Decaying World

Chapter 15 015 Body Tempering Part 1 (Thanks to Moon Knight and Moon Alliance Leader)
Lin Hui was taken aback, reached out and took the black object, examining it carefully in his hand.

This is an irregularly shaped object, resembling a lump of coal or some kind of black iron ore.

The surface has obvious gray-black fractures. It's unclear from which part of the monster in the fog zone it broke off from.

"Alright, I'll be leaving this afternoon. I've packed everything. I'll write to you when I'm settled in at the Zhao family's place!" After handing over the things, Chen Zhishen turned around, waved, and quickly left.

With his back to Lin Hui, a look of melancholy unconsciously appeared on his face. That thing was actually far more difficult to obtain than he had claimed, but Lin Hui had looked after him for so long and helped him so much; this was the only thing he could do for him in return.

"Have a safe journey," Lin Hui said sincerely, watching his retreating figure.

Within Qingfeng Temple, three years is the maximum time limit for practicing the Seven-Section Fast Sword, but most students successfully master it in about two years.

Chen Zhishen, who had been with the company for over a year, was only at a moderate level in terms of speed, but he was loyal, righteous, and had a clean background, making him easy to control. This was probably the main reason why the second senior brother took the initiative to recruit him.

Only after Chen Zhishen's figure had completely disappeared did Lin Hui turn his gaze back to the black object in his hand.

As usual, he focused his attention, opened the blood seal, and intended to check and identify relevant information.

hiss.

After a soft sound in my ear.

A line of blood-red text quickly appeared below the field of vision.

'Dead, sealed insect eggs.'

"Huh?" Lin Hui was taken aback. Insect eggs? Sealing?
The fragments he had previously collected all appeared to be remnants of some unknown species. Apart from the external descriptions, the information was only a rough indication of whether they were hot, cold, or poisonous.

But this thing... it seems...
"Not fragments?"

Lin Hui looked back carefully.

'Dead Sealed Insect Egg: This insect egg was once used to seal a special creature from the fog zone. After the creature escaped, the egg, deprived of its designated nutrients for a long time, gradually dried up and died. Its internal structure contains a powerful sealing pattern, which can evolve into branch 4.'

"So many evolutionary branches!?" Lin Hui was taken aback. Most other things had no more than three evolutionary branches, and this was the first item he had ever seen with four.

Clearly, this thing is no ordinary item!
After hesitating for a moment, Lin Hui clicked on the location of the evolution branch.

With a whoosh, four evolution paths popped up.

'1—Sealing magic circle.'

'2—Sealing Array.'

'3—Evil-Sealing Array.'

'4—Sealing Array.'

The abundance of branches caught Lin Hui off guard for a moment.

Just by looking at their names, you can tell these branches are definitely not simple. Those that can be called formations are probably beyond his level to understand in this world.

Not simple often means taking even longer.

Without hesitation, he clicked on each of the branches one by one.

'1——Sealing Magic Array: It can form a combination of special toxins to seal the elusive special magical energy.'

Required resources: A small amount of magical energy, a set of natural seal patterns. 10 years of physical and mental reserves.

Time required: 10 years.

Lin Hui's heart skipped a beat. Ten years!? That's a long time. He'd probably be old enough to run errands by now and still not be fully evolved. What's more, he had absolutely no idea what magic energy was.

He turned off this one and moved on to the next. This one had the same time as the one above, except that the sealed object had been replaced by magical energy, which he had never heard of before.

The third one is also about what was sealed away but replaced with so-called evil energy.

The timeframes are also extremely long, at least around ten years.

Left with no other choice, Lin Hui looked at the last one.

The fourth is a pure sealing formation.

'Sealing Array: This array can seal the consciousness of ordinary beings with a special toxin, derived from the natural three-dimensional toxin of the sealing insect.'

'Required resources: One month to conserve energy, one month to conserve mental energy.'

Time required: One month.

There were no extra things, just the evolution requirements for January.

Lin Hui pondered for a moment. This thing seemed to be the fastest evolving thing he could currently access.

He could afford to waste just a month; it would be a good time to test the effects of the Blood Seal on other things.

Anyway, once the body tempering begins, there's no rush to learn new sword techniques. My body also needs to be repeatedly tempered with the Seven-Section Fast Sword to reach its limit.

'However, this thing isn't as easy to obtain as Chen Zhishen said. I've searched outside so many times and haven't encountered it even once. It definitely isn't something that exists around here.'

Lin Hui realized that Chen Zhishen must have gone somewhere else to find this thing.

Perhaps it was some dangerous place. After all, he had been to all sorts of ordinary places, but he had never seen anything like it.

After collecting the insect eggs, Lin Hui sighed inwardly and quickly returned to the dormitory.

I opened the board of my bed, and underneath was a wooden box. I unlocked it, opened the box, and inside was a small pile of various cleaned fragments.

These fragments were all picked up by him while wandering around aimlessly. Picking up one, Lin Hui focused his attention and activated the bloodstain.

'Unknown Fragment: A fragment that fell from the broken shell of some creature. Evolutionary Branch: 1.'

'1—Synthesis of large fragments.'

This is the evolutionary answer most of these fragments provide. They evolved from fragments into larger fragments, nothing more. And the evolutionary time is also measured in years. An extremely long process.

"Perhaps continuous evolution and strengthening could achieve a complementary effect, but that's not what I want. Wasting the Blood Seal's time on this is not worthwhile; I must find a way to increase the Blood Seal's evolution speed."

Lin Hui put the newly acquired insect eggs into the box, closed it again, and locked it.

'Once the final evolution is complete, I'll begin experimenting.'

This insect egg was the fastest-evolving thing he had ever encountered, and it also seemed to involve extraordinary abilities beyond martial arts.

Faced with extraordinary abilities beyond his comprehension, Lin Hui felt a certain amount of anticipation.

He put the bed back on; he was somewhat concerned about the privacy of his living space.

"I need to find a way to live alone after the Body Tempering stage. Once I pass the assessment and become a formal disciple, I should be able to get a private room. It'll be soon, very soon."

As I stepped out of the dormitory, two young men, both new faces, came in. The places left by those who had left were naturally filled by new students.

However, this also brings security risks, and the theft of personal belongings is not uncommon here.

"Senior Brother Lin." The two greeted Lin Hui one after the other.

"Mm." Lin Hui nodded in response and brushed past the two of them.

Chen Zhishen left.

In the time that followed, Lin Hui began to feel more and more troubled while practicing his sword. Before, he could have focused entirely on practicing his sword, since Chen Zhishen would always inform him of anything that needed to be done when the time came.

But not anymore.

He was a loner and had no one to help him, so he always preferred to practice quietly in a corner by himself.

Hui Shen, who used to be quite polite to him, now completely ignores him.

Lin Hui had no choice but to find another place to practice his swordsmanship, where he trained diligently while waiting for the final evolution to be completed.

Only by completing the body tempering process and becoming a formal disciple of those twenty-odd people can he improve his life. He plans to take on a junior brother then to do errands or similar jobs.

As for now, he has no value to be relied upon or supported by others.

Time passes slowly.

A month passed in the blink of an eye.

Chen Zhishen went to the Zhao family, and to his surprise, a month later he actually sent a letter back to Lin Hui, along with some local specialties from that town. He had bought them with his first month's wages.

It was a peanut and date cake, very sweet and fragrant.

Lin Hui tasted one piece himself and gave the rest to his mother.

In his letter, Chen Zhishen mentioned that the Zhao family treated them very well, providing them with all kinds of benefits. His current task was to occasionally escort merchant caravans, and spend the rest of his time taking turns with the others to instruct the other ordinary servants of the Zhao family.

What left Lin Hui speechless was that Chen Zhishen mentioned in his letter that he had met a fellow female guard there, and the two had fallen in love and were now living together.

Forget Bai Hua, forget Xie Li, none of them can compare to my hot senior sister!

In his letter, Chen Zhishen praised his senior sister Zhang Tingfang as unique and perfectly matching his aesthetic.

The letter was written by someone else, and it didn't have Chen Zhishen's signature, only his red handprint. The handprint was even crooked, leaving Lin Hui speechless and amused.

He put the letter away and threw himself back into his full-fledged training.

*
*
*
Xinyu Town.

Lin Shunhe, looking exhausted, quietly crept along the shadows of the wall and silently slipped through a hole into his yard.

He looked up at the sky; it was almost evening, but the fog hadn't yet formed. He breathed a sigh of relief.

Money isn't so easy to earn.

Especially for an elderly man like him with a bad record, even his wife was implicated and almost fired. If it weren't for his many years of work and connections, his wife Yao Shan might have been fired by now.

Even so, Yao Shan's employer took the opportunity to deduct most of her income.

Lin Shunhe is still able to make money now, simply because he's involved in shady businesses.

He used his old connections to join a black market gang that specialized in selling stolen goods. The income was good, but he was constantly in contact with various dangerous people, making it quite risky.

Fortunately, things soon got better. He saved enough money to open his own shop. Opening a small general store and being able to make a living would be a good start.

dong dong dong.

Suddenly there was a knock on the courtyard gate.

Lin Shunhe was about to enter the inner room when he heard the sound and turned his head to look.

"Who?"

"Mr. Lin Shunhe, right? We're from the Fu'an Gang. The location you applied for has been approved. However, you can open the shop, but the rules cannot be broken." A rough male voice came from behind.

Lin Shunhe quickly stepped forward, breathed a sigh of relief, and opened the door.

Three burly men with thick waists and broad shoulders stood outside the door, wearing gray vests and black shorts, each holding a thick wooden stick and sticking it on the ground.

Upon seeing the door open, the burly man standing at the head of the group clasped his hands in greeting and said, "I am Xu Dao. Mr. Lin, do you still remember the rules?"

"I remember, I remember. After the shop opens, half of the profits will be handed over on time every month. Don't worry, I remember everything." Lin Shunhe nodded hurriedly. The Fu'an Gang is the largest gang in Xinyu Town. Before, when he did things for important people, naturally no one dared to come to his door to collect money, but now it's different.

"That's good. When you open the store, go to the nearest branch of the gang to register. If you encounter any problems in the future, you can report it to our store." Xu Dao nodded.

"Oh, and if the returns are too low, or even if you lose money, you still have to make up at least three thousand coins. Remember that." He suddenly remembered something and added.

(End of this chapter)