Second Patriarch: Rise Of The Liu Clan

Once Liu Zhu consumed the second piece of the pearl, there wasn't any going back. The energy began spreading through his body once again, and before long the same phenomenon was happening as before, only slightly worse. Fortunately, besides speeding up the recovery of his wounds, the vitality from near Liu Zhu's heart seemed to be restraining the energy somewhat and forcing it to dive into him bit by bit. If it weren't for that, it might be impossible to survive such a baptism of energy, even if he did have an insane ability to recover when his body was forced to the limit.

The second piece took quite some time to dissolve into energy, and the better part of a day had passed since the time Liu Zhu had begun eating the pearl. Instead of resting afterwards, he immediately broke off more pieces from the pearl with the energy he'd recovered, ignoring the pained cries from his body as he did so. As long as he could rely on it to heal, then some pain was fine. This led to a repeated cycle of taking a piece, consuming it, suffering through hours upon hours of torture, and then eating another piece of the pearl. He continued with this cycle until the pearl was completely gone, in the process coating the ground around him with massive amounts of blood and becoming fatigued to the extreme.

All of this took an unknown amount of time. There was a small opening in the entrance above Liu Zhu, so it wouldn't be impossible for him to track the passage of days, but he simply didn't have the focus to do that. His best guess was that using the whole pearl had taken at least a couple of weeks. Probably more. Once he finished he simply moved somewhere less bloody, collapsed, and rested. Once he was done resting, he immediately changed out of his blood-soaked set of clothes and into a new one. Luckily he'd left his pack on the opposite side of the room when he went towards the pedestal containing the pearl and the jade slip, so they hadn't been stained along with what he was wearing.

Now that he was reasonably rested and had his affairs in order, he needed to leave. There wasn't anything left in this room, and loitering around wasn't to his benefit. Someone may not have shown up who was able to enter the room yet, and as far-fetched as it was, if a Soul Foundation cultivator with enough vitality happened to enter while he was still there, it would be unfortunate to say the least. Still, the main reason he left was because there was nothing left. There were probably only a few Soul Foundation cultivators in the Northern Wastes at most, and they had better things to do than investigate the source of a beast horde.

Liu Zhu did a circuit around the room, hoping that he'd be able to feel around for an alternate exit, but unfortunately there was no such thing. Well, he supposed that was reasonable given the caliber of beast the owner expected to come here- they might be ridiculously tall, and even if they were small a distance of a couple dozen feet wouldn't be difficult for them to jump. Why go through the trouble of an alternate exit? It probably wasn't very easy to get the chamber constructed in the first place, so any bells or whistles like that were unlikely to be included. Even if the beast who made it was sentient, it's doubtful that he had the dexterity or skill to construct the place. It was probably made by a large amount of humans who either offered or were forced to offer their services.

Despite the practicality of only including one entrance/exit, it was rather difficult for Liu Zhu to jump that high. Fortunately, by using the pedestal to increase his height by a few feet and grabbing an indent in the rock halfway up, he was able to make the jump towards the top without too much trouble. The door wasn't open, but once he came in contact with him it began sliding open again. This process was slightly quieter than last time, probably since some acc.u.mulated vines and such were cleared out the first time he opened it, but it was still rather loud- he'd have to hope no one nearby could hear it.

Once Liu Zhu was out of the chamber, he was greeted by the ground, which was breathtakingly soft after his stay in that stone chamber. He may be able to deal with it, but he preferred not to sleep on stone, so the feeling of the ground after so long was a bit of a relief. After a couple seconds of awe at being outside for the first time in what felt like ages, he began slowly creeping down the hill. It was very late at night (which was part of the reason he'd left immediately in the first place), but he didn't want to dismiss the possibility of someone hearing the chamber open and telling people to stand guard around the hill. It was best to be cautious. Liu Zhu took a full half an hour to leave the vicinity of the hill, his pace slowed greatly by his caution. Much to his relief he wasn't spotted by anyone, and after exiting the immediate vicinity of the hill (which now had very few tents nearby), he dashed through the nearby forest and into a random direction. He wasn't sure where he was going, but that could wait for later- he still needed to get further away from now. He hadn't seen anyone, but it didn't mean that no one could be tailing him. It might be futile, but in that case it was best to try to lose them while it was still dark.

When the day broke Liu Zhu stopped moving, his paranoia about being followed more than satisfied. He'd gone far enough that he'd just be a traveler with no relation to that place by now. Unfortunately, he'd gained a new worry that night. As time dragged on and the pain faded, he had expected to sense some sort of gain within his body. He wasn't sure what sort of improvement he expected, but going through such a long period of pain couldn't have been for nothing, even if he couldn't notice any benefits yet. After worrying for a bit he eventually just sighed and decided to stop thinking about it. He might just be too impatient- he was sure he'd notice something soon. Or maybe that was just some blind optimism talking.

After leaving the area, Liu Zhu's first task was to scout the nearby area and figure out where exactly he was. While searching for food and firewood he was able to do this without much trouble. From there he decided where to go. Before he would've just gone along with Feng Jun and his group since he knew him somewhat and two were stronger than one, but it was almost certain he'd left the area by this point. To track him down he'd have to return to Border City, and while he considered themselves friends, it really wasn't worth the effort. The best course of action would be to head to a nearby tribe and ask for work there. While work was more plentiful in Border City than in tribes, they generally had a shortage of cultivators and wouldn't turn away a helping hand. If he could save time by going there instead, why wouldn't he?

Once a course of action was decided on Liu Zhu set out, going towards a small tribe a day to the north. The tribe looked far more peaceful than Wolfden Village, with no visible defenses or cultivators on patrol outside the village. It wasn't very far from the beast horde, but since the beasts had mainly gone in one direction, it was spared from its wrath. Upon entering the village Liu Zhu asked around and found where the chief of the village was. This normally wouldn't be proper, but the village was even smaller than Wolfden Village- a cultivator with strength equal to a Blood and Viscera Tempering cultivator was a valuable asset. Thus resumed Liu Zhu's wandering after what he would soon learn was over a month in that chamber.