(The summary of the plot events from the previous chapter is embedded in this one.)
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It was the next day, and Aotian was currently lying in bed with Rihai, who rested her head on his chest, still asleep, exhausted from the night before.
If Aotian had to describe how his wedding night went, he could only use one word: "Incredible."
After the wonderful night he had with Rihai, he didn't regret for a single second the year he had to restrain himself until the wedding. He'd say it was worth every moment. It was a sensational night for both of them.
But if he looked at his night from a pragmatic, not sexual perspective, he'd say there had been great progress.
Before the wedding night, he was at the 6th level of Foundation Establishment, not far from the 7th, and had achieved perfection in Qi Refinement for body cultivation.
Now, after the wedding night, he pulled up his current Status screen.
[Host: Long Aotian
Cultivation: 9th Level Foundation Establishment
Body Cultivation: 1st Level Foundation Establishment
Physique: Mortal
Qualifications: Low-Grade Five Element Spiritual Root (Low Qualification)]
Looking at his status, a satisfied smile appeared on Aotian's face as he gently stroked Rihai's hair.
Looking at her, he saw that her cultivation hadn't changed, since Rihai had already reached perfection in Foundation Establishment before the wedding and had fully recovered her past cultivation. However, now her cultivation seemed a bit more solid, and her body cultivation had also advanced to Foundation Establishment.
Unfortunately, that advancement hadn't improved the condition of her roots. After all, the improvement in the integrity of her roots didn't come from strengthening the body, but rather from a side effect of the synthesized body refinement technique he had given her. That technique didn't just strengthen the body—it corrected it and brought it to its optimal state.
If spiritual roots weren't somewhere between real and unreal—and didn't also encompass the soul, thus not truly being a part of the body that could be refined—Aotian believed that synthesized body refinement could improve root qualifications.
'Maybe in higher realms, body refinement can start to include the roots, but that's still a long way off. My bets to improve my roots will be placed on the mid-continents for now,' he pondered, then returned to thoughts of the previous night.
Feeling something stir below as he recalled what they had done, and seeing the exhausted Rihai, he quickly shook his head and focused on remembering only the pragmatic parts of last night.
'My dual cultivation technique still isn't complete, but it's already usable enough to fully block our vital Yin and Yang—also known as virgin Yin and Yang—from dissipating uselessly, allowing each of us to fully absorb the other's energy, thereby improving both cultivation and body… and that's why we advanced.'
He remembered this with a serious look.
Normally, a man possesses strong vital Yang, and a woman, in turn, vital Yin, and during the first sexual encounter, these are lost.
But, unlike what Aotian read in some xianxia stories, losing that virgin energy doesn't necessarily negatively affect either party's cultivation — unless they were cultivating an extreme technique based on one of those two types of energy.
In turn, it also doesn't benefit either party unless one has some kind of special physique. So, fortunately, it's not common to see virgin men or women being kidnapped to help others increase their cultivation that way.
Aotian, however, with his new technique, not only managed to perfectly control Rihai's energy, but also to channel the flow of vital Yin and Yang to strengthen each other's body. Although in future times the effect wouldn't be as strong as during the first, when their accumulated virgin energy was lost, there would still be benefits every time they had intercourse, mutually strengthening one another.
Therefore, it was very beneficial for them to practice this kind of healthy activity frequently.
Another incredible feature of Aotian's dual cultivation technique was that, as they performed it in different positions, the patterns of the technique would grow stronger within their bodies, further deepening the synergy between them beyond what normally occurred in dual cultivation. This would create an extraordinary level of connection, allowing Rihai's and Aotian's talents to merge during the process.
In other words, Rihai's powerful root would combine with Aotian's, allowing them to cultivate together using each other's talent. Unfortunately, this only benefited Aotian for now, as when combining and then splitting the benefit between the two, Rihai's talent would be dragged down, while his would rise significantly.
But aside from this disadvantage for her, the biggest issue was that Rihai's roots were damaged. Even if Aotian let his other minds cultivate for him during this healthy exercise, Rihai would feel great pain, as every time she cultivated and passed energy through her roots, she suffered.
Because of that, Aotian abandoned the idea.
But although there were many issues—both with the technique and with his low-quality roots and Rihai's damaged ones—he knew these problems would resolve with time.
The dual cultivation technique he had compiled, even incomplete, was already full of benefits, and it was the first Taboo-level technique he had ever created.
Taboo techniques are those beneficial at any cultivation level and only grow more powerful as the user evolves. Aotian's current dual cultivation technique fell into that category, but there was still much to improve, and he wasn't satisfied.
He didn't want just a simple Taboo-Tier technique—he wanted a super synthesized Taboo-Tier technique.
Aotian also wanted to improve his Enlightened Mind technique, but it was already at a very high level, and he needed a lot of reference material before he could even think about improving it, even just a little.
Shaking his head at those thoughts, he looked down at Rihai, having felt her stir slightly on his chest.
And, as he expected, her eyes soon fluttered a bit before opening, revealing her beautiful blue irises.
She blinked a few times as her mind slowly woke up completely.
Soon, she realized her cheek was pressed against a warm chest and slowly looked up, coming face to face with Aotian.
That's when the memories of the previous night returned, and her sober self began to analyze what had happened.
Little by little, her face turned extremely red, her eyes widened in shock and filled with tears.
She pulled the sheet up and hid her face, allowing him to see only her frightened, teary eyes.
Aotian's eyes widened at the sight, completely caught off guard.
He panicked when he realized she was about to cry.
"Hai'er, my love, what happened?!" he quickly sat up and hugged her anxiously.
Rihai rested her head on his chest again, still hiding her face with the sheet, but a few tears started to fall.
Aotian grew alarmed, not understanding what had suddenly caused her to cry like that, and insisted, wanting to help.
"My love, my life, tell me what's wrong. Let me help you, please!" he caressed her bare back, his face distressed, begging.
She looked up at him with pitiful, teary eyes.
"Tian'er… sniff… last night we went too far… y-you… you even s-stuck your finger 'there'…" she said in a trembling, cracking voice, as tears streamed down her blushing cheeks, wetting the sheet.
Aotian, who had been extremely nervous, froze upon hearing that and stared at her speechlessly.
She was simply… crying out of embarrassment.
Helpless, he raised a hand to his forehead and began to massage it, feeling a slight headache.
'Hai'er… that wasn't even the most perverted thing we did last night.'
He didn't know whether to laugh or cry, and helplessly just reminded her.
"I KNOW!" she screamed in shame, this time completely covering her head with the sheet as she lay her head back on his chest and cried.
Aotian once again found himself speechless, now staring at the little ghost in a white sheet lying on his chest, sniffling loudly.
Seeing her like that, he had to hold back from bursting into laughter. For a moment, he was torn between consoling her or taking the opportunity to tease her.
Unfortunately, the voice of reason won, and he chose to console. After all, self-preservation is the first law of nature.
Rubbing her back, he began what looked like it would be a long day of comforting her.
"My love, these things are normal. Remember how good it felt at the time? And we didn't do anything extreme. It might seem a little perverted, but we're a couple…"
…
While Aotian consoled his embarrassed wife,
Bao Wuji was crossing the sea at full speed, carrying the ten outer elders.
Occasionally, he used one of his four daily uses of the treasure radar to locate and avoid powerful beasts at the Nascent Soul level. Even though he could swat such creatures to death, Aotian preferred to avoid unnecessary complications.
At this point, Bao Wuji was already at the 9th level of Soul Formation, keeping pace with his main body's current progress, and his speed was far greater than when he had fetched Rihai and Aotian, which had taken fifteen days to return to the sect.
Even though the mid-continents were farther than the place he had gone back then, with his current speed, about ten days should be enough.
While the full-speed journey over the sea continued, the Infinite Dao Sect was not idle.
Since the leader of the territory Bao Wuji had captured after leaving the sect was not a good person, he had also been killed and replaced by one of the avatars.
Now, Aotian commanded four territories—one openly and three in secret. There was also the territory of the Bamboo Sword Sect, which obeyed his orders. So, it could be said that he controlled five territories.
And with the three new territories, Aotian didn't intend to simply pretend nothing had happened while ruling from the shadows. He would dominate them, clean out the trash, block the flow of information… and comb through the tombs and mines of the three regions.
Soon, the announcement was made, and the disciples went into a frenzy.
As they approached the peak of Foundation Establishment, they grew increasingly anxious and speechless at the absurd number of zeros in the price of Core Formation techniques.
Because of this, they would never miss a single opportunity to earn contribution points.
Thus, only two months after the last war, the Infinite Dao Sect sprang into action once more.