12 Fire

James figured that now he was in the 4th rank of body refining and it was about time that he left the cave for a bit. He wanted to hunt and eat some actual meat so that was exactly what he was going to do.

When James got to the end of the cave, the sight that greeted him was a dense greenery and tree's almost similar to a rainforest back on earth. James wasn't sure the normal cultivation rank that the animals in the forest were but he was hoping that it was close to his.

James carefully took his time when he was traversing through the forest, so far he hasn't seen any animals that were worth killing for the meat, all he saw was some tiny lizards and some snails, the optimal prey for him currently would be something like a bunny but he wasn't sure what he would find, or if there were even bunnies in this world to be honest.

James went a bit further into the forest and finally he spotted some signs of life. On the ground were some paw tracks from some type of animal. He wasn't sure what animal they came from but by the distance the paw tracks were apart from each other he could tell that this animal was running and it wasn't walking.

"Growl!"

James heard a growl come from behind him and what he saw surprised him. Right in front of him is the same crimson salamander that he saw the first time when he was reincarnated into the forest. James was happy because this gave him a chance to get some revenge for the first time he met and it was the perfect partner for a test of his strength. Soon a blue screen popped up in front of him showing the information of the crimson salamander.

[Race - Crimson Salamander

Cultivation level - Body Refining rank 3

Danger Level - minimal]

It was the time for James to turn the table and become the hunter and not the hunted. James went in for a slash with his claw and he wanted to cut off the salamanders tail with his claws so that he wouldn't have to worry about it later.

As James went in for the swipe the crimson salamander opened its mouth and spit out some fire at James. He was forced to cancel his attack since the flames were in the course that he was taking and even though he was above the salamander in level it could still hurt him with fire.

At this point James realized that he has two major flaws currently, the first flaw was the fact that he has no battle experience, and the second flaw was that he had no offensive manuals. If the salamander was at the same cultivation realm as himself he knew that he wouldn't have a chance against it but since it was a realm beneath him he could easily beat it.

Right as James dodged the fire the tail of the salamander came swinging at him and James knew that he couldn't avoid the hit. When the tail hit James he realized that he could barely even feel it so he just strait went in for the kill. James swiped his claw towards the salamanders neck and since they were in such close combat before the salamander could even realize what had happened his head went flying off the neck.

James first real combat was over even quicker than it started, if James wanted to get some real combat experience he would have to fight something the same level as him, but at the current moment it was better to go below since he didn't have the necessary experience to kill something at the same level as him.

While James was on his way back to the cave he decided to grab some firewood so he could make a fire when he got back to the cave. James wasn't sure how he was going to make a fire but first he was going to try the old fashion way by rubbing two pieces of wood together, but he wasn't sure if it was going to work.

But first as James got back to the cave he created something that he could hang the salamander up on so that he could get all of the blood out before he ate it as it would make the taste better.

After he was done with that he decided that he was going to attempt to make a fire. He chose the optimal sticks to rub together so that he had the best chance of making a fire. James started to use the old fashion way of rubbing sticks together but no matter how hard he tried he just could not get the fire to start so he decided to try a different way.

James thought that maybe since this was a cultivation world maybe he could create fire with just a thought so he tried many things to make a fire start

'Alakazam make the fire start!' yelled james while pointing one of his feet at the area he wanted to make the fire, but sadly it did not work.

James decide that he would try his last resort and to just understand the workings behind fire so that he could understand how to make it.

James thought about the way fire is created. Fire emits heat and light because the chemical reaction that produces flames is exothermic. In other words, combustion releases more energy than is needed to ignite or sustain it. In order for combustion to occur and flames to form, three things must be present: fuel, oxygen, and energy (usually in the form of heat). Once energy starts the reaction, it continues so long as fuel and oxygen are present.

James though about what chemical he would use as the fuel for the fire, even though you might not think about it fire doesn't actually need oxygen to stay alive. Yes, the oxidizer most often encountered is oxygen, but other chemicals also work. For example, burning hydrogen with chlorine as an oxidizer also produces a flame. The product of the reaction is hydrogen chloride (HCl), so the fire consists of hydrogen, chlorine, HCl, light, and heat. Other combinations are hydrogen with fluorine and hydrazine with nitrogen tetroxide. But since the at the current time the oxidizer that he had the most access to was oxygen so he decided to go with that.

Finally the last thing that James had to think about was the chemical make up of fire. In the usual combustion reaction, a carbon-based fuel burns in air (oxygen). Potentially, fire only contains gases from the fuel, carbon dioxide, water, nitrogen, and oxygen. However, incomplete combustion yields a host of other possibilities. Soot is a primary component of incomplete combustion. Soot mainly contains carbon, but various organic molecules may occur. Other gases found in fire include carbon monoxide and sometimes nitrogen oxides and sulfur oxides. A candle flame consists of vaporized water, carbon dioxide, water, nitrogen, oxygen, soot hot enough that it is incandescent, and light/heat from the chemical reaction.

Soon James entered a state of enlightment and he had understood the concept behind fire. When James was in the state of enlightment flames started to appear and dance around James as if the fire was exited about James' existence.

Finally when James woke up the first thing that he noticed was a blue screen that was in front of him.

[Congratulations for understanding the very basics of the Fire Dao!

A new function has been added to the system the Dao function, Understand the Dao and understand the working's of the Universe.]

James was exited he had finally accomplished something on his own and not with the help of anyone else. Even though it was technically chemistry class that he learned all of the information needed to make this possible he was still the one that had understood the concept behind it.

When James looked at the menu he noticed that there was a new tab that was at the end of the list.

[Name - James Smith

Lifespan - Infinite

Age - 2.5 weeks old, mental age - 20 years

Cultivation level - Body refinement rank 4

Spiritual qi needed to reach next level - 800/1,600

Race - Aspidochelone

Points - 20

Attributes

Skills

Quests

Shop

Gacha

Inventory

Dao]

James clicked on Dao and a very tiny screen popped up in front of him.

[Dao -

Fire Dao - 1% understanding]

James was a little disappointed that all there was was the fact that he could see his understanding of the Dao but he felt that it was enough for now. All of the sudden James could hear a voice in his head.

[In the future the Dao function will upgrade and gain more features, Since the host wasn't supposed to understand any of the Dao's yet most of the functions have been locked except for the viewing function.]

James finally understood the reason behind why the function was so minimal. He didn't think much about it and decided to move on to the next task.