a delicate little girl like her.

Huo Bao and Hong s.h.i.+ came first. Using the Blood Fu to enhance their strength meant that they wouldn’t need auxiliary help to train. However, there was one aspect of the Blood Fu that was worse than the Light Fu, and that was the fact that using the Blood Fu was far more painful than using the Light Fu.

The next day, 12th trained Chen Bing first, and then Chen Hong.

Huo Bao, Hong s.h.i.+ and Chen Bing weren’t curious like normal, instead the three of them hid quietly behind a giant rock, eavesdropping. They thought that even though they wouldn’t be able to see, it might be amusing to eavesdrop on the conversation.

To start, everything was calm, they were just listening to 12th saying, “Let’s begin.”

“Oh, um…… Ok, r-ready……”

It was a weak little sound, it was even a little shaky.

“Using Blood Fu will most likely hurt…… Definitely more than using the Light Fu, so bear with me!”

“Ok……I’ll……I’ll try, I’ll try to bear it……”

“If it’s too much just shout out…… There’s n.o.body around to laugh at you……”

And then everyone heard a small cat-like sound. Huo Bao was uncertain t and quietly asked, “Are there cats around here?” As soon as he asked this, Chen Bing hit him hard. He angrily said, “What cat?! That’s Chen Hong whimpering……”

Hong s.h.i.+ said with admiration, “Woah, she’s really something, that much pain and she’s only whimpering so quietly!”

Chen Bing mockingly said, “Not like you, no, when you scream, it’s earth-shattering!”

“Ouch……Oooh……ow ow…… Hrrnng, ow ow ow……”

The three of them looked at each other stunned. Huo Bao asked, “Hey, guys, what is that unearthly sound?” Hong s.h.i.+ and Chen Bing shook their heads with exasperation, and then Hong s.h.i.+ asked, “Why aren’t they speaking?”

Twenty minutes later they saw Chen Hong walking out holding back a tear, 12th covered in sweat followed suit, and the two of them looked rather embarra.s.sed.

After the two of them walked some way away, Huo Bao said, “Let’s leave quietly, if 12th finds us here then we’ll be in trouble……If the next time they train…… Let’s run!” The three of them got chills at the same time. They knew that if they interfered the next time 12th trained, they’d be punished horribly.

12th washed his face, laughing bitterly inside, it was just so bothersome to train a little girl. He took a deep breath, gathered his thoughts and climbed down the cliff.

The giant Earth Dragon had already been completely categorized, the parts had almost all been sorted through, all that was really left was the gigantic skeleton. Pretty much all of the Earth Dragon’s outer flesh had  shrivelled, so since it had no use, it was all thrown out. However inside there was quite a lot of fresh meat, all perfectly preserved. These were not only delicacies, but were also immensely nutritious and not available on the market.

All of the skeleton shone with a green hue. The bones were not the normal white colour, but were in fact a pale green which was quite nice to look at. The surface was smooth as a a crystal, almost as if it was made of emerald and occasionally Fu Patterns appeared that were barely noticeable. 12th was standing next to one of the Earth Dragon’s ribs, although that rib was relatively small when compared to the rest of the bones, he was only able to wrap his arms around one half of it, it was over ten meters tall so it felt as if it was a giant column.

“Are you worried about being unable to take all of the bones?”

Luo Jie walked over. 12th asked, “How are we gonna move this thing?”

Luo Jie smiled and said, “I won’t waste a single part, haha, all of these bones are of the best quality for creating Bone Fu, even if it’s shards and dust, it can still be purified and used as materials for creating Fu.”

12th then asked, “Master, when are we leaving?”

Luo Jie answered, “Restless are we? Don’t worry, we’ll probably stay for a little while longer. After we’re finished with this Earth Dragon we’ll need to go search the cliff base. There has to be some treasures around, you can tell just by looking at this Earth Dragon. This probably wasn’t the first time that the sandstorm occurred, even if it’s once every decade, there has to be some smaller Fu Beasts lying dead at the base of the cliff so we won’t even need to look very hard. I’m sure we’ll be able to find lots of useful materials.”

12th nodded. Reward for less effort? They couldn’t pa.s.s up an opportunity like this. “Master, what do you need me to do?”

Luo Jie replied, “Nothing for now. Although, this Earth Dragon is too big, even if it’s all purified it will still be considerably large so keep some for yourself, anything that you can purify yourself……you can keep it. Also, for  the scales that you collected earlier keep a bag, haha, that stuff is precious.”

A large Hidden Fu Bag can hold tens of thousands of scales, Luo Jie was spoiling his apprentice by handing him a bag for he only had six to begin with.

12th gleefully said, “Thank you Master.” Smiling, he received the Hidden Fu Bag.

Luo Jie is the backbone of this little group; he’s also the instructor, all resources and rewards obtained are his to a.s.sign, because of this 12th received quite a lot of stuff and as soon as it was given to 12th, it didn’t count towards the group’s collective inventory.

12th called over his companions to start looking for suitable shards of bone, since some of the bones were too big to work with.

Preparing the bigger bones involved processes like Purification, Segmentation and Liquefaction, 12th did not yet have the ability to do these things, so he could only look for the smaller pieces of bone and use the normal Purification Technique. If a Great Fu Master were to see this, 12th would no doubt receive a scolding for it would basically ruin the material. Even so he still obtained quite a lot of bone material for making Fu.

In the pile of large bones that Qi Nan Shan cut down he looked for the smaller shards of bone. He then proceeded to crush them and purify the powder. Using this method 12th was able to purify a couple hundred jin of bone powder, which he could use to create a base for the Fu. This was a great source of revenue because  bone powder like this was great for creating Treasure Fu, so if this was taken to a Fu market, its worth would be astronomical, Of course, 12th wasn’t stupid enough to sell it, getting materials like this is nothing but wishful thinking for most people.

12th felt like a  busy bee hard at work, slowly gathering nectar. His own Hidden Fu Bag was pretty much full so using Hidden Fu to create some Hidden Fu Bags was unavoidable.. Now the five of them were  bent over with around a dozen Hidden Fu Bags each, and on their backs were bags made of Beast Leather which were also full of Hidden Fu Bags.

The rewards this time were amazing, good thing Luo Jie had a larger storage capacity inside his Innate Fu Book; at least three of those pages were specifically for storing priceless artefacts and materials, these three pages were densely packed with Hidden Fu s.p.a.ces, otherwise they would’ve had to leave a lot of the materials from this Earth Dragon, which would have been a great waste.

Following Luo Jie’s instructions the Earth Dragon had been completely separated, not leaving a single thing that could be useful in any way. After they finished harvesting the parts, the ground was cleaner that it was before.

Luo Jie looked at the empty ground and said contently, “Nan Shan, take ten men east, I’ll take the rest west, make three days the limit, no matter what you find start heading back after three days. We’ll meet here and then leave this place.”

Of course, 12th would follow his Master. They followed the cliff face and throughout the entire journey all they saw were pieces of broken bone. Because they had just sorted through an Earth Dragon n.o.body was really interested in the skeletons, it’s a shame because everybody became rather jaded by the giant Earth Dragon, not caring about the piles of bones around them.

Luo Jie would occasionally pick up a piece of bone, with a sigh he would say, “There’s so much bone around, it’s a shame that we don’t have time to look through it all carefully.”

After a couple hours of walking, they found the corpse of a Fu Beast; it was clearly also a victim of this disaster. Its talons were over six meters long, the legs and body were long and thin, it had a head like a bird and a long beak. The bright red beak on it’s own was naturally a piece of Fu Material, it could be used to create a pair of greatswords.

Luo Jie said, “This is quite a good normal Fu Beast, haha, to kill this would’ve taken quite a lot of effort too, but now…… 12th, it’s all yours. Have at it.”

12th wasn’t modest at all and since his Master told him to, then he might as well do it. He took his four companions and started to sort through the Fu Beast. After watching the others sort through the Earth Dragon he already knew how to sort through this Fu Beast both quickly and efficiently. After only a few hours, not even the s.h.i.+t was left from this Fu Beast. The reason why it was so fast was because this Fu Beast only had skin covering its skeleton. All the flesh was gone.

Within three days, they didn’t walk too far, in total they had found six Fu Beasts, they also saw a few people from the Beast Raising Fu Sect, they had already become skeleton.

12th took a few Hidden Fu Bags from those corpses. There were all sorts of things inside however the most valuable things were two Fu Books just it was a shame he couldn’t find the Fu Keys, there were also a few Fu Scriptures, although they weren’t for training, they were actually books introducing the Beast Fu Sect, which were valuable for 12th.

Before six days were up Luo Jie’s group had returned to the rendezvous point. Qi Nan Shan’s group were already there, they were all Fu Warriors and had lots of energy and stamina, however, like Luo Jie’s group they didn’t find anything of real value. Everyone all knew that the real treasures were probably all buried beneath all the bones, but it was impossible to dig them all up, the amount manpower that required was too big.

Luo Jie said, “Once we cross these mountains, who knows what we’ll encounter. These lands are very dangerous, even a sandstorm nearly wiped us all out, everyone be careful. Heh, if we can return successfully then this entire escapade will have been worth it.”

“Yeah, all the times we’ve explored the Mysterious Lands, we’ve always come home empty-handed, haha, this time however…… it’s not been long after entering the Mysterious Lands, and we’ve already gotten ourselves a Variant Earth Dragon! Luck’s on our side, it was worth it!” Agreed Qi Nan Shan.

12th curiously asked Luo Zhan, “Uncle Luo, the last times you came into the Mysterious Lands…… You didn’t find anything good?”

Luo Zhan smiled and said, “That depends on what the goal and need was to come here. If it was purely to look for materials, then normally speaking there would always be some to find somewhere, however, if we had a specific reason then that gets hard. For example if we were hunting a Variant Fu Beast, going into the Mysterious Lands ten times…… I couldn’t be sure if we’d be successful in any of them. Even if we could find a Variant Fu Beast, I wouldn’t be certain that we could beat it and we may even have perished in the Mysterious Lands because of it, That’s why this time we were incredibly lucky; couldn’t you see how much your Master was lamenting?”

A new group of people climbed to the gap in the cliff face, following the mountain path, they walked a while until they found the path to exit the mountain. Along the way, they could gradually see more and more green gra.s.s and shrubbery, though sometimes they would even spot little animals scurrying about while there were also birds flying in the sky. It was no longer a barren wasteland around them.

Chen Bing pointed ahead, asking, “What’s that?”

12th squinted his eyes and looked to where he pointed, after a long while, he said, “That should be a small pond because that’s light reflecting……”

Chen Hong couldn’t help but cheer, “Wow, finally there’s a place full of fresh water! I’m gonna take a bath……” She suddenly realised that she may have gotten a little carried away and her cheeks started blus.h.i.+ng; she hurriedly hid behind 12th.

Luo Jie was unsure, he said, “Nan Shan…… Doesn’t that pond look a little odd to you?”