Chapter 95: A Promise Fulfilled!

By the time the Spirit Boat finally returned to the Evergreen Sect, the magnificent flying artifact looked considerably less magnificent than when Damian borrowed it.

Several sections of railing were missing, one side of the hull was scorched, formation lines flickered intermittently across its surface and there were enough dents and cracks scattered across the vessel that anyone looking at it could tell the thing had experienced an extremely eventful afternoon.

Mu Qingyao stood beside Damian as the Spirit Boat descended into the Evergreen Sect and stared at the damage with increasing pain.

"...This Spirit Boat has served my sect for nearly seventy years."

Damian coughed. "It still works."

"Lord Damian, one of the stabilizing formations is literally making a whining sound."

As if offended by her criticism, the Spirit Boat released a miserable...

Wheeeeeeeeeee...

Damian looked away. "Okay, that’s probably not ideal."

Mu Qingyao pinched the bridge of her nose.

The hundred serpent wives and their eggs had already been transferred into a secured Beast enclosure after arriving at the sect, with Damian giving strict instructions that nobody was to harm, dissect, sell, eat, experiment upon or otherwise do anything creative with his new dependents.

Ao Longtian had entrusted them to him, and that meant they were now his responsibility.

As for the poor Spirit Boat?

Damian resolutely stepped off it and handed the control token back to Mu Qingyao.

"I’ll pay for the repairs."

Mu Qingyao blinked.

"You will?"

Damian looked at her strangely. "Of course I will. I borrowed it in good condition and returned it looking like it fought a war."

"...It did."

"Circumstantial detail."

Mu Qingyao stared at him for several seconds before accepting the token.

"Are you sure? The damage is extensive, and if the Spirit Boat is taken apart for repairs, how will you travel outside the Evergreen Sect?"

Damian smiled. "The next time I leave the Evergreen Sect, I won’t need it."

Mu Qingyao frowned. "What do you mean?"

"The next time I leave this place, I’ll be able to fly on my own." Damian said while pointing upward.

Silence.

Jian Rui and Shen Lian barely reacted, while Bo Wen and Lin Meiyu seemed unsurprised.

After watching this supposedly Qi Condensation cultivator vaporize part of a river and launch them several miles through the air with the resulting explosion, Damian announcing that he intended to achieve flight before his next outing somehow failed to rank among the day’s ten most unbelievable statements.

Their ability to be surprised had died somewhere inside Ao Longtian’s crater.

Ning Ruomei, however...

Her purple eyes shifted toward Damian.

She knew what flight represented in Shengyuan.

Foundation Establishment.

Even among cultivators, true unaided flight was one of the most visible dividing lines between the lower realms and those who had properly established their foundations.

This man had entered the battle at Qi Condensation Level 1.

Now he casually announced that next time he left the sect, he would fly?

Ning Ruomei pursed her lips.

Then whatever resolve had been forming inside her quietly became firmer.

Damian noticed the look but said nothing.

There were considerably more interesting matters waiting for him.

......

Damian’s Guest Elder residence rapidly became a temporary procurement office.

The moment he entered, he requested access to the Evergreen Sect’s contribution ledgers and began ordering materials... lots of materials.

At first, nothing seemed particularly unusual.

Among them were common ores, spirit wood, medicinal plant matter, various Beast materials, refining sands, spiritual clays, array-compatible stones, alchemical ingredients and several other mundane resources that practically every major sect kept in bulk.

Then Damian kept going, and the material grades rose. ℴℴ𝘮

Ordinary treasury stock became restricted treasury stock, then restricted treasury stock became Elder-level resources.

Then he reached several items whose entries did not even display an ordinary Contribution Point price.

Damian pointed. "That one."

Mu Qingyao’s eyebrow twitched. "Lord Damian, that material is kept within the ancestral vault."

"Wonderful! I want it."

"And that?"

"Also want it."

"That item has been stored since my grandfather’s generation."

"Excellent preservation! Add it."

Mu Qingyao slowly looked away.

Contribution Points disappeared at a horrifying rate, but Damian did not care.

What was the purpose of institutional currency if someone never spent it?

He had already reached the point where ordinary sect stores were struggling to provide things genuinely interesting to him. If developing his Hundred Arts meant digging into the Evergreen Sect’s deeper reserves, then dig he would!

Of course, he paid appropriately.

Damian was not robbing them.

He was merely weaponizing his horrifying Contribution Point balance against their inventory management.

Then, because apparently one sect treasury was insufficient for whatever madness he planned...

Damian opened the Azure Water Sect ledger and Shen Xueyi watched silently as he repeated the entire process.

He ordered even more materials, then different materials, taking things the Evergreen Sect did not possess.

By the time Damian finished, the eventual delivery list looked less like one craftsman’s shopping order and more like five different profession halls had become drunk, combined their requisition forms and submitted the result under one name.

Jian Rui finally cracked.

"Lord Damian... what exactly are you planning to make?"

Damian turned.

Behind Jian Rui, Bo Wen, Lin Meiyu and Shen Lian were equally curious.

Even Ning Ruomei had been quietly examining the strange requisition list.

Some of those materials were used for Spirit Planting, others belonged in Alchemy, and several were obvious Artifact Refining resources.

There were also Array materials mixed throughout the entire list.

Technically, a few could even be used for Talisman Crafting depending upon processing.

There was no obvious finished item connecting everything.

Damian smiled mysteriously. "You’ll see soon enough."

Jian Rui waited but Damian kept smiling.

"...That’s all?" The youngster asked speechlessly.

"Yup."

Jian Rui sighed, feeling that he should have known better than to expect a straightforward answer from the enigmatic Lord Damian.

Once every purchase had been finalized, Damian turned toward Shen Xueyi.

"Have your mother bring the Azure Water materials personally."

Shen Xueyi blinked. "My mother?"

"Yes."

"...Very well."

She turned away before Damian could notice her lips purse slightly.

Why specifically her mother?

There were countless Azure Water Sect disciples capable of delivering resources.

Deacons existed!

Messengers existed!

Storage artifacts existed!

Did Damian simply want another opportunity to inspect Lan Ruyue’s undefeated ’chest muscles’?!

Shen Xueyi immediately dismissed the thought.

That was ridiculous!

...probably?

Damian had already turned toward Mu Qingyao.

"Qingyao."

"Yes?"

"Take me to your father."

Everything seemed to pause at this moment, with Mu Qingyao freezing in place while Shen Xueyi’s eyes widened.

For several seconds, neither woman spoke.

Then understanding struck both simultaneously!

Damian...

Damian was about to do it!

The promise he had made.

The matter hanging over Mu Qingyao since before Damian even properly knew her.

The condition which had left the Evergreen Sect’s final Foundation Establishment pillar trapped between life and death.

And if he was dealing with Mu Jianhong now...

Then Lan Ruyue was next!

Mu Qingyao’s heartbeat accelerated so violently that Damian could practically see the pulse along her neck.

A reddish flush entered her skin.

"Lord Damian... are you sure?"

Damian looked at her. "Of course."

"But after everything today..." Mu Qingyao asked hesitantly.

"It’s overdue already." Damian responded with a wave of his hand.

That simple sentence nearly destroyed what remained of Mu Qingyao’s composure.

She nodded quickly.

"Then... then please follow me."

......

Mu Jianhong remained inside the same deeply protected treatment chamber where Mu Qingyao had spent countless hours watching over him.

The room sat within the Evergreen Sect’s inner compound behind several courtyards and enough defensive formations that entering without authorization would be an excellent method of discovering how many different ways a cultivator could die simultaneously.

There were Warning arrays, Concealment arrays, Defensive barriers and Medical formations aplenty.

All of this, centered upon one bed!

Mu Jianhong lay there.

Damian had never properly appreciated how awful the man’s condition was until seeing him directly.

"...Damn."

The old Sect Master was thin.

Far too thin for someone who had once stood as the Evergreen Sect’s Foundation Establishment pillar.

Yet he looked considerably better than the descriptions Damian had heard earlier.

Mu Qingyao had obviously used the stronger Draughts Damian left behind before departing for Willowbank, and they had worked.

His breathing was stable, color had returned to portions of his skin, and the horrific Corpse Qi consuming his body had stopped advancing.

More importantly, Damian could sense True Essence repeatedly pushing against the remaining corruption from within.

The battle had reached a stalemate, and that alone was impressive.

The old bastard had been fighting this shit while unconscious for months.

Damian stared for several seconds.

"I’m impressed he lasted this long."

Mu Qingyao’s eyes softened.

"Father refused to surrender even after losing consciousness."

Damian believed it as Mu Jianhong’s eyelids trembled constantly.

They were not random either and clearly carried intent.

The man’s awareness was practically pressed against the surface, and he was inches away from waking.

Only the remaining mass of Corpse Qi prevented his damaged body from properly recovering.

Mu Qingyao clasped her hands together.

"Lord Damian... how will you handle it?"

Damian walked toward the bedside.

"Like this."

He placed one hand against Mu Jianhong’s chest and Divine authority responded instantly.

Unlike Mage spells, Damian did not need Mana or Mental Energy to power what came next.

A Level 3 Divine Spell Slot awakened as golden-white light gathered around his fingers.

"Aufer Maledictum!"

<Remove Curse>!

WHOOSH!

The effect was almost insultingly simple.

There was no struggle, no prolonged contest, nor any dramatic battle between Holy power and Corpse Qi.

The black miasma buried throughout Mu Jianhong’s flesh, organs, meridians and spiritual pathways simply... left.

Darkness erupted from his body in one enormous wave, the Corpse Qi twisting violently as though trying to cling to its host, but divine power passed through Mu Jianhong without harming a single strand of living flesh.

Mu Qingyao gasped.

One touch from Damian and years of accumulated corruption were simply... banished!

The room became still, as for the first time in who knew how long, Mu Jianhong’s body was completely free.

Mu Qingyao stared, her lips trembling.

"Father..."

Mu Jianhong’s eyelids moved, then slowly... opened.

His eyes were unfocused at first, and several breaths passed before awareness gradually returned.

His gaze shifted across the ceiling, then toward the woman standing beside him.

"...Qingyao?"

That was enough for Mu Qingyao to break.

"Father!"

She collapsed beside the bed and seized his hand as tears poured freely down her cheeks.

All the elegance of an Evergreen Elder disappeared.

There was no majestic cultivation dignity, no aura of an elegant noble lady, nor any romance.

She was simply a daughter whose father had finally returned.

Mu Jianhong’s fingers slowly tightened around hers.

Damian watched them for several seconds, then quietly turned away as this wasn’t his moment.

He left father and daughter alone.

......

When Damian returned to his residence, the first major batches of requested materials had already arrived, and so had Lan Ruyue.

The Azure Water Elder sat stiffly beside Shen Xueyi, visibly agitated despite every attempt at maintaining her mature composure.

She had heard everything, as her daughter had told her exactly why Damian requested her presence.

At first, Lan Ruyue hadn’t believed it.

Hope was dangerous when disappointment had already punished someone repeatedly.

Then Damian entered the room and glanced at her once.

Just once.

And something inside Lan Ruyue trembled.

There was no concern in his eyes, no uncertainty, nor any solemn healer’s expression suggesting a difficult procedure lay ahead.

Nothing.

The injury which had dominated her life for years...

Was clearly a trifle to this man!

For one strange instant, Lan Ruyue felt as though she understood something profound about the vicissitudes of life.

A catastrophe capable of destroying one person’s future could be nothing more than an afternoon inconvenience to someone standing upon another road.

Mountains were only mountains until someone learned to fly over them.

Her thoughts deepened.

Her spiritual state faintly seemed to climb...

"Sit."

Damian placed both hands on her shoulders and pushed her directly back into the chair.

Lan Ruyue blinked.

Under ordinary circumstances, a man casually grabbing her shoulders and forcing her into a seat might have received a rather negative response.

Today though, Lan Ruyue did not possess enough spare attention to care.

Damian reached into storage and removed a thick glass bottle.

The liquid inside was deep red, heavy and almost syrup-like.

Numerous golden flecks drifted throughout it like suspended stars.

Damian glanced at the appraisal.

[Item: Concoction of Healing

Grade: Rare (Valoria), Low Grade Three (Shengyuan)

Effect 1 (Valoria): A powerful restorative potion as well as a handy tool for quick recovery in battle and out of it. It heals all injuries for beings at and below Level 15, with severely diminishing effects for those above that threshold but the same basic effect for those below.

Effect 2 (Shengyuan): Completely restores physical injuries, damaged organs, meridians, dantians and cultivation foundations for cultivators at Late Foundation Establishment and below.]

Lan Ruyue could not see the panel, but she did not need to as everyone here understood Damian’s goods by now.

They also understood the rough hierarchy, so she could tell that this was the version corresponding to Foundation Establishment!

Realistically speaking, even a Draught probably would have been enough, but Damian apparently had no interest in gambling with ’probably’.

He clearly wanted no upsets nor any disappointments.

He wanted one attempt, and everything was done properly.

Lan Ruyue accepted the bottle with trembling fingers. "Fellow Daoist Damian..."

"Drink." Damian instructed simply.

And so she drank, all of it.

Shen Xueyi watched without breathing.

Jian Rui, Bo Wen, Lin Meiyu and Shen Lian had gathered nearby, their curiosity completely shameless by this point.

Several seconds passed, then Lan Ruyue’s eyes widened as a reddish-gold glow spread beneath her skin.

It flowed through every blood vessel, every damaged meridian, every scar, and every ruined pathway left behind by her failed breakthrough.

Lan Ruyue suddenly released a deep groan of relief.

"Ahhh..."

It sounded like someone had removed a mountain from her shoulders after years of forcing her to carry it.

Then suddenly, a great change occurred!

WHOOSH!

Spiritual Energy rushed inward!

Shen Xueyi stood abruptly.

"Mother?!"

Lan Ruyue’s cultivation began rising.

Qi Condensation Level 8, then Level 9!

The surrounding Spiritual Energy intensified, then she hit Level 10!

And then...

It did not stop where everyone expected!

True Essence actually returned!

Lan Ruyue’s previously shattered breakthrough progress reappeared piece by piece before stabilizing in a state that technically should not exist.

Half-step Foundation Establishment.

Silence filled the room as Lan Ruyue opened her eyes, then immediately froze.

Shen Xueyi looked equally stunned.

"...Impossible!"

This was not merely restoring injuries.

That alone would have been miraculous enough!

They had hoped Damian’s medicine might repair Lan Ruyue’s meridians and Dantian enough for her to cultivate again.

Restoring the Qi Condensation cultivation she lost after her failed breakthrough would already have exceeded expectations.

But this?

It restored the breakthrough itself?!

There was no such thing as Half-Step Foundation Establishment!

You either completed Foundation Establishment... or you failed.

That was precisely why cultivators called the process the ’Hundred Days of Foundation Establishment’.

It was a long, dangerous three-stage transformation that could not simply be paused halfway like someone taking a lunch break.

First came compression and liquefaction, where a cultivator compressed Refined Qi repeatedly until it transformed into True Essence.

After that came the dangerous expansion and reinforcement of the Dantian so it could withstand the vastly denser energy now contained within.

Finally came the baptism of the body and meridians, using that new foundation to transform the cultivator completely.

Lan Ruyue had successfully completed the first stage years ago, then disaster struck.

When expanding her Dantian, she lost control.

The violent energy rampaged throughout her meridians and nearly caused the Dantian itself to explode.

She had been incredibly lucky simply to survive back then.

Her failed breakthrough collapsed, her cultivation regressed, and years of damage followed.

Yet now...

All the True Essence she had once created had returned!

The partial expansion she successfully completed before failure had been restored and stabilized!

Nothing was rampaging, nor was anything collapsing.

The unfinished breakthrough simply existed in a state where she could continue when she wished, at her leisure!

Lan Ruyue stared at her own hands.

"This... this is..."

Shen Xueyi couldn’t even finish the thought.

It was more heaven-defying than a Foundation Establishment Pill!

Those precious pills merely protected someone from the worst consequences of failure.

They did not allow a cultivator to fail, suffer years of foundation damage, then restore their successful breakthrough progress afterward as though heaven had saved the game before disaster!

While mother and daughter attempted to comprehend that insanity, Damian had already started collecting the materials Lan Ruyue brought.

One batch after another disappeared into System Space.

By the time Lan Ruyue finally looked up, Damian was walking toward his cultivation chamber.

"Fellow Daoist Damian?"

He paused, then Damian glanced back toward Shen Xueyi.

His expression became faintly meaningful.

"Remember what I told you."

Shen Xueyi froze, then her face changed greatly.

Lan Ruyue looked between them.

"What does Lord Damian mean?"

Shen Xueyi opened her mouth, then hesitated.

Her newly lightened heart suddenly became considerably heavier.

Because now...

There was no debt, no crippled mother, and no family disaster hanging above her decision.

Exactly as Damian promised.

As for Damian?

He had already entered his cultivation chamber and closed the doors behind him.

A Permanent Realm Passage opened silently, then he stepped across and returned to Valoria.

He had materials.

He had plans.

And now?

It was finally time to begin the next step!