Chapter 109 - 80 : Undercurrents (2)

Chapter 109: Chapter 80 : Undercurrents (2)

He folded the map along its existing creases and returned it to his storage pouch.

Then he drew his short dao.

Daylight slid across the blade, catching along its edge as Ethan turned it slightly in his hand. He had used the weapon through every fight since leaving the city, and the wear was beginning to show. A few small chips marked the edge, and there were faint scratches along the blade where it had met reinforced weapons far better suited for cultivators. This dao had been made by a mortal blacksmith from ordinary steel. It had never been meant to withstand the force of clashes between cultivators, and Ethan knew that if he had not learned to reinforce it with Qi, the blade would probably have broken already.

He would need to replace it eventually, or at least have it improved. Once he was settled somewhere and had enough resources to spare, finding a weapon refiner would be one of the things on his list. He could not afford anything extravagant, but even having the blade reforged with better material or strengthened with something more suitable for cultivation would be an improvement. For now, though, this was still the weapon he knew best.

Ethan ran his thumb lightly along the flat of the blade before gathering Qi.

Over the past few weeks, he had learned far more about reinforcing it than he could have through practice alone. Every fight had given him another chance to test the limits of the technique under real pressure, how much Qi the blade could carry, how long he could maintain it, and how quickly the reinforcement began to break apart when his movements became too forceful. He had made plenty of mistakes along the way, but he had also gradually learned where to adjust.

A thin current of Qi flowed down his arm and into the dao.

He guided it toward the edge, keeping the flow controlled. The Qi gathered unevenly at first, thickening along one section before thinning out along another. Ethan adjusted the amount almost instinctively, drawing some of it back and redistributing the rest until the layer settled into a more even coating.

He moved the blade.

The Qi trembled.

Ethan slowed his wrist, changed the angle, and tried again. The reinforcement held for a few breaths before flickering along the edge.

His eyes narrowed.

That was one of the things the fights had taught him. Keeping the Qi stable while standing still was easy enough. The real difficulty came when the weapon was moving with his body, especially when he put force behind the strike. Too much Qi made the flow unstable. Too little and the reinforcement could not withstand the impact.

He adjusted the flow and tried again.

Slowly, he moved the dao through the air, watching the thin layer of Qi along its edge. It held. He increased the speed.

The reinforcement flickered and broke apart.

Ethan stopped, then tried again.

Slower.

Then faster.

Each attempt was another adjustment, another small correction based on what the previous fights had already taught him. He was no longer trying to understand the technique itself. He was learning how to make it work with the way he actually fought.

On the sixth attempt, the reinforcement remained intact as he brought the dao down against a dead branch.

The blade cut cleanly through the branch, sending it tumbling to the ground. Ethan lowered the dao and studied the cut. It was not perfect, but it showed that the reinforcement was holding together better than it had before.

His gaze returned to the short dao. The blade had held, and his Qi had remained stable through the movement. There was still plenty he could improve, but he had reached another small step beyond where he had been before.

He sheathed the dao and let his attention settle back into cultivation. Closing his eyes, Ethan began to cultivate.

Spiritual energy gathered around Ethan as he settled into cultivation. With his mind free from the distractions of the road, he could focus more deeply, refining the energy within him and steadily converting it into Living Blood. The process continued quietly beneath the trees, his cultivation advancing as the hours passed.

He remained there until the sun had moved farther west. When Ethan finally opened his eyes, the world around him seemed sharper than before. The sounds of the hillside reached him with greater clarity, from insects stirring among the grass to a bird settling on a distant branch. Farther away, beyond the trees, something moved through a patch of thorny bushes. Ethan’s gaze shifted toward it, and through Blood Perception, he caught the faint vitality of a small creature moving between the branches.

He let the sensation fade and rose to his feet.

The road was waiting.

By late afternoon, Ethan had reached the smaller route he had chosen from the map. It was barely a road, just a pair of old wagon tracks running through the grass before fading into stretches of dirt and stone. The hills gradually opened as he followed it, revealing a river winding between the slopes below.

A wooden bridge crossed it farther ahead. It was old and narrow, its boards darkened by years of weather, but it still looked sturdy enough to carry a person. Ethan slowed as he approached, his gaze moving over the bridge and the surrounding slopes. Nothing appeared out of place. No travelers, no carts, nothing moving among the trees.

He crossed without incident.

It was only after reaching the other side that something caught his attention through Blood Perception.

Several traces of vitality had appeared farther back along the road.

Ethan kept walking.

The group was not moving toward him.

They had stopped.

He continued for another hundred steps before glancing back. The road behind him remained empty, the bridge standing alone between the hills. Yet the traces were still there, gathered near the far end.

Then one of them moved.

Not toward him.

Away.

Another followed, and soon the rest were moving in the same direction, taking a different path through the hills.

Ethan slowed slightly.

He watched the empty road for a moment before turning away again.

That was unusual.

They had clearly noticed him. They had even stopped after reaching the bridge, as though deciding whether to continue.

But they had chosen not to.

Ethan continued down the road, his expression thoughtful. He had no idea what they had heard, or what had made them change their minds, but it was another sign that the situation around him was no longer the same as it had been several days ago.

The bounty was still there. The people interested in it would not simply disappear.

But perhaps they were beginning to understand that rushing toward it was not the same as claiming it.

Ethan walked on, leaving the bridge and the group behind as the road carried him deeper into the hills.

Near sunset, Ethan passed several groups of travelers along the road. Most paid little attention to him, but now and then a glance lingered a little too long, followed by a lowered voice or a whispered mention of the name Blood Demon. The reactions were subtle, but they were enough to tell him that the name had begun traveling beyond the people who had directly encountered him. Later that night, after leaving the road and making camp among the rocks, he sensed three cultivators nearby. They observed him from a distance before eventually withdrawing without approaching. Ethan gave it little thought beyond recognizing that people were no longer acting as blindly as they had before. He had expected the information to spread, and there was nothing more he needed to do about it.

The following day brought more travel through increasingly broken terrain, with Ethan occasionally checking his map as the road became difficult to follow. Around midday, he noticed a larger group moving through the forest some distance away. They kept roughly parallel to him for a while before eventually turning back, never making a move. Ethan simply continued east. That evening, he spent some time practicing with his dao, refining the Qi reinforcement through repeated movements until he was satisfied with the improvement, then settled down with his map and checked the route ahead. Lunar Echo territory was still ahead, and every mile he put between himself and the growing attention behind him mattered.

The following day passed without an attack. Ethan still noticed cultivators from time to time, but none made any attempt to approach him, and after a while he stopped treating every distant figure as a potential fight. Whatever they had heard about Blood Demon, it was clearly enough to make them reconsider rushing in blindly.

Ethan did not mistake that for safety. He was still being hunted, and the bounty was still waiting for anyone willing to claim it. But the change was noticeable. People were no longer acting on the reward alone; they were taking the danger surrounding it into account. Ethan could only wonder how much the story had already spread and what kind of preparations might be taking place elsewhere. For now, he continued east, knowing that the next person who came after him might be very different from those he had already faced.