Chapter 50: Is There Really Such a Demon?

Chapter 50: Chapter 50: Is There Really Such a Demon?

Changning Town. An ordinary town three thousand miles from Dao Yi Mountain, part of the Jiangnan Water Village region.

Outside the town stood a small Ruined Temple.

Li Jianzhou leaned against a pillar at the temple entrance, basking in the sun. A powerful surge of Life Qi emanated from his eyes.

The aroma of cooking food drifted through the air.

His disciple, Chengg Lin, had finished preparing the meal.

"Master, it’s time to eat."

In the distance, his other disciple, Zhao Yunkong, appeared on the small path leading to the Daoist Temple, pushing a four-wheeled cart with both hands.

Chengg Lin was overjoyed at the sight and hurried over to help him push the wooden wheelchair.

"This thing is finally ready."

Pushing the wooden chair before Li Jianzhou, she said, "Master, would you like to get on and see if it fits?"

Li Jianzhou glanced up, his expression gentle, and said:

"I can see it’s a perfect fit. Thank you for your hard work."

"It was no trouble at all," the two disciples immediately said, shaking their heads. "It’s what we ought to do."

As they spoke, they moved to help Li Jianzhou into the wheelchair. But as they touched him, they were stunned to discover a faint, white, silky membrane forming on his skin.

Chengg Lin was ecstatic. "Master, you’re starting to form a cocoon!"

Zhao Yunkong was even more excited. He stared at the membrane on his master’s skin, which was as thin as a cicada’s wing, as if he were covered in a new layer of crystalline skin.

"Master, you’ve finally reached this stage."

Li Jianzhou opened his only remaining palm, his gaze profound. "This cocooning process will take seven days at the shortest, a month at the longest. During this time, I will not eat or drink. I will be like a living corpse inside the cocoon, but you need not worry. When I break out, I will have reached the Grandmaster Realm."

Zhao Yunkong said excitedly, "As long as you succeed in breaking out of the cocoon, Master, we can charge back up Dao Yi Mountain! The only reason you lost to that Chen Sha last time was because Grand-Master was biased. He secretly taught Chen Sha Martial Arts specifically to counter you. Once your Divine Silkworm Scripture undergoes rebirth and you step into the Grandmaster Realm, you’ll even have a chance to reach First Grade in the future!"

The Divine Silkworm Scripture was once the ultimate Martial Art of the Divine Silkworm Sect. After the Divine Silkworm Sect fell into decline, a branch of disciples took the Martial Arts with them and established a trading firm in the territory of the Jin Country.

Unexpectedly, someone in the Jianghu learned of this, bringing disaster upon the Zhao Family. His entire family was slaughtered, leaving only him and his cousin, Chengg Lin, to luckily escape and wander the Martial Arts world of the Jin Country.

In fact, before the Zhao Family met with disaster, his father had a premonition. He had him wear the `Divine Silkworm Scripture` and sent him away from home early with his cousin to find his sworn brother, Li Jianzhou, on Dao Yi Mountain.

But by the time Li Jianzhou received the Zhao Family’s plea for help and rushed to the Zhao Country, all he found was the horrific sight of a massacred manor. From the letter, he learned that a pair of cousins had survived. He then searched within the Jin Country for seven long months, finally finding the pair in a den of beggars.

At that time, Zhao Yunkong and Chengg Lin had already experienced the cruelties of the world and seen the depths of human wickedness. As a result, they initially suspected that Li Jianzhou was actually with the group that had annihilated their family, and they were extremely distrustful of him.

It wasn’t until after Li Jianzhou found them that things changed. Without a word, he took the two of them to hunt down every last one of the enemies who had exterminated the Zhao Family. He made them kneel before the ruins of the Zhao estate and, over several months, helped Zhao Yunkong personally behead seven Grandmasters and thirty-two First-class Experts, allowing the young man to avenge his great grievance.

Zhao Yunkong assumed Li Jianzhou had helped him get revenge because he also wanted his family’s First-Grade Martial Arts. Thus, after his revenge was complete, he willingly showed the silk scroll of the `Divine Silkworm Scripture` he wore to Li Jianzhou.

To his surprise, Li Jianzhou didn’t even look at it. He just told him to keep it safe, instructing, "If you want to restore the legacy of the Divine Silkworm Sect in the future, it will all depend on this First-Grade Martial Scripture. Take good care of it, and don’t attract any more attention."

Only then did Zhao Yunkong realize that Li Jianzhou himself cultivated the `Great Yellow Court` from the world’s number one Major Sect. It was a contemporary First-Grade Martial Art in no way inferior to the `Divine Silkworm Scripture`, which was why he had no desire for his family’s manual at all.

After learning this, the two cousins finally let go of their suspicions. They fully accepted Li Jianzhou as their benefactor and took the initiative to ask him to be their master.

Later on, their master received news of mourning from Dao Yi Mountain. He took them back to the mountain for the funeral, intending to reclaim the position of Sect Leader that was rightfully his.

But unexpectedly, before the Spirit Hall, the unthinkable happened...

After they left the mountain, faced with a master who had lost an arm and a leg, a tearful Zhao Yunkong took the initiative and begged his master to cultivate his family’s `Divine Silkworm Scripture`, believing that one day, he would rise again.

「Half a year passed.」

Today, the critical moment for the `Divine Silkworm Scripture` to succeed had finally arrived.

The cocooning.

After eating his last meal for the day, Li Jianzhou had his disciples carry his body behind the Daoist Temple’s deity statue, where he curled up like a silkworm...

Gradually, threads of white Life True Qi seeped out from Li Jianzhou’s internal organs, clinging to the surface of his body and wrapping around him completely, forming a large "Human Cocoon."

The two cousins, Zhao Yunkong and Chengg Lin, were too nervous to leave his side for even a moment. They had already prepared enough food and water, and they stood guard day and night.

Reaching the "cocooning" stage of the `Divine Silkworm Scripture` was the most perilous trial. Many of their Zhao Family ancestors had been trapped at this very stage.

To spin a cocoon around oneself is to be placed in a land of death, only to be reborn.

This step was in itself a monumental gamble that pushed beyond the limits of human life. With all his Martial Arts crippled and his body devoid of True Qi, his only recourse was to excavate the latent life potential within his own internal organs and make a desperate push from death toward life.

Win the gamble, and he would be washed clean of all impurities, transcend his limits, and give birth to the powerful "Divine Silk True Qi" from within his body.

Lose the gamble, and his organs would wither and fail, and he would turn into a desiccated corpse.

A day passed just like that.

The thickness of Li Jianzhou’s "Human Cocoon" increased by an inch. This was his Life Essence Qi continuously flowing outward to form the cocoon, squeezing out his own potential.

......

......

During the same few days that Li Jianzhou entered his death-or-life cocooning, a decision that would determine the futures of several young people was also taking place on Dao Yi Mountain.

This was the second day since Chen Sha had taught Lin Qingqing, Lin Baibai, and Qii Zhengyi one stance of a Fist Technique each.

He was meditating in his room, in no hurry to challenge the "Hua Mountain Sword Discussion" Chapter.

This was because after clearing the second Chapter, quite a few Martial Arts Secret Manuals had dropped. The most precious among them was the scroll made of human skin that had dropped from Guo Jing, which was the second volume of the `Nine Yin Scripture`.

The Martial Arts recorded on it included over a dozen Superior Martial Arts, such as the White Python Whip Technique, Nine Yin White Bone Claw, Heart Shattering Palm, Golden Bell Shield, Hand Waving Five Strings, Great Demon Suppression Fist, and Shattering Divine Claw.

Chen Sha cultivated the Dao Yi Seal and the Great Yellow Court. For every additional Martial Art he mastered, the power of his Martial Arts grew stronger.

This required not only integrating the moves of these Martial Arts into the "Dao Yi Seal," but also using the Power of the Great Yellow Court to command the True Qi of other, different Martial Arts, achieving the principle of "one to unify ten thousand; the one is the whole."

This had to be cultivated step-by-step through the physical body; the Cosmic Light Fragments could only provide the direction for evolution.

Just as Chen Sha was trying to integrate the External Power of the "Nine Yin White Bone Claw" into his Great Yellow Court True Qi...

The sound of urgent footsteps came from outside, followed by Song Yu’s excited and joyful voice:

"Sect Leader-Junior Brother, you have to come see! In the woods behind the rear hall... that girl... that girl’s talent for Martial Arts is simply unprecedented!"

’It’s Lin Qingqing...’

Chen Sha opened his eyes slightly, a trace of surprise appearing in his mind as he guessed what had happened.

’It’s only been a day. Is she really that much of a demon?’