Chapter 75: Hiding Out

Zen quickly made his way back to his room, looking around ever so often to ensure that he was not being followed. He quickly opened the door to his room, breathing a sigh of relief when he entered and shut the door behind him. In his room, he was safe against most people.

He looked around the room for Shibi and was immediately surprised by what he saw. Sitting in a lotus position, next to the window, streaming in golden sunlight, was Shibi. His eyes were completely closed and his chest grew and sank peacefully.

His eyes widened when he noticed the hand signs Shibi was making. Shibi was practicing the Cracked Earth Meditation that Zen often failed at, but unlike the boy, the Scorch Ape seemed to be finding success with it. Zen closed his eyes, picking up the subtle streams of mana in the room, all drawn to and whirling around Shibi before being absorbed to be further purified into ki.

It seems his companion had learned the meditation technique by simply learning from Zen, although with Zen’s recent multiple failures to practice it, it was something of a miracle that the scorch ape was able to figure it out to the degree where it was meditating perfectly.

Shibi opened his eyes. The ape’s orange tail began swishing side to side at the sight of Zen.

“Hey, Shibi.” Zen said, walking over to him and patting him on the head. “I saw how well you were cultivating there. If your doing that now, I feel sorry for whatever beast picks a fight with you once you awaken your fire.”

Wild beasts were unlike humans, all their power was focussed into their beast cores, so they potentially had full access to their elemental powers since birth, unlike humans whose powers were spread across the diatians which had to be unlocked. Humans unlocked their elemental affinity when they reached Master level.

Zen placed his palm on Shibi’s head and closed his eyes. He used his ki to determine Shibi’s cultivation level, a skill he was not very good at, so all he could do was gain a rough estimate of Shibi’s current strength. He found out that Shibi was at least in Intermediary. For all he knew, Shibi could very well be stronger than him, at least when it came to ki quantity.

Zen smirked, “So when your out, you weren’t gallivanting like I thought you were, instead you were getting stronger.” Zen shook his head and sat down on his bed, prompting Shibi to rest on his lap. “Well, this is embarrassing for me, shown up by my own companion.” Zen gently caressed Shibi’s head. “Although, it doesn’t explain why I’ve never seen you use any fire elemental techniques. Is could ask someone about that.”

Zen sat there in thought, wondering who he may ask. Jiahai knew a lot more about beasts than he did, however, his relationship with Jiahai was… confusing now. Although he had helped him look for Shibi, Jiahai still pretty much ignored him and avoided interacting with him. It seemed their friendship had been severely damaged.

An idea sprang to mind of who he could ask but it would mean going outside, and risk getting caught by Bao and his other former friends. Everyone in their year knew that Bao was after him and everyone knew that Zen was avoiding getting caught by him. Although Bao was suspended pending his trail, he was still on campus and still had sway, case in point with Shibi’s attack, which the Scorch Ape was still recovering from. He had to be very careful. However, his curiosity was stoked and since it seemed Shibi was actively trying to get stronger, Zen wanted to help his companion.

But for now, he could only move at night. He would go out to meet one of the smartest boys he knew, his cousin, Jao Cong.