The Secret of the Giant

Li Huowang’s eyes snapped open. As he sat up from the rumpled bed and looked to his right, he saw sunlight slanting in through the window. It had been light out for a long time already.

“I overslept again?” Ignoring the blood streaks all over his body, Li Huowang hurriedly dressed and walked down the wooden stairs.

“Brother Li, good morning.” Zhuge Yuan, holding his fan, clasped his hands in greeting.

“Brother Zhuge, morning.”

Seeing him, Li Huowang slapped his forehead in frustration. He’d only just returned to the village and had already let his guard down. Zhuge Yuan, who had saved his life, was still waiting for him to be rescued. Practicing the True Cultivation Method was far more important than any mundane affairs.

He grabbed a steamed bun and some pickled vegetables from the table, wolfing them down before washing it all away with some congee. Then, finding a quiet side room in the Bai family compound, he sat down cross-legged, closed his eyes, and began cultivating the True Cultivation Method.

Following the obscure text of the technique, after enveloping the Primordial Unity with the Divine Fire from his eyes, the next step was to propel this Primordial Unity through the Root Chakra, the Sacral Chakra, the Navel Chakra, the Heart Chakra, the Throat Chakra, the Brow Chakra, and the Crown Chakra within his body in sequence.

He had to let all of his Ten Emotions and Eight Sufferings filter through the formless, colorless Primordial Unity, one by one.

The process was arduous. Li Huowang felt like he was trying to push a giant elephant with a wheelbarrow; after pushing for ages, it hadn’t budged an inch.

But he wasn’t anxious. Cultivation was not something to rush; it required persistence over time.

If that Heart-Element Bei Feng could do it, then he could too.

He didn’t know how long had passed. When Li Huowang opened his eyes, utterly exhausted, he saw that the sky outside the window had dimmed.

Meanwhile, the entire layout of the side room had become warped and twisted. Parts of the floor and walls bulged outwards, while other sections sank inwards.

Seeing this, Li Huowang frowned. The cultivation of this True Cultivation Method caused strange changes in the surrounding environment. It seemed he couldn’t practice here in Niuxin Village. He needed to find a place where it was harder to accidentally hurt someone.

Li Huowang stood up and headed for the door. Just as he opened it, he was startled to see a young man standing abruptly on the ceiling above his head.

When the young man saw Li Huowang’s appearance, he recoiled in terror, clearly frightened out of his wits. He scrambled backward on the ceiling, using both hands and feet.

Just as Li Huowang was wondering who this person was, he saw Gao Zhijian’s large figure also walking towards him—upside down on the ceiling.

Seeing the big simpleton, Li Huowang instantly understood. It wasn’t them hanging upside down; he was the one hanging upside down!

As soon as this thought struck, Li Huowang felt the floor give way beneath him, and he tumbled towards where the young man was.

He twisted in mid-air and landed steadily on his feet. Shaken, he stood up and looked back through the wooden door of the side room.

The place where he had been cultivating was now completely inverted. The floor had become the ceiling, and the roof beams were now below. He had been standing on that ceiling for so long without even noticing.

This only reinforced Li Huowang’s determination to find a new place to practice. This True Cultivation Method was certainly bizarre in its effects.

“L-Li… Li… Li…”

Li Huowang looked up at Gao Zhijian and patted him on the arm. “Just how old are you? How have you gotten taller in just a few months? Did you need something?”

“Mm.” Gao Zhijian nodded, then pointed outside.

Seeing the serious look on his face, Li Huowang thought for a moment and then followed him out.

“Godfather, my godmother told me to bring you back for dinner,” the young man, who had just been lying on the floor in shock, quickly said as he stood up.

“I’ll be back in a bit. Tell her to eat without me.”

Once they reached Gao Zhijian’s home, Li Huowang saw him holding a pile of stone shards. He looked guilty as he offered them to Li Huowang.

“This is…” It took Li Huowang a moment to recognize it. It was the stone slab ‘Heavenly Scripture’ he had given him, the very one that Danyangzi had once treasured.

Through Gao Zhijian’s halting explanation, Li Huowang learned that one afternoon not long ago, the scripture had shattered without warning. Strange, unintelligible words had then come out of it, seeming to mock the idea of attaining immortality.

“It’s fine. Don’t blame yourself. This has nothing to do with you. This thing was just a Zuowandao trick to fool people,” Li Huowang explained to Gao Zhijian.

He didn’t know when Danyangzi had gotten his hands on this so-called Heavenly Scripture, but judging by how long he had been collecting those scattered fragments for his alchemy, it must have been a long time—at least a few years.

The ‘Lord Lao’ that Danyangzi spoke of was obviously a Zuowandao in disguise, without a doubt.

It wasn’t just Danyangzi who had been tricked. There were the Renxiao in the caves from before, and countless more victims throughout the land.

A deception on such a grand scale, spanning such a long time, covering the entire world, couldn’t have been accomplished overnight. It would have taken decades, even centuries, to set up.

Such a vast conspiracy could only be the work of the Dice.

The Dice had gone through all that trouble, gathering the lies of so many victims, just to find an opportunity to summon Doumu’s incarnation and steal the Divine Mountain’s Eye that the Great Liang Emperor had worked so hard to obtain.

The Way of that long-dead Divine Mountain seemed to be… Chaos? Confusion?

“But it’s strange. Based on what I know of them, aren’t the Dice always trying to figure out how to trick Doumu out of her Way, planning to seize it and become sages or gods themselves? Why would they help her? Unless they got tricked by Doumu?”

Li Huowang was snapped out of his thoughts by Gao Zhijian’s hand on his arm. “Sorry, I was thinking too much. Gao Zhijian, is there anything else?”

“Yes.” After finishing his curt reply, Gao Zhijian turned and walked into the house.

He soon returned, holding a book on military strategy. Li Huowang remembered it. It was the one he had taken from Peng Longteng’s corpse.

“Th-this… this… this is… a-a-a… Military Path… c-c-cultivation…”

Li Huowang took it in surprise. As he flipped through it carefully, he was astonished to find that it really did contain a Military Path cultivation technique, teaching one how to increase and control killing intent through body refinement.

“You practiced it?”

“Mm.” Gao Zhijian nodded. He looked around, then walked over to a distant giant halberd. Gritting his teeth, he let out a roar and managed to lift the heavy weapon.

As a thick aura of killing intent spread from Gao Zhijian, the headless Peng Longteng began to stir excitedly, its massive hand clenching and unclenching.

“HAH!” With another roar, a powerful gust of wind blew Li Huowang’s robe and hair back. The massive halberd, bearing the weight of a thousand jun, slammed heavily into the ground.

The earth shook in that instant. Stone bricks cracked and shattered for inches around. Li Huowang felt as if an earthquake had just struck.

Startled, Li Huowang realized that Gao Zhijian, so quiet and unassuming, had grown so powerful without a word. If he got any taller, his strength might soon rival that of Peng Longteng in her prime.

Was this a testament to Gao Zhijian’s natural genius, or was the Military Path cultivation method just that easy to learn?