Chapter 171: Cultivation of Qi Transformation, The Change of Ghost Severing

September 30th.

The end of the month had arrived again, and it was time for the Martial Arts Hall to hold its end-of-month assessment.

During the last monthly assessment, the Martial Arts Hall participated in a joint search by the three academies to capture the Green-Faced Ghost.

In the monthly assessment before that, the Martial Arts Hall, along with people from the Inspectorate and the Stop-Goe Academy, acted together to enter the mountains and wipe out the An-Shen Sect.

After every monthly assessment, the situation in Xingcheng had undergone some changes.

But this month's assessment finally became very calm; because neither the Inspectorate nor the Stop-Goe Academy took any action, the Martial Arts Hall's end-of-month assessment returned to its original format—a ring tournament.

Currently, the realm Li Fei revealed before Hao Yi was that he had just broken through to the mid-stage of Body Breaking, so he participated in this ring tournament with a mid-stage Body Breaking cultivation base.

After Yuan Dao and the others from the Tiger Blade Gang were all arrested, besides Li Fei, there were only two people among the Grade A students of the Martial Arts Hall who had mid-stage Body Breaking cultivation.

And the grade of the implants used by these two people was not as good as Li Fei's, their utilization of the implants was not as good as Li Fei's, and their martial arts were also not as good as Li Fei's; even if Li Fei did not rely on the Ten Thousand Blood Bead, he could defeat these two with the strength trained by Hao Yi.

Therefore, in the end, Li Fei took the top spot in the September monthly assessment without any suspense.

With this, Li Fei had taken the top spot in the monthly assessment for three consecutive months, and according to the current trend, his securing of a spot for the Stop-Goe Department at the university next year was almost a certainty.

On the other side, the infighting between the Chief's faction and the Tiger Blade Gang continued, but after their momentum plummeted, the morale of the Tiger Blade Gang's faction was in turmoil, and many officials who originally supported the Tiger Blade Gang began to waver, which gradually put the Tiger Blade Gang at a disadvantage in the struggle.

It seemed that this fierce tiger that had dominated Xingcheng, the Tiger Blade Gang, was already failing.

In the following month of October, the Chief's faction marched forward triumphantly, "capturing cities and seizing territories" in the officialdom, while Li Fei focused on his cultivation.

During the day, he continued to follow Hao Yi for sensory training; even though his true realm was already at the Qi Transformation stage, the sensory training Hao Yi designed for him was still very useful and could effectively improve his combat power.

At night, Li Fei used the pretext of going to the Qingyuan Boxing Stronghold to spar and hone his martial arts, and under the guidance of Shangguan Xiao, he conducted his Qi Transformation stage cultivation.

To avoid making outsiders feel strange, Li Fei would go to fight a boxing match every night under Shangguan Xiao's arrangement.

At the Qingyuan Boxing Stronghold, in Shangguan Xiao's residence.

Li Fei was holding the Ghost Severing blade and sparring with Shangguan Xiao; the Ghost Severing blade in his hand emitted a dark golden aura, looking at first glance as if it had been plated with a layer of gold.

This dark golden aura was Li Fei's Geng Metal True Qi.

Innate Qi is not force and is not condensed enough, so once it leaves the body, it dissipates rapidly; under normal circumstances, it cannot be attached to weapons.

And this is where the power of exotic weapons is manifested.

For martial artists below the Qi Transformation stage, Ghost Severing is just a sharp weapon that can cut through iron like mud, but for martial masters at the Qi Transformation stage, Ghost Severing is also a divine weapon that can have Innate Qi attached to it, or even strengthen Innate Qi!

The Ghost Severing blade in Li Fei's hand was mainly forged from the bones of the metal-attribute exotic beast, the Ghost-Swallowing Beast, and also incorporated the body tissues of several fire-attribute exotic beasts, so it was most suitable for the infusion of these two types of Innate Qi: metal and fire.

When Li Fei injected Geng Metal True Qi into Ghost Severing, the Geng Metal True Qi would become more condensed and sharper!

Inside the courtyard, only a golden blade light was seen flashing, and a semi-transparent air vortex was directly slashed open.

With the blessing of Geng Metal True Qi, Li Fei could use Ghost Severing to directly slash through Shangguan Xiao's Storm Qi!

This also allowed him to truly pose a threat to a Dao Foundation stage powerhouse like Shangguan Xiao; Shangguan Xiao could no longer deal with him as easily as before.

The two sparred for dozens of moves, and during this process, Li Fei maintained the "Tyrant Body" state throughout and did not "exchange Qi."

After stepping from the Body Breaking stage into the Qi Transformation stage, there was no longer a need for intervals when using the extraordinary abilities of the implants, and there was no so-called "weakness period"; as long as one's own physical strength was sufficient, one could continuously use the extraordinary abilities of the implants.

After the two sparred for a few minutes, Shangguan Xiao used a flick of her finger with Thunderous Force to shake away the blade edge of Ghost Severing, but her finger was also cut by the Geng Metal True Qi attached to the blade edge.

Seeing this, Li Fei immediately stopped and wanted to apologize, but Shangguan Xiao waved her hand with a smile:

"Just a superficial wound, it doesn't matter."

While speaking, she exerted force with her finger, using Flash Thunder Force to completely clear away the Geng Metal True Qi attached to the wound, which then stopped the bleeding.

"Not bad, your utilization of Geng Metal True Qi is already quite proficient."

Shangguan Xiao looked at Li Fei with appreciation.

In the ten-plus days after the September monthly assessment ended, Li Fei conducted his Qi Transformation stage cultivation under Shangguan Xiao's guidance.

First, he still took elixirs every day, but the elixirs required for the Qi Transformation stage were different; he mainly took two types. One was Origin Qi Powder, used to replenish energy for the implants, thereby quickly recovering the consumed Innate Qi.

This medicine was something Li Fei had taken when Hao Yi gave him Qi circulation training every day, but Li Fei still did not know that until now.

There was another medicine called Golden Armor Pill, which was specifically for metal-attribute implants at the Qi Transformation stage; it could accelerate the growth rate of the implants and increase the total amount of Innate Qi.

These two types of elixirs were cheaper if purchased within the Martial Arts Hall, but they had more premiums if purchased on the black market, and one had to have channels to buy them.

A dose of Origin Qi Powder was 67 yuan and could be used at most three times. A bottle of Golden Armor Pills was 128 yuan, with 20 pills per bottle.

Fortunately, the Qingyuan Boxing Stronghold had purchasing channels, and Li Fei was not short of money for the time being, having tens of thousands of yuan in savings, so he did not need to worry about cultivation resources.

After taking the elixirs, Li Fei would use Geng Metal True Qi to "flush" every part of his body over and over again.

This process was both to strengthen his own physique and to train his control over Innate Qi, because there were many fragile places in the body that could not withstand the overly violent "flushing" of Innate Qi, and one would hurt oneself if not careful, so this process required sufficient meticulousness.

After more than ten days of strengthening, Li Fei's blood souls increased by another 8, and now the total had become 141!

And besides taking elixirs and using Innate Qi to strengthen himself, another item in Li Fei's daily training was sparring with Shangguan Xiao; this process was to train his utilization of Geng Metal True Qi.

When a martial master spars with others, they can use Innate Qi to amplify their speed, strength, defense, and so on, but the amount of Innate Qi is limited, and after it is used up, one must wait for the implant to re-absorb enough energy to recover, so how to use the limited Innate Qi to amplify combat power as efficiently as possible is a matter that extremely requires experience and technique.

During this time sparring with Shangguan Xiao, Li Fei learned many useful little tricks; although he dared not say he was already an expert among martial masters, he was definitely no longer a novice.

He broke through to the Qi Transformation stage through the "Breaking the Heart Barrier" method, and his mental power far exceeded that of martial masters in the same realm, and strong mental power helped him better control Innate Qi, so whether it was using Innate Qi to temper his body or using Innate Qi to fight, his progress speed was very fast, which made Shangguan Xiao full of praise.

"With your current control over Geng Metal True Qi, you can try to develop the second function of Ghost Severing."

Shangguan Xiao suddenly said to Li Fei.

"The second function?"

Li Fei looked at the Ghost Severing blade in his hand, "What other function does it have?"

Shangguan Xiao smiled: "The main material of this blade is the bones of the Ghost-Swallowing Beast, and one of the extraordinary abilities of the Ghost-Swallowing Beast is transformation. Its bones can deform at will, thereby allowing its own form to change as well, and even its color can change. This blade uses the bones of the Ghost-Swallowing Beast and also retains this extraordinary ability. You can try to use Innate Qi to completely stimulate it, and then control this blade to deform through Innate Qi."

"It actually has such a wonderful function?"

Li Fei was very pleasantly surprised when he heard this.

This Ghost Severing blade was so easy to use that he needed to use it for both his own identity and the Green-Faced Ghost identity, but this made it easy to be exposed.

And with this transformation function, Li Fei would no longer need to worry about this problem.

He himself could use the original form of the Ghost Severing blade, and the Green-Faced Ghost could just change the form of the blade.

"You try to completely fill this blade with Geng Metal True Qi."

Shangguan Xiao said.

So Li Fei began to continuously pour Geng Metal True Qi into the Ghost Severing blade. After he had poured about 40% of the Geng Metal True Qi in his body into the blade body, he finally could not continue, and the Geng Metal True Qi began to overflow. Then, the Ghost Severing blade in his hand emitted a slight vibration, and the Geng Metal True Qi inside the blade body also vibrated along with it.

"Remember this vibration frequency. In the future, if you want to make the Ghost Severing blade deform, you don't need to inject so much Innate Qi every time; you just need to use Innate Qi to maintain this frequency of vibration inside the blade body for a while."

Shangguan Xiao said, "Now, while maintaining the vibration of the Innate Qi, control the Innate Qi to flow inside the blade body, flowing according to the shape you want; this feeling is like kneading a clay figure."

Li Fei followed the method Shangguan Xiao said, and the Ghost Severing blade in his hand really began to slowly deform; the blade edge gradually became wider, and the blade body was also slowly becoming longer.

Having to maintain the Innate Qi vibrating at a specific frequency while controlling the Innate Qi to flow inside the blade body according to his own ideas was indeed quite difficult; if it weren't for the training Li Fei had gone through during this period, he really wouldn't have been able to do it.

He spent more than half an hour mastering the method of blade deformation and could freely control the Ghost Severing blade to change its shape and color.

However, this blade was not entirely cast from the bones of the Ghost-Swallowing Beast and also fused many other materials, so the general framework was already set; even if it could deform, it wouldn't be too outrageous, such as turning into a long spear, an axe, etc.

Li Fei could make certain adjustments to the width, length, and the streamlined shape and color of the blade edge.

Finally, what could be changed was the part where the handle and the blade body connected, which was the ghost-faced, fanged blade guard.

With a click, Li Fei actually took the entire blade guard off the Ghost Severing blade.

"This blade guard is cast from a complete piece of Ghost-Swallowing Beast bone and is embedded in the blade body, so it can be taken off."

Shangguan Xiao explained to Li Fei:

"I guess the person who cast the blade back then felt that the main framework of the blade body was already set, so in order to add more changes and fully utilize the characteristics of the Ghost-Swallowing Beast, they specially embedded such a blade guard. You can deform this blade guard into a handguard, into an iron chain tied to the blade, or something else; in short, it depends on your own imagination and actual needs."

Li Fei weighed the blade guard in his hand, looked at the ghost-faced, fanged form, and smiled:

"There really is something I can use it to change into."

As he spoke, he injected Geng Metal True Qi into the blade guard in his hand and then began to control the blade guard to deform.

The fist-sized blade guard was constantly flattened and elongated like a piece of dough.

Shangguan Xiao looked curiously at the blade guard in Li Fei's hand, wanting to know what he intended to turn this blade guard into.

A few minutes later, there was a cyan evil ghost mask in Li Fei's hand.

Shangguan Xiao was startled, then smiled:

"This idea is good; this thing is really perfect for a mask."

The mask the Green-Faced Ghost wore before was just an ordinary mask, which was easily knocked off or broken.

Even if Li Fei added a hood under the mask, it was still not safe enough.

Now that he used the bones of the Ghost-Swallowing Beast to make a mask, it was extremely hard, so he didn't have to worry about the mask being broken, and he could also treat this mask as a piece of protective gear for his head.

Li Fei also added a ring behind the mask for fixation. He put the cyan evil ghost mask in his hand on his face, and the ring passed just above his ears, looping around his head.

As he controlled the Geng Metal True Qi inside to change, the ring began to tighten, finally fixing the mask firmly on his face.

In this way, there was no need to worry about the mask being knocked off.

"Not bad, the Green-Faced Ghost's equipment is considered upgraded now."

Li Fei said with satisfaction, wearing the brand-new mask and holding the deformed Ghost Severing blade.

When Li Fei was upgrading the Green-Faced Ghost's equipment, Yu Hu was receiving a person in his study.

This person had a large frame, strong muscles, and somewhat dark skin; he was wearing coarse linen clothes and looked like a man doing hard labor.

"Is everything ready?"

Yu Hu asked.

The man in front of him nodded and said with a somewhat strange accent:

"Ready."

"Then let's begin."

Yu Hu looked out the window, his eyes as fierce as a tiger:

"It's time to let this Xingcheng change its sky!"

Under the cover of night, the ten thousand lights of Xingcheng flickered, a scene of peace and tranquility.

(End of chapter)