Decaying World

Chapter 126 Test 126 (Xie Jianyi does not guide Xiao Chaomeng Alliance Leader)

hiss.
The blood-stained pattern coalesced into a rhombus shape once more.

A thin line appeared below the pool in view, with a line of text marked at the end of the line.

'Water People: Remaining time: 6 months. Water, under the influence of special environments and unknown forces, can form special life forms resembling organisms. Their basic lifespan is 30 to 50 years. They possess the potential for growth.'

Note: Once formed, the water-human possesses only basic intelligence and obeys only the commands of its master.

After reading the introduction, Lin Hui quickly took out the Illusion Dragon Lotus, bit off a small piece, and swallowed it.

He hadn't expected it to only take six months. He guessed that it might be because his physical and mental strength were also improving, so the required total amount of evolution was relatively short compared to the amount he could improve every day.

Soon, the Blood Seal Evolution was completely completed after the Illusionary Dragon Lotus had been eaten less than a third of its length.

Wow.

A splash came from the pool in front of Lin Hui.

This oval pool of water, at this moment, seemed to be squeezed, collided, and constantly stirred up splashes of water, as if by some invisible force.

Disciples in the distance were attracted by the sound, but Lin Hui waved his hand and ordered them to block the surrounding area and stay away from here.

Lin Hui gazed quietly at the clear water in the pool.

one second.

Two seconds
Soon, a transparent head slowly rose from the pool.

Next come the shoulders, torso, and limbs.

A few seconds later, a two-meter-tall body of water formed a human shape and floated in front of Lin Hui.

His legs stood on the surface of the pool as if they were weightless.

'This is the Water Man?'

Lin Hui examined the object with curiosity.

The water-human has no facial features, only a rough humanoid outline. Its body is completely transparent, allowing one to see refracted and distorted scenery from one side to the other.

Its head is completely bald, and its body occasionally bulges out like clay.

But they can all be quickly compressed back into the body.

'What can this guy do?'

Lin Hui looked at the water figure, pondered for a moment, but couldn't figure out what its purpose was.

“Attack that wall over there.” He pointed to the gray-white wall on the right.

puff!
The next moment, the water-man flicked his head forward, like spitting phlegm, and a large clump of transparent water bulged out.

The water gushed out and crashed against the wall, soaking a large section of it.

Lin Hui glanced at the power from afar and fell silent.

This thing is worse than a kid throwing a brick at a wall.
He stepped forward, approached, and reached out to gently touch the water man's skin.

Without any hindrance, his fingers went straight into the inside of the Water Man's arm, just like touching a ball of water, without any difference.

Lin Hui withdrew his hand and was surprised to find that his hand was not wet at all, and none of the water had been carried out of the water man's body.

He circled the water figure, reaching out to pinch and touch it here and there. The water figure gave him the feeling of being a moving mass of water.

He reached out, his entire arm going through the Waterman's back and protruding out of his chest.

The guy didn't react at all and let him test him.

Lin Hui withdrew his hand, then drew his sword again without using internal force, and slashed the water man's neck with a fierce blow.

puff!
The water spirit's head was cut open, but it automatically closed up in an instant.

It stared blankly at Lin Hui, still showing no reaction.

'Try again.'

Lin Hui became interested, gripped his sword, and suddenly flashed forward, stabbing dozens of times in a single second.

Each sword pierced through various parts of the water spirit's body.

After all the swords had been thrust, he stopped and stood still, only to find the water spirit still standing there, completely unharmed.

All the sword wounds that had been inflicted had already healed completely.

'Immune to sharp weapons? I wonder what about blunt weapons?' Lin Hui finally discovered one use for this thing.

'What about using internal energy?'

He tried again, and the blade was slowly covered with a layer of purgatory internal energy that was white with a hint of red.

As soon as it started moving, the water creature in front of it trembled and retreated, showing a fearful expression.

"Alright, just stay in the pool and don't come out rashly and scare people," he said helplessly, dispersing the internal energy from his sword.

Wow.

The water spirit transformed back into water and returned to the pool. Everything returned to calm.

Seeing the pool restored to its original state, as if nothing had changed, Lin Hui breathed a sigh of relief, feeling a pang of regret for having wasted some of the Illusionary Dragon Lotus.

'Forget it, I won't feel right if I don't try. Besides, this thing is so well concealed; who knows, it might come in handy later.'

He looked around, his gaze sweeping over the stone bricks and trees.

'From this perspective, the stone figures, tree figures, and chopstick figures are probably similar. They're simply animated objects.'

'So, next, let's try purely conceptual ones. Since skills like swordsmanship can evolve, what about other concepts?'

He pondered for a moment, looked around, and then slowly squatted down, extending his palm and placing it on the ground.

The cold, white stone bricks had a slightly frosted feel to the touch, and there were small grains of sand and grass clippings stuck where they touched the palm.

Lin Hui closed his eyes and imagined the entire courtyard as the target of the blood seal's evolution.

hiss.

Suddenly, the bloodstains reformed from the pattern into a rhombus shape.

A new message appeared.

'Ordinary Stone Residence: A common residence built of hardened white sandstone, part of the Qingfeng Temple mansion, of ordinary quality. Function: Rest, stroll, relax. Evolutionary Branches: 3.' 'It actually works!?' Lin Hui exclaimed in surprise, standing up.

He looked around.

I was just trying it out, but I didn't expect the Blood Seal to actually respond.

After a moment's thought, he opened the evolution branch and examined it carefully.

'1—Mechanical Courtyard.'

'2—Immortal Sect Courtyard.'

'3 - Elemental Courtyard.'

The general direction of the three names can already be seen from the keywords.

Lin Hui's heart skipped a beat, and he clicked on the first one.

'Mechanical Garden: A functional ornamental garden originating from a wealthy district in a technologically advanced federation, possessing limited technological features. Its energy supply can last for one year.'

the second.

'Immortal Sect Courtyard: A scenic courtyard within the public area of ​​the Seven Abyss Sect complex, generally used by sect disciples for relaxation and leisure. It possesses some illusionary abilities and its energy can sustain it for one year.'

The third.

'Elemental Courtyard: The private courtyard of the mage Anthony, where elemental flowers are planted, and an elemental sprite has already sprouted there.'

'Another tough choice of three,' Lin Hui sighed.

He pondered for a moment but still didn't decide to evolve. After all, this was a courtyard, and it would be difficult to hide the evolution. If someone noticed something was wrong, it would be a big problem.

The existence of the Blood Mark and the ability to evolve things were secrets he knew very well but absolutely could not reveal.

Especially when you haven't determined your level of strength within the inner city, you absolutely cannot let any information slip out.

'Speaking of which, I should go to the inner city and meet the real high priests and great priests, to see what level my current strength really falls into.'

How to make this contact is the question. It would be best to make a gentle, indirect approach.

If I do it myself, and something serious happens, and I can't handle it, my true strength might be exposed, and the whole situation will collapse.

He had already determined that there were many mentally unstable people in the inner city, so a suitable candidate appeared in Lin Hui's mind.

'Tao Xuehai'

"This child possesses exceptional talent and abundant resources, indicating a distinguished background and high regard at home. Furthermore, he admires me and can quickly inherit my perfect swordsmanship. Using him to indirectly test the Inner City High Priest is a good choice."

After dispelling the bloodstain information, Lin Hui had one last test to conduct.

He temporarily set aside Tao Xuehai's probing plan and redefined the target scope for the next evolution of the blood seal.

Standing in the courtyard, he took a deep breath.

He drew his sword and touched the ground with the tip.

'The Blood Seal will evolve the entire Qingfeng Temple sect.'

hiss.

The next second, the bloodstain on the back of his hand dispersed again and then coalesced once more.

A new line of text quickly appeared.

'Qingfeng Temple: A fast-sword sect founded by Qingfeng Daoren, specializing in the Qingfeng Sword Technique. The current abbot is Lin Hui. No special effects. Evolutionary branches: 3.'

Lin Hui discovered that the number of branches in the evolution of the Blood Seal seemed to be mostly three, with only a very few instances of more than three branches.

He picked up his sword, went into the room, and sat down to rest.

Then my gaze fell on the three possible evolutionary branches.

'1——Qingfeng Temple (Demon)'

'2——Qingfeng Temple (Immortal)'

'3——Qingfeng Temple (Secret)'

'What kind of approach is this?' Lin Hui wondered. He quickly clicked to check the details.

'Qingfeng Temple (Demon): An evolved sect leaning towards demonic cultivation. Joining it doubles cultivation speed, but the difficulty of breaking through bottlenecks increases by 30%.'

'Qingfeng Temple (Immortal): An evolutionary path leaning towards the immortal path. Those who join will receive the title of sect disciple and will gain a 30% reduction in difficulty when breaking through bottlenecks, but their cultivation speed will be halved.'

'Qingfeng Temple (Secret): A clandestine evolutionary path. Those who join will receive the title of sect disciple and will gain a 50% increase in cultivation speed and a 10% reduction in the difficulty of breaking through bottlenecks. This effect is lost upon leaving the sect.'

'I can't believe it!? You can get a boost effect just by having a title?!' At this moment, even Lin Hui, who is considered to have a strong capacity for acceptance, felt that these three evolutions were utterly absurd.

Can you instantly become a genius just by joining a sect and getting a title?
This is simply a magic weapon for sect development!
He clicked to check the time required for the next three branches.

Twenty years, twenty-five years, thirty years.

The three evolutions instantly cooled him down; he couldn't afford them, he simply couldn't afford them.

"Right now, my priority is to improve my own strength. As for influence, I can focus on becoming stronger first, then I can go out and recruit more skilled individuals. With more skilled individuals, my influence will naturally increase."

With this in mind, Lin Hui's mindset calmed down considerably. Now that the Blood Seal was free, the Typhoon Sword Technique wouldn't need to evolve anytime soon.

He pondered for a moment, thinking about how to improve his strength.

'By the way, the sealing array we extracted earlier is currently only for internal energy circulation; it's completely useless against opponents who cultivate both internal and external techniques. Perhaps we could find a way to strengthen this ability.'

He remembered that the original sealing array originated from an item called sealing insect eggs.

"Someone come here!" Lin Hui suddenly called out.

"What are your instructions, Abbot?"

A disciple rushed in, clasped his hands in greeting, and bowed.

"Go outside and issue me a mission, a medium-level one, the content is: acquire a fog-zone creature called a Sealing Worm. Dead or alive, it doesn't matter," Lin Hui said in a deep voice.

"Yes!"

Lin Hui thought that the sealing array was very useful, and if he could further evolve and strengthen it, he might be able to boost his strength again in a short period of time.

(End of this chapter)