Opening his eyes, Ling Xu found himself in the middle of a forest.
Feeling the rays of light touching his skin, it seemed the right answer to sleep on Earth before coming here.
"Now that I have come here, where should I go?"
Being completely foreign to this new world, he didn't know which direction to follow. Ling Xu observed his surroundings and only found plants and trees, they looked a little different from the ones he knew from Earth.
"It would have been nice if the system gave me some kind of map or something, it's not like it had the need to throw me to the middle of nowhere."
As he was complaining, he heard a subtle sound coming from far away. He decided to follow it as it was his only clue.
Leaving the forest, Ling Xu saw himself standing on a path which lead to a city protected by a massive wall.
He walked on the path for an hour before arriving at the entrance where a row of people were lining up to enter the city. Lining up as well, he started hearing those in front trying to learn something.
"Man, I can't believe they are asking for a spiritual stone to enter the city. If it wasn't because the Formless Sword Sect is conducting their annual test to accept new disciples, I wouldn't pay even if they asked half of it."
"Yeah, saving for the entrance fee to the city has slowed down two months of training already. Just because Lesser Crimson City is a subsidiary city to the Formless Sword Sect doesn't mean that they should be allowed to extort this much from us."
The one who talked first was a fat man, he was conversing with the person in front who had quite the muscular body. Their complaints could be heard all the way to Ling Xu's place, they continued chatting as if no one could hear when a commotion caught their attention.
"What do you mean I can't enter if I don't pay a spiritual stone?"
"Those are the rules, if you aren't happy with giving the entrance fee you can turn back to where you came from."
"That's impossible, I have travelled an entire month just to get here and now you want me to return home just because I don't have it?"
The young man increased his tone even more, making the guard become impatient and angry. His hand moved showing no real effort but the next second everyone saw the energetic boy flying several meters back.
The rest of the line became silent, seeing the man not standing up for a long time even though the guard on the right barely made a move of his hand made them fall into complete shock. The fat man and the muscular one immediately stopped talking.
"Incredible! With just a flick of his hand he could send someone in the fifth stage of Blood Qi flying."
Even if he tried he wouldn't have the strength or control to send someone flying with just a move of the hand
Ling Xu looked at the guards realizing that they couldn't be messed with. It was even more shocking as he found out that they had no aura on themselves.
The other time he ever felt this way was when he confronted the mutant whirling ape on the mission. And now he was seeing two guards guarding the entrance have the same cultivation realm.
Ling Xu felt small all of a sudden, he didn't have any knowledge about the Qi Refining Realm but he had already encountered two cultivators with that level without having entered the city.
…
"One low grade spiritual stone to enter Lesser Crimson Town."
After waiting for a few minutes, the line advanced and it was finally Ling Xu's turn to pay the fee.
"What, you don't have one either? Didn't you learn from that guy earlier?"
"No, that's not it, it's just that…"
"What?!"
Becoming impatient, seeing Ling Xu not showing any sign of having the spiritual stone to pay, the guard was about to send him flying as well when he saw him move.
"I hope this works as well or else I won't be able to enter the city."
Ling Xu put a hand in his clothes and summoned a bottle he took out from his storage ring. The guard saw his hand take out a small bottle as he had a curious face.
"What is this?"
Taking the white bottle from Ling Xu's hands, he opened the lid and saw what was contained inside. Smelling the fragrance of blood qi he recognized its content very fast.
This is the reward he had gotten from the tutorial mission, after trying the effect of one himself the bottle had nine middle quality blood tempering pills remaining.
"These pills are middle grade blood tempering pills, one bottle containing ten pieces costs three low grade spiritual stones and there are nine in here."
The guard showed a special face, wanting to see Ling Xu's next answer.
"The rest are my form of showing appreciation for making the city secure, after all guarding the entrance isn't an easy job."
"Hehe little brother, you are quite the clever one, let me give you some advice free of charge."
"Many thanks, senior!"
"It's okay, you don't have to address me so that way. The thing is, I see you come from a small place, right?"
Ling Xu wasn't surprised that he thought that way as the guard noticed his strange clothes and concluded that it was from a small town far away from here.
Seeing those in the line and the guards, he had already noticed that people in this world wore traditional clothes.
Although the guard wasn't right he didn't deny it as it was the best explanation he could come up with. Seeing his nodding, the guard continued.
"When you enter the city you should head directly to the library, there you will find all the information you need to know about Lesser Crimson Town and the Formless Sword Sect."
"Why should I search for information of this Formless Sword Sect?"
Ling Xu asked without any prior knowledge about what a sect was or what this so called Formless Sword Sect was all about. All he knew was that there was going to be a selection of disciples, but he didn't know when.
"You don't know?"
The guard asked with an incredulous face which only worsened after seeing Ling Xu nod, confirming he had no clue.
"Arghh! I can't believe you came here without knowing, make sure to search it once you go to the library. It will become extremely important to you."
Ling Xu vowed and entered the city with a confused face after getting his first task. Now that he had successfully entered the city, he would do what the guard told him and directly head to the library.
"Information is power, if I don't know where I'm currently at it will be impossible for me to advance further in this world."
…
"This feels like a dream."
After having walked through the entrance path of Lesser Crymson Town for a while, Ling Xu entered the main street which was full of traditional style houses, restaurants and stores, like those in ancient times.
"Uh?"
Walking in the main street, Ling Xu was surprised by the people who were walking beside him. It wasn't because of their different attires as he had already assimilated it, but because every one of the people he observed was in the Blood Qi Realm.
He sensed their aura which showed that the majority of the adults were above the fifth stage and there was a high variety ranging all the way to the ninth stage. There were even a few who didn't have any aura.
"Although I don't sense any aura on them I feel the same way I felt when facing the mutant whirling ape and the guards at the entrance."
All of a sudden, Ling Xu felt small.
While he was probably the strongest person on Earth, his realm had now become the average on this town. Ling Xu had turned from being the predator to being the prey, if someone of these cultivators in the Qi Refining Realm had any ill intent towards him, he had no way to defend.
After all, although he had previously managed to kill the mutant whirling ape, Ling Xu had the help of several skills. But that beast had barely advanced and it couldn't compare to the cultivators in here who had probably surpassed its level and advanced even more.
Ling Xu felt that currently, if he had to face someone in here, the strongest he would be able to defeat would be in the ninth stage of Blood Qi. Even if he managed to find someone in the first stage of Qi Refining, he had lost all his skills so he felt like it was impossible and he would only die helplessly.
[Name]: Ling Xu
[Realm]: 7th stage of Blood Qi (23%)
[Cultivation]: Basic Blood Circulation (perfection), Existence Shadow Will (27,1%)
[Techniques]: Blood Thread Transformation (completed)
He saw his status panel as he realized that the skill category had completely disappeared.
…
After walking aimlessly for half an hour, Ling Xu had decided to ask people where he had to go as he had no clue. Fortunately, it only took him a dozen minutes to find it so he entered right away as the library had three floors and the first one was available for everyone to read.
Searching for the book that had the information he needed wasn't easy as the library had many books and Ling Xu had to pass through every title on several shelves which were divided into the same category.
But after a long time of searching he found the book containing the information he needed or was curious about.
The world Ling Xu is currently in is called Skyless Realm and it is divided into three races, which are humans, demons and beasts, where every race has its own territory.
The human race has the Four Seasons Continent, the demon race has the Demonic Paradise Continent, and the beast race has the Thousand Beasts Mountain Range dividing both humans and demons.
Ling Xu continued reading as he got more information about the human continent where he was currently at.
The Four Seasons Continent is divided into North, South, East and West. The small town Ling Xu is currently in is situated in a province called Qin Shi, in the periphery of Profound Roots Mountain Range.
It is one of the smallest towns and it is a subsidiary of Formless Sword Sect which rules one third of the mountain range, taking the leftmost side. The lord of Lesser Crimson Town was assigned by the sect to guard the town and he is currently the cultivator with the highest realm on it.
There are many cultivation realms but the ones currently known at Lesser Crimson Town are Blood Qi Realm, Qi Refining Realm and Foundation Building Realm. Anything higher than that isn't mentioned in the books.
The principal arts that help any cultivator increase their strength and progress further on their path of cultivation are Alchemy Refining, Weapon Refining and Array Refining.
Alchemy Refining is about the refinement of pills which can help one increase their cultivation and heal wounds between other things. Every pill has a realm and grade assigned to it.
Take the blood tempering pill for example, for a Blood Qi cultivator it has the wonderful effect of helping on tempering the body with pure blood qi energy. But for a Qi Refining cultivator the effect is minimum or non-existent.
Also, every pill can be assigned a grade based on their potency. These grades are low, middle and high. Ling Xu has already seen in the store a few pills sold at different grades, having each grade an increase in price as the higher the grade the higher the pill effect.
Then comes Weapon Refining, this art is about the refinement of weapons, armors and tools that can increase one's combat strength or help in other aspects. These items are named semi-treasure, treasure and spiritual treasure.
Each one of these belong to the Blood Qi Realm, Qi Refining Realm and Foundation Building Realm in order. They also have the same grades as the pills, low, middle and high.
And last but not least comes Array Refining, this art is about making formations that can act as protective barriers, create illusions and even support one's cultivation. They are also divided into the different cultivation realms and grades based on their performance.