Chapter 123 - 119: Ouyang Xue’s Cultivation, Insect Swarm Array

Chapter 123: Chapter 119: Ouyang Xue’s Cultivation, Insect Swarm Array

"Mother." Qin Yu walked briskly into the courtyard.

Ouyang Xue was pruning the flowers and plants. Hearing his voice, she looked up, a gentle smile appearing on her face. "Yu, you’re here."

"I have good news. I’ve finished deducing the Cultivation Technique I prepared for you. Take a look at this Cyan Wood Longevity Skill. I imagine it won’t be difficult to get started," Qin Yu said, smiling as he stepped forward and pulled a meticulously compiled manual from his robes.

"The Cyan Wood Longevity Skill?" Ouyang Xue immediately put down her pruning shears and hurried over. She carefully flipped through the pages, her surprise growing with every passing moment.

This Cultivation Technique had been optimized from the Gamma-level Low Grade Cyan Wood Skill. It discarded offensive techniques and retained solely the path of nourishment. Its gentle Qi Blood could nourish the skin, flesh, muscles, and bones, as well as the internal organs. It cleared the meridians and greatly enhanced one’s physique.

Most importantly, cyan wood nourished the face and maintained one’s appearance! It could make the skin smooth, give the complexion a healthy rosy glow, delay the growth of white hair, and preserve youth for a long time. Such effects held an irresistible appeal for the vast majority of women in the world.

Under Qin Yu’s guidance, Ouyang Xue soon began her first Cultivation session.

The Body Forging Stage of the Cyan Wood Longevity Skill did not require arduous physical conditioning like the Celestial Wind Formula. Instead, it relied on a set of special, soothing guiding postures akin to a dance. These movements exercised the muscles and bones, guiding the natural flow of Qi Blood. During Cultivation, it was best to be near plants and trees, inhaling their fresh fragrance and exhaling the impure air from within the body.

Of course, the most crucial step was the medicinal bath.

By utilizing the precious medicinal materials gathered by the Insect Swarm in the mountains, she could absorb their medicinal efficacy. The Cyan Wood Longevity Skill was originally a Wood Attribute Cultivation Method, and after modifications, it had become even more adept at absorption.

The only downside was that it burned through money!

Even at the very beginning of her Cultivation, following the optimal medicinal soup concocted by Qin Yu, the consumed materials would fetch at least a thousand taels of silver if auctioned at the Treasure Pavilion. Unless one came from a family of great wealth, they simply could not afford to cultivate it.

His mother’s Cultivation Talent was only average, and she was getting older. To ensure better Cultivation results, Qin Yu had even asked his father to spend a hefty sum at the Treasure Pavilion to purchase a Cyan Wood Nourishing Pill to complement her training.

The Cyan Wood Nourishing Pill was a Gamma-level Low Grade Elixir. It did not directly increase Cultivation; instead, it contained an extremely rich vitality. Once swallowed, it would slowly release this vitality within the body, nourishing the skin, flesh, muscles, bones, and internal organs, making getting started with the Cultivation Technique much easier.

Therefore, after following Qin Yu’s guidance and completing just one Cultivation session, Ouyang Xue easily crossed the threshold. She broke through the Body Forging Realm’s first layer, the Skin Barrier, at an almost unimaginable speed.

"It’s actually this simple?" Ouyang Xue felt the changes in her body. She looked in disbelief at her skin, which had become as warm and smooth as jade, faintly glowing with an understated cyan luster. It looked like the newly grown bark of an ancient tree, brimming with vitality.

She subconsciously tried to pick up a nearby porcelain cup to take a sip of water and calm her nerves.

CRACK.

She crushed the porcelain cup on the spot. Although the Cyan Wood Longevity Skill was a health-preserving Cultivation Technique, it could still significantly enhance one’s strength, allowing a person to unleash a thousand pounds of force.

"Perhaps you have an innate and extreme affinity with the Cyan Wood Longevity Skill, Mother. Naturally, your Cultivation progresses by leaps and bounds," Qin Yu said with a chuckle.

How could the affinity not be high? He had specifically created this for his mother, and it had even consumed a Cyan Wood Nourishing Pill worth thirty thousand taels of silver. Breaking through the Skin Barrier was only natural. Nourished by the pill’s medicinal efficacy, breaking through another barrier would not be difficult either.

This was achieved by sheerly throwing money at the problem!

"I’ve caused you so much trouble," Ouyang Xue sighed softly. How could she not know the immense cost involved? "This Elixir must have been quite expensive, right?"

She clearly sensed that the Elixir inside her body was still continuously releasing rich vitality. With just a slight guidance on her part, she had successfully broken through.

"It’s just a small sum of money. The Qin Family isn’t lacking this much! Father and Second Uncle have no shortage of Elixirs either. You’re just starting out, so it’s only right to use something better," Qin Yu waved his hand and laughed.

With him and the Insect Swarm around, the Qin Family truly had no need to worry about ordinary resources.

"Next, you can continue with your Cultivation on your own, Mother. If there’s anything you don’t understand, you can ask Xiaobai at any time. It can connect to the Insect Nest and constantly provide you with the optimal Cultivation Method."

Xiaobai was the Profound Ice Fox. Because of its pure white fur, his mother had named it Xiaobai. This Profound Ice Fox held high authority within the Insect Nest and could mobilize most of the Insect Swarm’s resources. Its level of intelligence was no lower than that of an ordinary human. While acting as a pet and bodyguard, it also served as an excellent teacher.

"All right!" Ouyang Xue smiled and hugged the Profound Ice Fox in her arms. She was extremely fond of the little creature and carried it with her wherever she went on a normal day.

It took a day to guide his mother’s Cultivation. Once everything was settled, Qin Yu directly rode a Thunder Roc into the sky, flying toward the Wilderness Mountain Range. He was heading to Bishui City to compete with other factions, so he naturally wouldn’t go unprepared.

SCREECH—

Even before reaching Snake Valley, piercing avian cries echoing high in the sky could be heard, loud enough to shatter metal and stone.

Eighteen Thunder Rocs, led by the Red Feather Demon King, soared through the air in formation. They were spaced merely tens of meters apart. With the Red Feather Demon King as the core, the Energy around their bodies faintly circulated, linking them as one unified entity.

On the other side, enveloped in gale-force winds, the Seven-Colored Spirit Deer launched intermittent attacks at them. A Wind Blade over ten meters long slashed forward.

Instantly, the power of Flame and Thunderbolt erupted from within the formation, uniting the strength of the eighteen Thunder Rocs and the Red Feather Demon King to easily block the strike.

Then, the Red Feather Demon King spat out a ball of Flame wrapped in Thunderbolt, blasting a massive and deep crater into the earth. Its destructive power was even greater than a desperate burst of True Sun Fire.

Daoist Soldier Array!

As he drew closer, Qin Yu clearly saw that optimized Array patterns had been drawn and smelted onto the wings and bodies of the Red Feather Demon King and all the Thunder Rocs using precious Materials. This was modified based on the Wind and Thunder Cavalry Secret Technique. With the Red Feather Demon King acting as the core of the Array, it integrated the strength of all units to achieve unity in both offense and defense.

Although this was only the initial version, and the Array patterns were added post-birth rather than innate to the Insect Race units, its successful operation was already a crucial step forward. All that remained was continuous optimization.

Directly fighting the Ganyuan Prefecture Realm might still not be enough. However, the strongest aspect of the Insect Swarm would always be the Insect Sea Tactic. With this elite force capable of temporarily forming an Array to contend with high-end combat power, supplemented by the endless Insect Sea Tactic, the overall threat would increase exponentially.

And at this moment, the Insect Swarm was still only Tier Two!

Without interfering with the drilling Insect Swarm, Qin Yu looked down at Snake Valley below. To the naked eye, the area looked no different from an ordinary small valley. Not a single member of the Insect Race could be seen.

But when the Thunder Roc descended to a certain altitude, the environment abruptly shifted. The true Snake Valley appeared before Qin Yu’s eyes. Nurturing Pools, large batches of experimental units, and various Evolution Chambers were arrayed within.

Green Wood Mysterious Array!

This Basic Array, selected from the Hundred Array Formulas, now covered the entirety of Snake Valley, cloaking it in a layer of Illusion Realm. Meanwhile, the second type of Basic Defensive Array and offensive Array were also in the midst of being deployed.

Complex things that required precise calculations like Arrays were simply far too suitable for the Insect Swarm. Being controlled by the Insect Nest made them stronger than any Array Master. The collision of knowledge systems from two different worlds erupted with unimaginable power, causing the overall strength of the Insect Swarm to be in a state of explosive elevation at all times.

This wasn’t all.

Qin Yu shifted his gaze to the Nurturing Pool. Apart from the corpses of the three Qi Sea Realm Great Demons that had already completed their nurturing, the vacated spaces had long been filled by other units. Thunder Rocs, Four-winged Black Thorn Eagles, and another kind of combat unit—nurtured from the bloodline of the Three-legged Fire Crow combined with the Insect Swarm’s genes—had also appeared.

Its size was even larger than that of the Thunder Roc, reaching a staggering thirty meters!

Qin Yu named it the Heaven-Burning Fire Crow.

It was obvious that this new Insect Race unit had a significantly enlarged abdomen. While this weakened its melee combat capabilities, it allowed it to carry far more Energy. Astonishingly, located in its abdominal region was an optimized Microscopic Insect Nest.

WHOOSH—

The Heaven-Burning Fire Crow took off and circled the sky once. From the honeycomb structure of its abdomen, it instantly expelled over a dozen similarly bloated Blade Insects.

A conventional Blade Insect was only the size of an adult’s arm. However, the Blade Insects fired from the Heaven-Burning Fire Crow were a full half-meter long and burned with Flame!

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

In a series of explosions, golden flames surged upwards. Its destructive power was over ten times greater than that of a regular Blade Insect!

Flame Blade Insect!

This kind of Blade Insect discarded its parasitic ability, opting for suicidal explosive damage instead. The larger size meant it contained more Energy, making the explosion astonishingly devastating. An ordinary Qi and Blood like a Dragon Martial Artist would perish instantly at the core of the Flame Blade Insect’s explosion. Its threat to the Qi Sea Realm had significantly increased.

If the Four-winged Black Thorn Eagle and Thunder Roc were fighter jets, then the Heaven-Burning Fire Crow had become a bomber. Its attack capabilities were simply off the charts.

Meanwhile, the Four-winged Black Thorn Eagles and Thunder Rocs were also undergoing upgrades and modifications. Microscopic Insect Nests were implanted into all their bodies, making their Blade Insect attacks no longer mere physical slicing like in the past, but bolstered by elemental attributes.

The Gale Blade Insects of the Four-winged Black Thorn Eagles possessed greater speed and stronger cutting power. The Thunder Blade Insects of the Thunder Rocs were more explosive and carried a paralyzing effect.

The Microscopic Insect Nest was originally optimized from the Heart-devouring Mother and Child Gu. It acted as an auxiliary unit and could be implanted into absolutely any unit. The Heaven-Burning Fire Crow made this integration even more absolute.

However, at this moment, Qin Yu’s focus wasn’t on them.

There were many more experimental units like these within the Insect Swarm, such as ground combat units fused with the genes of the Mountain-Splitting Demon King and the Flood Dragon King. Main battle units like the Profound Flood Dragon, cockroach, Thorn Snake, and Mountain Giant Ape were all being upgraded and optimized!

Some had undergone evolution during combat, while others underwent special modulation after the Insect Nest absorbed superior genes.

It was just that he was heading to Bishui City on this trip. Unless it was a critical juncture, he didn’t want to expose the Insect Swarm to others yet, so these units would not be put to use for the time being.

Ultimately, Qin Yu’s gaze landed within the Nurturing Pool, resting upon the three hundred experimental subjects cultivated using his own genes as a blueprint. The twenty subjects with the highest completion rate quietly walked out of the Nurturing Pool.

"This time, you all will accompany me on this trip."