Grasping Evil

Yue Country had lots of bodies of water while Zheng Country contained lots of mountains. However, Zheng Country experienced the most battles. The country was in chaos and graves could be seen everywhere.

In this country, cultivators of the devil path almost overwhelmed those from righteous path. Furthermore, fights were ceaselessly occurring among the devil cultivators.

From the voyage ship, it was not strange to see ruins that used to be owned by some sects. The only thing that made Ning Fan sighed depressingly was the sight of countless graves without tombstones within the beautiful scenery of green mountains, clear water and vast grasslands.

Zheng Country was already in a mess before, but the demons causing trouble in the country worsened the situation. Many of the country’s cultivators died from all the chaos in it. However, there would always be somebody to dig their graves and bury them inside.

That was the tradition of the cultivators in Zheng Country. If someone saw a dead cultivator, one would bury them in a proper grave as long as one had the capability. They might not be able to protect the lives of others but they would definitely protect the bodies of those who had passed away.

Yin Suqiu disliked the atmosphere in Zheng Country. She detested the scenes of endless fighting in this country. But Ning Fan’s gaze was always fixed on the graves.

No one knew whether it was a male or a female cultivator buried in the graves.

No one knew if it was a Vein Opening Realm or a Gold Core Realm cultivator inside the grave.

All that were sought after when they were still alive could not be brought into the afterlife. After their death, everything returned to their origin, ashes to ashes and dust to dust.

Zheng Country might be in chaos, but this tradition made Ning Fan sigh with admiration.

Holding grudges against the enemy when he was still alive but setting up a grave for the enemy once he died. Cultivators from Yue Country and Song Country were not as good as the cultivators from Zheng Country who were magnanimous.

Therefore, those graves became an excellent view in Ning Fan’s eyes. Apart from that, his mental state slightly improved.

The day you step into the cultivation world, you will never know when your life would end. Even if you are a superior Nascent Soul Realm cultivator, your life might end abruptly in the hands of a powerful Spirit Severing Realm expert.

Who else could escape death in this world? However, what was more difficult than dying was having someone who would set up a tomb for you.

If the flower wilted, I would bury it. But if I die, who would bury me?

“What do you see from those graves? Don’t tell me that you want to dig up those graves?” asked Suqiu while staring strangely at Ning Fan.

“What did I do to make you have such prejudices on me?” Ning Fan replied helplessly.

Then he shut his eyes gently and said respectfully, “Those who had just lost thier loved ones were mourning while others started singing songs. There was nothing to do for the departed aside from entrusting their bodies to earth. Zheng Country had the ‘Dao of Life and Death’. However, this dao was beyond my level of comprehension. I am not able to understand it. But the desolation of the mountains was beneficial for me.”

Yin Suqiu turned silent upon hearing Ning Fan’s words. She felt unfamiliar towards the Ning Fan currently before her. She felt that his level of comprehension was too high for her to reach.

She was proud of herself that she could persist on her righteous Dao even though she was standing between the righteous and evil path. But what Ning Fan perceived from the same sight was the Dao of heaven and earth.

During the day, Ning Fan would cultivate. In the evenings, he would listen to her flute. At night, he would look at the graves.

After awakening the demon veins, Ning Fan practiced hard all of the five-hundred low-ranking demon techniques. He started learning from the simplest technique, Fire Sense Technique.

In the evening, the melody of the flute made Ning Fan’s Heart Devil become calmer.

At night, the scenes of the graves made Ning Fan’s Divine Intent of Rain became more desolate, condensing its power.

The time spent on the journey in Zheng Country was four and half a months.

Along the journey, the thing that was worthy to be mentioned was that Ning Fan’s proficiency in demonic techniques greatly increased.

The five-hundred demonic techniques had a few simple techniques which were the five elements sense techniques such as Fire Sense Technique and Water Sense Technique. Aside from that, there were also complex techniques such as Ice Sense Technique and Melting Sense Technique. Last but not least, there were two practical techniques, namely Blood Reading Technique and  Body Possession Technique which was commonly used by demons.

Although they were low-ranking demonic techniques, each of them had a high threshold. Even the lowest grade of the techniques was Spiritual Level.

As a matter of fact, Sense Technique was difficult to learn. For the demons who had reached Gold Core Realm, they would have a chance to choose whether to transform into human form or to keep their demonic body. Of course, those True Spirit Realm demons which had powerful bloodlines could have a human and demon form at the same time. Choosing a form was only applicable to ordinary demons.

The lowest cultivation realm to be able to shapeshift into a human form was Gold Core Realm. At that realm, it was the initiation period of cultivating low-ranking demonic techniques.

These demonic techniques were many and simple. Although their power could not be compared to the power of Dan Realm or Nascent Realm Magical Technique, they must not be underestimated. Every demonic technique was passed down from the ancient demons.

Among these techniques, there was an underlying principle of simplification.

Demonic techniques emphasized on the speed of performing hand seals. It’s different from magical techniques. Hand seals would only need to be perform when the cultivator was unfamiliar with the magical techniques. If the cultivators had already mastered the magical techniques, they could just swing their sleeve or snap their fingers to cast the techniques. However, the essence of demonic techniques was completely dissimilar from the magical techniques.

Magical techniques were the techniques which used the magic power within the cultivators to combat or defense.

Demonic techniques used the demons’ sense to commune with heaven and earth and borrowed power from them. The bridge that connected the demons and heaven and earth was the hand seals!

At first, Ning Fan’s speed of performing hand seals was very slow. He would need at least a period of ten breaths to conjure the simplest demonic technique, Fire Sense Technique.

However, as time passed by, Ning Fan became more and more familiar at performing hand seals. From conjuring a technique in a period of ten breaths to a period of three breaths and finally, he could conjure a technique in just a single breath.

Normally, he would shut his eyes and practice hand seals at full speed while standing in the morning breeze.

Even though the simplest technique, Fire Sense Technique had tens of hand seals, Ning Fan could complete them in just a single breath.

The shadow of his fingers was so fast that Yin Suqiu was left speechless in wonder. The fastest cultivator in performing hand seals which she had seen before was nothing compared to that.

When his speed was getting faster, he felt that his connection with heaven and earth was becoming stronger and closer.

When he was beginning to cultivate demonic techniques, his objective was to cultivate all three path, divine, demon and devil. His magic power had reached a bottleneck and his body refining technique could not break through to the third level of Colossal Bone Secret Arts. Therefore, it was a good time for him to cultivate demonic techniques, improving his demonic power. Although his magic power could not be improved any further, the demonic power that he cultivated fused with his magic power, increasing the quality of his magic power. Currently, his magic power was much denser as compared to other cultivators of the same realm. The magical techniques that he can cast held stronger power.

The only thing that mattered to Ning Fan in cultivating demonic techniques was not only to increase his demonic power. The feeling of unifying himself with the heaven and earth was too mysterious.

Rumours has it, the Immortal Sovereign of ten million worlds was the most powerful demon.

In the four heavens and nine worlds that were created by him, demonic techniques undoubtedly had a closer relationship with heaven and earth.

*Xianzi = fairy

*zhang = 3.13 meter

Time continued to move but Ning Fan continued changing himself for the better.

He started to cultivate the Camellia Sutra. Although he possessed the Winged Demon bloodline, he had yet to decide the spirit for his demonic power since he just started to cultivate it.

His magic power held the attributes of ice and fire. Aside from that, he also had the Thunder Star  in the middle of his eyebrows. Unknowingly, he already had the spiritual power of three elements namely, water, fire and metal. He was an exceptional three-element cultivator.

Another reason for him to cultivate demonic technique was because he wasn’t willing to cultivate the three elements: water, fire and metal. He wanted to cultivate either the element of wood and earth.

Among the five elements: metal, wood, water, fire and earth, he mastered three of them. Camellia Sutra was a wood element demonic technique. Cultivating that technique would enable Ning Fan to master four elements. Then, he would be comparable to four-element cultivators!

Four elements… The cultivators who mastered four types of magic power were cultivators above the Nascent Soul Realm.

For common cultivators, the hardest part to achieve Nascent Formation was to awaken the five elements and condense them. They need to form the veins of the other four elements on their original veins. Thus, mastering all the five elements and achieve a breakthrough Nascent Soul Realm.

Cultivating the Camellia Sutra enabled Ning Fan to master four elements. If he can discover another earth element devil technique that was more powerful than Colossal Bone Secret Arts, he would definitely master all the five elements!

If he mastered all five elements, he would be able to make a breakthrough to Nascent Soul Realm, saving hundreds of years of comprehending the heaven Dao. Maybe it wouldn’t even take much time for him to break through to Nascent Soul Realm once he formed his core.

That thought was deeply rooted in his mind after knowing the potential of the Yin Yang Devil Veins.

Colossal Bone Secret Arts is a fire element body refining technique. It would be better if I can cultivate Corpse Transformation Technique, a stronger earth element body refining technique.

As corpses are buried under the soil, they would surely know about the earth element. After cultivating that technique, I could then be considered to have mastered the five elements!

In the past, he felt pathetic that he couldn’t cultivate the Corpse Transformation Technique because there was no way for him to awaken corpse veins.

However, he currently only needed enough corpse qi to fuse into his Yin Yang Devil Veins so that the ability of corpse veins could be assimilated.

Therefore, when he was looking at the graves, he was searching for a grave that he desired.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t a grave that held a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator in Zheng Country. The corpse qi from other graves were not enough to activate the corpse veins.

Ning Fan sighed with a hint of disappointment. He could probably only wait until he achieve a breakthrough to Gold Core Realm in the Endless Sea. After that, he would seek for a corpse of a Nascent Soul Realm cultivator at that place to absorb its qi.

Demonic techniques, corpse techniques…Ning Fan had no idea about what his future would be like. Would he be a demon, a corpse devil with bared fangs and wielded claws or just like the black corpse with a decayed body.

It has already been nine months since he left Ning City. Currently, his voyage ship was passing by the border of Zheng Country, entering Wei Country.

Wei Country had many temples and cultivators. But it was also experienced problems with demons.

What made Ning Fan feel unexpected was that he finally knew the reason of the demons causing troubles in these low-ranked cultivation countries.

“Oh, it’s fellow Daoist Zhou Ming. I’m sorry that I didn’t recognize you sooner. Don’t you know that Jin Country is currently facing the rebellious tide of demons? One hundred thousand army of demons are wreaking havoc in that country. Why do you have to enter the country at this period of time?” said an Early Gold Core Realm cultivator who was above the voyage ship.

This cultivator was dressed in a kasaya robe. His hand held a Buddhist monk’s cane. Although he was eight feet tall, he was as skinny as a monkey. Apart from that, his face looked like a monkey as well.

He addressed Ning Fan as Zhou Ming because after entering Wei Country, he started to use a pseudonym.

Currently, he was far away from Yue Country.  When he started his cultivation journey in the Endless Sea, he would bump into and offend some ancient sects and offend some powerful cultivators too. Therefore, he must not use his real name.

As for the cultivator just now, he was saved when Ning Fan’s ship passed by a hill. Yes, the person who saved him was Yin Suqiu. Whenever she acted, it was impossible for Ning Fan to leave her alone.

The  demon invasion in Wei Country was beyond Ning Fan’s expectations. There weren’t just Gold Core Realm demons but also Nascent Soul Realm ones too.

Luckily, Wei Country neighbored Jin Country. Therefore, it received assistance from the experts of the Rain Palace’s subsidiary branch. A few Nascent Soul Realm cultivators from the Rain Palace started to pursue the Nascent Soul Realm demons in Wei Country.

That Early Gold Core cultivator was bringing a group of small monks with him earlier. They were trying to send something back to their sect. However, on their way back, they were besieged by a group of demons with three Gold Core Realm demons among the group.

All the small monks under his lead died. He was the only one who was lucky enough to survive and was then saved by Yin Suqiu.

This cultivator was thick-skinned. After he was saved, he immediately hung on Ning Fan’s voyage ship with no intention to leave. He knew that Yin Suqiu and Jing Zhuo were ancestor figures so he pleaded Yin Suqiu to bring him back to his sect.

His name was Hou Lian（侯敛）1. However, Ning Fan was thinking why don’t he called himself Hou Lian instead (*厚脸) 2?

After all his disciples died, he still had the nerve to smile.

When he see somebody of influence, he would throw himself under their protection. Apart from that, he was also as timid as a mouse. How is that not shameless.

Or, why did he not call himself Hou Lian (*猴脸) since his face was like that of a monkey.

Actually Hou Lian did not know that Ning Fan had already judged him as a shameless person. He was still telling Ning Fan about the drastic changes that happened in Wei Country for the sake of his own safety.

After understanding the situation in Wei Country and Jin Country, Ning Fan frowned.

It just so happened that the rebellious tide of demons appeared when I decided to come to Jin Country to borrow its teleportation formation to go to the Endless Sea.

Demon armies are seldom united unless there is a demon general. There was a rule in demon armies. If there are demon armies, there must be a demon general. Could that general be the crimson-scaled man… Li Ban?

If that’s the case, willI face a problem when entering Jin Country with the Flower Demon?

I must go to Jin Country. If I bring along that demon, the demon general would probably know about it. I must never keep the Flower Demon at my side. I would rather abandon it or eliminate it at Wei Country just to stay safe.

When Ning Fan was hesitating, a dark demonic wind emerged on the bright, cloudless sky. It was approaching the voyage ship.

A group of ten demons including four Gold Core Realm demons appeared before them. There was even a Late Gold Core Realm demon!

Hou Lian’s expression changed instantly!

They had come!

Could it be that they came for the All-Heaven Relic?!

1. 厚脸  means thick-skinned, shameless

2. 猴脸 means monkey’s face