Chapter 140: Last-Minute Preparations

Ji Ruoyu was a sixth-year student of the Hidden Dragon Institute and the only sixth-year present. He was the youngest out of everyone who entered the ruins, and he was also the weakest. His student number was 40, and people often referred to him as Little Forty.

Yet, Su Chen regarded Little Forty as the most important individual here.

Based on the Hidden Dragon Institute’s selection criterion, the weaker a student was, the more likely they were to have a unique talent.

Ji Ruoyu was no exception. The only reason he was selected was because he had a special innate Bloodline Skill: Void Sensing.

Void-type Origin Skills were rare. Even if they were conferred by a bloodline, the user often had to reach a certain level of strength in order to put them to good use.

Ji Ruoyu’s innate Bloodline Skill was the same. He didn’t know any techniques like Void Transportation, Void Sundering, or Mount Sumeru Shrinking1. Even Su Chen knew Whitetower Teleportation, which allowed him to warp a short distance forward, but Ji Ruoyu didn’t know that either.

The only thing he could do was sense void fluctuations and any disturbances that occured.

Even though it sounded completely useless, that skill was incredibly valuable in a place like a ruins.

As soon as the ruins opened, violent void fluctuations would begin, and the void would become more and more unstable until it finally collapsed.

Only people who could sense these fluctuations could precisely determine the time of collapse and locate a safe exit location.

Knowing what time the ruins would collapse was incredibly important. It controlled what everyone would do during that period of time.

If you set a plan for thirty days but the void ended up collapsing after ten days, everything might be over before the plan was even really put into motion. All of the effort you had put in earlier would have gone to waste. If one were to encounter void winds as the void fragmented, it would be difficult to exit safely.

Developing a plan of action was only practical once they knew how long the void would remain intact for.

This was why Su Chen had placed so much emphasis on protecting Ji Ruoyu – nothing could happen to him. He needed the help of someone like Ji Ruoyu the most, since he was someone who was used to making a move only after everything had been set in place.

Even so, Su Chen wasn’t too worried about Ji Ruoyu’s safety yet. Ji Ruoyu had been told over and over to avoid battle and to just stay alive. His Origin Ring was filled with escape-type items such as transportation scrolls, defensive scrolls, Light Shield Talismans, and a bunch of other items. As long as his luck wasn’t so terrible that there were Ferocious Race youths everywhere he went, he would be fine for now.

After he finished briefing Zhao Xin, Su Chen handed him two low-level Windspeed Medicines and two Recovery Medicines before sending him on his way.

He returned to the cave to wait for other students.

While he was waiting, there was nothing to do, so he began to perform research on the two Ferocious Race youth’s corpses. Unexpectedly, he reached a lucky breakthrough in just half a day.

However, he would require some raw materials to substantiate those breakthroughs.

Fortunately, Su Chen’s original plan included venturing out anyways, so he didn’t wait any longer. Instead, he left a letter and his medallion within the cave, instructing them to wait there for him before venturing out into the forest.

After arriving at the forest again, he didn’t enter it directly. First, he determined the wind direction, then hiked to a corner of the forest and lit a stick of incense.

The incense began to waft out and pour into the forest.

This was Beast Drawing Incense, and it was even more effective than Beast Drawing Medicine. Its effect could be carefully controlled to, for instance, only attract Vicious Beasts.

Not long after, a white, long-eared Vicious Beast stepped out of the forest.

Su Chen didn’t know what Vicious Beast it was. After reproducing in a void for tens of thousands of years, the appearances of these Vicious Beasts were drastically different from those of the outside world. This wasn’t particularly surprising.

However, now was not the time to analyze such things.

He twirled the axe in his hands, then wagged his finger at his target.

The white-eared beast didn’t instantly charge over. Rather, it stared intently at Su Chen.

Perhaps it wanted to observe its opponent first, but the Beast Drawing Incense overrode its cautious tendencies.

Finally, it couldn’t contain itself and charged him.

The battleaxe chopped forwards, a shocking wave of energy surging forward.

The weapons that the Ferocious Race possessed were both large and cumbersome and very difficult to use. However, it was quite effective at dealing with Vicious Beasts, who weren’t able to adapt to situations very well and relied on their physical bodies to battle.

The beast’s claw slammed into the battleaxe. In one blow, the beast’s claw was split in two, and blood spurted out.

The Vicious Beast let out a pained cry and retreated.

It wanted to run after experiencing its opponent’s strength.

The axe in Su Chen’s hand chased after it, cleaving the white-eared beast down its back into two pieces.

After killing the Vicious Beast in two axe strikes, Su Chen tossed the axe aside, moved to the corpse, and began to absorb Origin Energy.

Yes, this was Su Chen’s true motive – he wanted to absorb more Origin Energy to raise his cultivation base.

Concocting medicines was only one part of Su Chen’s plan. The other part was to improve his strength and break into the Blood Boiling Realm.

The only reason that the two races had forbidden Blood Boiling Realm cultivators from entering the ruins was because they were worried that powerful energy fluctuations would disrupt the void, accelerating its collapse.

However, this concern only applied to the group as a whole. One or two Blood Boiling Realm cultivators would only have a limited effect on the collapse rate.

Of course, the two races had also taken precautions against this, so they had proposed that the candidates’ cultivation bases be limited to ninety Yellow Stars or below when selecting candidates.

There were ten Yellow Stars between ninety Yellow Stars and making a breakthrough. For most people, these ten Yellow Stars would require a year to obtain. Even the most talented individuals would probably take at least half a year.

The ruins would definitely not survive for such a long time, so they could avoid any breakthroughs from occurring.

However, this provision did not take into account Su Chen’s eyes.

During the training period, Su Chen had already raised his cultivation base to the stage of 90 Yellow Stars. Afterwards, he had carefully controlled his cultivation rate in order to avoid losing the right to attend.

After entering the ruins, however, he no longer had any apprehensions. Ten Yellow Stars was just one to two hundred Vicious Beasts.

This was also why he needed to find Ji Ruoyu. He would only know how long the void would exist and how his breakthrough would affect that duration if he found Ji Ruoyu.

For instance, if this void could only last three more days, Su Chen would just give up on his plan of breaking through here and go look for treasures instead.

However, if it could last for more than ten days, he could prepare to enter the Blood Boiling Realm.

After absorbing the white-eared beast’s Origin Energy, Su Chen began to clean up the corpse. These Vicious Beasts had existed in isolation for tens of thousands of years, allowing evolution to act on them. They had greatly diverged from the outside world, and researching them might bring some shocking discoveries to light.

He had just taken care of the corpse when another Vicious Beast came charging out of the forest.

Based on Su Chen’s current strength, as long as it wasn’t a peak-tier existence like the Clay Giant, he had nothing to fear from regular Vicious Beasts.

He wasted no time in killing it and absorbing its Origin Energy. Everything went as smoothly as could be, and Su Chen began to execute his cultivation plan.

1. There’s a purportedly famous Buddhist quote: “Mount Sumeru hides mustard seed; mustard seed contains Mount Sumeru.” According to my best interpretation, this is some kind of shrinking technique.