Chapter 63: The Stone Monkey Killed by Dao

His eyes had recovered, lifting Ding Huan's spirits; he roasted a fish simply, ate it, and returned to seclusion to cultivate the Luo Shi Jing.

As Ding Huan had anticipated, after only two days of cultivation, he felt his meridians cracking as if about to split open—the same searing pain of internal fire surged once more.

Ding Huan recognized this sensation; it was the same agony he endured when he first entered the Second-Level Gene Cultivator realm.

It seemed he was about to ascend to the Third-Level Gene Cultivator realm—this Luo Shi Jing cultivation was bearable, but the breakthrough was terrifying.

Fine bloodlines appeared on Ding Huan's skin; only he knew the kind of horrific torment he was enduring.

Each Zhou Tian of the Luo Shi Jing summoned waves of flame that burned his five viscera and six bowels, then spread relentlessly through every part of his body.

But Ding Huan knew he absolutely could not stop—if he halted now, his chance to break through to the Third-Level Gene Cultivator realm would be lost.

Qi surged wildly within Ding Huan, each surge nearly bursting his body apart—only at the last moment did the Zhou Tian circulation of the Luo Shi Jing barely carry away the terrifying Qi.

Even though the carried Qi continued to burn and torment his body, to Ding Huan it was far better than being exploded.

This torment lasted until the third day; even his eyes began oozing blood when he felt a brand-new channel opening within him.

The violent Qi finally found an outlet, instantly spreading through his entire body—a sense of rebirth filled every part of him.

Ding Huan exhaled slowly—he had entered the Third-Level Gene Cultivator realm.

He continued circulating the Luo Shi Jing to stabilize his cultivation while pondering how to modify this technique.

Two more days passed, and Ding Huan's cultivation stabilized at the Third-Level Gene Cultivator level.

He ceased pondering how to modify the technique; though his mind held many theories on cultivation methods, his cultivation level was too low to comprehend them.

At his current level, attempting to modify a technique as advanced as the Luo Shi Jing was nearly tantamount to suicide.

The techniques he could currently modify were too low-tier—this one would be useless to him.

Stepping out of the tent, Ding Huan began practicing the Wind-riding Technique.

Since acquiring the Wind-riding Technique, Ding Huan had wanted to perfect it, but he never had time to hone it.

Now that he had reached the Third-Level Gene Cultivator realm and had no immediate prospect of further progress, he decided to focus entirely on refining the Wind-riding Technique deep within this cave.

The Wind-riding Technique was not complex—it required only internal Qi and a Qi-circulation incantation.

To perfect the Wind-riding Technique, one needed only relentless practice until mastery was achieved.

Ding Huan was a man who could endure solitude; two hundred years of cosmic wandering had tempered his spirit.

Another half-month passed; Ding Huan trained the Wind-riding Technique by day and continued cultivating the Luo Shi Jing by night.

After entering the Third-Level Gene Cultivator realm, Ding Huan felt his progress had slowed noticeably—but even so, it was still faster than cultivating outside.

That day, Ding Huan activated the Wind-riding Technique and effortlessly ascended thirty meters into the air, then drifted down slowly like a falling leaf.

Ding Huan was pleased with his progress; if he exerted full power, he could even cross a hundred meters through empty air using the Wind-riding Technique.

With his current aerial range, shouldn't he be on par with those so-called Primordial cultivators?

Now, facing Antongao, Ding Huan believed he could escape easily.

Pfft! Escape? What nonsense—he was a Third-Level Gene Cultivator now, with Wind-Blade Technique and Wind-riding Technique; why should he fear Antongao?

He looked up at the monkey's position on the sixty-meter-high cliff, his body flickered, and he launched straight upward, used the cliff face for a brief push, and landed effortlessly beside the monkey.

Ding Huan was now a Third-Level Gene Cultivator, his vision extremely sharp.

Before approaching, he had seen clearly—he believed this was a stone shaped like a monkey.

But this stone resembled a monkey too perfectly—it might as well have been carved to mimic one.

That was the key to his suspicion.

Generally, a stone-carver's monkey statue would never be placed inside a cave, let alone wedged in a crevice sixty meters up a cliff.

"It really does look like…" Ding Huan stood on a protruding rock, staring at the stone monkey, murmuring to himself.

It wasn't just similar—it was identical.

Nature's artistry was unimaginable.

Ding Huan reached out and touched the stone monkey; since it was naturally formed, he had no intention of moving it.

But as soon as his hand touched the stone monkey, he sensed something was wrong.

Without hesitation, he slashed several wind blades around the stone monkey, then pulled it free with a flick of his hand and landed easily on the ground.

Ding Huan closed his eyes and placed his hand on the stone monkey's head, feeling intently.

Only a few breaths passed before he confirmed—it was neither naturally formed nor artificially carved.

This was a living, flesh-and-blood monkey, forcibly petrified.

Why say "petrified" rather than "dead"? Ding Huan had his own theory.

After years of wandering, his sixth sense remained sharp.

The monkey had been dead for an unknown time, yet Ding Huan felt its life force had been extraordinarily vigorous at the moment of death.

It was killed at the peak of its vitality—not merely slain, but seemingly frozen in place.

Studying the monkey again, Ding Huan felt it resembled a human with a monkey's face.

Its hind limbs were longer, its forelimbs shorter—just like a human's.

True monkeys have limbs of nearly equal length.

Ding Huan's gaze settled on the monkey's head—there was a mark of impact there.

He examined the mark closely, traced it with his fingertip, then stared in disbelief.

There was a cultivation technique imprint within it—meaning this monkey had been killed by Daoist magic.

His ability to detect this Daoist trace must stem from the knowledge imparted by the parchment.

The indentation bore intricate, interwoven reverse patterns—not chaotic, but deliberate; only Daoist attacks left such marks.

Otherwise, at his current level, he could never have perceived such traces.

Had his power been greater, he might even have deduced the exact Daoist technique used.

Ding Huan was thrilled—killed by Daoist magic proved his theory: ancient immortals had existed, but vanished—or retreated—after Earth's cataclysm.

This monkey had been beaten to death for countless years, yet it could still turn into withered stone, and he could even sense that this monkey was formed from flesh and blood.

What does this indicate? It indicates that this monkey had a chance to be saved.

Of course, the kind of "saving" he meant might differ from true salvation. But that didn't matter—as long as it was useful to him.

With his understanding of genetic theory and his application of genetic knowledge, as long as this monkey's genes still existed, he had a chance to locate them and fuse them with the genes of another monkey.

Ding Huan only wanted to learn the monkey's true origins and some details about the era it lived in.

So he didn't need to fully restore the monkey's life—he only needed to extract the monkey's memory genes.

Extracting a monkey's memory genes required searching through a vast gene library. For others, one person could hardly accomplish this.

Ding Huan had his own method: the Gene Dissolution and Elimination Technique.

When he extracted the anti-toxin genes from the Golden-Faced Thick-Tailed Ape, he had used the Gene Dissolution and Elimination Technique, and completed it in just two days.

To obtain this monkey's memory genes through the Gene Dissolution and Elimination Technique, it should take no more than one or two days.

The only difference from before was that Ding Huan did not intend to fuse these memory genes himself.

This was different from fusing ability genes—it was purely about learning what had happened back then.

So Ding Huan planned to find a carrier for the gene fusion of this monkey.

In other words, if he truly succeeded in transplanting this monkey's memory genes intact into a new carrier, it wouldn't be wrong to say the monkey had been reborn.

Rebirth, in simple and crude terms, was memory restoration. In complex terms, it was troublesome—it involved the soul.

Ding Huan placed the monkey aside, deciding that when he left this Shi Dong, he would take the monkey to the Yujiang University laboratory.

With his current strength, there was no need to hide. He could return openly to the Yujiang University laboratory—who could stop him?

He wasn't leaving now because Ding Huan felt the heavenly qi within the depths of this cave was far superior to that outside.

Thinking of heavenly qi, Ding Huan suddenly remembered what Steve had said when he was in the Gene Alliance's old stronghold.

The Gene Alliance had been wiped out completely because its powerful ones were all away.

These powerful ones had gone to Kunlun Mountain, claiming that an ancient Daoist cultivation relic had been discovered there…

Previously, his strength was too weak to do anything; now he was a Level Three Gene Cultivator.

Ding Huan's mind grew restless. The ancient Daoist cultivation relic certainly existed—he had long inferred the existence of immortals and gods from many details.

He had also heard that the Blue Star's Ten Great Academies had long ago found heavenly qi stones in the Kunlun Mountain Range—these were precious items imbued with heavenly qi, and cultivating with them accelerated progress.

He didn't know whether the Gene Alliance's people had found the Daoist relic; if they had, he'd simply go and seize it from them.

If the Gene Alliance hadn't found it, he'd find it himself.

He had always planned to uproot the Gene Alliance entirely; since he intended to raid their treasures anyway, his current cultivation level wasn't enough—he needed to reach at least Level Four Gene Cultivator before leaving.

He still had to continue his seclusion here.

(That's all for today's update, friends—goodnight, keep asking for monthly votes. Comments aren't showing up right now—you can't see each other's—but they'll be restored in a couple of days.)