When I wake up I feel oddly refreshed again. Opening my eyes reveals that it's still nighttime, the moonlight painting my room through the window with a blueish silver sheen. Trying to go back to sleep fails miserably, with me not feeling any shred of tiredness.
I sigh and sit cross-legged on my bed.. I close my eyes and inspect my aperture. The jade green copper essence sea rests still as a lake inside of it. It doesn't take long for me to manage to cause small ripples in it. Slowly but surely the ripples reach the aperture walls, hitting them and lightly nourishing them. As I continue causing ripples I slowly become more proficient in manipulating my essence, able to manipulate more and more.
The small ripples slowly turn into large waves, crashing into the aperture walls much more strongly than before. As I continue to hit the walls of my aperture with my primeval essence it slowly begins to drain, being consumed by the aperture walls. This is one of the limits that aptitude decides. Having more primeval essence means you have more essence to nurture your aperture walls, greatly speeding up your cultivation.
I retrieve the phone gu from my aperture and begin reading the immortal's inheritance. The thing is stupidly large, with over two hundred chapters, each of them somehow being the equivalent of a fucking PHD dissertation. Its author, who calls himself The Great Primordial Blood Vampire Immortal, was clearly a scholarly sort of person.
About four hours pass until the sun rises, leading to my primeval essence replenishing by 17.6%. This is another effect of aptitude. A person will regenerate 10% of their total primeval essence in an hour, my 44% aptitude means I replenish 4.4% primeval essence per hour. Someone with 88% aptitude would regenerate twice as fast as me. Their cultivation speed would be at least twice as fast compared to mine.
I put the phone gu back in my aperture, where it splashes into the essence sea and falls to the bottom of the aperture. I get up from my bed, stretch and then lean on the window, gazing on the forest surrounding the village as I do so. The sun shines through the treetops, painting shadows on the dew-laden grass below. A deer raises its head, inspects its surroundings before going back to grazing.
I keep an eye out on the streets, to make sure that I don't stay too much and screw myself over by not knowing where the academy is. It does not take long for Shen Cui to arrive, bowing to me after opening the door. After getting myself cleansed and dressed, making sure to put on the belt signifying I'm an academy student, I go outside and wait to find someone to follow to the academy.
I follow the first academy student I see, a lithe teen. I remember him getting mid D-rank aptitude during the awakening ceremony. The academy ends up not being all that far from home, about a 5 minute walk. The academy itself is a five story building, most of it is composed of apartments for the students.
Thankfully we're not split in different classes, so I don't have to worry about having to get to the correct classroom. I just follow the lithe boy until we reach the classroom. Once inside I just sit down on the nearest seat. Half of the students are already here, organized in small cliques. I pay some attention to them gossiping, hoping to speed up learning the language.
It takes fifteen minutes for everyone else to arrive, someone whom I'm assuming to be the academy elder going by the belt with a bronze 'III' inscription on it coming in five minutes after everyone is already here. I don't know whether he is giving a speech or trying to teach something, since I understand zilch. I pay attention all the same, both hoping to learn some new words and in order to not get singled out. Unlike the original Fang Yuan's five hundred years of experience, I have about one day of experience in this world.
Class does not take as long as I expected, after one hour the academy elder leaves. Everyone is getting up after he leaves the classroom so I do so as well.
Since I've now found myself with some free time I decide to start searching for the flower wine monks' inheritance. Once I leave the village I pick a random direction and proceed to search the forest around the village for a cliff with a waterfall. Fifteen minutes later I'm at a small cliff with a waterfall. Behind the waterfall is a boulder, a crevice has split the boulder in half, the crevice itself being a result of the water hitting the stone for so many years. It's time to test this 'Innate Strength' shtick.
I palm the ends of each half of the boulder and push. The halves are easily pushed away, each of them rolling once before landing on their flat sides. I then step into the cave and begin walking through. It slowly becomes narrower and narrower, about fifty steps in. I exit the narrow passage and step into the cave proper.
The floor is a striking dark red, emanating a small amount of light. Inside the cave there are multiple vines growing on its walls. They are Wine Sack Flower Gu and Riche Pouch Grass Gu respectively. There is also a robed skeleton leaning on the walls of the cave. I begin walking towards it, I lean down before hearing a man shout.
I turn around and stare at the image being projected on the wall. A gu master is kowtowing on the floor, in front of him is another gu master. The person kneeling is the Gu Yue clan's fourth clan leader, the second leader to have reached rank 5. The person standing is the flower wine monk. Both of them are surrounded by gu masters, elders of the Gu Yue clan.
According to the 'official' history, the flower wine monk attacked the Gu Yue village and our fourth clan leader heroically sacrificed his life in order to save our village. The reality is a bit different.
The flower wine monk was a rank 5 demonic gu master. He came to Gu Yue village in order to trade. Our clan leader at the time attempted to steal a gu from the flower wine monk, leading to them coming to blows. The flower wine monk won, but our clan leader sneakily used a gu on him, preventing him from using primeval essence.
I watch as the flower wine monk's expression changes into anger, before he rushes towards the clan leader and kills him with a single punch, making him violently vomit out his bones and internal organs. Afterwards the flower wine monk begins a fierce battle against the elders of the Gu Yue clan.
This scene is being projected by a Photo-Audio Gu. It is a one time use gu that records a scene and replays it in this fashion. Once the flower wine monk kills the final elder the scene replays itself, starting with the two kneeling once again.
I know that there is something weird going on with this inheritance, but I haven't read enough of the novel to reach the point where I would know exactly what that is. Never thought that me wanting to avoid story spoilers would end up screwing me over . What personally strikes me as weird is the ground. Why the fuck is it red and bioluminescent?
I go to the flower wine monk's skeleton, kneeling next to his corpse. I take a small pouch from the skeleton's belt. Inside of it are fifteen primeval stones. I take one and hold it in the palm of my hand. The white stone that lands in my palm is round, its size is about as big as a fingertip. This is the currency of this world, they serve as both a cultivation resource and as money.
Searching the cave for a bit reveals the other thing that I was looking for, a yellow patch of earth. Digging underneath it reveals a closed lotus. Once I get it out of the ground it slowly begins opening, revealing a cute white ladybug the size of my fingernail. The flower is Earth Treasury Gu. Gu need to be fed, otherwise they will wither and die. That is what happened to the gu of the wine flower monk, after so many years passed almost all of his gu withered and died. The purpose of the Earth Treasury Gu is to hold a gu, keeping it in a state of hibernation and preventing the gu from starving to death. Once the flower has opened completely, the Earth Treasury Gu shrivels and dies. It is a one time use gu.
I pick up the white ladybug. It is a rank 1 White Boar Gu. If this was a wild gu it would be very difficult to refine. Since it's been already refined once before and left here for someone else on purpose it thankfully does not need much to be refined. I push a tiny amount of primeval essence into it and it is immediately refined. Thanks to 'Instant Success' I only need to use it once for it to have an effect. I push primeval essence into the White Boar Gu, using its ability and immediately gaining the strength of a boar.
The first Gu that a gu master refines is known as their vital gu. A vital gu is important for most gu masters because it cannot die when one fails to use it in refining gu via fusion. For me it's not as important at this moment, as I have eleven gu that will grow in ranks along with me.
The White Boar Gu is somewhat easy to feed, requiring a full pig every five days for any other gu master. Thanks to my brother, that's now been turned into three boars every five days for me. Thankfully the only real difficulty is going to be actually finding boars, which shouldn't be that hard if I just get some maps from hunters the same way Fang Yuan originally had.
I rise and go to the crevice, once I'm within an arm's distance from it a cute white silkworm flies through the opening. I quickly catch it with my hand. This is a rank 1 liquor worm, same as the one that my brother chose for me. This was the vital gu of the wine flower monk, it degenerated into a rank 1 liquor worm from the lack of food. I can't actually refine it right now, since I don't have enough primeval essence. I think a bit on whether or not to take it with me before deciding to take it with me. I just close my fist and keep it there, I'll shove it into a clay pot or something once I get to the village.
If my luck is as good as I've starting hoping that it is, I shouldn't have any issues feeding both it and the white boar gu from now on. I leave the cave and immediately find a boar drinking water right from where the waterfall is landing. I rush towards it before it can react, grab its head and smash it into the half of the boulder next to us, spreading its gore everywhere.
I now let out the white boar gu and watch as the tiny ladybug proceeds to eat an entire boar in about five fucking seconds. Cleaning myself using the waterfall does not take long. I dress myself once again and head back to the village. If anyone asks where I've been I'll just shut up and ignore them. It's not like I can do anything else.
Halfway through the journey I realize another oddity with the wine flower monk's inheritance. Why is the liquor worm NOT left as an inheritance? He left the rank 1 white boar gu along with other gu, but he didn't leave his main gu worm?
It does not take long for me to get back to the village. Once I get home I steal a clay pot, a lid for said pot and two full jars of wine from the kitchen. When I arrive in my room I shove the liquor worm in the pot and spill the wine inside of said pot. The liquor worm begins swimming and drinking the wine. This one shouldn't be too difficult to feed either, with its food being simple wine. I put the lid on the pot and shove it under my bed.
With all of that sorted I go and get Shen Cui. It's time to learn some more of the language. I spend the rest of the day learning as much as possible about the language, slowly but surely learning more and more words. At this pace I'm feeling that I should be able to hold a toddler level conversation by the end of the week.
When night comes, Shen Cui bows to me and leaves the room. I wait for a bit of time to pass before I open the pouch with my primeval stones. I take one and begin attempting to use it. It doesn't take long for me to get the gist of how to do so. I now open the clay pot and take the liquor worm. It's drank all of the wine in the pot and is currently sleeping off, seemingly in a food coma.
Holding the worm in one hand and a primeval stone in the other I begin refining the liquor worm, pushing my primeval essence into it. As I'm pushing essence into the worm I also begin to draw primeval essence from the primeval stone. This is the purpose of primeval stones, replenishing a gu master's primeval essence. I am using them because my 44% essence is not enough to refine this gu without external assistance. As I keep drawing essence from the stone it begins to shrivel, until it disappears completely. Once it's gone I take another and begin drawing from it.
Six stones and 40% of my essence later I've refined the liquor worm. With most of my primeval essence used up I just go to sleep, it's not like there's anything else I can do right now.
-next day
I wake up in the middle of the night once again, finding myself unable to sleep. My primeval essence is nowhere near recovered. By my estimations it should be near full when I come back from the academy. I stretch and start reading the vampire's inheritance.
Once I arrive at the academy I see that around a third of the class is waiting in the courtyard. I just go and join them, we're probably going to begin training in martial arts today. My suspicions are confirmed twenty minutes later when the academy elder and a rank two gu master arrive. They both give a small speech before doing a short martial arts demonstration. The academy elder leaves after the demonstration and the martial arts teacher immediately has us begin practicing basic punches. While we're doing our moves he begins to talk, giving instructions.
He does not stop talking. His voice is an endless barrage, continuing regardless of how much time passes. Ten minutes later he has us practice side stepping all the while continuing to talk. I understand why everyone hated martial arts practice in the novel now, this guy just keeps yapping endlessly.
Once we've practiced for a full hour he lets us go. Everyone, except for me, is drenched in sweat and panting by now, since we were given no breaks whatsoever from practicing punches and dodges. When I get home the first thing that I do is take a bath before going to my room and beginning to cultivate. Shen Cui is standing at the door, waiting for me to finish cultivating so that I can get her to teach me some more.
I sit cross-legged on the bed and close my eyes. The liquor worm is swimming through the primeval sea in my aperture whilst the white boar gu is calmly floating atop of it. I activate the liquor worm and begin turning my jade green copper essence into pale green copper essence.
Gu cultivation has nine ranks. Ranks 1 to 9. Each rank has four substages, each with its own color for primeval essence. Right now I am at rank one initial stage. The next stage is the middle stage, followed by the upper stage and then peak stage. The liquor worm's ability is to turn primeval essence to its next substage. The liquor worm is slowly turning my jade green essence into pale green essence.
Once all of my primeval essence has been upgraded I begin cultivating, smashing the primeval essence into my aperture's walls. Using primeval essence of the higher stages in cultivation is much more effective than using primeval essence of one's own stage. I continue cultivating until I am completely out of primeval essence. Once that's done I open my eyes and confirm that Shen Cui is still present.
Our lessons continue until nighttime, with us pausing only for dinner. Once the time for her to leave comes I smile. "Goodbye".
She bows at me. "Goodbye lord Fang Yuan."
After she leaves I begin reading the vampire's inheritance, skimming through and searching for any of the gu in my set. In twenty minutes I manage to find the abilities of three of the gu worms from my set. They are the:
Blood qi Gu : Allows a gu master to replenish their blood. It is a support gu.
Blood-Step Gu : Allows a gu master to make a controlled leap. It is a movement type gu.
Essence Lotus Gu : Fucking spawns money and speeds up your primeval essence recovery.
Afterwards I just go to sleep, I'll search for the rest when I wake up.
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I'mma be crossposting on RoyalRoadl, same username as here.