Chapter 379: Red Feather to the West
After making sure that he was well prepared and informed, Cao Yun finally decided to leave for the Subei Province. He bade farewell to Governor Leng as Guai Mo, and to Hall Master Fang as Cao Yun. Then he obviously bade farewell to the Huang family since Hongyu was being kept within their stables. The valiant bird thanked Huang Liyue. She was smart enough to understand that that woman had saved her life. Besides, she had also a strong affinity with her both because of her True Fiery Fenghuang bloodline but also because she had been in the Yellow Death World with her. Her Qi had also entered her egg.
When they left, Elder Ying accompanied them for some time. He almost seemed like a father who was reluctant to let his daughter leave the nest. But he had to and knew that this was the right decision since only Cao Yun was able to control her condition.
Regularly, Cao Yun had to inject his Qi within Hongyu in order to make sure that the seal around her evil core was strong enough. Without his help, she would consume her prenatal Jing and slowly wither away. However, Cao Yun had no way of restoring what essence she had already burned away. As an alchemist, he knew how difficult it could be to do so, but he was not hopeless. After all, she was still very young. Now that she didn't need to burn her own blood essence, she was full of vitality. In the long run, this shouldn't affect her too much. And he might even be able to find a way to help her permanently, given enough time.
The Subei Province was the neighbor of the Sunmen Province, the most western province of the entire Hongchen Kingdom. The Nine Peaks were forming some form of natural border to the north of the kingdom. However, to the west, it was open albeit for a large river. The Sunmen Province was the most exposed province but also the most militarized. Indeed, the governor was literally a war general. That was the only province in the entire Hongchen Kingdom in this situation. But considering how often it was attacked, the Imperial City did not fear a struggle for power within the province. They were only afraid that it might fall. As such, they were ready to give all the power to the army there in order to protect it against the demons. Sometimes, this Sunmen Province was called the Demon Gate.
General Long Cheng was indeed a very powerful man. Although his cultivation had only reached 7th-grade Spirit Warrior, he was probably the greatest general of the entire Hongchen Kingdom. His knowledge in terms of strategy and tactics was unparalleled. Sect Leader Xuan could have bested him in combat but it wasn't sure whether the Wubei Sect would be able to resist against his army on the battlefield. Having one extremely powerful warrior was not a viable strategy in the long run. But of course, the Wubei Sect was also protected by the very terrain and by many array formations. Moreover, they had no reason to fight each other.
On the other hand, the Subei Province was somewhat safe from the demons. General Long was acting like a lightning rod for their aggression. In the Subei Province, the power and influence were shared between Governor Jiahe, the Xue family and the Yun family. General Yun was known as a great warrior as well, but his merits were eclipsed by the prodigious General Long. Both men were however friends. That was the reason why Governor Jiahe was almost always favoring the Xue family. As any other governor, he was trying to keep a form of balance so that he would always stay on top, and the Imperial City with him.
The Subei Province had a tiny branch of the Myriad Cherry Blossom Hall. Since those provinces were exposed to the threat of the demons all year long, the Myriad Cherry Blossom Hall had not invested a lot of funds in this part of the Hongchen Kingdom. But they still had a branch because fighting demons allowed warriors and sometimes mercenaries to sell a few weapons and artifacts. The rest of the year, they had to resort to hunting and they needed to have some form of income. As such, the Imperial City itself had financed the Myriad Cherry Blossom Hall to open branches there. Otherwise, the mercenaries and even soldiers might become restless and this was not a good thing for anyone.
Finally, the Huang family had started to implant itself there. Huang Jian and Huang Lü had gone to the Sunmen Province in order to help in the war effort. Matriarch Huang had been able to sell it easily as some form of abnegation on their part. In truth, it was not. They really wanted to expand and she had used the opportunity. Besides, it would be good for them as Huang Lü was an illegitimate daughter of Huang Jian and she wanted to fight and improve herself. To the south, in the Subei Province, Huang Si had also some forces because she had an ambitious project.
For now, Cao Yun did not know that Huang Si had found some very interesting mines that were larger than even the Xiliang Mines which had made the Huang family filthy rich. But he knew that she was not there without any good reason. However, it didn't really concern him much. Matriarch Huang had told him the local branch would be made aware of his arrival. If he needed them, he might get their help. However, the local branch was very tiny and had little influence. The day they would expose their new mine, they would suddenly become the most powerful family in the Subei Province though. Until then, they had to proceed carefully, buying all the land they had to in order to make sure that those mines were legally theirs.
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Hongyu was a 4-core demonic beast. She was not from any species Cao Yun or even the Huang family knew about. However, she looked very similar to a Blood Boiling Fenghuang. The evil core in her had probably had some impact on her biology. And indeed, it had made her incredibly fast. Just like Elder Ying, she could have outbursts of speed close to the speed of sound or even exceeding it. But this was not a speed she could sustain. Besides, they could be attacked by demonic beasts if they disturbed them too much. With her current speed, she and Cao Yun would need a bit more than two months to get to the Subei Province. That was around half of the time Cao Yun had estimated. This was a lucky break for him.
In theory, Hongyu could cross the entire Hongchen Kingdom in less than a day. However, there were many array formations and protections against flying demonic beasts as well as flying cultivators. With the demonic beasts stampede and the threat of demons, those defenses were at their highest. And there were still defenses left from the Legendary Era no one knew how to control. In fact, there were even damages in the very structure of space itself that dated from the great wars between demons and humans. As such, even a 9-core demonic beast could not travel as they pleased. Moreover, Cao Yun didn't want to appear suspicious. He was now fully playing the role of Guai Mo. Thus, he needed to go through the official proceedings.
From Matriarch Huang and Governor Leng, he had received every document necessary to cross the borders while flying on Hongyu. Everything in the sky was monitored by many experts. And not just anyone could go around that way as they pleased. Cao Yun would need to stop at several outposts to prove his identity and provide those documents. But it would still be two or even three times faster than if he had gone by foot.
During the travel, Cao Yun often used his Qi to check on Hongyu's seal. He also got some ideas on how to find a more definitive solution. Although he was nowhere close to a real solution, he might find ways for her to be fine for longer periods of time without him around. As he was constantly examining her seal, he was getting more and more knowledge on it. The progress was slow but there was some.
Of course, he also worked on his own cultivation. In two months or so, he would be able to break through to 5th-grade Blood Child. On the other hand, he was ever so cautious about his Bai Hui. From time to time he was working on his Five Prodigious Gates. But he quickly noticed something very strange and fascinating. The vitality and vibrancy of the world tree in his Bai Hui was slowly moving toward his two Labor Palaces that were in his palms. Instead of being afraid, Cao Yun was rather excited. This vitality didn't seem to be a threat at all, quite the contrary in fact.
Besides, it might solve his problem, at least a part of it. His Five Prodigious Gates had to be perfectly synchronized for him to break through to 4th-grade Mortal Warrior. Indeed, as a 3rd-grade Mortal Warrior, he had to temper and forge those gates now that they were open. But he had first to make sure that they were all working in harmony. Right now they were not. Part of it was psychological because Cao Yun did not dare put too much strain on his Bai Hui, but a huge part was also physical. His Bai Hui had truly been damaged and the repairs had made it different from the other gates. Hopefully, it would help solve the latter problem.
From time to time, Hongyu would land in order to recuperate. Flying with a demonic beast was a great sensation. It had saved Cao Yun a lot of time and Hongyu was still just a very young bird. Once she was older, or had developed another demonic core, she would be even faster.
As they were resting, Cao Yun went to hunt down some demonic beasts. With his current strength, he could easily kill any demonic beast with less than six cores. Killing 6-core demonic beasts depended on their actual strength, some were stronger than others. But they were not a mortal threat to him anymore. However, if he sensed one, he would rather use his 'Ashen Feather Seal' to conceal his presence and disappear. Thankfully, he only crossed path with two of them overall, and no demonic beast who had more than six cores.
Around Hongyu, he also set up array formations to protect her. Cao Yun had modified some concealment array formation with his understanding of 'Ashen Feather Seal' in order to hide her as best as he could. Since her bloodline was related to the True Fiery Fenghuang, it had even more effect than he had hoped. Indeed, Huang Liyue had created this technique while thinking of her own family first. Cao Yun had called this array formation Scorched Earth Embers. It was close to a 2-star Human array formation and it had been invented by Cao Yun with the help of Sun Liao using a 3-star Human array formation as a basis.
After hunting down some demonic beasts, he would feed them to Hongyu in order to keep her strong. Slowly, she was forming her fifth core but it would take years for it to be fully developed. Demonic beasts could only cultivate as fast as their biology allowed them to. You could not force feed them into breaking through faster. However, they had to feed in order to cultivate, so this was necessary.
Besides, Cao Yun also worked on his alchemy and he got some ideas after working on Hongyu's seal for so long. She needed the intent of the Drop of Wrath to preserve her blood essence. It turned out that 'Storms in the Crimson Furnace' allowed Cao Yun to create some blood essence from the Drop of Wrath. Using it would stall his progress in 'Storms in the Crimson Furnace' but right now he was focusing his blood cultivation around 'Crimson Inferno Road'.
By using 'Reducing the Five Sheng', Cao Yun was sending all his blood around the Drop of Wrath in his heart to slowly extract its essence into his blood. With this process he was not extracting prenatal Jing but postnatal Jing. It was way easier to recover. Compared with Qi, it was still a bit more difficult, but this wasn't an impossible task like prenatal Jing. In fact, it would naturally recover.
After practicing his blood cultivation, Cao Yun guided a few drops of his blood essence, blood rich in Jing, outside of his body. Then he used his 'Aureate Grove' to combine it with the blood of a few demonic beasts as well as parts of their demonic cores. He had also found several plants and ingredients. At first, he tried with very tiny portions of his blood because he knew that the first tries would be failures. And he was right.
In fact, his cauldron almost exploded a couple of times. If he had worked on his old bronze cauldron, it would have detonated for sure. Thankfully, this 'Aureate Grove Crucible' was sturdier than that.
After many failed attempts, Cao Yun finally refined a pill that contained traces of his own blood essence with the intent of the Drop of Wrath within. Hongyu tested it and it had the desired effect. It was able to replace her own prenatal Jing to preserve the seal around her evil core. The problems were however numerous.
First of all, any alchemy pill contained toxins. As much as Cao Yun had tried to limit them, they were there. Over time, they would accumulate and cause problems, especially since Hongyu would need to take these pills often. However, it could temporarily replace Cao Yun if he was not close by.
Another problem was that it solved nothing at all. It was just a way to buy some time for Cao Yun. He would still need to find a way to deal with the evil core directly and not just the symptoms.
Finally, he could not make too many of those pills. Indeed, he was literally using his blood essence to make them. For the experiments, he had already used a lot of that. The Drop of Wrath was very powerful but it could not produce infinite quantities of postnatal Jing. Even if it could, Cao Yun was still very limited in what he was able to extract from it. Hopefully, as his control over the Drop of Wrath would improve, he would extract more and more until his entire blood was similar to the Drop of Wrath.
After less than two months of travel, they were finally close to the Subei Province. After crossing the border, Cao Yun had to check at the nearest outpost first.