I Steal the Ancestors' Sacrifices to Nourish Myself-Chapter 38 - 9: Young Generation ’Yan’, Outward Expansion

Chapter 38: Chapter 9: Young Generation ’Yan’, Outward Expansion

With a new Celestial Vein in the clan, Huo Chang can explore even further areas for the tribe with more peace of mind.

Why can the Upper Huang Tribe span three thousand miles? It’s not because of just one Celestial Vein but because generations of Celestial Vein Martial Artists have gradually expanded outwards.

Which mountains can be traversed, where there are wetlands to be avoided, and where rivers can be crossed safely.

They have maps.

Having an additional Celestial Vein does not truly make the tribe stronger; more importantly, it requires control over the region.

In Martial Dao, the Upper Huang Tribe has taken a small step further than Blazing Flame, but it has also run into a bottleneck.

"The plague has stopped for so long; the Upper Huang Tribe should have come out to loot by their strength, but they still haven’t appeared. Could it be they were actually harmed during the plague?"

Blazing Flame was the first among nearby tribes to start collecting the remnants of nearby tribes after the plague ended.

If the Upper Huang Tribe wasn’t severely damaged, they should have been out looting.

At this time, Huo Shan spoke up, "Maybe the plague was more widespread than we imagined, and the Upper Huang Tribe is gathering but doesn’t care about tribes like ours near the deep mountains."

"Whatever, we should focus on our development."

"The Upper Huang has always been arrogant, we’re not afraid of them now, but we must be cautious; being careful is never wrong."

Huo Chang pondered and said, "I only need to take a portion of people with me when going out, and we must remain vigilant in the tribe’s defense."

"Speaking of which, should we discuss what generation name to use for the younger members of the tribe?"

"These children are the hope of our tribe’s future. After three hundred years, Blazing Flame has finally seen a chance for development. How about using the name of Blazing Flame for the generation name?"

Huo Xian, always holding the beast hide scroll and pen, spoke up.

His suggestion was agreed upon by Clan Elders Huo Yuo and Huo Yun.

These children are different from them; their Martial Arts cultivation begins not with the old Quenching Technique but with an improved new method.

There is even the presence of a witch and the scene of dual Celestial Vein Martial Artists heralding the prosperity of Blazing Flame.

"’Flame’ suggests the rising fire, fitting the prosperous scene of our tribe. Let’s use ’Flame’ as the generational name."

Several of the older Clan Elders echoed in agreement, while Shen Can silently observed, realizing the old men had already coordinated their thoughts in advance.

Generational names are irrelevant to him; what’s important is distinguishing the generations.

Flame it is then.

A bonfire clan meeting lasted for most of the day before everyone dispersed.

Huo Xian returned to his cave and continued his record-keeping by lamplight.

Shen Can glanced and did not disturb him, as Huo Xian had developed a new hobby of recording clan history.

Once it gradually passed down, perhaps the tribe could eventually have a historian.

Some roles don’t need deliberate arrangement; they naturally evolve into positions due to existence.

Returning to his cave.

Shen Can took a deep breath.

Next, he planned to sort through the Martial Arts details from the Mountain Opening to Celestial Vein Realm.

Currently, he had two experimenters, his uncles Huo Shan and Huo Qii.

Uncle Huo Shan’s talent was slightly better; he hadn’t noticed his Qi Strength reaching a growth bottleneck yet.

But Uncle Huo Qii was much weaker; after a month of training, his Qi Strength had the least increase, which didn’t surprise Shen Can.

Just waiting for him to recover to verify the side effects of the Witch Medicine he deduced.

As usual, he lay on the stone bed and entered today’s witchcraft deduction.

[Longevity: 243]

A Tier Three Wild Beast had longevity of 473 years, and deducing Tier Three Neutralizing Witch Medicine Formula and Neutralizing Anesthetic Powder Formula took 230 years, during which he poisoned himself countless times within the Sacrificial Tripod Cauldron space.

From the sacrificial beasts he evaluated, Shen Can found that Exotic Wild Beasts tend to have more longevity.

That Tier Two Heluo Fish provided him with over three hundred years of longevity, whereas compared to Wild Beasts, the people of Blazing Flame’s tribe have far less longevity.

The next morning, the entire tribe came alive.

A group of tribespeople carried farming tools out of the tribe and began tending fields outside the mountain, weeding, irrigating.

The farming in the Great Wilderness also relies on nature for sustenance, so the cultivation techniques are not necessarily superb, but they are much better than slash-and-burn agriculture.

Some tribesmen started to travel far to search for herbs in the mountains.

Shen Can got up early and started to get busy as well.

Before dawn, Huo Chang led a group of fifty-something Mountain Opening, Stone-Breaking Martial Artists away from the tribe.

The cache of Tier Three Beast Blood was left untouched, said to be reserved for the tribe’s younger members and children.

Although the Martial Arts System of the tribe saw an imbalance in the number of Martial Artists across tiers due to the sudden increase in meat and beast blood, yet it would be foolish not to use the resources instead of hoarding them.

Huo Chang specifically took older Martial Artists away, leaving the Hunting Team’s numbers practically unchanged, allowing them to focus on cultivating Inner Strength at home.

Shen Can’s initial idea was simple, to first train this batch of Hunting Team members into Martial Artists.

This goal is not difficult because there is Tier Three Beast Blood available.

The Power of One Wilderness is enough to become a Martial Artist, and the energy contained in Tier Three Wild Beast’s beast blood is abundant.

Even when diluted dozens of times, it’s enough to break the bottleneck for ordinary tribespeople.

With enough Stone-Breaking Martial Artists, Mountain-Opening Realm Martial Artists can emerge from them.

Huo Shan, as the Hunting Team Leader, divided the three hundred people into three hundred-person squads, each led by a Soldier Captain.

In distributing the diluted Tier Three beast blood, Shen Can, being the Ancestral Temple Keeper, naturally used it first out of respect.

Now he no longer supervises the Hunting Team’s cultivation and has handed the matter over to Huo Shan.

During the day, Huo Shan practices with the clan members of the hunting team and returns at night to report to Shen Can about the cultivation status of the clan members and himself.

As for Uncle Huo Qii, he is somewhat different. He lives in a cave beside the Ancestral Temple, making it convenient for Shen Can to closely observe his recovery situation.

Shen Can now relies on the cooperation of the two uncles, along with his own cultivation, to make detailed verifications on the specific cultivation details between the Mountain Opening Realm and the Celestial Vein Realm.

...

Early in the morning, after pinching his nose and finishing his mixed rice, Shen Can started practicing the Kui Ox Fist in the earthen cave.

After finishing several rounds of Kui Ox Fist, thoughts emerged in his mind.

Sacrificial Master: Shen Can

Sacrificial Artifact: Sacrificial Tripod Cauldron

Martial Arts Realm: Mountain Opening Realm (Power of Twenty-Five Desolations)

Lifespan: 160

He then grabbed the wooden bow that Huo Chang used before advancing to the Celestial Vein, gathering strength in both hands.

With a "twang," the wooden bow moved slightly to show respect to him.

Could not pull it open.

Shen Can placed the bow back on the rack, previously hypothesizing that the Mountain Opening advance to Celestial Vein Qi Strength range is likely multiples of nine.

He is now not far from the Power of Twenty-Seven Desolations.

Clearly, even three times the Power of Nine Desolations couldn’t pull open this bow.

The next step would be four times the Power of Nine Desolations.

When initially becoming a Mountain Opening Realm Martial Artist, he had the All Transformations Return to One Divine Technique.

Relying on eating scattered ordinary beast meat millet rice, and removing occasional time delays from cultivation, on average, his Power of One Desolation increased about every six to seven days.

Later, changing the food to entered-tier wild beast meat further enhanced the effect.

Though later plagues and other issues delayed, reducing cultivation time, the quality effect of entered-tier wild beast meat offset the reduced cultivation time.

Still averaged about six to seven days to increase the Power of One Desolation.

This situation changed after gaining the Power of Eighteen Desolations, Shen Can found consumption doubled.

To similarly increase the Power of One Desolation after eighteen desolations, the meat consumption increased to one and a half to two times that before eighteen desolations.

Making the time to raise the Power of One Desolation extended to about eleven to twelve days.

But after adding Tier Three fish blood mixed rice, the energy contained in high-tier beast meat shortened part of the cultivation time again.

Similarly, eating Tier Three fish blood mixed rice greatly weakened the effect of his All Transformations Return to One Divine Technique.

All Transformations Return to One has a more wondrous effect when high-tier resources are scarce, requiring the accumulation of lower-tier resources for high-quality transformation.

According to his current cultivation situation, reaching the Power of Thirty-Six Desolations would take at most three months, even considering time generously.

It’s just the Tier Three fish blood mixed rice quantity is limited, releasing all would scarcely last many days.

Don’t know how the clan leader’s harvest on his outing will be.

...

Over a month later, Blazing Flame East.

Two figures swiftly traversed the mountain, covered in mud; other than the weapons in their hands, all other belongings were wrapped in soft beast hide, making very little sound upon collision.

The two quickly entered a mountain cave.

"Clan leader, ahead there isn’t a great river, but rather a wetland swamp; we tried, it’s somewhat treacherous, not matching the recorded map situation."

Huo Chang put down several maps in his hand.

During this outing, he brought the maps gathered from other tribes along and continually acquired new maps from tribes encountered en route.

Unfortunately, post-flood, the terrain slightly changed compared to the map.

Whether the map is wrong or the flood altered the terrain, arguing this makes no sense.

According to the map description, there should be a north-south great river ahead.

By the river and mountain location, there was a tribe named Ze Ji.

If resources could be directly reached, that would be the most time-efficient way.

Unfortunately, the map suddenly became useless.

The great river turned swamp, the tribe vanished.

"Travel around it to the next tribe’s location."

Orderly, the group exited the mountain cave, Huo Chang took the lead towards the swampy land, beginning to head north intending to bypass the swamp.

However, after skirting it for more than ten days, mud and water surged amidst the mountains.

Huo Chang stood atop a small mountain, gazing southeast.

Stretching water and marsh, mountains and waters intertwined.

"Clan leader, according to clan records, Great Wild Marsh is five thousand miles east of our tribe; we seem not to have gone beyond three thousand miles yet."