Riluo City (Blue Phoenix Book 1) (4 page)

‘Nah, I didn’t cause the truck to appear, I just used the opportunity to merge with you,’ the voice sounded bored as it spoke. It seemed as if he did not even care about Hui Yue’s death, which in turn only nurtured the younger man’s rage.

‘You should thank me you know.’ The voice said as if it was capable of sensing the hostility which was aimed towards him; nonetheless, the voice still contained an obvious hint of disdain.

‘If I hadn’t merged with you, you would not have had the possibility to reincarnate this quickly.’ Once again the voice turned smug as it pointed out just how much Hui Yue owed him.

I doubt he is lying, Hui Yue thought annoyed, it seems as if he does not care about me, so why would he lie about such a small thing? After contemplating for a short time, Hui Yue decided to believe the arrogant voice in his mind. In the end he had no real choice if he wished to get information.  In turn, though he did not wish to do so, he had to leave behind the grudges which were seething inside of him.

‘What do you mean when you say that you caused me to reincarnate? And where am I?”

As soon as Hui Yue had asked those questions he heard a sigh coming from the Phoenix and somehow he understood the feelings that the Phoenix felt.

A certain degree of impatience, annoyance but also hope. Hui Yue once again felt astonished as he realised that he was currently able to understand the feelings of the voice inside of his mind. He was deeply astonished, but also unsure as to why the Phoenix would allow him to feel  this.

‘I will need to tell you a very long story,’ the Phoenix said after a very long pause. At first Hui Yue thought that it was due to the voice being too lazy to explain the situation. Yet, Hui Yue had no intention of letting it off with just that.

‘I got nothing but time. I am a baby you know.’ He thought back, while noticing that his new mother had fallen asleep, and he himself also pretended to be asleep so that he could have an undisturbed talk with the voice in his mind. Hui Yue could not help but  wonder if mental patients felt the way he did right now.

‘Okay, okay, I’ll tell you,’ the Phoenix said as the silence had gotten suffocating and Hui Yue could not help but imagine a child which was throwing a tantrum.

‘This is really quite a long story and you better listen because I will only tell it once.’ The phoenix said aggressively, but Hui Yue stayed quiet.

He had a feeling that the Phoenix was able to understand everything about him even if they did not directly communicate, unfortunately it did not work both ways.

‘Hmm,’ the Phoenix grumbled a little before it decided on how to start, ‘this world is quite different from the one you are used to. Here strength is what matters the most, the stronger you are the better prospects you have in life.’

The Phoenix was quiet for a second before continuing, ‘this world was created by the Four Divine Beasts, the Azure Dragon, the White Tiger, The Vermillion Bird and the Black Turtle. These Four Divine Beasts had created multiple worlds prior to this one; however, they decided to settle down here. They laid down their bodies as foundation for each of their countries. Their consciousness created new bodies that they used to walk these lands and experience a normal life.’

Hui Yue’s jaw gaped as he heard about those four beasts. He would never have believed that they were real.   In China they valued these beasts as constellations, even went as far as to call them the symbols of China. To think that these beasts were real, and that he was in a world created by them was simply unfathomable.

Even though Hui Yue was filled with excitement and astonishment, he had not opened his mouth even once.   Instead, he was focusing on whatever Lan Feng was saying. He is definitely not going to repeat this later, Hui Yue thought dejectedly.

The Phoenix snorted before speaking once again, ‘thousands of years went by after this place was created and the Divine Beasts had started their own families within their individual countries. Their descendants were not divine beasts as them, instead they were normal humans.’ Hui Yue felt a nostalgia washing over him as he heard the words.

Knowing that he himself had no reason whatsoever to feel nostalgia caused him to assume that these emotions belonged to the phoenix.

‘Time went by and eventually the Four Divine Beasts decided to enter into  eternal sleep. They had long since buried their original bodies far below the surface of this world , and they spent the rest of their energy to create four mountain ranges that split  this whole continent into four equal parts. In the middle was a large castle. Those four parts represented the locations of each of their bodies. Each one of the divine beasts called their oldest son to the Four Beast’s Palace in the center of the continent. There they passed down their legacy, together with some of their powers and the right to lead a kingdom. After this rite of passage was completed they then re-entered their original slumbering bodies and went into an eternal hibernation.’

Yet another wave of sadness and nostalgia hit Hui Yue as the final words were spoken, and although these feelings did not belong to him, they had a great influence on Hui Yue’s mood.

Hui Yue was not a slow person, and he instantly understood that this was now  part of the Phoenix’s story.

‘The sons did a good job and many thousands of years passed by in peace. Civilisation flourished and humans started cultivating their internal powers. However, four thousand years ago a human tricked the descendant of the Azure Dragon and used his powers to seal and banish the four beast clan leaders from this world.’

This time it was a mixture of hate, regret and pity which flashed across Hui Yue’s mind as he understood part of the reason why the Phoenix had ended up as a hairpin.

‘You got to be the descendant of the Vermillion Bird?’ Hui Yue asked as he decided to make sure he was right about his assumption. He had a lot of questions waiting to be answered, but some things were more important.

‘That’s right,’ The Phoenix said with a proud voice, and Hui Yue understood that this voice indeed  had a  right to be proud.

‘Then why are we stuck in a baby’s body instead of one matching our age?’ Hui Yue could not help but ask. Being in an infant’s body with the mind of a twenty-four-year old person was simply too bizarre for him to accept.

‘Why don’t you try being sealed inside a hairpin for four thousand years?’ The Phoenix snorted,

‘I had the minimum amount of power back then and only a small fraction got released when I merged with you and you were dying. We share a body right now so I am unfortunately quite limited by this,’ he continued with disdain

‘Hey, don’t complain about the body, it was you who chose it’ Hui Yue pointed out with a laugh, at this the Phoenix was incredibly haughty. A strange sense of satisfaction grew within Hui Yue every time he  had made the Phoenix display its unhappiness.

If Hui Yue had been attracted to the blue phoenix hairpin, he was definitely repulsed by the self-proclaimed phoenix. It was hard to explain why his feelings were like this, and he could not think of any valid reasons, however something about the phoenix was making him annoyed.

That being said, Hui Yue genuinely enjoyed hearing about this new world which he had ended up in, and the story of the four divine beasts had made his heart beat much faster.

The Phoenix also had a good reason as to why he was so arrogant. Not many were able to claim that they were the first born son of the Vermilion bird.

‘I didn’t have many bodies to choose from you know.’ The Phoenix replied. .

‘You should be thankful. If I had not helped you with this reincarnation you would have been stuck in the netherworld for god knows how long and there would be no possibility for you to remember anything from your previous life.’

‘It was you who was complaining.’ Hui Yue laughed as he enjoyed hearing the Phoenix trying to persuade him to be indebted to him. .

‘Shut up. Do you want me to continue with the story or not?’ Hearing that, Hui Yue decided not to argue any further and waited for the Phoenix to continue. .

‘It was four thousand years since I was last here, so I don’t know how the countries are split up right now, nor do I know about who controls what, but I do know about the cultivation since that is one thing that will never change.’

Hui Yue’s interest was piqued even further when he heard the word cultivation. Cultivation had been practiced in the past, but he had never found anything that could prove it to be helpful.

‘Everything in this world has an essence and a person has something called a Xia dantian, or a lower dantian. This is where they are able to refine the essence in the world into Qi and store it in a Qi spiral. You can increase your strength by gathering more essence and refining it into Qi. Refinement is crucial for achieving the best results. The finer the Qi gets, the better the results are. There are three different dantians, but you can only gain access to the next two if you are strong enough.’

This is confusing’ Hui Yue said, as he was trying to follow the explanation. The voice within him was explaining vast amounts of information in a short time resulting for Hui Yui no understanding on the subject and  a slight headache coming his way.

‘It’s not my fault it is confusing!’ The phoenix said without the slightest display of pity, and he quickly continued his monologue, giving Hui Yue no time to digest the previous information.

‘Okay, listen closely. Cultivators are ranked with ten ranks of strength and every rank is split into nine stars. First rank is Student, then i Disciple, which is then followed by Practitioner. Those three rely solely on the Xia dantian, the lower dantian, and refinement of essence into Qi.’ After this the voice paused for a moment, causing a smile to appear on Hui Yue’s infant face.

Although  the phoenix claimed that he would not care whether or not he was understood , he still paused and allowed Hui Yue to quickly repeat the said information,  branding it into  his memory.

‘If a person has enough Qi of good  quality and some cultivating talent it is possible to break into the Master rank.’ The phoenix continued with an overbearing voice, pretending that the previous paused had never happened. Hui Yue was amused, but chose not to comment on how the phoenix might try to act cold, but truly was  considerate.

‘After Master comes Grand Master and Duke. Those three ranks still absorb essence into the lower dantian and refines it to Qi, but they also open a second dantian, the middle dantian known as Zhong.’ The phoenix held another short break before it continued,

‘The Qi travels from the lower to the middle dantian and gets refined even further into spirit power. It is much finer than the usual Qi, and it allows the user to use some higher ranked combat skills amongst its other uses.’ The Phoenix did not dwell on  spirit power too much, as it would be a very long time before Hui Yue would even be able to see a spirit power user. Hui Yue could only approve of this decision as he already felt flooded with countless new information which he tried to keep from intersecting.

‘The next three ranks are King, Emperor and Saint. To achieve the rank of King you need to open the final dantian, whic is the higher dantian, known as the Shang. It allows the user to refine the spirit power into Wu Wei. Wu Wei is the ultimate strength, upon achieving it you will be in a completely different league than all other cultivators below this rank. However, it requires building some insane basics from the start at the lower dantian and continuing with intense, gruelling training throughout the middle dantian.

One can only hope to reach the Emperor rank. Because of this they are incredibly rare.’ The Phoenix was quiet for some time while trying to think if it had gotten all the basic information explained.

This silence was well received by Hui Yue who was working his brain to the highest possible speed. He managed to slowly digest all the information and ensured that they were valued highly.

A frown appeared on his infant face as he had thought of everything the phoenix had said

‘That is only nine ranks,’ Hui Yue said slightly confused, ‘what is the tenth?’

‘It’s the rank of a god,’ Lan Feng answered swiftly, ‘but you don’t need to know about that yet. Firstly, it is completely different from the ranks that rely on dantians and secondly there has only been four gods as far as I am aware.’