WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR
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Episode 13: Foundation Establishment Breakthrough (4)
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Once Hui-dan agreed, Ise took out a soul-binding contract.
Hui-dan would protect the children. She would not harm or mistreat them. Once Giwon turned fourteen, she would recommend him for admission to the West Lake Guild.
He did not include any frightening clauses about Hui-dan losing her life if she broke the contract.
She might get scared and back out before agreeing.
Besides, soul-binding contracts carried a certain degree of force for cultivators.
Even verbal promises held power between cultivators.
For a righteous cultivator, a single word spoken became a line etched into the soul. Breaking it would naturally crack the cultivator's Dao heart.
Still, just in case, Ise added one more safeguard.
“I’ll come check on you in five or ten years.”
“...Yes.”
“Then shall we get to the main point?”
Ise immediately moved on to his next matter.
“I need information about first-grade demon beasts or tenth-star demonic cultivators, as well as how to obtain a Foundation Establishment Pellet and what precautions to take when using one.”
“A Foundation Establishment Pellet? No amount of Spiritual Stones can buy information on how to get one.”
“I know. General methods are fine too. Becoming a direct disciple of the Pill Altar Sect, for example. I just want to confirm what possibilities exist.”
Hui-dan let out an understanding sigh.
A Foundation Establishment Pellet. It was a dream medicinal pellet for cultivators at Great Completion of the Qi Condensation Realm.
They waited and waited for the fortuitous encounter that might someday let them safely break through to Foundation Establishment.
“I can organize the general information for you. But don’t get your hopes up too high. Most cultivators never hold one in their entire lives.”
“All right.”
Ise nodded lightly.
The earlier requests were only a cover to obtain directions for taking the Foundation Establishment Pellet while concealing the fact that he already possessed one.
“Would information on demon beasts from the Heaven-Demon Great Mountains be acceptable?”
Ise blinked once. The Heaven-Demon Great Mountains lay north of the Zheng Empire, beyond its territory.
“Below the Ten-Thousand-Li Great Wall, meaning within the Zheng Empire proper, demon beasts have practically been wiped out. You won’t find a first-grade demon beast inside. To encounter one, you have to cross the Ten-Thousand-Li Great Wall and enter the Heaven-Demon Great Mountains. But it’s far too dangerous for a lone independent cultivator to enter...”
“Is it far?”
“You only need to travel about two hundred li north.”
“That’s fine. Give me information about that place.”
“Would you like information on the Ink-Scaled Blood Python, the Shaman Tree Giant Python, or the Vajra Yaksha?”
“The Shaman Tree Giant Python.”
Ise answered without the slightest hesitation.
“You know Shaman Tree Giant Pythons live in male-female pairs, right?”
He knew. That was why he had chosen them.
Two at once. Was that not killing two birds with one stone?
A short while later, Hui-dan returned with a thin booklet and two sheets of parchment.
“The total is one hundred and twenty-five Spiritual Stones.”
“Here.”
“Thank you, Senior. Please come again!”
After paying the full price for the information, Ise left the External Affairs Pavilion.
* * *
‘It’s magnificent.’
Viewed from atop the Ten-Thousand-Li Great Wall, the Heaven-Demon Great Mountains possessed the grandeur of immense untamed nature.
The Zheng Empire was impressive for constructing a wall nearly ten thousand li long, but beyond it stretched a vast mountain range with no end in sight.
They said dense forests extended for millions of li. Could anyone cross them on foot, even if they walked their entire life?
Demons were everywhere underfoot, and Foundation Establishment Realm demons, even Core Formation Realm demons, were not uncommon.
This was truly the territory of demons.
It was a natural barrier so formidable that cultivators would not even consider crossing it before reaching the Core Formation Realm.
Beyond it lay the Northern Continent.
Cheongun of the Tyrant Sword Sect, whom he had met in the secret realm, suddenly came to mind. They might never meet again in their lives, but Cheongun had left a strong impression on him.
Ise leaped over the wall.
Following the direction and distance marked on the map from the External Affairs Pavilion, he tracked the Shaman Tree Giant Python’s traces.
‘It’s not far.’
The deeper one entered the Heaven-Demon Great Mountains, the stronger the demons became. That meant Qi Condensation Realm demons had mostly been pushed toward the area near the Ten-Thousand-Li Great Wall.
Before long, traces of enormous serpents appeared everywhere.
The information had been correct.
Finding the Shaman Tree Giant Pythons’ exact location was not difficult.
They were simply too huge to miss.
‘The next dish will be Ginseng Snake Soup.’
Snakes had always been considered nourishing food.
Ise suppressed his drool and watched the two snakes slither toward him.
The female breathed fire, while the male spat lightning.
If one died, the other became wildly stronger.
They also made protecting each other their highest priority, which made them especially troublesome opponents.
They did not even have any particular weakness. Their scales resembled black iron, and neither their eyes nor the insides of their mouths were especially vulnerable.
But having no weakness also meant they had no exceptional strength. They were remarkably tough, but they did not possess many truly dangerous attacks.
The only method was a direct assault.
Like a craftsman tanning hide, he would have to attack patiently until their tough scales broke and they fell.
Thunder exploded above his head. At the same time, a stream of flames shot through the mist from the side.
Ise raised an Earth Wall at an angle to deflect the flames, then shifted one step aside to avoid the lightning bolt’s direct strike.
The lightning struck exactly where he had stood moments earlier, sending dirt erupting like a fountain.
After locating the demon core with spirit sight, Ise used the Jet Stream Art and targeted the female first.
The scales directly above the demon core. If he struck that spot hundreds of times, it would eventually break.
* * *
“One mid-grade Qi-Condensing Pellet. A fourth-grade one.”
“One fourth-grade Qi-Condensing Pellet costs one thousand Spiritual Stones.”
“......?”
Having finished hunting the Shaman Tree Giant Pythons, Ise briefly doubted his ears when he came to buy a Qi-Condensing Pellet.
It was not difficult to find one at the medicinal-pellet shops in West Lake Market. The problem was the price.
One thousand? Was this not outright robbery?
“Why is it so expensive?”
“Isn’t that obvious? Supply is low, and demand is high.”
Ise checked several other medicinal-pellet shops, but every one of them charged the same price.
It was a price that strongly suggested collusion.
In the end, with tears in his eyes, he handed over ten mid-grade Spiritual Stones and accepted the Qi-Condensing Pellet.
His next destination was the cave abode rental office.
It stood along a mountain slope on the outskirts of West Lake Market.
“A low-grade cave abode costs five Spiritual Stones per day. There are two vacancies left. A mid-grade cave abode costs ten, and there is one vacancy left.”
“Don’t you have a high-grade cave abode?”
“Yes, but there is only one high-grade cave abode, and another cultivator is already using it.”
“I’ll take the mid-grade one. For thirty days.”
Ise handed over three hundred Spiritual Stones and received the cave abode’s key, a spiritual talisman.
The inside of the cave abode was clean.
There was a single-room cultivation chamber, a blue-stone platform in the center for sitting cross-legged, and an engraved formation along the walls that further condensed the flow of spiritual energy.
A small pill furnace stood in one corner. There was even a sand timer to mark the passage of time.
Everything needed for cultivation was prepared.
He sat cross-legged on the platform.
First, he swallowed the mid-grade Qi-Condensing Pellet and replenished most of his depleted spiritual energy. Then he took out the bamboo slip from the secret realm’s stone chamber, which contained instructions for consuming the Foundation Establishment Pellet.
He read every character carefully.
To achieve Foundation Establishment, one had to destroy the spiritual meridians and form a Dharma-Flower Dantian.
Then one had to destroy the brain, undergo spiritual-brain transformation, and awaken divine sense.
Those were the two steps of breaking through to the Foundation Establishment Realm.
The Foundation Establishment Pellet guided the user through all of it without requiring the cultivator to do it personally.
It allowed a safe breakthrough without the risk of the cultivator mishandling spiritual energy, shattering the brain, or destroying the spiritual root.
However, as the Foundation Establishment Pellet’s energy burned all the pill toxin within the body, it released powerful toxic energy. The user had to focus on purging it.
The Great Exorcist Order’s Demon Extermination and Spirit Subjugation Method had no process for removing pill toxin during the Qi Condensation Realm. Thus, when taking a Foundation Establishment Pellet, toxic energy could block the spiritual meridians or contaminate the dantian.
Of course, none of that applied to Ise.
The mysterious spiritual herb he had consumed in the secret realm.
The energy it had left behind still remained within him, continuously expelling pill toxin from his body.
Even at this moment, the spiritual herb’s energy was driving the pill toxin from the mid-grade Qi-Condensing Pellet out of his body.
That was the ordinary Foundation Establishment process.
The Heaven-Demon Dual-Meridian Physique had to go through an additional transformation, shattering and reconstructing the demon core as well.
The greatest danger was the heart demon tribulation.
From the Core Formation Realm onward, heavenly tribulation began to descend as lightning from the sky. But during the Foundation Establishment Realm, the heart demon tribulation arrived during spiritual-brain transformation.
In that brief instant when the spiritual brain opened anew and divine sense first connected with the outside world, the heart demon sleeping in the deepest part of the cultivator emerged.
If the cultivator could not control it, their Dao heart would collapse on the spot, turning them into a demonic cultivator.
Ise imagined the entire Foundation Establishment process from beginning to end. Once he had steadied his heart, he began circulating his cultivation method.
Having done it once before, the process felt familiar.
At first, he absorbed as much spiritual energy as possible. Then he took it in slowly, as though letting droplets fall. After that, he controlled it with the utmost precision, as though placing grains of sand on a balance scale.
Once the internal qi in his body reached complete equilibrium, he stopped breathing and activated an Isolation Talisman, severing external qi from internal qi.
The moment Ise recited the Tribulation-Crossing Incantation from the final chapter of the Demon Hunting, Spirit Release, and Qi Condensation Art, spiritual energy began to whirl around him.
Ise brought the Foundation Establishment Pellet he had set aside to his mouth.
An unfamiliar energy cautiously took its first step into his body.
Neither spiritual energy nor demonic qi, it was a strange energy that seized hold of his internal qi and guided it.
It swept across his spiritual meridians once, gathered every trace of flowing spiritual energy, then dismantled the spiritual meridians one by one.
During that time, the pill toxin mixed into the Foundation Establishment Pellet was forced out of his body by the spiritual herb’s energy.
There was no pain.
The spiritual meridians were spiritual flows rather than physical parts of the body.
Then, as when he had formed the demon core, spiritual energy began to gather layer upon layer, turning his body into a vessel.
It seemed ready to overflow, yet it did not. It gathered endlessly until it finally rippled quietly within him.
The Foundation Establishment Pellet’s energy did not stop. It guided the spiritual energy contained in the Dharma-Flower Dantian straight toward the Hundred Convergences Acupoint.
In an instant, his head felt as though it exploded with a crack.
His consciousness vanished, as if his memory had been cut off for a moment.
When he regained awareness, he found himself collapsed on the floor.
‘...Since it’s reconstructing my brain, losing consciousness is only natural.’
The problem was not the pain, but his recovery.
He had no idea how long it had taken for his brain to recover.
The sand timer he had prepared to track the time had run out long ago.
Ise turned it over again.
The energies that had been waiting began striking his brain once more as soon as he regained consciousness.
‘Taking a Foundation Establishment Pellet doesn’t mean I can relax.’
Crossing a major realm boundary was clearly no ordinary matter.
He had worked hard to maintain his center and avoid falling into a heart demon tribulation.
He had prepared thoroughly, and he was confident he would succeed, but... even so, he had to proceed carefully.
Failure would turn everything he had built until now into a sandcastle, crumbling away.
Footnotes:
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