“That could be possible but how would you find a source of lightning Qi strong enough to purge this poison?” Cro-La asked.

“You would need a lightning source stronger than your current cultivation…” Ryu said as he produced the two lightning fruits he won from the auction. One was a Three-Colored Lightning fruit while the other was a Four-Colored Lightning fruit.

Cro-La stared at them with shock and envy. For a lightning Qi based cultivator, a pure source of lightning such as these fruits were priceless. These fruits were born from the nature from countless bolts of lightning, they generate the purest sources of lightning Qi!

“If you know the method of using these fruits together, I could use it to help you out.” Ryu replied. He actually has a Five-Colored Lightning fruit already but he’s using this chance to see if the head of the Raging Thunder Sect could tell him how to fuse his fruits into a seven colored one.

“A Five-Colored Lightning fruit would be in the Emperor Domain! And a Six-Colored Lightning fruit would be in the Supreme Domain!” Cro-La said with disbelief after noticing that there’s six different color between the two fruits.

After a moment Cro-La collected himself and apologized. “Sorry for getting side tracked there. Where were we… oh right. To combine them would require a person who has mastered Elemental Mutation though…”

“Elemental Mutation?” Ryu asked.

“Yes, the ability to transform your whole body into one element. My daughters have this ability because of their special bodies but their cultivation is much too low. I can also do it too if I was in perfect health. It took me centuries to learn it. No one else in the sect has reached that stage yet… perhaps my brother but I’m not sure if he’s willing to help me out. In case you haven’t noticed, there are vultures outside awaiting my death. A fight between fractions waiting to succeed me has already begun.” Cro-La said sadly as he produced a few books from his storage ring and handed them to Ryu. Ryu vaguely remembered Ling-Yu displaying this ability in the Forbidden Forest.

“Lightning Elemental Mutation allows the user to avoid material and Qi attacks alike by turning into pure lightning and allowing the attacks to pass through you. Users can be crushed, split, or separated into multiple parts and reform without injury?” Ryu said in shock to himself as he pretended to flip through the manuals. The Infinity Tome had recorded all the contents the moment he touched the manuals.

Remembering the Exoe had fire and ice elemental training manuals, the clone started browsing through them too all the way from the Lin Province. There was indeed a fire and ice mutation method. He quickly linked the similarities between the Fire, Ice and Lightning Elemental Mutation. The instructions were simple, it’s the process of making your Qi do what it needs to do hard. Since Ryu can bend Qi in his sleep, this was a piece of cake.

“Actually, I just happened to be a proficient lightning user that can perform something similar to Elemental Mutation. If you can just give me some pointers, I’m sure we can make it work.” Ryu said. It was partially true. Ryu is loved by the Qi and can bend it at will, he is probably the only person that can control and fuse all elements by Prince Na’Vi’s estimate. He just needed the method which he got now.

“Oh really? To be the great Drunken Master disciple you must be someone extremely extraordinary. Forgive me. I’ll explain what I know about these fruits.” Cro-La said with new hope across his face. “The lightning fruits are composed of different lightning types, differentiated by colors, you first have to extract one type while you are in the state of Elemental Mutation…”

Outside the tent the twin girls were talking amongst themselves and the majority of the elders pranced around uneasily. Some had started acting unruly ever since the leader got poisoned years ago. Recently his daughters that were hidden away for their own safety came back with an antidote that worked like a charm. This got some of the elders sweating because they have already thrown their support behind Has-Tai to succeed him. Some elders supported the girls because their special bodies will definitely allow them to reach the apex of lightning arts.

Has-Tai was furious and anxious at the same time, no one could tell what he was thinking. He was the successor to this sect until a few years ago when the twin girls were born. His father suddenly shifted all his attention them, even hiding them away from the sect in a secret location that nobody knows. Has-Tai’s talent was only average, after living for nearly a thousand years he finally advanced into the King Domain. The girls on the other hand could already perform all kinds of lightning manipulation since they were babies. It was obvious he’ll lose his position within the sect if his father recovers.

There was no movements or updates for a few hours when suddenly a huge burst of lightning meters wide in diameter shot out from the tent into the sky, good thing no one was inside the tent or they would definitely be severely injured or disintegrated into nothingness. This abnormally thick stream of lightning was maintained steadily and surprised all onlookers. An elder can produce a Qi based lightning attack that’s around a meter wide but there’s no way to discharge it continuously for over a minute. Right now in front of them a five meter wide lightning bolt was originating from their leader’s tent and showed no signs of stopping. Even if they wanted to charge in, they couldn’t!

“What’s going on?”

“Is the headmaster alright?”

“I’ve been with this sect for three hundred years, what kind of technique is this?”

“Has the leader revived?”

There were tons of chatters amongst the people present. One minute passed. Two minute passed. Fifteen minute passed without anyone being able to do anything. What they are witnessing couldn’t be described by words. The clouds have darkened after been hammered and charged by this unnatural lightning form below.

Finally it stopped. The air around the tent was filled with residue lightning Qi that would zap low cultivators to death. Two figures slowly emerged from what’s left of the tent.

“Headmaster!”

Everyone cried out. One of the two figures walking out was their master but unlike his previous frail appearance, his aura was full of vigor and there was life on his face once again. Although his body was still slim, his movements no longer lacked strength.

“You! What were you doing?” Has-Tai shouted at Ryu, with a violent movement he threw a spear at Ryu. He was still angry over the humiliation he had brought upon him earlier. The spear hummed through the air but Ryu made no attempts to dodge it. Cro-La just sighed.

Bam! A loud collision sound resonated out as Ryu’s chest was pierced, a huge gaping hole appeared. The spear was stuck in his chest still. The bystanders gasped, especially the girls. Before anyone could say a word though, Ryu took the spear out with his bare hands and his wound regenerated instantly. Ryu acted as if nothing happened and threw the spear back in front of Has-Tai. His expression was priceless, he couldn’t tell if he was dreaming.

Lightning Elemental Mutation!

These three words appeared in the minds of everyone present. It was a sign that one is a consummate practitioner in their element of expertise, which in this case was lightning. Ryu’s wound had no traces of blood but instead had hints of lightning Qi. Beside the sect leader and his daughters, no one else had reached that stage yet.

Cro-La finally spoke to break the silence. “This miracle doctor was recommended by sect leader Sonia and managed cure me of my illness. Our sect is forever indebted to him. Has-Tai, don’t make trouble for him in the future.”

With a wave of his hand, a terrible pressure was emitted from all directions. For a minute none of the elders could even take a step or breathe. Suddenly a roaring thunder that seemed to shake the very earth beneath them echoed out followed by a lightning storm a few seconds afterwards. The clouds above was already charged previously from the abnormal lightning bolt from the tent so this skill was many times more intimidating than normal. The lightning storm was unique in that it rained down streaks of lightning as if it were hail. It destroyed the area just outside of the camp, everything was disintegrated and only a flat surface remained. The spectacle was witnessed all the way from people within the Fading Shadow City five kilometers away.

“The Unconquerable Lightning Blizzard! He… he has fully recovered!” Elder Jin cried in joy. Elder Cian was too emotionally to even speak as she stared at the strongest move of their sect. They had been full heartedly supporting their leader and his decisions for centuries.

The other elders that were plotting for a political take over once Cro-La passes away lost all blood to their face. Before Cro-La was too ill to deal with them but somehow he recovered all his strength, he definitely won’t let the past offences go. Ryu praised Cro-La for unleashing such might with lightning. Although Ryu can call thunderstorms through nature arts of the shamans, it wasn’t as overbearing as this.

“Senior Dragon, it would be an honor for us to accompany you to the Thousand Swords Graveyard.” Cro-La said earnestly. Everyone was shocked at his choice of words, he wasn’t inviting Ryu to go along with the sect but for the sect to have an opportunity to go with him.

Cro-La knew that Ryu had to expend quite a lot of effort to cure him. Ryu used his body as a filter between the newly formed Five-Colored Lightning fruit which was an Emperor Domain item and himself. The strain on him must have been unbearable even with Elemental Mutation since Ryu himself is only in the early King Domain. He was also stunned by Ryu’s ability to control Qi and the depth of his Qi, even though Cro-La himself has returned to the mid King Domain at level 66, Ryu’s Qi at level 60 isn’t the least bit inferior to his Qi.

Ryu agreed and was escorted to a private tent that Cro-La ordered to be set up for Ryu specifically.

“I don’t know how to thank you enough.” Cro-La said once again.

“No, your guidance on the process and your perseverance was the key factor.” Ryu said honestly. It was through his instructions that Ryu managed to fuse the lightning fruits and when Ryu purged his poison, his body must have felt like it was been torn to shreds. “Here, I know your cultivation was higher in the past but now that it had fallen, you can borrow my Five-Colored Lightning fruit to regain it.”

“I couldn’t possibly accept this.” Cro-La said immediately, he already felt so indebted to Ryu.

“This fruit self-generates lightning Qi, as long as you don’t drain it completely it’ll recover.” Ryu said as he pushed it into his hand. “I have some urgent matters to contemplate about, I would appreciate not to be disturbed.”

“Of course.” Cro-La replied and he immediately ordered Ryu’s tent to be off limits, even for elders.

Ryu spread his aura around to make sure there was no one surveillancing him from anywhere and he quickly set up enchantments to seal his tent in. His clone back in the Infernal Fist School had discovered more disturbing things.

There were three unique crystal recordings that were in Exoe’s possession. All of them contained bizarre and profound martial skill techniques that can’t not be described with words. As if some invisible force prevented one from recalling it. This was awfully similar to the technique Drunken Dragon Fist! One set of skill labeled the Eternal Phoenix focused on air-borne attacks and recovery. Another set of skill labeled the Indomitable Genbu focused on defense, strengthening the body to an unimaginable degree. The Merciless Tiger focused on pure slaughter with invincible penetrating powers.

Ryu’s clone already skimmed through the images from the crystals but he learnt nothing at all. The more he looked, the more confused he got. There might be some mechanism that prevents users from making a copy but since these techniques are also unranked, they can’t be learned with common sense. It took Ryu many days under the Drunken Master’s direct supervision to learn one unranked skill. If Ryu wanted to extrapolate these unranked skills by himself, it would take much longer since only the moves were performed but no explanations were given.

Ryu recalled that the Drunken Dragon Fist School is one of seven ancient schools of martial arts on the Heaven Continent that follows the two person rule and have devoted their lives to martial arts and cultivation towards immortality. Drunken Master Du-Bai gave him a brief history on these schools. They each represented a mystical beast: the dragon, phoenix, tiger, tortoise, qilin, tengu, and frog. These schools actually formed an allegiance millions of years ago to protect an important treasure. Du-Bai said that if he does perish in his fight against the master of the Divine Tengu School, he would arrange something to pass the heirloom to Ryu.

From Exoe’s memory, he got the Eternal Phoenix crystal recording from the mysterious master that led him down the wrong path. He got the Indomitable Genbu and Merciless Tiger crystals after his master slayed the disciples of two unknown supreme experts.

“Those jade pendants… could it be the treasure that the seven ancient beast schools are guarding? The enmity between the Divine Tengu master and master Du-Bai… is it possible that it was caused by the master of the Eternal Phoenix School?” Ryu said in shock after reaching the horrifying conclusion. The fight between these two was bound to happen in around nine months. Ryu made a mental note to get to the bottom of this and stop the two from fighting.

The master of the Eternal Phoenix School, also Exoe’s master, must have betrayed the allegiance made by the ancestors of the seven ancient beast schools and decided to collect or take whatever treasure they had been guarding. He also mentioned that he was going to enter a hundred thousand year closed door training. That must mean he is at least in the Sovereign Domain or higher. Ryu already suspected Du-Bai to have exceeded the Sovereign Domain since he was over a million years old. After going through Rebirth, you gain a million years in longevity so a hundred thousand years in secluded training is like nothing.

Right at this moment, Ryu’s clone was interrupted by Exoe and his grandparents. They had just finished the tour of the school and came to check up on him.

“Since this is your double, I presume nothing will happen to you if we do meet an unfortunate end?” Exoe asked curiously. His interest in Ryu seems to have piqued greatly after chatting with his grandparents.