Time seemed to flow by at an astounding rate. Before he realized it, Lute had already spent six months within the Fallen Tide Hall. During the entirety of this time, he hadn’t rested even once. From the moment the sun dawned over the horizon until the next time it did so once more, Lute was always actively repeating the same day in a cycle.

At the crack of dawn he would rush over to the smithy where Elder Irida would teach him alongside the other trainees. Until the afternoon, she would teach him new blacksmithing techniques. But she would still ruthlessly and savagely abuse him whenever he made a mistake. This went for every trainee, but for some reason, he seemed to suffer from her wrath the most.

However Lute put up with it, he was advancing steadily enough with his blacksmithing that he didn’t mind whatever it was Elder Irida did. However the cuts she left on him were still as agonizing as ever, the pain he felt had been increasing many times over these four months. They would heal enough to become scabs, and then the next day Elder Irida would reopen them when she hit Lute for making a mistake.

After suffering but also making advancements in blacksmithing, Lute would then clean himself. After donning his robes, he would then rush over to the class Toros taught. Although he couldn’t craft formations or runes that functioned because he wasn’t in the Spirit Opening Realm, Lute still learned a plethora of information.

He’d learned the history of formations and runes and their uses. He’d also learned of the many different types of runes and formations. But this was the easier part of the class. The true difficulty lied in the repeated drawing. Under the watchful gaze of Toros, for hours on end, Lute would etch different runes and formations onto the hide of Vicious Beasts.

He’d copy them exactly from an image in a book. This was extremely draining mentally, if Lute lines were off by even a single millimeter, Toros would make him restart entirely. It didn’t help that earlier in the day; he’d already been physically and mentally drained by Elder Irida so it pushed Lute towards the limits of how long and how intently he could focus. Being forced to restart upon making a mistake went for all the disciples, since Toros only had four disciples including Lute, he was able to personally watch over all of them.

Once his classes finished, Lute would retreat to the caves beneath the arena. Securing one for him, every night he would read and memorize one of the many books he acquired from the library. This was Lute’s favorite aspect of being in a sect. He was like a sponge, greedily soaking in all of the knowledge he could because he never had the ability to before.

In his village, although there were enough books where he could learn to read, they were mostly fantasy stories meant for children. When he saw a library full of books that weren’t fantasies and spanned across many subjects, Lute’s inner scholar came out, he wanted to read everything. Legends and mysteries were especially of interest to him.

What caught his attention the most were the three forbidden areas of the Crimson Tide Planet. They were the Desert Tomb of the Heavenly Emperors, Shadow Spirit Caverns, and Heavenly Tribulation Valley. Each one was full of mysteries. Even a peak Heavenly Emperor wouldn’t casually waltz into these three places.

Not a single Heavenly Emperor had ever entered the forbidden desert and came out alive. This was why it was called the Desert Tomb of Heavenly Emperors. You could be a peak Qi Overlord or even a half-step through the Heavenly Emperor bottleneck and you would be able to enter this desert and leave alive. But the moment a Heavenly Emperor entered, they would never return.

Shadow Spirit Caverns at first didn’t seem as dangerous, many would come out alive. But it was what happened to them afterwards that was absolutely terrifying. No matter your cultivation level, those who entered were never the same afterwards. Some went insane; others were driven to commit suicide because of nightmares. A few crippled themselves, and even worse, some became mindless and feeble, seeming to age until they were on their death bed, they would foam at the mouth, and be unable to do anything without aid or even think for themselves.

Lastly, the most mysterious of the three Forbidden Areas was the Heavenly Tribulation Valley. It was a land wreathed in lightning of many colors. What made it the place that was most mysterious and unknown was the fact that specific rules, some known and others unknown couldn’t be broken, even by accident. An example was that a cultivator couldn’t enter if they were above the Ascension Realm. Even if a Peak Heavenly Emperor were to try and force their way in, they would be struck by the lightning, not even ash would remain.

Because of this, many of the sects, especially the Primordial Sects would send in their most talented disciples with protective equipment that only a Peak Heavenly Emperor would have. Sometimes they would return after entering, and other times they wouldn’t. Of the ones that did return, they would have used up all their protective items and appear to have one foot in the grave.

However when asked what they experienced, the answer was always the same thing, “I saw the truth.” These disciples would often seclude themselves for many years or they would abandon their sects. The only commonality between all of those that survived, they would usually grow into Peak Heavenly Emperors that were so powerful it was said they had stepped half-way onto the divine path. Just like the Heavenly Emperor of Slaughter, it would take many Peak Heavenly Emperors to subdue and kill them.

While all three of the forbidden grounds were of interest to him, Lute was enamored by the Heavenly Tribulation Valley. Not only was it because of the lightning, instead he wanted to also see the truth. Before he entered the Emperor Qi Realm, he wanted to enter this forbidden area and learn its secrets. But even more importantly, he felt from his inner self that it was a chance to cultivate a Negative Origin Body for lightning. Although he wanted one fore darkness and fire as well, lightning was his top priority.

With this goal in mind, for the past four months, Lute had cultivated in earnest, always putting forth as much effort as he could. Every night for the past four months he’d been practicing the seven arts he rented. He’d already returned them to Cal since he memorized them. Instead, he was focusing on merging them with the Thousand Ways Scripture since he could use them at an acceptable level.

Lute had already finished merging Qi Explosion Tactics with the Thousand Ways Scripture. However, he’d only managed to merge two of the seven arts with it; they were the Illusionary Mirage Steps and the Aura of the New Moon as they were the easiest. For every art he merged into the Thousand Ways Scripture, it became harder to merge another. Right now it seemed he was at his limit and couldn’t merge a fourth art because of cultivation level, soul strength, and not having all the Laws of Severance free from the Five Paths of Severance.

With the goal of creating an infinitely evolving art, Lute was using the Thousand Ways Scripture as the foundation. It didn’t have techniques but instead made it so he would always fight in the most optimal way, wasting little energy but always moving, attacking, or defending with the most strength possible that he could use.

Whenever he merged an art with it, they would be become fine-tuned. Being perfected even more after they already had severed from heavens way, they would be able to exhibit more power but also waste less Qi. However, for this new art that he wanted to infinitely evolve, Lute had no idea what to name it as of yet.

Through all of this persistent training, Lute had reached the bottleneck of the fifth level, and then with the assistance of the Essence Gathering Formation, he’d broken through to the fifth level of the Nascent Qi Realm.

Today was no different, Lute was cultivating, steadily closing in on the sixth level of the Nascent Qi Realm. However, at the crack of dawn, as he left for the smithy he caught movement out of the corner of his eyes. At all times except when he broke through in cultivation, Lute had kept his cultivation suppressed, so for now, if we was at odds with anyone they would think he was at the third level of the Nascent Qi Realm. The truth was that he was nearing the sixth level of the Nascent Qi Realm, in a few months; he would smoothly cross the bottleneck.

Lute slowed down his walking speed but acted as if he hadn’t noticed. But, every so often as he walked, he would see shadows out of the corners of his eyes. Flitting around in the dark alleys, they would stop and observe him.

Lute’s eyes seemed cold and staring straight ahead but on the inside he was laughing, these people thought they were hiding.

‘They seriously think I haven’t noticed them? I’m afraid that unless they are in the Spirit Opening Realm I will always be able to find them.’

Lute casually walked forward without any fear, if these people wanted to observe him, then he would let them. If they wanted to make a move against him, he would retaliate ruthlessly. There was no one around so he felt no fear of being caught.

Finally, as he approached the smithy, more people began to gather in the streets. There was a crowd of people. Lute quietly revolved his Qi so as to make sure his stalker wouldn’t notice what he was doing. Then as Lute walked into the crowd, he used Illusionary Mirage Steps and Aura of the New Moon. In the crowd, his footsteps became silent and unpredictable.

When he moved his feet it seemed as if illusionary images of his legs appeared with every step he took, making it appear as if he was stepping in many directions at the same time, combined with Aura of the New Moon suppressing his already nonexistent aura, Lute disappeared into the crowd. He wasn’t invisible, but instead he became another face in the crowd of people disappearing into the masses. He was specter that freely moved within the people unnoticed.

After delaying his arrival to the smithy for about ten minutes, Lute finally reached his destination after he was sure he lost the people tailing him. In front of the smithy was Elias, clearly he was waiting for Lute.

As Lute approached him, Elias had a stack of papers. Elias walked up and handed the papers to Lute in passing as he whispered in a cold voice, “Here’s all the information I could scrounge up. Now it’s up to you to hold your end of the oath, I will need you in one weeks’ time, so prepare to take a leave of absence for a about a month, your excuse, a joint mission from the request hall.”

Lute’s eyes narrowed, the atmosphere around him grew increasingly cold. Swiftly putting the paper reports into his spatial ring, as he continued walking past Elias he replied in an equally cold voice that was abnormally sharp and cold even for Lute as he whispered, “Fine, but you better know what you are doing, I was being tailed by multiple people, and I am certain you are too. I don’t care what you’re planning, but I didn’t agree to sacrifice my life, if I am going to die, I will bail out on this scheme of yours.”

“You don’t need to fret about dying; the possibility of a Spirit Opening Disciple coming after our lives is slim at the most. But the information about us being tailed is important; there is only one possibility as to why someone would tail us. One of my siblings had been watching my movements apparently. Tonight, I will come to your cave that you cultivate in, those are secure and they won’t be able to eavesdrop, and we shall speak further there.”

Lute nodded, and then they both went their separate ways. Lute strolled into the smithy; however his mind wasn’t in tune with blacksmithing. This showed itself as Elder Irida savagely cut Lute more than normal. But he didn’t care, all he wanted to do was quickly end his day so he could look through the intelligence report that Elias had obtained for him using his families influence