Bloodline strengthening

Li Zhu stood in the cave, panting. Both his arms were injured, one of them being covered in burn marks. Furthermore, he had ingested too many spirit plants, which was causing the heavenly energy inside him to rage about, like a storm.

All these injuries required healing, so Li Zhu sat down and began to control the raging energies, before using them to heal his arms. Hua Shu also sat down, replenishing her now exhausted energy and healing the few injuries caused by the spider slashes.

Although the two seemed very serious at the moment, they were both ecstatic, and could not believe they had just defeated the powerful Mind-Breaking Hundred-Clawed spider, a fearsome spirit beast.

"Li Zhu, should we return to the sect or continue our mission?" asked Hua Shu, after about an hour of cultivation.

It was now quite late, and If they wanted to finish the mission they would have to sleep in the forest, which was not ideal. That said, the 200 spirit stones reward was quite tempting.

"Let's just return to the sect. We have many spirit plants now, so I can determine which ones either of us would need, and we can simply sell the rest for spirit stones. " Li Zhu quickly replied, choosing to return to the sect right away, afraid of losing all the treasures they had found.

In a forest full of spirit beasts, anything could happen, and Li Zhu was not willing to take the risk of losing these plants, which they had fought so hard to keep.

Standing up, much of his body ached, yet most of his injuries had healed, with only a few burn marks left on his right arm.

While he was recovering, Li Zhu had already stopped the fusion between him and Buddy, who was now roaming the cave in boredom.

After they gathered all the spirit plants that had been dropped by Li Zhu during the fight, the two ran back to the Flaming Saber Sect, aiming to count the earnings they had made from this short trip to Moon-Death forest.

With the herbs and plants they now had, many cultivation pills could be made, although neither of them knew alchemy, so they would have to pay a fee for an alchemist to make pills for them.

Alchemists were pretty rare, since they required extensive knowledge and practice. Because of this scarcity, the fee would probably be quite high, but they currently had no other options. While some plants could be ingested, making them into pills would boost their effect greatly, so paying an alchemist was still worth the cost.

It took them quite a bit to return to the sect, since they had still not completely recovered from their tough fight. As they traveled, they considered which plants they should keep and which they would sell.

Li Zhu, of course, did not need Shadow Mushrooms, so Hua Shu took a few of those, and the rest they decided to sell. They went through all of the plants, deciding if either of them needed them.

Li Zhu only needed fruits that he could feed to Buddy and plants that could be used to make cultivation pills, so many of the rest either went to Hua Shu or to their shared fund for sales.

After about two hours, Li Zhu and Hua Shu reached the Flaming Saber Sect, going their separate ways, after deciding to meet in the outer sect marketplace two days later.

Both of them had matters to settle and pills to make with their spirit plants, so they would sell the remaining treasures in two days, splitting the profits in half.

Li Zhu headed to the outer sect housing, since he needed to feed Buddy with a few demonic spirit fruits he now had, and the night was closing in on them. The next day he would find an alchemist to make pills for him, since if he went this late in the day to Phoenix peak, there was a chance that he wouldn't find anyone willing.

Three demonic fruits were found in the cave, and they had all gone to Li Zhu, who was excited to see Buddy's strength increase. Although spirit beasts could increase their strength naturally by absorbing heavenly energy, certain beasts such as Demonic Shadow Wolves used treasures to boost their bloodlines, which would allow their cultivation to become exponentially faster.

Each spirit beast had a bloodline, which determined the speed of their cultivation, and the maximum level they could reach. There were methods to boost bloodlines, yet most spirit beasts needed very specific and rare items for this to be possible, while Buddy only required anything which had demonic energy.

This trait was very good in a spirit beast, since it theoretically meant that with enough effort and enough searching, one could strengthen their bloodlines endlessly. This, of course, was only in theory, and boosting a bloodline became increasingly difficult, requiring rarer and more powerful items to even have any effect.

Li Zhu finally reached his room, number 753 in the outer sect housing. The moment he opened the door, his eye landed on an item, causing an initial burst of surprise, and right after a wave of regret.

Li Zhu had somehow forgotten the only spirit weapon he owned... the Blue Thunder Gauntlet!

In the fight with the Mind-Breaking spider, the gauntlet would have helped him deal more damage, yet he had surprisingly forgotten this item in his room.

Although Li Zhu was brave and had endless determination, if there was something he lacked, that would be short term memory. He was great at remembering things he read or learned years earlier, yet as he went into the mission with Hua Shu, he had forgotten that he needed to make a stop at his room and pick up the gauntlet.

He couldn't even be blamed, though, since at the time, he had only been going into the sect to search for ways to earn money, and e hadn't expected to be fighting that very day.

Fortunately, the trip had gone well, so Li Zhu did not really beat himself up over his mistake, and he simply laid the demon fruits on the small counter, before indicating to Buddy that he could eat them.

No matter how many demonic energy he ingested, Buddy would be fine, so the dog leaped towards the fruits in joy, quickly finishing them off.

A few seconds after he ate the fruits, Buddy transformed into his Demonic Shadow Wolf state, from the adorable little dog he generally looked like.

His bloodline was now being boosted, and the red marks that he was covered in began to change shape, yet still forming an abstract design, which had no symbolic meaning.

He also grew larger, as he now reached the size of a full grown human, if he stood on his rear legs At the same time, his pitch-black fur began to change, wavering between shadow and solid. If a mortal human was here, they would probably be unable to see Buddy, rather only sensing his presence.

Buddy's strength did not increase, and only his potential changed, which would make cultivation much faster for him in the future.

When Li Zhu had awakened the Demonic Shadow Wolf bloodline in Buddy, its strength had grown to the sixth stage of Qi gathering realm, yet that was an exception to the rule, since it was the first awakening, rather than a bloodline increase.

Li Zhu stared at Buddy's changes in pleasant surprise, since any growth that Buddy had was a growth that he had as a summoner.

After some other feature changes, Buddy finally stopped evolving, the effects of the demon fruits having diminished, and his bloodline now more pure than before.

Much to the disappointment of Buddy, after a short delay he turned back into his dog form, disappointed again with what looked like a recurring trend.

It was quite peculiar that Buddy did not stay in his Demonic Shadow Wolf form, and Li Zhu had no idea what the reason could be.

Nothing he had ever read mentioned awakened spirit beasts returning to their original forms, so Li Zhu would have to find this out on his own, hopefully sooner rather than later.

This was not the time, though, and Li Zhu sat on his bed, before beginning his nightly cultivation session, aiming to stabilize his cultivation for when he would get the pills made out of his spirit plants.

Cultivation pills contained a lot of energy, yet the rapid increase in strength caused small flaws in the cultivation. Because of this, Li Zhu needed to consolidate his cultivation, and form a stable foundation, before he could attempt any more breakthroughs.

If one did not care for flaws, and only used pills to boost their cultivation, they would eventually reach a point when they could no longer advance, since their foundation did not allow them to.

For this reason, even the heirs of large kingdoms would not exclusively use pills to increase their cultivation, since it was akin to ruining their future.

Li Zhu himself, as the crown prince, had only taken cultivation pills when attempting breakthroughs, and used his sweat and blood to slowly cultivate the rest of the time. That said, he still had an advantage over many, since the environment he cultivated in had very pure heavenly energy, which was easier to absorb and refine.

As Li Zhu cultivated, he smiled, with this thought in mind, "I'm finally growing stronger! Heavenly Dragon Empire, here I come!"