Chapter 593: Killing Intent

Soon, Jiang Qiu had explained his purpose to the local True Body Realm Great Demon. He was here to trade for resources, but he didn’t actually have many valuable items on his person.

Although many Ancestors in Nine-tailed Fox City had gifted him a trove of incredibly valuable Treasures of Heaven and Earth, he had already consumed most of them for his Cultivation. The few resources he had left were not valuable enough to trade for items used by those above the Transformation Realm.

After all, the strongest beings in the middle section of the Primitive Ancient Forest were those at levels above the Transformation Realm. If they possessed such premium resources, they would have used them themselves. So in truth, even they didn’t have such things. Thus, the items the Ancestors had given Jiang Qiu naturally wouldn’t have been absurdly rare and precious.

For this very reason, now that Jiang Qiu had arrived at the Spirit Fruit Forest, he really had nothing of substance to offer. However, that didn’t mean he lacked the capital to trade for resources. In fact, the Secret Techniques and Cultivation Techniques stored in his mind were all exceedingly valuable. If he so wished, he could exchange them for a vast quantity of resources.

And so, he sent word to the True Body Realm expert here, stating that he could provide an Advanced Cultivation Technique in exchange for sufficient resources.

Most of the Demon Race in this world didn’t actually possess very advanced Cultivation Techniques. Their power depended primarily on developing their own bloodlines, not on powerful Cultivation Techniques or Secret Techniques.

In other words, naturally strong individuals like those with the Chaos Bloodline were powerful from birth. Their strength didn’t come from mastering or comprehending some incredible Secret Technique; they were powerful simply because their innate abilities were immense.

Under such circumstances, the Cultivation Techniques and Secret Techniques they were able to comprehend on their own were not very powerful. To Jiang Qiu, at least, they were quite primitive.

Perhaps, to the lower echelons of this world—to the members of the Demon Race just beginning their Cultivation—these techniques were incredible. But to Jiang Qiu, they were merely scratching the surface.

Take the Nine-tailed Fox, for example. When he first met her, she hadn’t mastered many techniques. But after he gave her the cultivation concept for the Nine-tailed Form and continuously shared some of the Secret Techniques he knew, both she and One-tailed came to command incredibly powerful offensive methods. For instance, their Spirit Charm could transform into an invisible whip, capable of lashing an enemy to death in an instant.

It was impossible to defend against and utterly unpredictable. Only members of the Demon Race with much higher Realms and exceptionally keen perception could hope to react in time.

Against enemies of the same Realm, the Nine-tailed Fox’s techniques were practically invincible. In fact, even those in higher Realms couldn’t necessarily handle her.

This was the superiority granted by Cultivation Techniques and Secret Techniques—an advantage that was nearly insurmountable. Just like now: even though One-tailed was facing a True Body Realm Great Demon an entire High Realm above her, she felt not a shred of fear in her heart.

Under normal circumstances, other Great Demons would feel inferior before such a powerful being. Even someone like the Celestial Wolf Ancestor, who had only recently reached the True Body Realm, would be all but subservient if he were to meet this Great Demon from the Spirit Fruit Forest, who had been at the True Body Realm for many years. The difference in strength was immense; a gap in Realm was often impossible to overcome.

Their offensive methods were purely for offense, and their defensive methods purely for defense. It was difficult for them to branch out into unique cultivation paths. Their techniques were exceptionally pure, but also quite simple.

The advantage of this approach was that their attack power would be focused to the extreme, or their defense condensed to its absolute limit. However, the overall effectiveness wasn’t that great. They were easily blindsided by flashy and unconventional Secret Techniques.

Clearly, Jiang Qiu was the type of Cultivator whose repertoire of Cultivation Techniques and Secret Techniques was full of such flashy methods. Not only did he possess the bloodline of the Dragon Race, but that of a Dragon Emperor. He already knew a vast number of Secret Techniques and had even been able to guide the Nine-tailed Fox in developing a heaven-defying Cultivation Technique like the Nine-tailed Form.

So now, he was prepared to offer a type of Substitute Secret Technique in exchange for resources. As long as the other party could provide enough resources to guarantee One-tailed’s advancement to the True Body Realm, he would gift them the Substitute Secret Technique!

The True Body Realm Great Demon was stunned for a moment upon hearing this. Then, he burst out laughing. “You’re saying you intend to trade a Secret Technique that turns one’s body into an illusion in exchange for our most precious True Body Fruits?”

He truly found it laughable. ‘Never mind whether this kid’s Secret Technique is real or not,’ he thought. ‘Even if it is, it doesn’t sound very useful. It’s not as if we haven’t tried creating illusions before, but all our attempts ended in failure.’

‘Furthermore, our region has some of the most well-developed Cultivation Techniques in the world. Ours are basically the most advanced and creative you can find.’

‘And why? Simply because resources here are incredibly abundant. We don’t have to fight other races for them, which means we can dedicate all our effort to researching Cultivation Techniques. Because of this, our system of Secret Techniques is superior to that of any other group.’

‘In other words, that’s the key to how we secured our foothold in this resource-rich forest. Why don’t the other Demon Races or those with Chaos Bloodlines come here to snatch our resources? Because they can’t beat us.’