Path of the Ascendant

She performed a few basic exercises to adjust herself to the changes she had made and then dressed herself in the Crimson Robes of the Third Arrival, making sure to examine herself closely before doing so.

Her point of view had gone up yet again thanks to the height she had added to her body, but the overall size of her body had gone down thanks to the compression of her muscle. Before, it was incredibly easy to presume her to be a man or someone who had put an immense amount of work and effort into ensuring that her muscles were as prominent as possible, but now, her appearance almost seemed to regain an immense quantity of yin. Although every muscle was still pronounced, they were now contained almost fully within her lithe frame.

Although such a change would typically reduce the potential that she had for intimidation and coercion due to the seeming reduction in physical threat, she found that her natural dominating air had somehow only increased, quickly concluding that it must be due to the improvements in her twin mental energies impacting her very presence.

In the end, she decided not to attempt to change her hairline, instead altering the basic structure of the strands of hair to make them even more resilient and durable.

‘Perhaps, one day, after an intense battle in which I perish completely, only a bunch of red hair will remain on the scene of battle, confusing any travellers that pass it without any context about the situation,’ she joked to herself, brushing her fingers through the silky red length of her hair.

At some point during the process, her skin had once again turned a shade darker, likely responding to the immense quantity of yang True Ascendant energy that had gone into reshaping it. It still looked more like an intense tan than an outright transformation of her body, but if this was to occur with every breakthrough, she would end looking a lot like Fen Zhi by the end of the process.

‘That could be useful if I could change my appearance at will, as I could then blend in with anyone from any environment without needing to cover up my face or apply some kind of makeup or illusion to deceive them,’ she considered, theorising that the third and fourth realms of physique cultivation might permit for some further alteration of her form, though the fact that this form of cultivation seemed to be searching for stability and perfection rather than fluidity meant that she might need to settle down on a single skin tone and general build by the time she reaches the peak, ‘Perhaps this will be something that I can control more if I am able to improve my physique itself onto the next stage.’

Other than these changes, most of them weren’t immediately obvious to the casual observer, with the vast majority of her physical alterations having occurred beneath her skin. Still, they were bound to create difficulties for anyone who intended to use their knowledge of typical human physiology in order to attack her, as the subtle changes to most of her major organs and the complete modification of the circulatory system meant that this knowledge was entirely useless against her.

The bigger changes would have been to her twin mental energies, with spiritual will changing the most out of the two.

Her killing intent had remained within the same realm, and thus it had only grown stronger without any particular modifications to the base structure of the energy itself. It was brighter and stronger, with the illusory battlefield that it could impose upon the world becoming clearer and more detailed once again.

On the other hand, her spiritual will was entirely indistinguishable from what it had previously been.

Whereas the energy was previously pale and white, almost seeming to be significantly weaker than all three other forms of energy within her meridian networks, it was now focused around an enormous array within her mental domain, with every parts of the fantastic structure significantly enhancing the power of her spiritual will. It now resembled the ichor of the ancient gods, forming smooth silver strands of pure power that she could unleash whenever she wants.

With this improvement, the range of her spiritual will also grew by half a metre since the beginning of this session of her cultivation. If she was to use her spiritual will energy rather than the sensory method, her range appeared to be doubled.

As she had to gather further data, she took one of the silver strands and launched it into the stone walls of the former blood pool. The strand cut straight through the crimson fog that was innately produced by the Beast, surpassing it easily thanks to her cultivation and general mental ability, and when her spiritual will energy struck the wall, it went straight through without any issue whatsoever, being stopped only when it got to her usual range of spiritual will. If not for the obstruction of the killing intent within the walls, she knew that it could have travelled twice as far.

‘Although it behaves differently to killing intent, I can see that it is inferior to it. Even without the congealment of my killing intent into a single strand of energy, it is already able to tear through the physical world merely by coming into contact with it. If I was to release my spiritual will energy in a large area around myself, it would not have as powerful an effect,’ she observed to her disappointment.

Nevertheless, an additional form of energy to use in combat was an improvement, no matter how weak or strong it was.

With the growth of her mental energy came the increase in her ability when it came to any of the great arts, with the most significant effect being to her ability to create arrays and inscriptions, as those are heavily reliant on her spiritual will for the activation and usage of the arrays themselves. Even if she was to work with an array of killing intent, she would be able to create each line and connection within the array more carefully and get more out of it during the eventual activation.

‘Perhaps it could also assist my blacksmithing by allowing me to judge the metal I’m working on more carefully, potentially exposing the main issue that is leading to my constant failure to produce any form of equipment that matches my theoretical understanding of the art.’

She could only confirm this via experimentation, so, for now, she tied up her hair and left the room that she had reserved for herself, coming across the scene of Dugu Wei and Qiu Sheng trembling in opposite corners to one another. The second that they heard her approach – but failed to observe her spiritual will that she instinctively sent forward to avoid any ambushes or unpleasant surprises that tended to occur when being in proximity with too many people – they looked even further away from one another.

“Are you two alright? Did my killing intent overwhelm you?” Wei Yi inquired, not being surprised in the slightest that Qiu Sheng had made her way down to this place.

“I’m sorry, Mas-” Dugu Wei recovered first, though she froze mid-sentence when she stood up and tried to look in Wei Yi’s direction as if nothing had happened. Her eyes were clearly drawn to a variety of places of her body, with the natural focus being on the parts that had been affected the most by the recent physical reconstruction, “Master, are those the effects of soaking in the blood pools?”

“That depends on what you mean, really.”

“For instance, the change in your skin colour…?”

“That’s my physique, not the blood of the Beast. Normally, your flesh would just be corroded away.”

“And the muscle?”

“I’ve compressed it to have more room for improvement. In the future, if I continue to work out, I will look exactly as I did before, then I would be able to repeat the process over and over again to – theoretically – attain an almost infinite level of strength through the physical form alone.”

“Uh-huh…” she nodded before muttering under her breath, “You look hotter now…”

Wei Yi was physically incapable of not overhearing this, but she chose to ignore it, “Did you want to tell me something, or were you intending to just stand there?”

“N-No, I will return to my other duties…”

As she left, Qiu Sheng turned around and approached her.

“Master, I’m sorry for trying to waste time and going against your instructions-”

“Then you may return to doing what you’re meant to be doing, especially since you seem to have been continuing to waste our time for roughly twenty four hours after you could have left,” Wei Yi interrupted her mid-sentence while she thought, ‘They were trying to shirk their duties in the bedroom – or Meng Chu’s office – again, then. Perhaps the many weeks of simple relief that I had provided them weren’t enough to teach them, so I might need to get a little harsher…’

Just like her blacksmithing ability, she would need to consider this further before acting upon it, so for now, she allowed the two of them to leave and, to ensure that the room remained somewhat hygienic in the future, cleansed the room with her strengthened physique energy.

The shape and function of the True Ascendant energy did not significantly change thanks to her breakthrough, but the power did. Whereas she previously needed a sensible quantity of energy to outright melt the stone, she could now touch the ground with the physique energy for a brief second to achieve the same result.

As she was still incapable of forcing the ground to freeze, she leapt out of the chamber and headed upwards throughout the underground passages, seeking Meng Chu’s office.

On her route, she encountered several soldiers who considered stopping her before they finally recognised her, making the issue of her rapid physical changes be even more obvious in her eyes. In the future, she would need to either cut down on how much she changes her physique with every single breakthrough, or create some kind of illusory or mental technique to prevent her appearance from changing in the eyes of others, or to automatically make them connect her previous vision with her new one.

Both of those ideas could be implemented via the enormous spiritual will array through the integration of an existing illusory array, but that could not be accomplished until the next realm, so long as her understanding of the spiritual will realms was accurate and not deceptive, whether Bai Hao had lied to her intentionally or was simply missing some information of his own.

Thus, when she barged into Meng Chu’s room without any warning, as per tradition, she began with an explanation of her present features, “Listen, everything about me that’s different is due to a progression in my cultivation of physique and killing intent, as well as my personal adjustment of the self. If you have any inquiries about this, I could consider providing you with an explanation later, but for now, I need you to mobilise the troops and workers. Beast’s Rest is going to expand today.”

“That was a very… succinct explanation,” he responded, “What do you mean?”

“About Beast’s Rest’s expansion? As you know, the city right now isn’t small, but if we were to have an influx in the population, there would not be enough space to accommodate them. We require more housing and commercial buildings, including a few more brothels to pull in those currently living on the outskirts of the city. Since you’ve done this stuff before, I can safely leave it to you, but I require it done.”

“I see. Are you attempting to create a miniature version of Yi City within the prison realm? Do you think it will work in this environment?”

“It will. I was able to defeat some of the strongest forces in this town while I was significantly weaker, and the physique cultivators at the third realm were no match to me while I was in the first, meaning that now that I have progressed, I ought to be able to contend with those in the fourth. Thus, in terms of strength, I shouldn’t have any difficulties with establishing my authority over those that enter Beast’s Rest. When it comes to maintaining my control and preventing irritating factions forming within the walls, my expanding mental energies and the underground passages should be able to solve most of our problems – oh, and you will need to build out the underground passages and link various buildings to it so that it can be used throughout the entirety of the future area of Beast’s Rest.”

“Then, will we have a set of blueprints to work from, or should I work on that myself as well?”

“Begin by simply expanding the walls, and I will provide you with a vague outline later on. While I would like to do everything myself, I have to acknowledge that I have no experience whatsoever in construction, architecture and general city design, so you or one of your subordinates can handle it.”

“Understood. I will get it done immediately,” Meng Chu said, standing up and leaving the room, with Wei Yi following him. He came across Dugu Wei quickly, ordering her to bring Lei Fu, Wang Shi and Hua Ju, alongside with some master craftsmen and builders, for a briefing on their current plans, choosing to ignore her fearful behaviour around Wei Yi.

While they were being gathered, Wei Yi departed and sought out the blacksmith that she had recruited some time ago, finding him in the middle of working on a simple hatred blade.

“Do you mind if I step in for a moment? I would like to try something,” she said, waiting for a silent nod from him before taking up her hammer, some unused metal from the side of the smithy and approaching an anvil.

 

Some time later, she returned the hammer to the back of her head and looked upon the finished product. It was not entirely horrible, but it also lacked the same quality that one would expect from a four-star blacksmith. As this happened despite her full efforts to take in every single detail of the process and work with it, the result proved that she still needed to put in more effort.

‘If only I understood what the issue here was. I am sure that I am doing everything correctly, and yet the process is still failing to achieve the results that I need… Perhaps this is the balance of the heavens in action, limiting me in this particular respect.’

Still, there was some improvement in her craft, so she sighed and put the sword she had made aside for someone else to take, if it grabbed their interest. She hadn’t invested any significant effort nor any unusual materials into the weapon, so even if someone hostile to her was to take hold of it, the most they would get out of it would be the knowledge that she still has more to learn about the art of blacksmithing.

For now, she departed to the meeting room, finding it to be filled with everyone that Meng Chu had called for earlier. She was very familiar with the three squad leaders that served under Dugu Wei, but she found that she recognised some of the builders and architects as well. They were still wearing the standard uniforms of soldiers and guards, with a few basic tools around their belts or in their pockets being the only significant indicator that they were anything more than bodyguards for the squad leaders that had been brought in.

“Boss Wei, did you need us for something?” Lei Fu asked, bowing upon her entry.

“Naturally, I did. Tell me, you and your fellow squad leaders, what is your opinion on the current Beast’s Rest? Feel free to provide your honest opinions.”

“Beast’s Rest? Eh…”

“I think it’s pretty good, really,” said Wang Shi, interrupting her peer when she saw that he was unable to come up with an answer immediately, “Though it could always be bigger! Heh… Imagine joining all of the pieces of the Beast together and having an enormous city that spans the entirety of the prison realm!”

“Master Wei Yi, though I think that her expression was a little crass, I do agree that there is room for improvement. We could use more land, more people and more of the expanse of the prison realm.”

“Lei Fu, do you share this opinion?”

“I… I do, Boss. With the recent additions to our forces, we could handle a far larger settlement.”

“In that case, I have some excellent news for all of you. We are going to expand the town of Beast’s Rest and double its size, so that our domain may be more fitting for the future, when we control this side of the prison realm. Perhaps, when we escape, this may even become our base of operations, from which we besiege the Great Families until we can reclaim Yi City from them, and return it to its former glory. You three shall be responsible for clearing out any bandits that may have settled down around our jewel in the wastes, and also for protecting the workers who shall construct the new walls and residences in the area that we will claim. Speaking of which, do you also serve as builders?”

As she turned to look at warriors that had been brought in alongside the squad leaders, one of them chose to step forward to respond, “That is correct, boss. Strength is important in construction work, so most of us end up being warriors as well.”

“Makes sense. Do all of you also have an interest in returning to your other occupation?”

“Of course! Some of us had personally worked on the underground passages and commercial buildings in the town, and I don’t think I’ll be speaking for only myself when I say that I want to get back to work!”

“Excellent. In that case, why don’t we begin as soon as possible? Get your men and gather the supplies you require for the construction of a new wall. Since I am uncertain of the best conditions and locations to construct these walls and some towers to oversee any potential intruders in, I will rely on your expertise to decide on such things. Do you have a map you’ve worked with before, or would you like to examine areas in person in order to conclude this sort of thing?”

“Checking things in person would be best for the fine adjustments to your designs, but the rough outline can be completed with a map. I always carry one around with me,” replied that same person, removing a dried leather scroll from his clothes and unfurling it on a nearby desk, “Show me the rough outline that you intend for Beast’s Rest, if you would.”

Wei Yi took a look at the map, compared it with her mental image of the outskirts of Beast’s Rest, then pointed to one of the mountains to the west, saying, “I would like Beast’s Rest to extend to that point, someday. I trust I do not need to tell you why?”

“Naturally not. Any miracle fluid spring is incredibly valuable, and securing it within our walls would make it far easier to protect.”

“I’m glad you understand. Since I suspect that extending the city straight to this point would be impractical, to say the least, I propose that it is brought to these areas first due to their defensive potential,” she moved her finger to a point north of the town, roughly half as far away as the miracle fluid spring, “The land there is incredibly suitable for defensive walls, in my opinion, and the wall can be continued through these points, extending slightly further here and here to gain a further defensive advantage.”

“Hm. These positions are excellent, but this and this area do not appear to allow for a stable foundation for the wall. I would suggest adjusting their locations to here and here…”