“Teacher… be careful.” Fan Zhong spoke those words not knowing if the old swordsman had heard them.

Complication settled into his eyes as he considered the implications of what could make the old man so grim. There were only two times he had seen a similar expression on the immortal’s face. The first being when they had fought the bandits in Butont and the second was when he had been taken away for that month-long training session. Whatever had been contained in that jade slip seemed to far outweigh either of those situations as Fan Zhong could feel his mind reeling simply from the gaze Xing Zheng had leveled at him.

Shaking his head he looked at the brick on the stone table and sighed before moving forward to start working on it. To begin with he sat down and focused his mind, allowing all thoughts to dissipate until only the void and the sound’s around remained. Deeper he went into that state of meditation, slowly eroding away even the sounds around him until all was silent.

With great care Fan Zhong rose and focused his eyes on the brick while willing his mental energy into that gaze. The image of a rune replaced the void slowly taking shape as an outline. These runes were made up of a shape whose lines were drawn by small runes of the same shape.

In turn, the small runes were made up of even tinier runes again of the same shape repeating over and over for as many layers as his mental energy could manage. This was what often gave Dao runes their blurring effects and gave headaches to those who looked at them. Eventually once enough layers of overlapping runes were used to form the original shape one would have to start causing the internal runes to move in the pattern that was naturally formed by the rune itself.

Only after nine layers was this possible and it was said to take an enormous amount of potent mental energy to form even a single rune that way. All of that was far away, however, as now Fan Zhong simply needed to form three layers to activate the technique. That threshold was important for runes as three layers were the most basic level required to form low-quality runes.

Slowly his mind focused and after an unknown amount of time it felt like a vortex appeared behind his eyes that absorbed his mental energy. In Fan Zhong’s field of view, the brick now had a circle floating over it that was filled a little over three-quarters the way with an earthy brown color. The rest of the circle was filled with two tiny slivers of blue and bright red followed by a large chunk of misty gray.

The whole projection was surrounded by a wispy blue mist that formed a border around the inner sections of the circle. Seeing that caused Fan Zhong’s eyes to widen as he recalled that the blue mist meant the natural treasure was spirit grade. From the instruction manual, he knew that white would have meant an earthly grade. Meanwhile gold would represent a nascent grade, something that should be impossible as none of his instructors had ever even seen natural treasures of that potency.

All things considered, this confirmed that the brick was truly a good vessel for a treasure as spirit grade was considered the best anyone could hope to get in the valley. Nodding in satisfaction he noted the faded nature of the blue mist outline, this should represent that the brick was only barely spirit grade. Taking a deep breath Fan Zhong once again strove for his state of clear-mindedness before retrieving a few small bags from the side of the table.

There were six of these bags, one for each of the six pillar elements with around 20 kg of treasure essence in each. These bags had been a gift from Xing Zheng to refine his first treasure and the old swordsman had said they were low-quality spirit treasure essence. Sighing he remembered that one of the unfortunate things about refining was the math involved in figuring out the weights and ratios involved with each refinement.

With reluctance Fan Zhong set about arranging a series of scales and instruments meant to facilitate the process. It seemed that today would be a long day.

Howls accompanied a freezing chill that seemed at odds with the sun that beat down over the valley on the horizon as Zi Bao crested a hill. His breath came in ragged rasps and his right hand clutched at a wound that soaked his torn martial robes with blood. Across his arms and back, similar lacerations were also present giving the impression that a feral creature had set about the young man with razor-sharp claws.

Fear was set deep on his face as he looked back to see wispy strands of silver-colored gas rising from the canopy of the forest below the slope that ran up to the hill. In the sky above that portion of the forest, the very air seemed to become dark and thick as if it were night and storm clouds hung overhead. Now that Zi Bao was out of the forest he could see the effect fading as if he was leaving another dimension and returning to the normal world.

As he observed this a shrill howling sound like a scream formed from glass rubbing against stone rang out followed by the terrified calls of others in that terrible place.

“Serves those Wei dogs right, snooping around for trouble. It's fortunate the surviving clan records gave me some idea about this place, otherwise…” Another wave of terror washed over Zi Bao and he shivered so much that his hands loosened for just a moment.

After another pause to sneer at the forest he turned to begin limping down the other side of the hill, anxious to be back inside Forest Depths Village. Just as he began to clench his left hand once more his open palm reflected a ray of light revealing a golden gleam.

Sweat beaded on Fan Zhong’s brow as he carefully finished placing the last of the treasure essence inside three of the circles carved into the stone table surrounding his brick. These were formation cores that would use the essence to feed into the refinement process and in total there were six. A master of the ‘Refine the Foundation’ technique could use these to complete a six-element chain to ultimately give a large boost to the end material, saving on costs or increasing the overall effect a given amount of treasure essence could give.

Currently, he could only manage two supporting elements in the process, and through numerous tests, during practical lectures, he’d seen the rather explosive results to the vessel if one exceeded their limits. Knowing this he had selected the earth essence since the treasure would be earth aligned. Next came metal essence as it birthed earth in the six pillar elements cycle allowing it to act as a boost to the earth essence. Finally, the water essence sat in the third circle as it was the supporting agent for the metal essence.

As he double and triple-checked the calculations that were scribbled on a scroll near the edge of the table Fan Zhong’s eyes seemed to drift to the essence itself. It came in the form of heavy glowing dust that gave off light that corresponded to the quality and element contained within. From the texts, he knew that once essence surpassed the spirit grade it would start forming incredibly small crystals instead of dust but for now he would have to make do with this.

Taking a deep breath he placed his left hand over the water essence that sparkled a hazy blue while his right hand moved into position above the metal essence. The formation had a connecting line that started with the furthest circle at the 10 o'clock position. Moving from there a rune connected counterclockwise to the 8 o’clock position and so on before the 12 o’clock position connected to the middle of the table where the vessel sat.

With great care, his left hand formed a hand sign while mental energy gathered in Fan Zhong’s mind's eye to begin forming the rune that would activate his refining technique. More sweat beaded on his brow as the runes that made up the stone circle carving flickered, sometimes filling with white light before briefly shutting off. After five minutes he managed to activate it and a circular curtain of light gently surrounded the water essence with a shining corridor that led to the metal essence.

Gritting his teeth Fan Zhong shoved away images of failure and the table exploding, forcing the first rune to stay solid in his mind as the second one formed. This process went smoother and after a minute the metal essence had a similar curtain surrounding it with wisps of blue mist seeping into the dust causing it to glow brighter. Stirred on by the ease of success here he moved his left hand from the water essence over the final circle to begin the third step.

Then trouble struck, as soon as the third and final rune for the earth essence started to coalesce the energy in the air seemed to quiver. It took all of his mental discipline and training to bite down the emotional response and stabilize the previous workings, barely getting them back in place. With dogged determination Fan Zhong pushed forward slamming his will into the technique to make it stable.

In his mind he allowed the song of his internal war to play, amplifying the sounds that conjured images of looming mountains that pressed down on all of creation. Cracking sounds started echoing out that only Fan Zhong could hear as his limited mental energy seemed to buckle under the stress of focusing on the technique while using the image of his path.

Snarling he poured all himself into the working. Internally he now realized that part of the problem lay in using such high-quality materials. In the practical lectures they always used earth-grade natural treasures and his mental energy had never had to contain a refinement like this. The spirit materials were like a high-grade flame as they released their energy to clash with and fuse with the brick as a vessel. In this process his mental energy served as the kiln for the refinement, taking the beatings of the essence releasing its potential.

Blood started seeping from the corners of Fan Zhong’s lips without him noticing as his mind focused entirely on finishing the process. As the third rune snapped into place the essence circles connected a line to a final containing circle surrounding the vessel. A torrent of energy surged forth, filling the central circle and beginning to make the brick shine with iridescent light.

Almost by instinct his right hand moved overtop of the treasure as it started forming. While doing so he started to form a series of hand seals while forming a final set of images in his mind. In total Fan Zhong’s mind held three refining runes and a single ephemeral and changing rune that corresponded to the seals.

Pain mounted quickly as his vision seemed to go white leaving no time to see if he performed the seals correctly. After what seemed like an eternity the blaring agony started to fade just slightly and over the course of an unknown amount of time it completely receded. Fan Zhong slumped to his knees as he coughed and grunted through the pain

Once he opened his eyes they revealed a dark night sky speckled with stars that shone like celestial jewels. A crescent moon sat high in the heavens illuminating the pavilion. With a quick check, he was able to determine the privacy array that kept others from observing was still active and most likely the reason no one had checked on him.

Drawing in a great breath Fan Zhong winced as the pain seemed to fill his body, causing each movement to arc with what felt like a lighting arc of agony. It took some time before he could stand and by that time the sound of footsteps could be heard from the small staircase leading into the pavilion. Turning his head Fan Zhong was greeted by the stern gaze of his best friend as well as the small snout of a cub-sized Little White.

Seeing that made him smile as the water wolf seemed to teleport beside him to begin licking at his face. Apparently, the old swordsman had communicated with his companion before he left, teaching him how to control his size. While speaking with Xing Zheng he learned that older spirit beasts learned to do this instinctively and as such the process to learn the skill would be like teaching a fish to swim.

Once taught the right way to move energy they would simply know how to do it. Thankfully the overlord of the surrounding regions was a sect that dealt with beast taming and raising leaving Xing Zheng with a lot of auxiliary knowledge about such topics.

“Brother Zhong, why must you go so overboard? I’ve been waiting for you at the sparring arena for over three hours now and even the masters didn’t know where you were. With this privacy formation, I had to find Little White to track you down!” Fan Yong’s tone was accusatory but it also carried some genuine worry as well.

“Apologies Brother Yong, Teacher was supposed to guide this refinement and it would’ve been done much sooner. Unfortunately, it seems that something urgent came up and he had to leave while promising to return before the tournament. In his absence I got a little carried away.” Fan Zhong looked up at the other young man while rubbing his head with a self-deprecating grin.

The motions hurt however, the more he moved the more the stiffness and pain were fading so it seemed that all he could do was work through it.

“That is… worrying. I suppose we don’t need to worry about him though. What would it even take to scratch that old monster?” Fan Yong shook his head and chuckled lightly. “In any case, can you stand?”

Grimacing Fan Zhong looked at the ground and attempted to push himself up. When his arm gave out as support for the attempt a soft pillowy feeling pushed against his back replacing the support. With the help of a Little White’s size-changing, he was on his feet in just a few minutes, albeit with a lot of help from the loveable furball.

For his part, the water wolf was ecstatic to have so much attention and was dutifully pressing forward with a snout every time he started to lose his balance. Looking at the table Fan Zhong smiled as he was now staring at a smooth brick that was roughly the size of his palm and four times the thickness of his hand. At the center was a circle that was made of runes with the Fan clan crest in the middle.

While measuring out the essence he had opted to refine the lowest possible quality spirit-earth-grade magical treasure. That was something that only provided a one percent boost to the inherent qualities of the vessel material and was barely above a mortal-grade treasure. All of this was for two reasons.

The first was that he didn’t really benefit as a First-grade martial artist from Qi enchantments and as such the quality didn't really matter. Aside from the durability boost provided by the refining process, this made the treasure not much more useful than a normal weapon for him. A spirit natural treasure weapon was almost impervious to attacks below the Master realm by itself and with this refinement, it would take a competent Grandmaster to destroy it.

With all of this considered the second reason he only refined the treasure to inferior spirit-earth grade was to save on materials. Spirit-grade natural treasure essence was incredibly expensive in the valley and the amount that Xing Zheng had given him could’ve probably bought a sizable portion of a village or town. Knowing this he had to be mindful of how much was used.

Unfortunately, this was compounded by the fact that the old swordsman had taught him a formation that would allow the weapon to shift into a different shape. This was not great as formations took up part of the treasure essence lowering the refinement boost. With the 10% decrease from the single formation Fan Zhong had to use enough material to refine an 11% inferior spirit-earth grade treasure even though he was only planning on the final product giving a one percent boost.

All of that had been worth it though as the end result had turned out marvelous. With a flick of his hand, Fan Zhong spun the brick around his wrist before catching it and pushing mental energy into the formation. In a flash of iridescent light, the brick morphed, narrowing the sides.

Meanwhile, the ends elongated, and what was left resembled a smooth gray stone staff. Testing the balance he found that it was only slightly heavier than the old staff he’d used in the clan and overall was lighter than the original brick. This was most likely because the basic refinement technique had burned away everything but the primary earth element, wasting the more ethereal energies that the treasures had held.

“Ahh!” Fan Yong shouted as the treasure transformed into the staff, seeming caught off guard by the bright flash of light.

“What? Never seen a supreme treasure refined by a favored son of the heavens?” Fan Zhong asked while smirking.

“Supreme treasure my ass.” Fan Yong grumbled while slugging Fan Zhong in the shoulder in revenge. “Did senior teach you some techniques for controlling treasures? I don’t remember seeing something like this in the refining lectures you dragged me to.”

Fan Zhong winced at the playful blow but endured it, he deserved it after all.

“Indeed, it's a formation that lets you imbue an alternative shape for the treasure during refinement. Also, you're a free man so the decision to go was yours! Don’t pin your actions on me!” Fan Zhong replied, red-tingeing his face as he recalled that his friend wasn’t all that interested in the refining lectures.

In truth, he knew that Fan Yong had attended the basic lectures weeks ago and was now learning knowledge specific to his Spirit cooking while they were separate. However, ever the good friend, the other young man had followed him to the basic lectures without question or complaint. His presence had been a comfort for Fan Zhong and had served equally well as a study partner to ask for ideas or compare notes.

“Hmph, whatever, Young Master Fan Zhong.” Fan Yong replied with a small smile on his face.

“Y... You!” With these stuttered words a limping Fan Zhong began a display that the whole sect saw as he chased after the other youth.

Little White ran between the two in circles, enjoying the exercise and occasionally making sure his master didn’t fall over. Disciples were aghast as they saw the trio shouting and laughing as they ran down the walkways and across training grounds all the while their constant back and forth echoing throughout the mountain.

Night sky loomed overhead as a man walked through a field of shifting chest-high grass. All around him the air whistled as the cool night breeze brushed against all living things. He wore a wide-brimmed bamboo hat that hung over his face obscuring it from sight along with practical brown martial robes.

At his side rested a sheathed sword that seemed rather odd. It lacked a cross guard and the hilt seemed to merge with the sheathe making the entire object appear as one seamless piece. As he walked the air around the man seemed to distort and twist and occasionally an area of the tall grass would be pushed aside by a peculiar gust of wind.

At this particular moment, the area around him did this lifting the bamboo hat ever so slightly to reveal a handsome middle-aged man with short-cut black hair. He had a scar running down the left side of his face and the air of a scholar permeated his expression. This was of course Xing Zheng and he was currently standing within the endless expanse of the Northern Plains.

In particular, this field was 200 km southeast of the Flowing Grass Valley at the edge of Deng clan territory. At his feet lay the dried-up corpse of a young warrior from a clan with the crest of a black arrow. The body was dried up as if it had been laying in the sun for years and was sapped of moisture while a gaping hole was blasted through the chest.

It seemed to have been a young man who was a member of the nomadic clans that visited the Deng to trade for goods. Here on the plains, young martial artists were trained in the field and many lost their lives during the process. Xing Zheng knew all too well that the spirit beasts that roamed the tall grass as well as the birds of prey that warred over the sparse peaks killed innumerable amounts of nomadic clansmen each year.

This was amplified by those very peaks, strange mountains that seemed to jut out of the ground like swords made for titans. There was a rumor that long ago a race of immortal titans had used the Northern Plains as a burial ground and that these were actually swords of fallen warriors from that race left to mark their graves. Whatever the truth, it was the reality that these areas had some of the few forested areas of the plains.

Venturing inside could give a young hopeful warrior rare herbs and natural treasures that would give his position in the clan a significant boost. All of this didn’t even mention the various wars that raged over these resource-rich areas. Even though he knew all of this Xing Zheng could instantly tell that this warrior had been killed by no such beast or war.

What gave it away was a combination of factors. Firstly the ground was damaged all around, littered with cracks and fissures from martial artists fighting not to mention the various arrows from the plainsmen firing their bows. Looking at these he could see that most of them were still present and even mounds of loose dirt hadn’t blown away with the constant winds.

Considering these factors it was obvious that the battle had been recent. However, the key factor was something that was not present. Using his divine sense Xing Zheng was constantly observing the energy flows in the area.

While doing this he could instantly see that there was no gathering Mental Qi or dispersing ambient Vital Qi. Around him, hidden under the swaying tall grass, there were over two dozen bodies. If left alone this amount of slaughter was enough to form a zombie or two and could spread further with more victims and time.

He had been to many battlefields that had been left to fester, assigned to do cleanup duty to prevent this very thing. Every single one of them showed signs of the Mental Qi that contained the resentment and hatred of the slain gathering together with the Vital Qi that dispersed in the air when someone died. This was the work of some sort of demonic art that harvested that energy and used it to further advancement, a sloppy one if the battlefield was anything to go by.

Normally experienced demonic practitioners would allow some of that energy to remain to give the impression the fight had occurred long ago, causing the Qi to dissipate over time. It could be any number of demonic arts but there was some part of Xing Zheng that told him… this was a Blood Qi cultivator. However, that caused a pause for him.

The scene was so obvious it was like an invitation for anyone caring to investigate. True the power used had been below the spirit level and as such below far-range detection. However, it would be obvious to anyone keeping watch over the area what had happened when they received the report. When scouts had reported to the Deng clan elders that this was going on, his network of contacts within the area had made sure to pass the message along within an hour of receiving it.

All of this seemed to be perfect, and it reeked of a trap. Even more so now that he had been in the area and contacted some of the baronesses' people that were nearby via divine sense and similar reports had cropped up. Each of them drew a path that led him deeper into the center of the area.

As he took a deep breath the cry of a swiftwind twin-tail reminded him of a day. Stepping into that memory was like walking into a dream. All around him was a similar sight, tall grass as far as the eye could see while wind seemed to caress all of creation. The sharp tang of blood coated the air of the memory as a scarlet hue settled on the horizon.

There on top of a mountain of corpses sat a bored-looking young man meditating with his eyes closed in crimson red robes with an amused expression. Xing Zheng had seen war before that time and witnessed fields full of bodies. However, nothing prepared him for that sight, a mix of pure slaughter amid the concentrated terror left within the energy of that field.

As he approached it felt like the agony of uncountable souls were lashing out at him, begging any living lifeform to endure their resentment and hatred. When he was only 500 meters away that young man opened his eyes.

“So you’ve come, dog of the heavens. Tell me, what treat did your masters promise for throwing away your miserable life here?” Sha Da leveled a cold, predatory smile upon him.

“Demon, I give you this one chance. Surrender yourself and enter service under me to repent your crimes for the rest of your life. It will be hard, however, until the end of days your deeds will work to right that evil which you brought into this world!” Xing Zheng felt a bead of sweat start to form on his neck from the pressure of the souls; however, his voice carried the pride of a son of the Xing Empire!

This was his code for serving as a Judgment Executioner, all who he hunted would be given this chance exactly once! In the proceeding hundreds of years, he had never once hunted a demonic cultivator without giving them this option. He himself did not start to understand why until centuries later while mulling on the topic.

It gave him peace and settled the irritation in his heart over the ways of the neutral path clashing with his instincts to embrace the righteous path. All beings should have a choice in the world, and be allowed to walk on their own path or so was said by the neutral path's Primordial Ancestor. In this way, even though a small one, Xing Zhengdid just that and acknowledged that his targets walked their own path. From that moment on they had to choose to keep walking it even knowing it would bring conflict with him.

He still didn’t fully understand why this gave him peace during these hunts however, perhaps it would simply come with time. Refocusing on the memory he now saw the tells of the attack that would make this fight so difficult. Each of the corpses was shimmering ever so slightly as the earth trembled with barely perceptible vibrations.

Amid all that, his focus had been solely on the arrogant smug smile plastered on Sha Da’s face.

“You seem pretty strong, perhaps father will give me something nice if I refine a vital soul from you. Feel honored as I can only do this three times in my life, you're the first,” A red glint flashed across the young man’s eyes as crimson light surrounded him.

That would mark the start of the fight as hundreds of blood-colored phantom spears raced upward from underground to attack Xing Zheng. A single mistake and it had almost cost him his life that day. Sha Da had been a competent fighter but without the injuries, Xing Zheng had sustained from that surprise attack the results wouldn’t have nearly been so close.

Between then and now, that had been the only noteworthy blood cultivator he had fought. Sure there were some minor practitioners but Sha Da had been different. He had possessed obvious training and a coherent style with techniques to complement it.

Now here he was, standing in the exact same area tracking another such practitioner. Inwardly Xing Zheng smiled to himself. These demonic practitioners set off a storm hoping to lure him into the eye to crush him. It seemed they hadn’t learned, he and the storm were one and the same.

Time passed slowly for Sha Mu as he waited near the center of the Northern Plains region. Already he and his fellow disciples had spent almost three months in this pathetic Lesser Region and it was already grating on his nerves. At first, he had been happy his idiotic older brother had been killed while training in the mortal world all those years ago.

It had been a chance to earn his father's approval and gain the identity as the heir to the Blood Wings sect, a sizable upgrade from being the Second Young Master. However, that was before it had actually happened. His father had been less than pleased and all but ignored him in the resulting years, choosing instead to go into seclusion.

Due to this, he had inherited the responsibilities of being the heir without much of the protection as the person who would’ve given him that was now in closed-door cultivation. Such had started centuries worth of scheming and manipulation to keep his own life and position. In the first decade alone ten different assassination attempts were made!

Those years had drilled into him the truth of the world. Schemes were used by the weak. Deception and lies only tools to be used to gain edges. What really mattered in the world of cultivation was strength, indomitable might that pressed down on the world like a sword of celestial might. When it had come to him the truth seemed so obvious, one of the lessons that had been told to him practically from birth.

It was then that Sha Mu understood what ‘profound’ truly meant. Profound was an essence found in the experience of the world colliding with sayings that men remembered. Ephemeral and elusive, these words contained a hidden world that could not be opened unless you experienced the truth of them for yourself.

In a way that made the sayings themselves almost tragic, as if they were paintings of catastrophe made for the blind who could not see their message. You could say them as much as you wanted and those who lacked experience would reply with things such as ‘I know!’ or ‘I understand.’ when in truth they were those furthest from understanding! After gaining this enlightenment his cultivation skyrocketed and he’d broken through to the Qi condensation realm a little over 400 years ago.

Since then he had continuously challenged himself, ever hungry to gain enough strength to stifle the feeling that he was drowning in the sea known as the world. No longer did he ride on the hopes that his father would exit seclusion and favor him nor that the sect would treat him like a chosen son of heaven. All of that had been until he had missed his father’s actual exit from seclusion while hunting in the wilds.

So offended had the old man been that he instantly told him that since he wanted to rely on himself so much Sha Mu no longer needed to be the heir of the Blood Wings Sect. This had ruined everything, crushed all of his momentum! After much bowing and gritted teeth, his father finally relented and said this.

“Son, let it not be said that your father shows favorites. Since your big brother died in that small mortal empire, then as his brother you should be looking to avenge him! Bring me the head of his killer and only then will your inheritance be reinstated.” The old man had said while maintaining the air of some aloof immortal.

He had almost attacked the man right then and there with only the reminder that the core formation old monster could crush him with a glare stopping him. This had been 180 years ago and every moment since was spent frantically searching for this blasted Judgment Executioner. Now that would all come to a rest, he had taken the bait and been mercilessly tracking down all the mortals they’d given techniques to.

After months of checking and collecting info they had confirmed, there were no mysterious protectors following him. Finally, they had taken the last month to set up a formation that would stop any of the old monsters hiding here from feeling this battle going on. With a minor effort of will, he signaled the others, who were positioned underground in a 100 km circular pattern around him, to activate the concealing formation so that the central Northern plains were concealed from long-range divine sense scrying.

Taking a deep breath Sha Mu felt let go of the power that was wrapped around him like a thick cowl. Instantly his 11 meridian Qi Condensation power was revealed, almost peak power for that realm! A smile crossed his lips as a powerful divine sense quickly zeroed in on his location and a massive amount of energy started moving his way.

“Good, this will finally all be over.” Sha Mu whispered under his breath with relief as a sinister smile crossed his face.