Chapter 360: Through The Fire
Devastated, the disciples were speechless. They were all elite disciples of Cloud Hall with skills and strength equal to the top disciples of any second-grade sect.
However, when compared to Zen, they were nothing, as unworthy as the dirt on the earth.
But Zen didn't care how people regarded him. He just concentrated the demonic phantoms in front of him and rushed forward. In a blink of an eye, Zen was able to approach the red treasure chest.
“Vroooom.”
Just as when Zen reached the chest, a whirling sound echoed. The mechanisms inside the cave stopped working and the fierce wind disappeared without a trace.
'Here it is!' Zen cheered inside.
As he was fumbling over the treasure chest, Zen seemed to have triggered the mechanism that would open it. There was a 'clicking' sound and the lid of the chest snapped open.
But before he could realize what was happening, an irregular mass of black material floated out of the opened chest. It looked alive, soft and was moving.
Zen tried to touch the mass, but his fingers went straight through the black material.
Puzzled, he studied the intangible substance some more. When he leaned closer, the matter wriggled and writhed, rushing towards the part between his eyebrows.
A very cool and refreshing power waved through Zen. He felt like that he was bathing in ice and snow. The chill penetrated his brain, not unpleasantly, but like a good refreshment on a hot day, clearing away his anger and anxiety.
His soul was enhanced and purified; his spirits lifted.
Zen didn't know how long he was out. When he woke up from the short meditation and opened his eyes, the black mass was gone. It was absorbed by his body.
Because Zen's soul was intensified and stronger than many disciples, his ability to digest energy was faster than Lewis. Apparently, Zen was much stronger than Lewis in that context.
Normally, this dark substance would greatly enhance the soul strength. It had a similar effect on Zen but the result on him was less apparent.
It was like comparing a landowner with many acres of land to his name with a peasant. If a landowner acquired more acres, the changes wouldn't be that visible. But when a peasant acquired acres of land, the change would be obvious.
Zen was the landowner in the analogy. He possessed a soul energy twenty times larger than the black matter. Thus, the growth of acquiring the black matter wasn't visible at all.
Therefore, it looked like he had only little improvement in soul strength.
After he opened the red chest, he climbed further up the cliff. His next target was the blue treasure chest.
Lewis failed to reach the blue treasure chest. As he watched Zen continue, he taunted with a sneer, “What an idiot! He should've stopped at the red chest. Hasn't he learned how difficult the next one can be? Does he think he has what it takes to open that blue chest? I don't think he has any plans on how to open the blue treasure chest.”
“Congratulations, Master Shi! Your disciple has opened the red treasure chest!” the leader of Auspice Sect said with a smile.
Kenneth laughed, “Thank you. Your disciple, Lewis, has opened it, too. The honor also belonged to him.”
“Forget about it! Lewis found it difficult to get there. But your Zen got there effortlessly as if walking on level ground.”
Hearing them bragging with each other, the leaders from Iridescence Sect, Brumous Sect, and Red Sect rolled their eyes in dismay.
It was the only thing they could do since none of their own disciples had made it to the red chest yet. Being able to open at least the red chest, the two disciples were already considered luckier than most. Not many participants made it that far for the past many years.
Out of nowhere, Fernandez suddenly announced, “Look! Zen has climbed to the second stone platform!”
The audience turned their attention to Zen again. His movements were not as elegant as Lewis', and his pace was relatively slower. But his actions were effective, and cliff climbing wasn't difficult for him, since he was a warrior practicing in martial arts.
“But can he survive the fire?”
“Why hasn't he squatted down? No one wants to be burned in the face!”
the sect leaders discussed. At the start, they thought Zen would imitate Lewis' approach, get down on the ground, avoid the direct impact of the flames, and slowly crawl over.
But to their disbelief, Zen didn't do any of that. He stood on the stone platform, facing the raging inferno.
“What does he plan to do?”
“Is he going to use his flesh against the blazing fire?”
“What is he doing? He could be burnt to death!”
called the audience in shock. When the leaders stared into the Picture Slab, they couldn't believe what they were seeing. The look on their faces was indescribable.
Being a cultivator of nature level, Zen's body wasn't strong enough. It would be impossible for him to resist the fire with his mortal body alone. Even the master cultivators at the stage of Internal Elixir Realm had to use life vitality for defense.
They were cultivators who practiced life vitality power, but they wouldn't stand a chance in the burning fire, unlike those cultivators who refined their skins, muscles, and bones.
“Kenneth, is Zen also a body refiner?” asked Fernandez who noticed the calmness on Kenneth's face.
If Zen also was a body refiner and fed on herbs and fruits with innate vitality, he might have a chance to survive the fire.
However, Kenneth shook his head and said, “I have no idea, either. Judging by his incredibly strong body, he seems to be one. But I've never sensed any forceful energy in him, not even a sliver of such strength. That tells me that he's not a body refiner. But these two phenomena contradict each other. It has puzzled me for a long time, and yet I still can't figure it out.”
Zen's performance in the All Peaks Competition had impressed many people. The body strength he had showcased was still fresh in their mind as if it just happened yesterday.
The strength of Zen's body was outrageous. It was tough in defense that even Patrick's Green Lotus Karma Fire couldn't hurt him a bit. But as everyone witnessed, Zen didn't possess a sliver of forceful energy.
Forceful energy was different from life vitality. It was the strength generated from the process of body refining and owned by body refiners only. Like the life vitality practicing cultivators, body refiners also needed greater forceful energy to refine their body further and obtain larger power.
“What? I have never seen such a strange disciple before.” Hearing Kenneth's remarks, Fernandez looked surprised. He was amazed and worried at the same time.
Kenneth nodded in reply, “He is, indeed. And every word I said is true. You know I've never lied.”
But neither of them knew the true reason why Zen was different from the ordinary disciples. He had obtained a strong body not by practicing body refining, but because his body was “forged” into a weapon. And since his body was a weapon, no “body refining” practice could work on him, and thus no forceful energy was generated.
While the leaders were still in awe, the blazing fire flared up and rushed towards Zen.
BOOOOM!
Raging flames engulfed him, turning him into a burning torch.
But Zen stood steady and blocked the flame into the stone platform.
The tongues of fire wreathed fiercely and burned everything with their fiery breath. And not for long, Zen's clothes were burned to ashes.
Naked, he felt a little indecent and embarrassed. As a disciple practicing in martial arts, he didn't know any magic to protect his clothes. And since his clothes weren't so durable, they were often easily worn out. But he had a few spare clothes in his space ring which he could put on later.
However, burned by the blazing flame, golden runes began to appear on his body as he initially planned.
When he first saw the flame, he thought it as a chance to intensify his body further. He decided to use it for reinforcement to refine his body to a higher stage. Right now, his body could be compared to a spiritual weapon, and with the use of the flames, he planned to forge it into a fairy weapon.
However, when the flame engulfed him, he proved that his calculations were wrong and na?ve.
The flame was powerful, though it did not seem to be of high rank. It was the type of empowered flame to forge the weapons, but it couldn't be used to refine his body.
And the runes, although they appeared in the fire, they didn't rotate and assimilate the power in the flames.
'Not my day, indeed!' Zen was a little grumpy. But he adjusted his mood and charged forward, breaking through the flames.
However, he didn't know that his behavior had caused a buzz among the audience, and the whole thing just went ballistic.
Far away, Lewis was lurking on a tree. He had used a secret method to slow his breathing, hiding from the other disciples and the ghost-faced spiders.
At the start, he was sitting between the branches, chewing a stalk of grass out of boredom. But when he saw Zen walked into the flame and moved forward smoothly, his mouth dropped open in shock. The stalk of grass fell from his jaw to the ground.
“Idiot! What just happened?” Lewis was overwhelmed by the scene.
He had been viewed as the best disciple of Auspice Sect, a once-in-a-millennium genius.
He was so much better than other disciples in his sect that he won the first place in the sect competition with ease. The disciple who won the second place was no threat to him, not to mention the others.
And in this Test of Cloud Road, only two other disciples caught his attention: Lennon Zhao and Frank Zhuo. They were the top two disciples of Cloud Hall.
The leader of Auspice Sect also repeatedly told him not to mess with these two guys.
Thus, in the hidden trial he had to go through, he covered his face with a cloak, lest he would be conspicuous and hated by Lennon and cause trouble.
But unexpectedly, he realized that there were many able men competing in the test. In addition to the disciples of Cloud Hall, many skillful disciples from other sects also took part.
At the start, he didn't pay much attention to the other disciples. He had so much confidence in himself that he thought no disciple was stronger than him. And only regarded the other skillful disciples as “not bad”.
But this Zen of the third grade of nature level suddenly showed up. His martial arts skills and power control surprised all the audience. Seeing him conquer the flame with his bare body, Lewis had to admit that he was no superior to Zen.