Martial Peak

Yang Kai could feel Old Demon and the Insect King fighting within the Star Chart Space. Although in the beginning, Old Demon was not the king’s opponent, the Insect King had swallowed so much energy, it could not digest it all and had become severely bloated, greatly reducing its speed, allowing Old Demon to fight with it.

As time passed, and the Insect King was forced to swallow more and more energy, Old Demon gradually reversed the situation, seizing the upper hand, the Soul Breaker Awl displaying its might, constantly forcing the Insect King to retreat, inflicting countless scars.

The back of his hand was hot. Having been forced to channel so much Yuan Qi, Yang Kai had also suffered some injury. Observing it now, the originally hidden star chart was now radiating light; an endless stream of glowing stars was burned into his eyes, and amongst those stars Yang Kai could vaguely see one black and one gold light clash back and forth.

The air began to fill with a burnt taste since due to him having poured in too much True Yang Yuan Qi, his hand had been burned.

Despite this, Yang Kai insisted, still channelling in Yuan Qi. The huge Yuan Qi not only burdened the Insect King, forcing it to consume too much, even Old Demon had been affected.

Old Demon’s soul and the Soul Breaker Awl were evil things, True Yang Yuan Qi was their nemesis, if not for Yang Kai’s approval, Old Demon could not store the Soul Breaker Awl in his body.

Usually, there was no problem, but now, Old Demon faintly felt like the heat from the True Yang Yuan Qi melting him.

An uneasy feeling filled Old Demon, causing him to urge Yang Kai with his thoughts, but all he got in response was silence.

After what seemed like thousands of years, Old Demon only vaguely heard Yang Kai call him,

“Come out!”

Old Demon had almost despaired; he had even thought that Yang Kai planned to cruelly destroy him along with the Insect King, and had thus refused to respond to him. So when he heard his Young Master call out, his mood suddenly shifted from that of a dead victim’s to a cherished friend’s.

Not daring to stay any longer, when Yang Kai opened a path out of the Star Chart Space, Old Demon instantly fled.

The Insect King also wanted to flee, but that gap which had opened was quickly closed, not give it any chance.

[Star Mark!] Yang Kai loudly roared, slowly raising his right fist. Endless star images scattered about the sky, this gloomy cave suddenly resembling a bright starry night.

A loud noise burst out, the whole insect cave violently trembled, and blood sprayed out from Yang Kai.

There was no trace of the Star Mark martial skill materializing, but Old Demon instantly understood what had happened. His heart in shock, he could not help but exclaim, “Young Master!”

“I’m alright!” Yang Kai spat out a few mouthfuls of blood, his face pale, panting heavily, he turned his eyes to his right hand to see.

The back of his hand was bloodied, and even the white of his bones was vaguely visible, but after carefully checking, Yang Kai suddenly laughed.

The Insect King was dead, the breath from its body completely dissipated.

After being bloated with so much energy, heavily wounded by Old Demon, and then finally eating a full powered Star Mark, if it had survived it would be a miracle.

Old Demon was shocked speechless. After a long silence he sincerely praised, “Young master, Old Servant deeply admires!”

Not admiring was impossible; after all, Yang Kai’s Star Mark was not directed at an external target, but instead exploded in the back of his hand.

If there had been the slightest miscalculation, Yang Kai would have died!

Fortunately, Yang Kai’s control was superb. Most of the explosion was channeled to the Insect King, while his body had only borne a little bit of it.

Being so decisive with his own life, this was not something an average person could do. Old Demon was thoroughly impressed.

“Keep a close eye on our surroundings; I may have to heal for a few days!” Yang Kai hurriedly said as he ripped his clothes, wrapping the injury on his right hand and closed his eyes.

Star Mark was an extremely powerful martial skill, allowing Yang Kai to knock a sixth-order Monster Beast to the ground. Now, even if he had only taken a fraction of its power, it was not something his Qi Transformation Fifth Stage cultivation could handle.

Right hand in excruciating pain, Yuan Qi in disarray, five viscera and six organs all shifted and damaged.

(Skoll: He is saying he is grievously wounded.)

The only thing that gave Yang Kai some relief was that although the back of his hand was a bloody mess, the Star Chart Space still existed, meaning there was no worry about being unable to use Star Mark.

After spending a lot of effort, Yang Kai finally calmed the Yuan Qi chaos in his meridians, constantly running his True Yang Secret Art, then controlling his True Yang Yuan Qi to heal his wounds and clear the body of scars.

After two full days, Yang Kai slowly opened his eyes, first asking, “Those insects did not come in?”

This had been his biggest concern, those small insects did not pose much of a threat to him, their order was low, only their numbers were annoying, but those giant insects were clearly not just low grade Monster Beasts, any one of them was not worse than the Red Cloud Sect disciples he had been caught with.

“No.” Old Demon replied, “Those insects did not dare to enter here, after all, this is the king’s residence.”

“That’s good.” Yang Kai breathed a sigh of relief, also noticing that his injuries seemed to have recovered much faster than before, he proceeded to unwrap the cloth on his right hand. Although the back of his hand was still bloody, it was clearly healing very quickly as he could no longer see his bones and tendons.

Old Demon seemed to sense Yang Kai’s doubts, explaining, “Young master last time on the Red Cloud Island peninsula you refined a few Congealing Blood Beads, enhancing your body’s Blood Force, allowing you to restore and recover faster than ever before. The more you enhance your Blood Force, the stronger your vitality will become.”

“So it was like that.” Yang Kai nodded.

“Young Master, now that the insect king is dead, have you noticed if it left behind anything?” Old Demon suddenly asked an odd question to Yang Kai.

“Left something behind, like what?”

“Old Servant is not sure, but Young master should carefully check.”

Hearing how serious Old Demon was, Yang Kai also frowned, immediately examining his body again.

After a long time, he really found something unusual in his body, an unusual ray of energy gathered in his dantian, which was neither his own cultivated True Yang Yuan Qi, nor anything which had been absorbed by the Unyielding Golden Body. Hidden within his dantian like it was, if not for Old Demon’s reminder, Yang Kai would not have found it.

“What is this? The Insect King’s residual energy?” Yang Kai wondered.

Listen to his description, Old Demon could not help but breathe a sigh of relief, exclaiming, “Sure enough!”

“You know what this is? Quickly say.”

“Does Young master remember when Old Servant had said this thing was similar to an ancient insect I had heard of before?”

Yang Kai nodded.

“Before, Old Servant simply had some suspicion, but was not sure; after all, I have never personally encountered this kind of thing, just heard about it. Then when Old Servant fought with it, that suspicion was fifty or sixty percent confirmed, and now with young master’s description, Old Servant is now certain it really is that kind of ancient insect.”

“What kind of insect?”

“A Heaven Devouring Insect!” After Old Demon had spoken this name, he quickly offered congratulations, “Congratulations Young Master, receiving this exceptional treasure, young master’s good fortune is immense, Old Servant is deeply envious.”

“Get to the point.” Yang Kai sat up, ready to listen to Old Demon explain these unknown things.

“This kind of ancient insect can swallow anything, it especially likes to devour a variety of energy and flesh and blood, and contained within every Heaven Devouring Insect’s body there is some kind of opportunity, if someone can refine it, they can acquire great benefits. This opportunity can be many things, like a supreme secret art, a mighty martial skill, a powerful artifact, or even a chance to unlock some hidden strength in one’s own body! Thousands of possibilities, impossible to tell, it all depends on that person’s luck.”

“How can an insect’s body contain these things? Allowing a cultivators strength to rise to the heavens I can understand, but for it to hold a supreme secret art or a mighty martial skill is too bizarre, right?” Yang Kai asked suspiciously.

“What young master does not know is that this insect is not born like a regular insect, instead it is a rare object born from the heavens itself, a treasure so wondrous Old Servant cannot help but sigh that he did not receive it. Moreover, in this world there are many supreme secret arts and martial skills that were formed spontaneously by the heavens, were spied upon by mortals, and then spread throughout the world, so an insect having such a thing in its body is not that surprising, let alone, this famous Heaven Devouring Insect!” Old Demon’s voice was full of envy, and after finishing and seeing Yang Kai not respond for a long time, apparently stunned, he said, “Young Master does not believe?”

“I am not certain, but since it can be refined, after refining it I will know if it is truly so amazing or not.” Yang Kai did not commit or deny.

Hearing about it was one thing, but seeing was believing; not to mention everything about this Heaven Devouring Insect that Old Demon knew was hearsay, what the truth was could only be explored.

Once again closing his eyes, Yang Kai tried to form a link between himself and the strange energy trace in his dantian, running the True Yang Secret Art, using his hot True Yang Yuan Qi to refine it.

One day, two days, day after day constantly refining. Eventually that trace of energy slowly showed a change; in the beginning it conflicted with Yang Kai, after all, it was something that formerly belonged to the Insect King, not him.

But after continuously refining it, it gradually absorbed Yang Kai’s energy, and finally one day, it suddenly divided into two, and uncontrollably flooded into Yang Kai’s body. At the same time, Yang Kai felt a burst of searing pain on his back, coming from his shoulder blades, just like a hot iron had been pressed onto them.

The pain came quickly, and left just as fast, not giving Yang Kai any time to react.

After carefully checking his own strength, he discovered he was still Qi Transformation Stage – Fifth Stage!

[This damn Old Demon lied!] Yang Kai cursed.

Although he had not believed Old Demon’s words before, but he also couldn’t suppress the faint hope in his heart to enhance his strength.

But after refining this thing, his cultivation had not increased at all, much less acquiring some secret art, martial skill, or precious artifact.

After Yang Kai opened his eyes, Old Demon could not wait to ask, “What harvest has Young Master gained?”

“What shit harvest, I gained nothing.” Yang Kai snapped back angrily.

Old Demon was shocked, “Impossible, this was definitely the legendary Heaven Devouring Insects residual Heavenly Law Energy!”

“Pft, legends are there to deceive people!” Yang Kai snorted.

“No no no, Young Master does not understand, Old Servant, remembers that before he had an enemy who because he refined a Heaven Swallowing Insect, obtained a supreme secret art, and went on to achieve extraordinary heights. This is not just a legend, but something that really happened, Old servant swears on his life... on his soul, this is the truth.” Old Demon being ‘dead’ could only swear on his soul.