Cold.
A chill, similar to staying in an ice cave, went straight to his heart.
In Xia Fei’s half-conscious state, he swallowed that white pearl, which started to melt the moment it entered his body. Strands of energy, imperceptible to the naked eye, rapidly traveled throughout his body, aimlessly flowing everywhere. He felt an intense pain in his internal organs, and the cold aura left Xia Fei looking very pale.
The pain he was feeling far surpassed any of what he had experienced taking Phantom’s medicines before, and it was essentially an inhumane torture.
Xia Fei abruptly opened his eyes while still in that lakewater, his mind regaining clarity. Those strands of energy had agitated him and accelerated his mental energy recovery. However, the amount of energy released was simply more than what his body could take in. He felt a stab of pain on his chest as if something was about to gush out from his abdomen.
It was like a steam building up in a boiler that surpassed its limit, ready to explode at any time.
As Xia Fei was recovering, he could vaguely smell the scent of death. He ignored the pain and chill on his body as he made a fitful attempt to surface, all the while, he did what he could to suppress that overwhelming energy coursing through his body.
Unfortunately, as the energy did not belong to Xia Fei, he had no means by which to control it no matter how hard he tried. The energy constantly flowing through him turned even more crazed, and he could feel numbness slowly creeping into his four limbs. The situation was extremely dire.
That was when Xia Fei’s seventh brain region came alive once more.
Like a dam opening its floodgates, the swell of energy in Xia Fei’s body suddenly found catharsis. Everything began to madly rush toward the seventh brain region.
The seventh brain region was merely a tiny piece of brain tissue that not even a high-powered microscope could observe, yet it was this miniscule space that absorbed all the energy that his body could not withstand.
It was like a black hole, where not even a massive star could escape its draw.
No one knew where the energy all went, but it took the small seventh brain region just a matter of seconds to absorb everything.
Seemingly unsatiated, the seventh brain region went back into deep sleep once it was done as if nothing had happened.
Xia Fei broke to the surface of the water. He had just experienced an astounding recovery in terms of both his mental and physical energy. He swam quickly with his two arms as he made his way to the shore, and once there, he lay on a wet boulder, breathing hard.
The feeling of surviving a disaster was truly amazing and could be likened to finding a garden of Eden after having been living in a dark cave all their life.
The pleasure he felt was hard to describe. In those few seconds when his seventh brain region was absorbing the overflowing energy, it felt as if he had just emerged from a very comfortable full-body massage; every single cell in his entire body felt absolutely rested as if he had just finished a very pleasant sunbath.
Xia Fi was not exactly sure what had just happened to him, but he could vaguely recall that he seemed to have swallowed something, though try as he might, he simply could not remember any detail at all.
Phantom was standing at Xia Fei’s side, his eyes filled with surprise. Because he resided in the Moore Stone, he was unable to stay more than ten meters away from Xia Fei, which meant that he very clearly witnessed everything that had happened.
Xia Fei sat down, his eyes sweeping around his surroundings. “What happened?”
Phantom closed his mouth, gravely asking, “You don’t remember one bit?”
Xia Fei nodded. “I can only recall my body becoming extremely weak after expending much of my mental energy and sinking into the murky waters. Then, it’s like I finished eating a meal; my bodily functions got restored in a matter of seconds.”
With that, Xia Fei attempted to move his arm a bit. It moved swiftly across the air, full of vigor. He could feel his strength stronger than before and his mind clearer than ever.
This was a state that Xia Fei had never experienced in his heyday. To be able to recover his vitality and mental fortitude in such a short span and even improve in the process, it was simply unbelievable.
Phantom chuckled. “You did not just finish eating a meal but also a sumptuous feast.”
Xia Fei furrowed his brows, puzzled, even as Phantom continued laughing. “Do you know what you’ve just killed?”
“Nope.” Xia Fei shook his head. “Even the Beast Spirit Codex has no records of it, so that gigantic snake must be a mutated organism of sorts.”
Living organisms would often trigger mutations as a result of being influenced by the environment they were in or from radioactive elements. From the appearance of that snake and the difference it exhibited from the other serpent species he knew, Xia Fei could already guess that it was a mutated one.
Phantom nodded, for Xia Fei’s guess had been in line with his.
“After you split that snake in half with your Thunderfury, a white pearl emerged from its skull. You swallowed that pearl in your groggy state moments ago,” Phantom explained.
Xia Fei had a great epiphany after hearing it. “So it’s due to that snake pearl that I’ve managed to recover my bodily functions in such a short time. Looks like that snake pearl is really amazing.”
“Not just that; what benefited the most from it wasn’t your body but your seventh brain region,” Phantom solemnly explained.
Xia Fei hastily checked his seventh brain region via his consciousness, and sure enough, there seemed to be slight changes in that tiny space compared to before. It appeared to be a bit more open, but because the seventh brain region was miniscule to begin with, the changes were not too obvious.
Phantom spoke softly at this point, sounding mysterious to Xia Fei. “Your seventh brain region has absorbed ninety-nine percent of the energy from the snake pearl and is rapidly mending itself right now. If you go through the same situation twice more, I reckon that the damage in your seventh brain region will be completely healed, and you’ll be able to cultivate through the ranks without relying on medicines anymore.”
Xia Fei was slightly shocked hearing this. Learning that his seventh brain region had gradually begun to repair itself was great news. As his cultivation increased, the required medicines also became more and more of a bottleneck to Xia Fei. After all, there was a limit to the amount of precious stuff with medicinal properties in the universe, and they were hardly something that he could get hold of whenever he wanted. This was not mentioning the large amount of time spent waiting for the medicinal residue to be completely absorbed by his body after every batch of medicines he ingested; as his rank increased, the time it would take for this absorption process would also increase as well.
Right now, the time needed for the medicinal residue to be fully absorbed was almost up to a year, and who knew if the more potent ingredient he consumed would need up to ten or a hundred years? Just a ten-year wait would be far too long, given how urgently Xia Fei wanted to improve.
“Heh, does that mean I have to always be dancing on a knife’s edge, hovering between life and death, in order for my seventh brain region to take the initiative and engage in recovery?” Xia Fei grimaced.
Every time Xia Fei was met with a crisis, his seventh brain region would secretly be helping him. It was through the countless life-and-death battles that Xia Fei obtained his second special ability: psychokinesis.
Now, after having narrowly escaped death, his seventh brain region once again attempted another round of self-recovery.
It was as if only extreme danger was enough to agitate his seventh brain region into waking, and it was changing Xia Fei in its own way, slowly but surely.
Phantom pursed his lips grimly. “That does appear to be the case.”
The seventh brain region was too mysterious. Be it Phantom or Harris, and even Xia Fei himself had not been able to accurately describe it, much less control it. Aside from it providing humans with powerful abilities, no one knew what else the seventh brain region offered, and Xia Fei could only keep searching in the dark to make progress, with no one out there able to give him any sort of help.
After all, Xia Fei’s seventh brain region was completely opened, and there was no precedence for its occurrence.
Xia Fei got up and his gaze swept across his surroundings again. “Let’s be on our way. Though that sect senior of yours, Darkshadow, lent me a hand, I doubt he will let me off easily seeing him like that.”
Phantom shook his head anxiously. “No, we have no idea how my second sect senior is right now. We need to first locate him, confirm that he isn’t in any danger, before we leave.”
Phantom was not really an obstinate person, but since this concerned his discipleship, and once something was related to the Assassins, he would become very serious.
Xia Fei could only go according to his request and follow along the lakeshore, searching for any trace of Darkshadow.
All of a sudden, a sudden eagerness came over Xia Fei; acting upon it, he ran at his top speed for a short burst.
“Phantom, don’t you think my speed is faster than before?” Xia Fei asked, somewhat puzzled.
“Indeed, that appears to be the case. The snake pearl not only helped repair a portion of your seventh brain region, it also increased your speed by about fifty percent, meaning that you’re already very near Star River rank, your speed nearing 6500m/s,” Phantom said.
Xia Fei nodded, happiness flooding his heart. Just one percent of that snake pearl had effectively increased Xia Fei’s speed to a standard near Star River rank; achieving such an effect was simply beyond words.
Not only did it help repair his seventh brain region, it also increased Xia Fei’s speed by 2000m/s. He had essentially killed two birds with one stone.
Phantom was worried about Darkshadow’s safety, so he did not care to discuss Xia Fei’s improvement, hurrying him to search for his second sect senior after a brief overview of the situation.
Over by a shoal that was covered in gravel, Xia Fei spotted Darkshadow wheezing painfully. It appeared that he had been struck by Thunderfury’s impact and was thus injured from it.
The injured Darkshadow hardly posed a threat to Xia Fei, so the latter walked to a point several meters away from the former, squatting to ask, “Are you all right?”
Darkshadow knitted his eyebrows together. He had clearly witnessed Xia Fei suffering from more grievous injuries than he did moments prior, yet the young man was suddenly looking completely lively and spry in the blink of an eye. This left Darkshadow feeling very unsettled.
“I’m fine. I’ve broken four of my ribs, so it’s a little inconvenient for me to move about,” answered Darkshadow in a deep rasping voice. “How are you unscathed?”
Xia Fei smiled. “Perhaps I was a little luckier.”
‘D*mn luck,’ Darkshadow complained internally. Phantom’s second sect brother would only be even more unsettled if he found out that, not only was Xia Fei uninjured, the entire incident had been a blessing in disguise to the young man, for part of his seventh brain region got repaired, subsequently increasing his cultivation.
They both entered the cavern and encountered the giant python, and each man had fought with the huge snake and ended up severely injured, yet the difference in the outcome for either man was heaven and earth.
Xia Fei profited for no apparent reason, while Darkshadow ended up having trouble with even just walking. Just what sort of fairness was this?
Xia Fei pondered for a moment before he stepped forward and moved Darkshadow’s two arms to his back, using a thin metal wire to bound them together.
“I’ll carry you out, but you’ll have to suffer this indignity for a bit in order for me to ensure that you won’t be able to attack me as we make our way through these caves.”
Darkshadow was speechless. He was already having difficulties moving because of his broken ribs, so he could only acquiesce and be at Xia Fei’s mercy. There was no way he could hope to win given the current state he was in.
Phantom sighed. Xia Fei was simply too cautious, tying the old man despite his injured state. At the end of the day, the man was his sect senior, so he could not help but feel disgruntled seeing how he was treated.
Still, Xia Fei did not care for this. In his eyes, Darkshadow was still a threat, and though he fulfilled Phantom’s request to save the old man’s life, it did not mean he needed to reveal his back to this stranger.
Darkshadow was soon bound tightly. Xia Fei then gingerly lifted the man as he began his search for an exit.
After several more turns, that red rainforest once again appeared before Xia Fei.
He was just wondering if he should leave Darkshadow here or secretly send him back to the Assassins’ camp when something abnormal suddenly occurred.
