Btth: The Rise of Qingshan

In the silent courtyard room, the calm air suddenly rippled violently. Traces of faint white spiritual energy permeated from the air, continuously drilling into Yan Qingshan's body, strengthening his Dou Qi.

Yan Qingshan gritted his teeth, enduring the collision of energy inside and outside his body. The Qi Gathering Pill he had consumed had already taken effect. The enormous energy began to push his Dou Qi to compress and sublimate. Although this process was still considered safe, it was definitely painful, especially for the meridians in his body.

He silently endured the waves of tingling pain constantly coming from his meridians. Fortunately, his many days of hard training had not been in vain. After a long period of medicinal baths, his physique had greatly improved. Although the pain was unbearable, for the time being, it had not caused too much burden on his body.

Inside his Dantian Qi Sea, streams of pure energy from the Pill were frantically refined and assimilated by his Dou Qi, strengthening his aura and continuously condensing and compressing his Dou Qi.

This was a necessary process for advancing to a Dou Practitioner. Accumulating enough energy to break through to a Dou Practitioner required even a peak nine-stage Dou Disciple practitioner to prepare for more than a month before attempting the breakthrough.

Once a breakthrough to Dou Practitioner failed, if unlucky, one might even fall back to the eighth stage of Dou Disciple, wasting months of hard work. Therefore, it was common for many people to attempt the breakthrough a dozen or even dozens of times before successfully advancing to Dou Practitioner.

The third-grade medicinal pill, Qi Gathering Pill, contained energy that was effective even for a Dou Grandmaster, but its medicinal properties were mild, and even those in the Dou Disciple stage could use it. Of course, Dou Disciple cultivators would waste most of its medicinal power.

The Qi Gathering Pill contained an incomparably vast amount of energy, enough for a Dou Disciple cultivator to attempt the breakthrough more than a hundred times, making failure almost impossible.

The potion Yan Qingshan had concocted might not be as effective as the real Qi Gathering Pill, but the energy it contained was definitely more than enough for a Dou Disciple cultivator to break through to Dou Practitioner, so his chances of success this time were very high.

Inside Yan Qingshan's body, the Dou Qi continuously grew to a peak. After the Dou Qi in his body expanded to a critical point where it could no longer increase, a change finally occurred in his Dantian Qi Sea. The surging Dou Qi in his body, along with his hand seals, suddenly contracted rapidly towards his Qi Sea.

It was as if a vortex had appeared in his Dantian, infinitely compressing countless Dou Qi energies into a single point. The moment that point slowly rotated, it was as if his whole being had sublimated to another state, and he immediately felt a different world.

"This is... a Dou Practitioner!!!"

Yan Qingshan fell back into the icy cold bath barrel. The cold bath water made him a little more awake. Disregarding his joy, he regained his composure and closed his eyes slightly to sense the condition of his body.

Inner vision was an ability that martial artists could only master after reaching the Dou Practitioner level. The higher the strength, the more thorough the understanding of the body's condition.

Now, at the location of his Qi Sea Dantian, a palm-sized milky white Qi cyclone was slowly rotating, surrounded by a layer of nebula-like milky white energy gas.

There was an essential difference between a Dou Practitioner and a nine-stage Dou Disciple practitioner. What a Dou Practitioner cultivated was called Dou Qi, while what was cultivated after Dou Practitioner was the real Dou Qi. Although there was only a one-word difference, the substance was vastly different.

"Dawn, display my specific data!"

As Yan Qingshan's mind moved, a stream of information quickly appeared in his mind.

Host: Yan Qingshan

Cultivation: One-Star Dou Practitioner

Strength: 1.3

State: Tired

Agility: 1.2

Mental Power: 13

(Data collection target: average value of one-star Dou Practitioner in Qingshan Town. The median data of one-star Dou Practitioner is 1.0 for each indicator)

"There's not much time left, I have to prepare quickly!"

After Yan Qingshan sensed the power in his body for a while, he suddenly opened his tightly closed eyes, his mouth slightly open, and a mouthful of turbid air was exhaled, and his face regained a little rosiness.

Yan Qingshan quickly got up and cleaned everything up as quickly as possible. After leaving a letter on the table in the room, he took out the luggage he had prepared earlier and left Thousand Medicine House while the sky was beginning to show a hint of white light, taking advantage of the still thick night to head north into the Magical Beast Mountain Range.

Yan Qingshan left Thousand Medicine House without saying goodbye. This was something he had planned long ago, even several months ago. He had packed his luggage and letter before today, and he would leave as soon as he successfully broke through to Dou Practitioner, minimizing contact with people.

He had arranged a careful plan before the breakthrough, completely unwilling to cause any trouble. Qingshan Town was a small town, almost the lowest-end human settlement on the Dou Qi Continent, second only to the even worse mountain villages. But even in such a small town, there were many Dou Practitioner and even some Dou Master.

In Qingshan Town, most Dou Practitioner broke through after the age of twenty. Even the so-called geniuses of previous generations were all eighteen or nineteen years old at the youngest. There had never been anyone like Yan Qingshan, who was only barely fifteen years old.

Once the news of his breakthrough spread, he would inevitably be in the spotlight, attracting countless coveters.

He did not have the strength to protect his secrets, and having just broken through to Dou Practitioner, his aura would inevitably be unstable and difficult to guarantee that he would not be recognized. Therefore, he had made plans before the breakthrough. Once he successfully broke through, he would leave a letter and leave for a period of time, returning to Qingshan Town when he was sure.

Yan Qingshan had been preparing for this for a long time, formulating a meticulous plan. He would leave Qingshan Town for a few days every month, and leaving a letter again today would not seem abrupt and arouse suspicion.

…

The Magical Beast Mountain Range in winter was quite desolate, especially after the snow fell, with silver frost covering the ground. Only some oily evergreen vegetation decorated the silver-clad landscape with a few green spots.

Amidst the intertwining of withered yellow and snow white, a series of footprints stretched deep into the Magical Beast Mountain Range. A young man wearing a gray-white fox fur coat, holding a blade, carefully walked through the desolate forest. This person was naturally Yan Qingshan.

"At this speed, I should be able to reach it around noon."

Yan Qingshan compared the route map and his memory, confirming that his direction was correct.

Yan Qingshan was now disguised as a medicine collector entering the mountain in the snowy season. He had gained a lot along the way to his destination. The leather bag behind him was bulging, and in this short period of time, he had gained at least a thousand gold coins.

Yan Qingshan walked very cautiously, with routes planned in advance. He had been relatively safe along the way, and several potential dangers were avoided by his early warning.

At noon, he arrived at a dense forest. Behind the dense forest was a cliff, and between the cliff and the dense forest was a flat open space, where he stopped.

"Set up camp first!"

Yan Qingshan stood on the top of the cliff and looked into the distance, seeing a vast expanse of snow. Being cautious, he did not rush to act. Instead, after finding some firewood, he began to set up camp in the open space.

Although he had carefully checked and found no peeping eyes around, he did not go down the cliff directly. Instead, he made the moves a winter medicine collector should make, setting up camp after finding a suitable place. Although it was a bit early at noon, his behavior did not seem abrupt.

The sun set quickly in winter, and medicine collectors and mercenaries entering the mountains in winter were different.

Mercenaries' goals were mostly magical beasts, while medicine collectors were for herbs and valued safety even more. They basically planned to set up camp early and would not be like those mercenaries who would only find a campsite when they were ready to rest.

After Yan Qingshan prepared the campsite, he hid behind the campsite's cover and began to prepare the things he needed. After confirming again that no one was watching him, he tied one end of the rope to his campsite and slowly slid down the cliff along the cliff wall.

Yan Qingshan controlled his figure and carefully slid down the cliff wall, stopping in front of a strange steep cliff wall. A strange pine tree grew out of the rock wall, which could be considered a place to barely stand.

Behind this strange tree was a pile of messy dead vines and bushes. If one observed carefully, one could find wind sounds in the gaps of these bushes, and there was a not small hole behind them, a hard-to-find mountain cave. If Yan Qingshan had not known his goal and observed carefully, he might have missed it on that day.

"Danger!!!"

Yan Qingshan's hand had just pushed aside the vines, and the pores all over his body suddenly contracted. The warning in his heart surged, the tip of his foot suddenly tapped the rock wall, then he pulled the rope, and his whole body shifted three feet upwards. A porcelain bottle was thrown by his other hand, hitting the attacker who suddenly rushed out.

In the whistling sound of breaking air, a long snake-like object with a color similar to the rock wall darted out and bit. It failed to bite Yan Qingshan, but instead bit the porcelain bottle he threw, shattering it into pieces. Powder with a faint fragrance spread in the air.

"Cliff Snake, huh!"

Yan Qingshan followed the momentum and adhered to the rock wall, twisting his body to adjust and clearly see this attacker, a first-rank monster Cliff Snake, this is a snake-shaped monster that lives in rock walls.

The Cliff Snake's body is flexible and flat, not only can it easily climb rock crevices, but also because its body is flat and long like wings, it can glide between cliffs. Moreover, this monster's attribute is a mutated form of the earth attribute, the rock attribute, with a body as hard as rock, difficult to be injured by ordinary swords, and extremely difficult to deal with.

The Cliff Snake failed in one attack, coiling in mid-air and then twisting its body and hissing towards Yan Qingshan, its triangular eyes emitting a bloody cold light, and its whole body emitting a dark yellow glow.

"Hiss～～～"

The Cliff Snake hissed again, its flat and narrow wing-like organs vibrated, twisting and rushing towards Yan Qingshan, the white sharp teeth in its huge mouth shimmering with a cold light, making people shudder.

"Puff..."

Just as the Cliff Snake was less than a foot away from Yan Qingshan, he stepped back, grabbed the rope and twisted to dodge, using the momentum to avoid the position. Because the distance was too close, the Cliff Snake had no time to adjust its position, crashing into the rock wall like a flying knife, the splashing flying stones scraped Yan Qingshan's body and made his skin hurt.

Yan Qingshan didn't dare to be careless, while twisting, another handful of powder was shot from his hand, covering the entire area where the Cliff Snake was.

The Cliff Snake's frantic writhing was suddenly greatly affected, after twisting and swaying in the white powder for a while, its whole body stiffened and got stuck in the rock crevice and didn't move.

Yan Qingshan didn't dare to be careless, took out the blade and gathered strength from afar and chopped, half of the Cliff Snake's body outside the rock crevice was almost severed, half of its spine was exposed outside, but even with such injuries, it only twitched slightly, it seemed it really couldn't move anymore.

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