18 - Bloodline Inheritance?

As Xu Xin stared at Xiao Wei, he displayed no hostility towards the latter, only demonstrating his ice elemental power, which was meant to show that he didn't cultivate the same element as Xiao Xin, showing that he wasn't the same person.

In reality, he was the same person, but he wanted everybody to believe that he was a different person so that he could recover entirely before destroying the Xiao royal family.

He didn't expect to hide his identity from the royals of this kingdom since they wouldn't hurt him after he explained himself, but he wanted everyone else in this continent to believe he was a different person.

He intended to make Xiao Wei experience what it meant to feel true, unrestrained terror before he died, and he was going to destroy the entire kingdom right in front of him, slowly grinding away at it, leaving nothing behind as he went.

He wanted Xiao Wei experience what it felt like to have death chasing after him, knowing that it was inevitable and unavoidable.

There had been several times when Xu Xin had sought to bring out terror in people, and he had never failed to do so.

He was a master at bringing out such a primal terror that it would grind away at someone's mind until there was nothing left behind but a crazed fear and constant anxiety that would eat away at them until there was nothing left.

It was for this reason that so many people were terrified of him.

When he sought to do something, he never failed to do it, and whenever he did, he always went above and beyond, messing with people's minds to get what he wanted and destroying anything that stopped him in his path.

Suddenly, Xu Xin's frigid inner energy suddenly transformed into the watery inner energy, and his entire aura went through a drastic change as he seemed to become warm and welcoming, like an amiable old man.

Everything about his demeanor changed as he seemed to go from a cold and distant genius to an approachable and friendly person that seemed to instinctively give off an inviting aura.

He then looked at Xia Yue next to him, and he smiled faintly, looking nothing like he had just a moment ago despite having the same face and body.

He then looked at his arm, and he directed the watery inner energy in his body to the slice in his arm, and instantly, a small bit of dirt and disgusting pus was pushed out of the cut, and then the entire cut seemed to be surrounded by the watery inner energy as it isolated it, forcing it to heal faster than it naturally would.

Xu Xin had finally understood a bit more about ice and water, and he was able to use this healing ability of the watery inner energy, and though he was still unable to use the maneuverable icy barrier around his skin, it wouldn't be much longer before he was able to.

As the barrier formed over the slice in his arm, it appeared like a delicate tattoo on his arm, but it flowed beautifully and calmly, like a gently flowing creek.

It also glowed lightly, and it seemed to be peaceful and healing.

As his arm continued to heal, he then closed his eyes once again and continued to sit there, now seemingly extremely peaceful and calm, his demeanor so completely different from before that Xia Yue and Xiao Wei barely recognized him as the same person.

Suddenly, both of them had doubts that he was actually Xiao Xin, because if he was, even if he had been crippled and restarted his cultivation, he wouldn't be able to change his cold and bloodthirsty aura so dramatically even if he cultivated the element of water.

Xiao Wei was almost certain originally, but seeing the change in his demeanor, he was now starting to have serious doubts, because, as Xiao Xin's brother, he knew him better than almost anyone, and the only people who knew Xiao Xin better than him were Xiao Xin's father, his master, and his fiancée.

As such, he knew the fundamental behavior that Xiao Xin had, and his personality wouldn't be able to shift so dramatically in such a short amount of time, especially not because of what had happened to put him in this situation in the first place.

In reality, even Xu Xin himself was surprised by how much his personality had shifted, but he knew that it was likely because of the changes to his body and mind, which allowed him to be calmer, more rational, and more flexible in the way he functioned, like water.

It was to the point where he could even display this warm attitude while sitting right in front of the person in this world who he hated the most.

Nothing in this world could have made him able to do this previously, but that aquamarine blood within his body had dramatically changed almost everything about him, allowing him to do this.

He himself was aware of this fact, hence why he did it in the first place, because he knew that it was an almost flawless way to help convince his brother that he wasn't actually Xiao Xin despite all the coincidences that had happened that said otherwise.

Within Xu Xin's mind, he was thinking about the fundamentals of ice and water, and he realized that his understanding of it previously, though extremely good, was all surface level knowledge, and though it was unmatched under the seventh stage of the martial arts path, it wasn't actually very in depth like the ancient ice water technique went.

As he sat there, he was not only circulating the watery inner energy through his body, but he was also experimenting with how to use it and the best way to make it flow, and that allowed it to flow faster and smoother through his body, which also, in turn, sped up the process of healing the cut on his arm.

At the same time, he didn't even realize it, but an extremely faint tattoo appeared on his skin, though it was so faint that nobody here would be able to see it even if they were looking directly at it.

Meanwhile, as this tattoo started to appear, there was a change in the drop of aquamarine blood within his body.

It had suddenly gathered together from all across his body, and it seemed to be lightly pulsing as it seemed to gather a whole bunch of his watery inner energy around it.

Then, it began to madly absorb his inner energy, like a sponge that had been dried for a thousand years finally meeting water.

It instantly sucked up all the inner energy in a radius of about three inches around the drop of blood, and this radius was only getting bigger.

Xu Xin obviously noticed this irregularity, and he instantly opened his eyes again as he tried to understand what was happening, because as far as he was aware, there was simply a section of his body within his chest that suddenly and inexplicably absorbed all the inner energy within the area, and it was continuing to get bigger.

As it extended to five inches, he started to get alarmed, as he felt that there was actually a pulling force coming from the inside of his chest.

He felt his inner energy flowing through his entire body start to slow down as it got pulled towards this one spot.

Even the inner energy being used to heal his arm was no exception, and it started to grow slightly unstable, with the flowy barrier dimming and growing unstable, with certain parts of it inexplicably starting to flow up his arm.

He looked at this in shock, and he quickly realized that this wasn't as simple as it seemed, and he converted all the inner energy in his body to the ice element, but this did nothing to stop the suction power as the void in his chest continued to get bigger and bigger.

The drop of aquamarine blood, meanwhile, was starting to pulse with power as it absorbed the inner energy from his body.

It then started to show signs of getting bigger, and it further increased the suction power as Xu Xin felt it start to pull inner energy directly out of his dantian.

Instantly, as soon as his dantian started to get affected, the suction power increased, and he wasn't able to stop any of the inner energy in his body from flowing to this point in his chest.

Even a little bit of Qi in the air was starting to fluctuate, though it didn't actually move.

He was now starting to panic, but there was nothing that he or anyone else could do, and he wouldn't let anyone else do anything anyways since he felt that this might be related to his recovery from a shattered dantian.

Thinking about it further, he then decided to take a leap of faith, and he instantly took control of all the inner energy in his body, no longer trying to direct it away from that spot, but rather, he directed all of it towards that void in his chest, figuring that something there needed the inner energy in his body.

As the inner energy converged on that area, he suddenly became aware of something pulsing with power within his body, and he was instantly confused, because whatever this thing was seemed to be a part of him but at the same time contained its own intelligence.

He suddenly felt the connection and the pulsing getting stronger as it absorbed more of his inner energy, but he was also getting concerned, as the inner energy within his body was quickly getting depleted.

Even his dantian was starting to struggle to keep up with the amount being consumed.

By now, most of his body aside from his dantian was completely void of inner energy, and about half of the inner energy within his dantian had been absorbed, but he still didn't know what was happening.

Suddenly, the pulsing got stronger as he felt like that spot within his chest had completely bonded with his body, truly becoming a part of him.

Then, suddenly, the drop of aquamarine blood within his body suddenly started to split down the middle, like a cell splitting into two.

As it absorbed more inner energy, the split became clearer, and he suddenly felt the pulsing get stronger, as the drop of aquamarine blood in his body started to pulse in size and strength.

Then, all at once, just as every last bit of inner energy in his body was absorbed, the drop of aquamarine blood finally split into two, and he felt that they had completely become part of him, and even after they stopped absorbing power, he could sense their existence and even very slightly control them.

He suddenly realized that this power was actually slightly familiar to him, and thinking back, he suddenly realized that it seemed to have some of the same ancient energy on it as the voice that came from the tree that day.

He suddenly realized that perhaps, whatever this thing was that was within his body was, it was the reason that he was able to recover, and it had just become a part of him while dividing into two.

As he was curious as to what these two things were, he tried as hard as he possibly could and directed them towards the cut on his arm, where he suddenly saw an aquamarine glow appear followed by two glowing drops of aquamarine blood.

He was astonished, because this aquamarine color was none other than the exact same color that his eyes, hair, and nails had changed to.

He also realized that wherever the aquamarine drops of blood went, the healing process was sped up by about ten times at the very least, and he felt that they were even merging into his flesh and changing it.

Of course, a drop of blood was extremely small, and he realized that he could have the blood spread out through the entire wound, to the point where it couldn't even be seen, but it would speed up the healing process of the entire wound by about ten times while also having a positive effect on his entire body.

The drops of blood were already extremely small, and he was only able to see them because he knew exactly where to look and when, while also controlling them to have them condensed, but he then relinquished his control over them, feeling exhausted from controlling them.

'Is this a bloodline inheritance?' He couldn't help but wonder.