One hour later.
Xiaotian began to understand how slow it could be to cultivate with only a level 1 life root.
After a full hour of doing this boring process, he had barely increased to 7%!
'God... this is going to take a long time.'
Fortunately, he was seeing great progress in his "spiritual fat" and the system had already stopped insisting on it. His belly and overall spiritual body were slowly returning to normal, but he still couldn't stop.
In the process, he vomited again, because as he struck the spiritual energy inside him, it had gotten out of control. Fortunately, the wound was no longer life-threatening.
As if by miracle, the wounds had closed.
So he had to keep going. He had a lot of spirituality within him, so he didn't need to stop to absorb from outside, which allowed him to advance more quickly than someone of his level.
'A blessing that has disguised itself as a curse and almost killed me.' He smiled, unable to say anything against this curse that had struck him, because right now it was his only source of continuous strengthening, without having to spend months.
He continued his process, slow and boring.
Five hours later.
He opened his eyes; they shone casually as spirituality found an outlet.
He looked at his hands and clenched them.
He felt an insane amount of strength coursing through his veins, muscles, and bones. Every part of his body seemed to have been strengthened, but the most important thing was his own energy.
It was different.
At least a good percentage of it was different from how it had been a few hours ago. The color remained the same, but the intensity varied.
'40%...'
He smiled.
'So this is what it's like to be in the Intermediate Stage.'
He never thought he would get this far, using what little he knew about cultivation. He was already preparing to return to the sect just to learn how to cultivate, but things had changed.
A small accident turned into his greatest opportunity.
'Just like in the novels.' He almost laughed, finding that funny. Wouldn't it be interesting to be in a novel?
However, he was amazed by the astonishing amount of spiritual energy that those two flowers had put into his body in just a few minutes. He vomited the remains of those flowers twice, and in the process, refined and condensed 40% of his spiritual energy.
He had refined just over 160% of his Early-Stage spiritual energy!
And yet his spiritual body was still a little chubby... There was still excess spiritual energy.
He made a mental note never to swallow those things so carelessly again. He had been suffering from internal pain for the last few hours, which was still ongoing, as his veins were still being pressed by the spiritual energy.
But he couldn't stay here, because he noticed that his cultivation speed had slowed down in the last few hours.
'I have to clean this up.'
He looked at the system. The mission was still there, and it still said he was the only one in the ruin. He hoped that it would be updated in real time, as he had used it in the last few hours to stay a little longer than he should have.
He got up and left the house. Before leaving, he made sure there was no one on the roof, and then he began to walk through the city, searching for his targets...
Two hours later.
Xiaotian was juggling something amazing he had just obtained.
[Uncovered Cursed Spider Scale]
| Rank: Epic.
| A Cursed Scale capable of becoming a powerful shield that repels powerful attacks.
'Epic rank and a lifesaver like this. I must say that this ruin has been really generous.'
With the previous item and this new one, Xiaotian should thank heaven for having fallen here, because the work has been minimal. Except for the danger he faced when fighting that bastard earlier, the rest has been quite easy.
His speed and strength have increased, so he wouldn't expect anything less. Although his flesh is still very weak... Attacks continue to pierce his physical defenses, although they are only minor wounds.
He looked at the destroyed city around him before storing the last two spirit crystals in his inventory.
In the last battle, he wanted to play big and made a weak specter, and one of those specters that go alone joined forces against him, as he wanted to practice so that what happened before wouldn't happen again. He was able to kill them with relative ease.
So now, the last two crystals were a bit uneven.
One weighed 20 kilograms, and the other 100; the latter was very heavy and the heaviest he had found here.
'Time to go find the boss.'
He didn't look at the city when he thought that; instead, he looked at that ball still floating above him.
He had searched the city tirelessly for that queen, even looking in the burrow, where it was in the ruins of the earth, and he didn't find it.
The only place he hadn't searched...
Was up there.
'That must be hollow on top, she must be inside.'
It wouldn't be the first time that the boss of a ruin was in a different place than where he should have been. Those guys think carefully and analyze their chances of beating challengers, so they tend to choose places like that.
And there was no problem climbing up.
Xiaotian walked to the back of the city, where a mountain rose above the walls of the "cave." This mountain had places you could walk on, like dangerous cliffs, and it was the only route to the top.
At the top of the mountain, after an arduous and dangerous hike, Xiaotian was able to look into the center of that ball.
A black mouth greeted him.
"As I expected..."
He wasted no time and jumped toward it, landing nimbly on it, near the "black mouth."
There, he prepared himself... although he only had to draw his sword and look at the system again, focusing on just two things.
[Number of Ruin Challengers: 1]
[Sword as Tool: 21/30.]
Each time he killed a specter, he felt his strength increase. His physical and mental power grew stronger each time, but it was like a surge that didn't come from cultivation, but from something much deeper and more enigmatic.
At first, he struggled to realize it, because initially it was barely perceptible. But after several repetitions and practice, he understood that this originated from the Spiritual Essence Points.
But the most amazing thing he has seen so far is that for each point, his connection with the sword increases, as does his understanding of it.
'I don't know if there will be other benefits later on, but thanks to this, I know how to move better with this body that shouldn't be mine.'
He smiled.
This was his moment to obtain a legacy technique given by the system and stop cultivating so slowly; even more, he was going to receive that title that eluded him in his first life.
And he wasn't going to waste this moment.
"This time I'll have it from the start. Let me show you who the true Conqueror of Ruins is!"
Immediately, he jumped into the black mouth... what could be the wolf's mouth for him.