Chapter 696 - Controlling the Black Gourd (1/2)

Translator: Radiant Translations Editor: Radiant Translations

He would reflect upon every failure before trying once again. After comprehending a variation which he was confident of, he would attempt to control the Black Gourd. In the end, the Black Gourd remained unmoving. The terrifying flames within the gourd had burned the energy he sent through. He failed time after time–and it had been a few thousand failures already. Even Xue Ying with his heart realm was starting to feel frustrated.

He attempted all kinds of different ways and had even summarized his experiences while trying them out. He used a random strategy–whatever laws he comprehended would be taken as the base. He would ponder over it madly before attempting to ‘deceive’ the gourd. Who knew if he might be right? He spent three months comprehending more than 2,000 variations of cultivation techniques, yet no matter how random the permutation was, they all failed in the end.

“Hu.”

Xue Ying let out a long breath. A strong gale blew out and destroyed the mountain opposite him. Hurricanes formed around him. It was fortunate that he had prevented others from interrupting him, and that there were no humans 50,000 kilometers around him. There were some who lived around here in the past, though they had been teleported away by Xue Ying using his Mirage World.

After he calmed himself down slightly, Xue Ying turned around and went back to his bamboo house.

He sat cross-legged and poured an expensive fruit wine for himself before taking a sniff. Only then did his heart realm regain its usual calm.

‘I can’t go on like this.’ Xue Ying thought, ‘I’ve already failed a few thousand times. Even if I continued randomly for the next two years, it’d only end up in more failures.’

‘Maybe I’ve been thinking wrong all the while.’

Xue Ying closed his eyes.

Countless characters were flashing in his consciousness just like before. Those characters constituted the entire technique.

‘Every single character is filled with limitless profoundness. If I were to comprehend a single character thoroughly, I might have to spend a long time doing so. Comprehending those characters once might take me more than five years.’ Xue Ying reflected, ‘Thus, I thought that it was certain that this is not the way. I have always been worried that there isn’t enough time–five years is too short. That is why decided to dabble and stop in comprehending each character before trying to understanding the technique as a whole.’ Xue Ying extended his senses into those characters, ‘Maybe I should be taking it slow and try to understand character by character instead.’

‘The first character.’

Xue Ying focused his consciousness on this first character.

The character was glimmering. It was fluctuating and felt genuinely profound.

Xue Ying meticulously pondered the profound mysteries behind the fluctuation. Slowly, he had a deeper understanding of it before it finally became a cultivation technique.

‘Thoroughly comprehending a single character conceives a cultivation technique?’ Xue Ying was slightly startled as he opened his eyes. Still, it took a long time to comprehend a single character–a full three months! Judging by this speed, coupled with less than two years left, he could grasp seven characters at most.

‘Let’s see if I can control the Black Gourd.’ Xue Ying waved his hand. The Black Gourd appeared on the bamboo table once again.

He extended his thoughts.

At that moment, the luminous sun force produced a white character that flew over. But it was different from the past–instead of a large number of characters, it was just a single character, yet this character was much more profound.

Once this character entered the Black Gourd, it was burned silently by the terrifying flames within.

‘Failed?’ Xue Ying was stunned.

‘No other ways. Continue.’ Xue Ying closed his eyes. He had failed a few thousand times previously and was able to persevere on after keeping the Black Gourd.

The second character was flashing. It, too, emitted a mysterious fluctuation.

He meticulously pondered over it.

When he fully understood the character, he realized there were many similarities with the first character since they were of the same type. Thus, the time taken to comprehend it was much faster–he took just a month to understand it fully.

‘It seems there are some mistakes with my understanding of the first character?’ After Xue Ying thoroughly understood the two characters, he had some suspicions over the first character he comprehended, and immediately amended the original inaccurate cultivation technique to reflect his new understanding.

“Weng.”

Displaying this technique, it formed a single white character and entered the Black Gourd to no avail.

…