Chapter 313: Three Conditions

Xia Fei suddenly had the impulse to choke Furball. That Purple Heart of Spirit had an inestimable value, acquiring it after his fraughtful journey in the Wild Star Region. No one would have guessed that Furball would actually eat it before Xia Fei could even enjoy it.

All he saw was Furball lazily lying on top of the Heart of Spirit, hiccuping from time to time, looking very comfortable.

Meanwhile, the originally radiant Heart of Spirit had dulled significantly, no longer as dazzling as before.

From the reduction in its color, Xia Fei could already tell that Furball had absorbed a third of the energy inside, though he had no idea just how its small body could contain that wild energy. Xia Fei could already feel his five senses and insides swimming just from trying to extract that bit of energy from a tiny Red Heart of Spirit, yet this Furball, which was no bigger than a chicken’s egg, had absorbed so much in one go. It had to be mentioned that the energy contained within a Purple Heart of Spirit was a thousand times that of a Red Heart of Spirit.

“Well done, Furball!” Phantom gloated with glee.

Xia Fei rolled his eyes at Phantom. “What do you mean well done? That Purple Heart of Spirit is a priceless treasure. If this guy continues eating it like this, there’s no way I’ll be able to raise it even if I have a mountain of gold and silver to my name. That’s practically stealing.”

Actually, Xia Fei was more irked by Furball’s dismissive attitude. There were also low grade Red Heart of Spirits spread across the desk, yet this creature had not even spared them a glance, going right for the expensive Purple Heart of Spirit.

Xia Fei’s heart ached as he used his fingers to calculate just how much Furball had cost him with this one ‘meal’, and the final sum he came up with left him utterly dejected.

“I’m going to use the Beast Spirit Codex to communicate with it, find out just what is inside its stupid head.” Xia Fei was furious. A single meal cost him several battleships; the appetite Furball had just demonstrated had completely infuriated him.

“Don’t.” Phantom hurried to stop Xia Fei. “Furball is still in its infancy, so how can it withstand your attempt at invading its brain? You may end up causing some irreversible damage if things go awry… Best to wait for it to grow a bit older first.”

Xia Fei was being stubborn. “How d’you think I’m going to even rear it if it keeps eating like this? I wish I can just slap it to death right now.”

Phantom had a sudden inspiration as he blurted out, “It’s already eaten purple stone. If you slap it right now, there’s no way for you to recuperate the investment you’ve previously made to it.”

Xia Fei froze. Phantom’s words made sense; killing Furball was very easy, but doing so would hardly cause it to spit out what it had eaten, and he would end up coming away empty-handed both ways.

His raised right hand landed on Furball’s side. He flicked the little ball of fur off the Purple Heart of Spirit. Unfortunately, the little creature had no idea that Xia Fei was enraged, turning around beautifully as it sailed in the air, accurately landing on the back of Xia Fei’s hand. It hugged his hand tightly, then furiously licked it as if very grateful for Xia Fei feeding it.

Actually, Furball was still very cute even when it was not eating and was just like a precocious child. It was constantly showing weakness before Xia Fei, making it appear to be trying to please its master.

Xia Fei sighed and began collecting everything on the desk. He held that dimmed Purple Heart of Spirit in his hand, staring at it for a good long while before heaving another sigh and putting it back into his spatial ring

Ever since he learned the technique of extracting energy from the Heart of Spirit, Xia Fei had always been thinking of how he could create an energy conversion device to utilize the Purple Heart of Spirit in his possession so that he could improve his cultivation. Now, it seemed that everything was nothing but dust in the wind.

Not only that, Xia Fei still had no clue just what else he could feed Furball with once it completely consumed the only Purple Heart of Spirit he currently had.

“Suck-up,” Xia Fei chided as he gave Furball a light smack. Furball was unfazed, continuing to ingratiate itself to Xia Fei, licking aggressively with its tiny tongue at times, rubbing its soft fur at other times. Xia Fei suddenly realized that this little creature was actually very cunning, for it was very obviously acting all docile and tame after having taken advantage of him.

“According to the records in the Beast Spirit Codex, the higher grade an exotic beast is, the more picky they are with their food. Furball enjoys Hearts of Spirit, which means that it’s an energy type of a high grade,” Phantom gleefully commented.

Xia Fei sat in a chair and lit up a Hongtashan, plainly saying, “I, of course, know what you’ve just said. It’s only in the heat of the moment that I reacted the way I did moments ago… There’s no question that Furball is a high-grade exotic beast, but it’s far too dramatic; it even gave that haughty look after eating the energy within that Purple Heart of Spirit.”

Phantom laughed. “Doesn’t that just prove that excellence runs in its veins as well, being able to show such regal disdain for sentient beings from birth? Who knows? Perhaps Furball will grow up to become an exotic beast that is at the beast king grade.”

“Beast king?” Xia Fei gave this idea some thought. “Who knows how long it’ll be until it grows up, though? It’s going to eat away plenty of money if it has a really long growth period.”

Phantom pouted. “The more it eats, the more precious it is, and the more powerful its future potential becomes. This is like investing in stocks: it matters not how much you’ve invested but what returns you’ll be getting. Furball is still young; you can establish a contract with it after it grows up some more so that it becomes your exotic beast exclusively, never betraying you. In the event that it really grows up to be a beast king grade exotic beast, you’ll have immensely profited from it.”

Xia Fei nodded. He stuffed the now satiated Furball back into his bosom, lightly patting it a few times. “I hope that you’re not going to eat like that every day, or else I’ll really end up going bankrupt.”

…

What Xia Fei worried about did not happen; Furball had gone into deep slumber after that hearty meal, curled up in Xia Fei’s bosom every day. Even when Xia Fei poked it, the little creature merely gave his finger a little lick before going back to sleep as if ingesting the Heart of Spirit was sapping its energy greatly.

Xia Fei thought back to his experience when he was younger and had a dog; a puppy would not have any notion of being full, so it was easy for problems to crop up if their diet was not controlled. Xia Fei had, thus, decided to control Furball’s appetite in order not to let him overeat like this time.

Several days of observation later, Xia Fei discovered that, though Furball spent all its time asleep, nothing out of the ordinary happened to the creature’s body. Its fur had recovered the luster from before, maybe even slightly shinier, but its body was still the size of a little chick, not at all appearing to have grown larger.

…

Going by what Xia Fei understood of exotic beasts, there was no need for them to be large, but they could not be weak and small like Furball, either. For such a small creature, which Xia Fei could send flying several dozens meters away with a light flick, would it not just be swallowed whole in one bite if it ran into a vicious beast?

It was not often that Xia Fei had free time, so he decided to spend this period learning the Delusion manual that Shadowless had given him. There were over a thousand forbidden techniques recorded within, and Xia Fei had yet to find the chance to cultivate it since it came into his possession.

Xia Fei could only bemoan the fact that he did not have the ability to be everywhere at once, such that he could participate in the tournament, spend time with Avril, cultivate the Beast Spirit Codex, psychokinesis, research the nether bell and his book on robot coding, manage Quantum Holdings, discuss further cooperation with Alliance Military, and so on and so forth. There were so many things that needed his attention, so he could barely find time to breathe.

Fortunately, Xia Fei’s nerves were tough enough, so he could devote all his time to cultivation and research every day beyond two hours of rest. Any other average human would probably go insane from lethargy if they were in his shoes.

He was still a week or so away from his rendezvous with Sarah and Butcher. Xia Fei made the decision to devote all his time on studying the forbidden manual during this period.

He made himself a bowl of fried paste noodles and brought it into his study, eating as he read the manual. The decorations of this antique study was simple and elegant, chocked full of calligraphy and portraits of famed individuals whom Xia Fei did not recognize. This study had not been installed at Xia Fei’s behest but was Nicole’s instructions. Gaia Industries did the retrofitting and modification of this Impaler, and the only modification Xia Fei made was remove the overclocking chip from Vampire and move it to Impaler.

Sometimes, Xia Fei really wished that he had a few more copies of the overclocking chip, for swapping it in and out of ships like this was very inefficient. Unfortunately, it was not easy to acquire that type of ancient civilization AI chip, requiring quite a bit of luck on top of its expensive price tag.

A big bowl of fried paste noodles was very quickly consumed by Xia Fei. His fortune might have changed, not requiring him to eat such commoner’s fare, yet he still enjoyed fried paste noodles the most. First, it was to his taste, and second, he would always get this feeling that he was back on Earth every time he ate a bowl.

This could perhaps be what nostalgia was.

Propping his two legs on the desk, Xia Fei comfortably lit himself a cigarette as his eyes scanned through the manual quickly.

“Hey, walking through walls sounds like a good technique; care to learn it?” Phantom happily asked.

Xia Fei shook his head and pointed to the row of small fonts below. “Look carefully; I’ll have to observe abstinence in order to learn it; I have no intentions of becoming a monk.”

Phantom nodded, laughing. “Oh, yeah. With how the relationship between Avril and you is advancing, perhaps Avril may be unwilling to let you even if you want to become a monk.”

Xia Fei rolled his eyes, though he was feeling a bit restless deep down. He was almost twenty yet still a virgin. Xia Fei himself was quite embarrassed by this fact. Besides, he was still a completely functional and healthy human being. He could not deny that the thought had crossed his mind, but he felt that Avril was simply too good to him, which was why he had decided to endure it first.

Xia Fei calmed himself down and continued flicking through the pages.

Xia Fei had already skimmed through the manual before; only, he was not carefully reading every word and each technique like today. After all, there were tens of thousands of remarkable techniques recorded within the manual, and choosing one or two of the most exceptional techniques to cultivate was not easy.

Xia Fei had once thought of learning everything inside the entire manual, but he understood the concept of biting off more than one could chew all too well. It was not about having an abundant set of techniques but specializing in the few, instead. Currently, Xia Fei already had the Beast Spirit Codex, psychokinesis, and the Sly Thrust. With these three major techniques, what he now needed was not another, which he could cause mass destruction with but something he could make up for his weakness.

Setting down that heavy Delusion manual, Xia Fei knitted his brows. It was not that it was not a good manual; in fact, a lot of the forbidden techniques written within were incredible, but there was always a price to be paid for each technique.

Xia Fei was never one to shy away from making sacrifices, and he was a firm believer that the biggest rewards came with the greatest risks. Essentially, all these techniques were decent, but nothing truly stood out, which would make Xia Fei’s eyes shine.

“What, you don’t like any of these?” Phantom probed.

Xia Fei nodded. “I keep feeling that they lack something, and my intuition is telling me that none of these techniques is appropriate. The most eye-catching technique is ‘cerebral shock’, exclusively taught to the Assassin Sect’s Deathguards. From a martial arts standpoint, cerebral shock is indeed not bad, but cultivating it will not only require one to pay the price with their life force but will also cause irreversible damage to the practitioner’s brain.

“Every single one of those Deathguards is glazed eyes and impassive. I originally thought that it’s due to their long isolation. Only after reading this manual’s description did I finally understand that those were all side effects of their cultivation. I have no wish of becoming such an inhumane existence.”

Phantom sighed. “Those who get chosen to be Deathguards sure have it rough, no way of returning to normal life after cultivating the technique, and utilizing cerebral shock requires them to pay with their life force just to increase their cultivation by leaps and bounds. The price is simply too much.”

Xia Fei continued. “I know there’s a price for everything, but it’s important to always keep the price-performance ratio in mind; the price for these forbidden techniques just isn’t worth it, and the cost and benefit just aren’t balanced, which is what’s making this hard for me.”

He recalled what Shadowless had told him before his departure from Nameless. “These are all forbidden techniques; learn what you wish, but whatever you do, don’t learn what you can’t. Everything is done in moderation.”

Xia Fei suddenly realized that Shadowless seemed to be telling him not to learn these techniques, but if Shadowless did not want that outcome, why would he give it as a master’s gift to his student?

Xia Fei could not make sense of it. He stood up and paced around. The more he thought of Shadowless’s words, the more he felt that there was a deeper meaning in it, and his astute instincts were also stopping him from cultivating.

“Act decisively, or else you’ll face a world of trouble,” Xia Fei muttered to himself. “Having this manual around me will just be a disaster waiting to happen; better if I just destroy it.”

Phantom coaxed him against the idea. “This is the only item our ancestor, grand elder Shadowless, left to you. You ought to at least