Chapter 5: Recognizing Reality

While Fa Ma was practicing in his room, two middle-aged men were discussing him in a restaurant not far away from the inn. They noticed Fa Ma a month ago, and noticed the extraordinary talent the boy had. When they were ten years old, they had only advanced to the third stage of Battle Disciple. They've been mercenaries for the past eighteen years and their achievements only went up to two-star Battle Master. It has only been luck that they have survived till now.

"Shi, today's the day we finish things off." "The brat has already noticed the fire cave, Luo. It's only a matter of time before he comes. We just have to wait." The two men were twins of the Earth and Wind attribute with Shi being the earth attribute and Luo being the wind attribute. They noticed that he would always go out to hunt monsters every three days and even knew that he was an alchemist. However, the kid was always out there by himself, and they hadn't noticed a guardian taking action once. Now, all they had to do was wait for him in the cave.

When Fa Ma left to hunt monsters again, he was heading towards the territory of the Sand Stone ants. These were monsters that would grow to only the second level at most but were infamous for the swarms that could even take down a Battle Spirit. Last time he was around this area, he had vaguely felt a strong fire attribute in this area. As he went closer towards the cave, he felt a faint warning coming from his intuition. He knew that there was most likely something guarding the cave as that was the case with most treasures, but he had prepared a third-grade anesthetic that could even knock out a third-order monster. Despite officially being a first-grade alchemist, he could already refine third-grade pills. He set a strict requirement on himself to achieve a 100% success rate in each grade before he moved on. As he essentially had unlimited resources to test everything, this seemingly illogical feat could be done and he was now in the process of mastering second-grade pills with a current 70% success rate for most pills. 

Despite the trump card of a third-grade anesthetic, he still was uneasy when entering the cave. With spear in hand, he slowly advanced forward and finally saw the fire attribute treasure he was sensing. It was a pool of Magma Slurry, a dream for fire attribute fighters as it could strengthen the foundation and increase the strength of fire Battle Qi but was extremely rare. However, before he could step forward, he sensed an attack coming towards the back of his head. 

As he ducked, a yellow colored sword flew past his head. However, another attack was rising from his feet as a whip started to rise from the ground. Seemingly stuck, he immediately exploded his Qi and leapt in the air towards the Magma Slurry. He finally saw the figures of the two attackers; both were wearing a black cloak and masks with a faint battle gauze protecting their figures, signifying their Battle Master strength. Judging from the yellow and green colors, one was an Earth attribute and the other was a Wind attribute. Fa Ma still felt confident as he could sense that their strength wasn't overwhelmingly powerful. As he readied himself for the incoming fight, he slowly began charging up a "Jungle Emperor's Canon" from his "Ape Ascendancy" technique. In a flash, the wind attribute took the lead to attack first and launched a "Wind Thrashing Whip" to his face. With his move fully loaded, he took the initiative to launch his spear directly at the wind attribute fighter. Surprised at the speed of the move, the wind attribute fighter had no time to dodge as his body exploded with the spear passing by.

"Asshole, how dare you kill Luo!" Shi screamed in rage. Immediately, he took a pill out of his bag, and his strength started to surge explosively. At this moment, he almost reached the realm of a Great Battle Master. Fa Ma immediately burst to his spear and turned his enlightenment mode on. This was a true battle of life and death as he felt the threat increase several times. The Earth Battle Master ran towards him with reckless abandon, but his strength allowed him to cross the distance easily. The Battle Master attacked with brute force and forced Fa Ma to retreat steadily. Seeing a flaw, the Earth Battle Master immediately launched his final blow, "Earth Giant Sword", and a sword wave flew towards Fa Ma.

Fa Ma couldn't dodge as he was almost out of Dou Qi, and he didn't have enough time. He could only fight through it. Watching in the corner, Li Zhan, Li Chen's younger brother and a peak Battle Grandmaster, immediately prepared to save Fa Ma.

As the sword got closer, Fa Ma got into the basic Grounded Stance of his spear technique. He seemingly became connected to the spear in his hands and all his insights that he had developed over the past few years connected into one. In the Dou Qi continent, there are rarely any weapon users as the weapon refiner profession has been lost long ago and weapons condensed by Battle Qi are often stronger than regular weapons. Even though there are some with scattered inheritances, it hasn't become a unified system like alchemists. However, the weapon users that do exist know that the realm of master lies in weaponship (being proficient in the weapon), momentum (where a faint spiritual might exudes from the weapon), intention (where a practitioner has mastery of various techniques and establishes a unified concept that aligns his soul closer to the weapon), heart (the practitioner starts to input his emotions into the weapon), soul (when weapon and practitioner become one), domain (where weapon and practitioner can influence the surrounding heaven and earth), and law (where weapon and practitioner can resonate with the world itself). The realm of momentum had always been a mystery to Fa Ma as there was no set manual to achieve the inexplicable, but, under the pressure of life and death, he opened the door to the realm of momentum and took a big step forward as his strong soul power started to merge with the spear. This resulted in Fa Ma's new move, "Ape Sky-Splitting Cannon." The moves collided head on, but the spear light quickly broke through the sword and went straight through the Earth Battle Master.

As the enlightenment mode ended, Fa Ma gasped and started retching towards the floor as he stared at the cold bodies lying on the soft sand. This was the first time he had ever killed a human being, and it was the first time he was plotted against. He knew that few people would be willing to offend a young Battle Practitioner as they knew it could only come from a powerful background. However, there are always some who would rather risk everything for that small chance of becoming rich.

He sighed and used his soul power to scan the two bodies and found a profound low-level skill "Rainbow Gecko's Cover." It was a non-attribute art that allowed users to blend into the environment by mimicking the Dou Qi around them. It was probably the two fighter's only treasure. If the Battle Master's knew what Magma Slurry was, they probably would have become richer than robbing. This made him sigh with fortune that he had a good background in this life as he only found out about the slurry in the Alchemy Guild's classics. 

"Whoever is hiding in the dark, come out!" Li Zhan was shocked that Fa Ma noticed him, after all, he was wearing a Soul-Veiling stone, an item that hides wearers from soul power detection and blends into the environment, and only leaked his power for an instant.

Li Zhan slowly stepped into the cave and introduced himself, "Hi Xiao Ma, I'm Li Chen's younger brother from Searing Copper City." Fa Ma briefly returned his greetings. He wasn't too surprised that he had a protector, but since he never detected anybody, he completely forgot about it. His focus returned to the magma slurry. Magma slurry could only be stored in Jade Essence materials to prevent them from melting through the storage. He didn't have too many on hand and asked Li Zhan to help him collect the liquid pool in the middle. In the center of the pool, there was a big Magma Heart Essence lying inside. It was an item that could help gather and purify the surrounding fire energy. He could probably use this piece until he breaks through Battle Spirit. 

In order to utilize the Magma Slurry, he needed some Earth Essence Grass, Ice Cold Spring Water, and Purple Purifying Lotus. Those were relatively rare materials and could only be found in the capital of the metal region, Searing Copper City. After returning and packing up his items, Fa Ma called an early end to his trip and returned to the city.

As soon as he returned to the manor, Zhi Gui ran up to him and gave him a good old fist of love as he went flying. "Old Turtle, you'll regret this I swear!" Despite the words coming out of his mouth, he gave the old man a fierce hug as they went to dinner and he told them of his experience.

As soon as he told Old Turtle about the magma slurry, Old Turtle started swearing about Fa Ma's insane luck. This was a treasure that was worth a sixth grade pill. While negligible to someone of Old Turtle's level, it was a treasure that could even help people break through Battle Spirit. In the next month, they received the materials and he even sent two bottles of the eight he had of the newly refined magma slurry to the Li Mansion. He received word later on that Li Zhan advanced to Battle Spirit and that he had the entire family's gratitude. That old dog Li Chen still tried putting him and Li Yue together but he wasn't having it as she was just a little brat. 

For the next four months, he lived a four part life of refining pills, practicing with the magma slurry, merging the Sun Fire technique with the Volcanic Exploding technique, and practicing with various experts in the Li Family and Old Turtle. Old Turtle beat him up harshly each time, and he could only scold in secret otherwise he would get spanked. This hard work allowed him to quickly reach a four-star Battle Master and a third-grade alchemist, in his standards. His foundation still maintained strong as the Magma Slurry liquid kept on expanding his veins while tempering his Dou Qi, but the huge energy within it still made him advance. In fact, Old Turtle even exchanged a bottle for a fifth-grade Celestial Solarflora beast fire. This fire is a yang fire that is usually gentle and nourishing, but when illuminated by sunlight, it can quickly turn into a domineering fire. Once he finishes merging the two techniques, he will refine it.