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The Science of Cultivation - Chapter 281: Baiting & Luring
🕑 Added 2025-04-14 22:30:05 +0000 UTC“I’ll have to rely on you, friends from Sword Saint Isle,” Li Lang said as he gestured for his minders to make their move.
Jun Ziyan was just about to leap off the roof of the Skyrunner when her companion, Da Xing, pulled her back. “Leave it to me.”
The bald man with a robust build nodded to his brother, wordlessly telling him to look after Jun Ziyan before diving straight into the waters below. The resulting splash barely added to the chaos as two underwater Qi beasts were already making a ruckus. They were both in the late stage of Foundation Establishment, making Da Xing’s actions quite perilous. However, they were only getting started. It would only get worse from here on.
“No need to look so worried,” Li Lang said as he noticed the frown on Jun Ziyan’s face. “We’ve used Mortal-grade versions of the talismans we gave you guys and got away from Earth-grade Qi beasts before. These Earth-grade talismans should hold up against Saint-grade threats.”
“That shouldn’t be the case! The difference between major realms isn’t linear like that. I don’t think you understand how powerful Violet Core cultivators are and the Qi beasts that can stand up to them,” Jun Ziyan retorted.
“If our intentions were to confront them, then I may agree with you, but when it comes to utility talismans like the Concealment, Decoy, and Smokescreen Talismans I gave you, it should be enough to catch any Saint-grade threats off-guard long enough to get away.”
The combo of talismans was something Li Lang had used in the past, and he had continued this tradition, procuring the Earth-grade versions of them.
“Plus, that’s just plan A. If it doesn’t work, we could always retreat into the Crucible. I believe even a Spirit-grade Qi beast would have trouble breaking into it.”
“Fine, I get it. That’s the only reason I agreed to this plan in the first place,” Jun Ziyan said in exasperation.
She then made it apparent she wasn’t up for any more conversation as she brought her full attention to the scene below.
The splashing of the water intensified, but the white waves it made obscured what was taking place below. Soon, blood surfaced, turning the small section of the ocean red. Seeing this, Li Lang wasted no more time and steered his Skyrunner inland toward the island they had found. An unconscious deviator was then thrown down, hanging below to act as bait.
Repeating the scene the group had become used to, several Qi beasts snarled at the presence of an intruder dangling from the Skyrunner. They began crawling out from the nearby nests.
As these natives of the island sprinted at the intruder, they quickly found their target zipping away. Despite being more intelligent than the average animal, the Qi beasts saw red and single-mindedly chased after their prey.
Li Lang watched as the two raptor-looking monsters charged after them. The terrain below him passed by rapidly. The greenery of the trees constantly repeated itself until it finally didn’t. A gray rocky area was followed by the dark green waters of the sea. He carefully watched his targets rush to come to a stop as they neared the end of the cliff.
Just when his ploy of luring the Qi beasts off the cliff seemed to have failed, a masked man suddenly appeared from behind and sent out two palm strikes at the rear of the raptors. Their receding momentum instantly reignited once from the shove, then again, as if an invisible explosion rang out behind them. It was enough to send them flying off the cliff, tumbling into the ocean.
However, the cliff wasn’t that tall. The drop was nowhere high enough to even kill a mortal man, but it just so happened to be near the area of the red sea where Da Xing had plunged into. Frantic splashes could be seen as the Qi beasts struggled to shore, but their resistance suddenly ceased.
As that happened, a thump sounded out on the deck of the Skyrunner, drawing the attention of everyone nearby.
“Da Xing. I hope it went well?” his brother, Da Feng, asked.
“Just Earth-grade Qi beasts, of course it did. Not sure how it’ll go if anything stronger shows up, though.”
“We’ll have to wait and see. The ideal situation is if we don’t come across them at all. Let’s go retrieve Wei Ping and observe for a little while before repeating the plan.”
His companions nodded, and he proceeded to steer the Skyrunner back toward the island.
Li Lang’s plan was to lure the strongest monsters from the island toward the sea, where equally powerful Qi beasts lurked in its depths. The idea was to get them to eliminate each other. He wasn’t sure the likelihood of this plan was to succeed, but he decided to go with it anyway.
There was one underlying reason for that, and it wasn’t because this was the best plan he could think of. His main plan had a high likelihood of succeeding, but if he were to live on an island, it was a good idea to study up on its environment first. That included any powerful Qi beasts nearby.
Just because Sword Saint Isle stood strong didn’t mean he could do the same. Their party had no Spirit Divide Realm expert to rely on. As someone who had worked with pioneers colonizing new planets, it was a modus operandi he was quite familiar with.
Knowledge was power. In order to set up a safe place for him and his students, he needed to learn about the surrounding neighbourhood first.
A few hours of constantly repeating his luring strategy later, they spotted their highly anticipated target. Just as the scene of a raptor-like monster being pulled into the sea by another underwater predator was about to calm down, an ear-piercing cry violently shook the island. It was followed by the rumbling of the earth and the splintering of trees. Before long, a four-legged Qi beast came bulldozing toward the shore.
It was grey, with a body that was as tall as the largest elephants Li Lang had seen. Its body, however, was twice as long. The rhino-like creature was lined with hard, jagged horns, starting at the tip of its nose, running up to its head in a brutal crest, and continuing down its spine like a ridge of stone.
It only stopped charging when it arrived at the top of the cliff where Li Lang’s party had been plunging Qi beasts into the ocean. By that time, Wei Ping had taken the hint and retreated to his allies up in the air already.
“I don’t th-think we’re going to be able to move that thing even if w-we all pushed it together,” Wei Ping commented.
“Let’s hope another guest will show up, then,” Li Lang replied.
The party quickly climbed higher into the sky as they saw the rhino Qi beast staring up at them. They were praying for a sea creature that could hold its own against the rhino to appear, searching for any shadows in the water.
“I don’t think we’ll be able to spot anything if we go any—”
Before Long Yi could finish his words, he abruptly shut up as he stared with wide eyes at the gigantic shadow further out in the ocean. It was so large that it was about a quarter of the size of the island.
It surfaced a distance away from the island and simply stared at the rhino on the shore. Both beasts let out a cry, but otherwise remained unmoved.
“Hm, seems to be a deep sea creature responding to the calls of our rhino friend down there,” Li Lang said. “They both do seem intelligent enough to stay out of each other’s preferred environment, so I don’t think our plan will work.”
“That’s it? We’re just giving up like that?”
“Yes, I’ve seen what I wanted to see. The Saint-grade sea creatures around here don’t seem to like going up towards the shallow areas, and learning that is good enough for me. Time to start building our new home.”
“What?” Long Yi cried out.
His face betrayed how much he wanted answers that everyone else in the group wanted to hear as well. The group stared at Li Lang, using their gaze to press him to elaborate.
“Boss, isn’t i-it about time you reveal what you’re g-going to do or where you’re going to d-do it?” Wei Ping broke the silence to urge him further.
“Yes, yes. When we were searching for hot spots under a strong ley line out in the ocean earlier, I already marked a suitable spot,” Li Lang replied with a small chuckle as he directed the Skyrunner to pick up speed.
“But all the islands we found were only on small ley lines and barely big enough to build a small estate,” Long Yi argued. “I thought we were going for something bigger.”
“No, we won’t be taking over any islands.”
His words puzzled his crew. Before anyone could ask a follow-up question, he gave them the answer.
“We’ll be building our own island.”
“Building our own island? How are we going to do that?”
“B-Boss,” Wei Ping cut in. “None of the areas with a-a suitable hotspot we found were in shallow water. It’s g-going to take a long time. Even with Long Yi’s af-affinity with the earth element.”
Li Lang smiled upon seeing his friend being so quick on the uptake about his plan for a man-made island.
“No, it actually won’t take that long. We may not have any experts that can move mountains at the wave of their hand, but we have something similar or perhaps even better.”
The group blinked blankly at his words before Jun Ziyan let out a loud yelp of surprise.
“You’re talking about the Crucible?!”
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Comments
Scrutinizer
We’ve used Mortal-grade version[s] of the talismans we gave you guys and got away from Earth-grade Qi beasts before.
Scrutinizer
Ah, yes, just plop the Crucible in the middle of the ocean on a strong ley line, and presto! It grows into its own little island. Spirit-Grade leviathans of the deep will conveniently not bother you there, too!
