Ancient Strengthening Technique

AST 1000 – The Almighty Hallow Pill, The Surge of Power (1)

Looking at the last remaining Hallow Pill, Qing Shui was filled with intense excitement. He then poured out 40 or more pellets, almost half of the 99 pellets and proceeded to store the other half inside the bottle before sealing it shut.

He took another bottle and stored the pellets he had poured out inside it. After the pellets were contained in the bottle, he closed the opening as means of sealing it completely. However, he could still open the bottle anytime. He knew he wouldn’t be needing the other half that had also been sealed for the time being.

Right now, Qing Shui was filled with hope as he observed the Hallow Pill in front of him.

Heavenly Vision Technique!

Hallow Pill: A pellet refined from the Hallow Fruit, allowing the user to gain a power with the strength of 100 stars. This pellet could be consumed by both demonic beasts and humans, which could strengthen the power of one’s bloodline, enhancing their natural talent. Each demonic beast and human could only consume a maximum of two pellets. Consuming more than two would not yield any more results. Only those with Martial Emperor cultivation were allowed to consume the pellet, otherwise the possibility of severe injury to the meridians would occur.

When he read the description of the Hallow Pill, his hands trembled with astonishment. The pellet was too powerful and too terrifying – nothing less expected from a pellet refined from the Hallow Fruit. The Seven-headed Scarlet Serpent was protecting the fruit when he encountered the dreadful beast, so he knew the fruit must be extremely powerful. Despite knowing that, he was still blown away by the information received about the Hallow Pill.

He was dumbfounded for a while until he managed to calm himself down. Indeed, the pellet was powerful but only those with Martial Emperor cultivation could consume it. However, it wasn’t that surprising, given that only those above Martial Emperor level would possess enhanced capability and strength, thus allowing them to endure the powerful effect of the pellet.

Qing Shui was deep in thought for quite a while before he made up his mind and took out a number of Hallow Pills from the bottle. He decided to feed the pellets to the Five-Headed Demonic Spider, Fire Bird, Diamond Gigantic Elephant and the Spirited Snake Turtle!

Even though both Diamond Gigantic Elephant and Fire Bird did not possess the power of more than 100 stars, they could still be considered demonic beasts of an early stage Martial Emperor. Moreover, the bloodlines of the Diamond Gigantic Elephant and Fire Bird weren’t a problem for them to be able to consume the Hallow Pills.

The Five-Headed Demonic Spider had already possessed the strength of a Martial Emperor, which would be the same case for the Spirited Snake Turtle as well. In any case, he didn’t need to worry. After watching his demonic beasts consume the Hallow Pills, he stood aside and waited for any sign of their development patiently.

When he thought about Luan Luan’s demonic beasts, he felt happy for them, yet sad at the same time. He was naturally stronger than his own demonic beasts but Luan Luan was different – she was far weaker than her own demonic beasts. There was no need to be concerned about that, as her powers would surely surge in the future. After that, he turned his thoughts towards his demonic beasts and quickly felt unsatisfied about their speed – they were not as fast as he imagined. But that could change and he had a feeling that the change would come very soon. They had unique bloodlines and the Hallow Pills were said to have the capability to enhance their bloodlines with certainty.

Qing Shui looked at the pellets and decided to save some for Luan Luan, as well as for Qing Qing. His sister has a very powerful demonic beast too.

Roar!

Qing Shui didn’t expect that the first demonic beast to show any reaction would be the Diamond Gigantic Elephant. A clear roar was surprisingly high-pitched and the metallic roar was more distinct, almost like a dragon’s roar, albeit only slightly. All in all, the roar was a pleasant sound to his ears.

The halo surrounding the Diamond Gigantic Elephant flashed abruptly, turning into a ray of golden light instantly and only for a while. Qing Shui looked at the current Diamond Gigantic Elephant and noticed no visible changes to its body. However, its elephant head had changed slightly – it had become a bit ferocious. The slightly longer neck had become twice as thick as before and the nose had shrunk to less than half of its previous length. Qing Shui felt the current appearance of his demonic beast was more appealing to his eyes and he felt quite happy about it.

The elephant looked quite sturdy and a bit violent, as well as savage looking. Qing Shui continued to observe the slightly different appearance of the head before he activated his Fiery Golden Eyes to analyze its power.

The Diamond Gigantic Elephant had its power surged towards the amount of 130 stars! It could only gain the strength of seven stars during Qing Shui’s exploration in the Sacred Land of Panacea.

Dragon Elephant Force: A passive ability that could increase the overall power by four times permanently!

Qing Shui was stunned. The Dragon Elephant Force had unexpectedly increased from three times to four times. The Hallow Pill was indeed a great item, allowing the powerful bloodline of his elephant to receive a great benefit for its skill.

Mighty Elephant’s Recklessness: Twice the power of the indiscriminate attack that could lock onto a maximum of ten targets.

Mighty Elephant Stomp: Great Perfection Stage. The stomp could unleash ten times the power of its attack damage.

Still a bit weak in his opinion, otherwise the force of this stomp would be extremely deadly.

Instantaneous Diamond Evasion: Instantaneously flash towards the perimeter of 300 meters!

Diamond Sword Qi: The Diamond Gigantic Elephant would spout a burst of Core Qi attack that could prove to be extremely lethal. This ability could decrease 20% of the opponent’s speed that would last about an hour.

Vajra Subdues Demons: After activating this skill, opponents within the surrounding perimeter of 100 meters would lose 10% of their overall power. This effect would last for an hour!

Ferocious Diamond Attack: The Diamond Gigantic Elephant’s instant physical attack. This skill could double the attack power of its physical body.

Dark Infernal Flames: The ability to launch the Dark Infernal Flames attack against any opponent!

Diamond Gigantic Elephant could unleash a power of 650 stars under the effect of the Dragon Elephant Force. But what caught Qing Shui by surprise was the Dark Infernal Flames, which was an ability the elephant had after consuming the Demonic Beast Origin Essence Soul Pearl a long time ago. The Diamond Gigantic Elephant hadn’t had a chance to use it in a battle. All he could remember was that the black flames that appeared under its feet resembled four lotus flowers in full bloom.

The flames would always stay beneath its feet, so Qing Shui eventually forgot about the Dark Infernal Flames ability. Moreover, the Diamond Gigantic Elephant hadn’t even used it once, even when it was left to unleash its attacks of its own freewill.

When the elephant had finally calmed down, Qing Shui proceeded to feed another Hallow Pill to his demonic beast. At the same time, the black flames surrounding the Fire Bird had already faded, allowing Qing Shui to observe its change.

The color on Fire Bird had became darker, essentially turning its body to a full black color. The overall power of the Fire Bird was now the strength of 150 stars. It had also gained a strength of ten stars during its time in the Sacred Land of Panacea.

Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens: A passive ability with zero energy consumption. The Fire Bird would gain four times the power permanently. All subsequent skills would require half the energy to unleash!

No change. Qing Shui quickly read through the rest of Fire Bird’s data. With the exception of increasing its power by 100 stars, nothing else had changed. However, Qing Shui decided to try his luck and fed it another Hallow Pill.

Fire Bird’s power was instantly boosted by the strength of 150 stars, which would become 750 stars under the effect of the Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens. The destructive power of the Phoenix Dance of Nine Heavens could reach the strength about 1500 stars – an advantage of being a demonic beast of powerful bloodline. If only its power was a bit higher, the damage power would be boosted to a terrifying amount in an instant.

But that shouldn’t be a problem to latch onto right now after feeding it two Hallow Pills. Qing Shui was still happy to see that his demonic beasts had gained a tremendous amount of strength and had their abilities enhanced.

After the time required to burn an incense stick had passed, the Five-Headed Demonic Spider was beginning to show an exceptional change. The body of the spider had become sturdier and it had finally reached a power of 220 stars. While in the Sacred Land of Panacea, the spider had gained a strength of 12 stars as well. The Five Qi Origin was also able to allow the spider to gain five times the amount of its overall power permanently, boosting its power to about 1300 stars immediately.

Like the other two, Qing Shui also fed one more Hallow Pill to the Five-Headed Demonic Spider. He was also aware that it would be quite difficult for the spider to grow out the sixth head but once it could, it would be a terrifying breakthrough that would surpass his expectation.

When he recalled the Seven-headed Scarlet Serpent he had encountered in the Sacred Land of Panacea, he sensed a difference between this beast and his Five-Headed Demonic Spider. The ancient records stated that the Five-headed Scarlet Serpent would have at least the power of 10,000 stars. It seemed like there was a huge contrast between the bloodline of the spider and that of the serpent. Naturally, the Five-headed Scarlet Serpent was exceedingly stronger than the Five-Headed Demonic Spider. Perhaps the spider could reach the power of 10,000 stars as it continued to grow out its heads but he had no idea when that would be. It could be during the growth of the sixth head or its seventh head….

Just then, he recalled hearing the voice of the Five-Headed Demonic Spider during their telepathic communication with each other. The spider had the voice of a little girl, which caused Qing Shui to think that this Five-Headed Demonic Spider was different than the common spiders one would encounter almost anywhere in dangerous areas. Just as he was about to delve into his nonsensical thoughts, the Diamond Gigantic Elephant began to emit a golden halo once again.

Qing Shui rubbed his nose. The Hallow Pill seemed to be the right palate for the Diamond Gigantic Elephant. Fire Bird’s change was less exceptional than that of the Diamond Gigantic Elephant. He remained enthusiastic as he waited to see the final change of the elephant as soon as the halo light began to fade away.

But what he got was a great shock to his heart!

The giant elephant’s head had changed. It was a bit ferocious before but it was still visibly an elephant’s head. This time, it was more ferocious and most importantly, the half-shortened nose was completely gone. The head was more like a dragon’s head now. The Diamond Gigantic Elephant looked quite docile before but now it was the complete opposite. Moreover, there was a murderous intent emitting from the elephant. The will to battle was quite intense, much like the will of a large behemoth battling in a war zone.

Although the Diamond Gigantic Elephant didn’t look quite docile, Qing Shui regarded its current look as more magnificent than before. Others would only look at it with envy due to the golden gleaming figure of his demonic beast. The overall look of the elephant felt quite solid and substantial, with the highlight of its features mostly on its ferocious yet impressive head…..

The Diamond Gigantic Elephant currently has the power of 230 stars and most importantly, the Dragon Elephant Force had jumped to another level, allowing the elephant to gain five times of its overall power permanently.

It was hard to believe that the Hallow Pill could allow the Diamond Gigantic Elephant to undergo a tremendous change like this, with the others skills being exeptions as they did not change this time. With the current state of the Dragon Elephant Force, Diamond Gigantic Elephant could reach a power of nearly 1400 stars. The Mighty Elephant Stomp and the Ferocious Diamond Attack had the ability to multiply the power of its attack, which could turn its power to about 2800 stars. While the Mighty Elephant Stomp could be used to strike against ten targets, the Ferocious Diamond Attack could only be used against one target, making it seemed like the latter would be useless in an actual battle against multiple enemies.

Regardless, Qing Shui was quite satisfied with the tremendous changes to the Diamond Gigantic Elephant, which led his demonic beast to gain a whopping 227 stars of power with two Hallow Pills. Qing Shui hadn’t applied the supplementary power he had received from the elephant onto himself yet. The mass formed in his Dantian seemed quite impressive at the moment too.

Before Qing Shui could think of the amount of supplementary power he would gain from the Diamond Gigantic Elephant, Fire Bird abruptly let out a high-pitched cry, which was followed by a circle of black-colored halo enveloping the entire body of his demonic beast.

Instantaneously, the black halo turned darker, as black as ink. Qing Shui felt a bit excited, yet dubious at Fire Bird’s current situation. He was looking forward to its change but he couldn’t help but feel odd when the color of Fire Bird’s body was beginning to turn darker.

When the halo finally faded, Fire Bird had turned from the previously fiery red color to a completely pitch-black color. The black was as cold as night but the color looked magnificent on Fire Bird nonetheless. However, Qing Shui was more worried for his children, because they might be frightened by the black color Fire Bird was currently wearing.

‘Impressive’ was one word to describe the current Fire Bird. Qing Shui could feel an aura of coldness, as well as an air of ferocity emitting from the Fire Bird. Of course, this was nothing new to him as Fire Bird was already fierce and magnificent to begin with.

Fire Bird’s power had reached to the strength of 250 stars. When he turned to read the Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens, he burst out laughing.

Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens: A passive ability with zero energy consumption. The Fire Bird would gain five times the power permanently. All subsequent skills would require half the energy to unleash!

The amount of power gain of the Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens had changed to five times. Under the effect of this skill, the Fire Bird could reach the power of 1500 stars immediately. The Diamond Gigantic Elephant’s Dragon Elephant Force, Fire Bird’s Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens and Five-Headed Demonic Spider’s Five Qi Origin were all passive abilities that would last forever without the need to activate the skills manually. Additionally, no energy would be consumed and these abilities would only grow accordingly to overall power of the respective demonic beasts. This was way better than an instantaneous increase to its power. Such a powerful battle skill like these could only be possessed by demonic beasts of the Martial Emperor level. Moreover, Fire Bird’s power could be doubled or tripled but anything beyond that would be considered rare in most circumstances.

Fire Bird’s other skills did not change but Qing Shui was already satisfied with the changes to the Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens. Under the influence of the Phoenix Dance of Nine Heavens, Fire Bird could unleash a damage power about 3000 stars but only for a limited time and uses. Luckily, the cooldown time for the skill was quite short, so Fire Bird could use it again in no time.

Qing Shui was extremely satisfied with his Fire Bird. The color change of his demonic beast was due to the awakening of its bloodline. That was a change worth celebrating but because Qing Shui was used to the color red, the sudden change to black as dark as the calligraphy ink would require a bit more time to get used to.

What Qing Shui had always striven for was power. Regardless of the color change of his Fire Bird’s body, he had no qualms about it as long as his demonic beast continued to become stronger. After he was done observing his Fire Bird, he then turned to the Five-Headed Demonic Spider, who did not change at all.

Could it be that the Hallow Pill was more effective towards certain bloodlines?

The Dragon Elephant Force of the Diamond Gigantic Elephant received twice the upgrade, jumping from three times increase of power to five times increase of power. Fire Bird’s Dark Phoenix of Nine Heavens had jumped from four times the effect to fives time the effect of its power.