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Chapter 87 - Progress
🕑 Added 2025-02-11 01:40:34 +0000 UTCLife and Laptop Update:
I got a new laptop. The old one's motherboard was shorted at 2 places. Luckily, the SSD was unharmed and I got back all the data. I didn't have to rewrite the three latest chapters I had written in my backlog. For some reason though, dropbox did not automatically sync what I wrote on Feb 1st :\
Thank heavens that I had the scrivener backup in my SSD.
I will be posting again regularly. I really am sorry for the inconvenience. This was totally unexpected. One day I was reading some papers for my thesis, the next day the laptop refused to boot. I couldn't post since I couldn't access to scrivener sync from android, it only has an iOS app.
The laptop died while I was visiting my native village deeeeeeeeep in a rural area. I had also gotten sick prior to that, and a few days earlier my bank had called about a problem. My phone screen protector broke (twice, even the replacement one), as did the phone case. A bus almost hit our car. A rickshaw hit my dad. While travelling in the capital, a bus hit our bus (no one died). The train was late by a few hours. My brother's wallet almost got stolen. I caught a cold, hurt my leg.
Yep. Nice 10 days.
I bought the new laptop with patreon money though. It has a 2 years warranty (the last one, a Samsung laptop, I got second hand with factory warranty already over). I am so glad to be back writing. And posting. And stressing over my thesis.
Thanks for sticking with me (whoever is reading this). My follower count kept growing, but maybe some readers really were caught off guard by the sudden break. The story was almost at 4.30 rating, but over the last few days I got a lot of negative ones. For those who still read the story and haven't rated yet, it only takes a few seconds to leave one. My hope is that one day the story can climb back up to 4.5, although that at the end depends on my writing haha.
Have a nice day guys. See you on the next chapter.
Heavenly Allocation: Body
+5 Primordial Qi
+3 True Qi
「Good morning, Yu Han!」 Fei Rui's puppy-sized body appeared in Yu Han’s vision. 「Last night was fun. We killed the bad ugly worm and went for a walk in the place beyond your dreamscape. What was that place? Why did you want to go back?」
"Good morning," Yu Han said.
「Good morning!」 Fei Rui ran off without needing answers.
Yu Han heaved himself up, using a hand to block the sunlight stinging his eyes. The room was empty; Fang Zhao and Li Yao must've already gotten up.
Right, they were supposed to finish their Filth Eating Ghoul hunt before noon. After that, they would all take Huang Niuniu to complete her Trial by a nearby river.
Name: Yu Han (Johan)
Level: 2 (+1)
Active Accords: 1
True Qi: 4 (+4) / 300
Pure Qi: 181 (+150) / 300
Primordial Qi: 5 (+1)
Lifeforce: 737 (-55) / 912 (+120)
So I did lose lifeforce... It was full at 792 before. Now lifeforce had gone up by 120.
Yu Han couldn't remember seeing the “lifeforce lost” notification. Did he simply miss it in the heat of the battle?
Levelled up. It felt surreal. Was that really the forests of Taiwan?
There was an easy way to verify. He could echo a scene from his past life, and then echo what he had seen yesterday. Match up the trees for similarities.
He felt guilty. His wish to go back was too strong. The urge was undeniable. But now, as he woke up, he had to accept that this was his new reality.
Was there really a portal connected to Earth in his dreamscape? Yu Han doubted it. It was a dream, after all. The scene beyond his dreamscape might just be limited to that mountain. Or Yangmingshan National Park, where Yu Han had been in the moment of his death.
He told himself not to get his hopes up. After all, he was still Yu Han, not Johan in the dream. He could echo objects there. And he could only do so in his dreams.
That might not be reality.
Yu Han opened all three windows in the room, lining the same east wall. The sunlight came in unobstructed. The day was sunny, no mist on the horizon.
Today was the 150th day since he'd come to this world. Since that green meteor blasted him out of existence.
Green fire. The meteor had it. The watch Fei Rui memorycast had burnt green. This Ghost Dreams Parasitic Fireworm also commanded green fire.
There was something going on, and it had something to do with the green meteor.
But what?
It was hard to investigate in the real world. He didn't have unrestricted access to knowledge with the Internet like before. I still gotta look it up.
Fire burnt green when copper, boron, and some other elements were introduced to it. That probably wasn't the case with the green meteor, though.
Beasts that use green flame? That was a lead.
Yu Han brought up his stat panels.
Primordial Qi: 5
[Mind Origin: 17.33]
Intelligence: 14
Memory: 24
Perception: 11
Clarity: 10
Focus: 11
[Body Origin: 7.60 (+1.00)]
Endurance: 8 (+1)
Vitality: 11 (+1)
Strength: 8 (+1)
Agility: 5 (+1)
Dexterity: 6 (+1)
[Spirit Origin: 8.60 (+0.40)]
Adaptability: 17 (+1)
Magnitude: 5
Density: 6
Fortitude: 10 (+1)
Purity: 5
A smile crept up to his face. Yu Han clenched his fists in front of his eyes, then unclenched them. It was subtle, the power. But there was a feeling of confidence inside of him.
He could do more with his body now. He would have to test it out when practising Martial Arts. But part of his very being told him that he was stronger. He hadn't felt like this during the first two Heavenly Allocations at Levels 0 and 1. Why now? Had he become more perceptive? Was it the perception stat, or maybe the high Mind Origin overall?
How do I do this? They would go to the Hidden Realm the next day. Yu Han didn't want to wait to allocate the Primordial Qi. Who knew; even one substat being higher could save his life.
He brought up the Arts panels.
[Deep Sleep]
Type: Bloodline
Grade: Mortal Level 1
Mastery: Initial Step Level 2
True Qi: 49 (+39) / 300
[Echoing Dreamscape]
Type: Auxiliary
Grade: Mortal Level 10 (+1)
Mastery: Initial Step Level 6 (+2)
True Qi: 420 (+271) / 700
[Calm Before the Storm Breathing Technique]
Type: Cultivation
Grade: Mortal Level 5
Mastery: Initial Step Level 3 (+1)
True Qi: 116 (+351) / 400
[Ox Tail 72 Sweeping Forms]
Type: Martial
Grade: Elite Level 2
Mastery: Initial Step Level 2
True Qi: 143 (+91) / 300
[Thousand Petals Awareness]
Type: Psychic
Grade: Elite Level 9
Mastery: Initial Step Level 3 (+2)
True Qi: 136 (+447) / 400
Looking at the progress of his Arts over the last two weeks, Yu Han couldn't help but be satisfied. After he had figured out the trick of Cultivating inside his dreamscape, the True Qi gain for Arts had skyrocketed.
Calm Before the Storm Breathing Technique had levelled up a few days back. The average True Qi he could get from that was around 20 to 35 for each night of Cultivation. Because of it, his natural Realm True Qi gain had risen from 1 to 2 per day to 2 to 4. It might have looked like a small increase, but in Yu Han's case, that was practically doubling it.
Thousand Petals Awareness had levelled twice. Now it was easier for Yu Han to boost or mute a sense—especially the sense of touch, which he practised every night in his dreamscape while Cultivating. He would still blank out after a while and start levitating in space, though he had no idea why. But he could retain his conscious mind for longer now.
This could be why I can better sense my power increase from the Heavenly Allocation.
Echoing Dreamscape had been at 347 True Qi the day before. So in addition to his usual gain of around 15 to 25, he’d gained an extra 50 True Qi.
He had hoped that it would explode like it did before, when he had done all the tests with memorycasting.
Yu Han opened up the Traits panels.
Traits:
[Existential Anchor]
Grade: Mortal Level 2 (+1)
True Qi: Requirements Not Satisfied
[Deep Writhing Clam Bloodline]
Grade: Mortal Level 10
True Qi: 159 (+89) / 1100
[Qi Affinity]
Grade: Mortal Level 7
True Qi: 11 / 800
He froze. Existential Anchor had levelled up. There had been no notification. He was sure of it. Usually when an Art would level up, it would notify him.
Yu Han concentrated on the words: Existential Anchor. Nothing happened. No answers or hints.
What are you?
The trait was probably why he was unaffected by Fang Zhao's ring's mind control. He could also hear through the psychic whispers of the Mad Bloodhounds. The trait also didn't appear on talent orbs; Qiao Jinhai and Dong Chou had been none the wiser.
So for now, all it had given him were advantages. And he had a hunch that his transmigration was the reason he had this trait.
But it would be nice to know what it actually did! Yu Han wasn't complaining about the level up. He more than welcomed it. But he needed more data.
The shock from the Existential Anchor almost made him miss the huge True Qi gain to Deep Writhing Clam Bloodline. Yu Han had looked up what a Deep Writhing Clam was. It was basically a clam octopus. There were normal animal variants, and many different types of Primal Beasts. The running theory on why Cultivators had such varied beast-type bloodlines was that far into the past, perhaps millions of years ago, they had an ancestor; that ancestor was a spirit beast who could take human form, and had married a Cultivator.
The usual way to increase these bloodline trait levels was via pills, potions, elixirs, spirit foods, and gruelling Body Cultivation, each more painful than the other to tickle out every last bit of potential from the flesh, bones, and blood.
Yu Han didn't want to do the last one, and he was too poor to regularly use pills and spirit foods.
I guess the Deep Sea's Spites count as spirit food? Or are they alchemic brews?
His belly rumbled.
Yu Han brought up the stats panel again. After some thought, he decided to put everything into Memory. Though in his past life, there was a growing trend of generalisation rather than specialisation, Yu Han knew the only advantage he had over others was his dream abilities. Because of it, he could Cultivate Psychic and Cultivation Arts there directly, unlike Martial Arts, which would not increase. This effectively gave him more hours to train.
And the only stat that had reflected tangible improvements to his Echoing Dreamscape was Memory.
It was also a question of how important the Origin stat's value was, as opposed to the importance of each substat. If the relation between the Origin Stat and the substats really was a weighted average, dumping all his points into his highest substat would increase the Origin stat the most. This would have the upside of giving him both the highest stats in Memory, and the highest in Mind Origin.
Psychic Arts depended on Mind Origin. Of course, different Arts would probably depend on different substats, like how with Body Origin, lightness skills depended more on Agility and Dexterity—as opposed to archery Arts, which might depend on Strength and Dexterity.
Yu Han hadn't decided to dump all his future points into Memory either. But it should be fine at least for the initial levels, where he could maximise his training potential in Deep Sleep with Echoing Dreamscape.
He concentrated on the words and put 5 Primordial Qi into memory.
Primordial Qi: 0 (5)
[Mind Origin: 22.0 (17.33)]
Intelligence: 14
Memory: 24 + 5 -> 29 (24)
Perception: 11
Clarity: 10
Focus: 11
Immediately, an intense pain shot through his head. He groaned, falling on his butt. The cold ground rattled his bones, and the sunlight scorched his eyes.
"Fuck—"
With each second, the pain would increase. It started as a stinging throb, then developed to feeling as if someone was poking around under his eyeballs with a barbed stick.
He pulled back the Primordial Qi.
Primordial Qi: 5
[Mind Origin: 17.33]
Intelligence: 14
Memory: 24
Perception: 11
Clarity: 10
Focus: 11
And the pain slowly vanished.
Comments
Gravonhaft
Typo for [Echoing Dreamscape] Grade: Mortal Level 10 (+1) Mastery: Initial Step Level 6 (+2) True Qi: 420 (+271) / 700 Grade and Mastery Level Up notification bracket can be deleted cause they had already leveled up in ch. 82 before
