Sage of Humanity

She pursed her lips and asked Lu Ye, "What did Amber do wrong?"

Lu Ye turned his head and glared at Amber. He briefly explained how Amber had rashly charged out during the previous rescue operation, then continued, "You still remember the first rule of our agreement, right?"

Yiyi obediently stood before him, her back ramrod straight, and immediately replied, "In all matters, you lead, and if opinions differ, I should listen to you!"

"Not a bad memory!"

Yiyi turned her head and sternly called out, "Amber!"

With a whimper, Amber\'s robust body slowly moved in front of Yiyi, raised its eyes, and looked pitifully at her. Yiyi raised her hand and slapped Amber on the head, "Lu Ye told you not to be impulsive, why didn\'t you listen? You shouldn\'t have charged blindly at that time; you needed to follow the plan."

She delivered a slap with each sentence.

Yiyi also knew that Amber\'s impulsiveness had caused some trouble. From the outcome, Lu Ye had killed those four cultivators and rescued her, but if Amber had shown a bit of restraint, things could have been much better, and perhaps Lu Ye wouldn\'t have fallen unconscious.

This time, her escape was entirely due to Lu Ye\'s decisive action; had Amber not charged out then, any hesitation on his part would have cost him the opportunity.

Yiyi kept this gratitude in her heart and to teach Amber a lesson, she did not hold back, hitting Amber\'s head until it thudded. Explore more adventures at empire

"Enough," Lu Ye interrupted her, looking at her earnestly, "I don\'t want this to happen again."

They had only started working together recently, and everyone needed time to adjust to each other and work out the kinks. But such incidents should only happen once; if it happened again, Lu Ye couldn\'t guarantee that he could come out unscathed, and he definitely didn\'t wish to be harmed by his allies one day.

"Understood!" Yiyi nodded and looked at Amber, "Did you understand?"

Amber whined softly as a response.

Yiyi then turned to Lu Ye and sincerely said, "Thank you!"

This thanks was for Amber as well as for herself; she had escaped thanks to Lu Ye risking his life. Moreover, the situation was still not over; they were trapped in the Sky-Splitting Gorge, and whether they could escape was still an uncertainty.

Lu Ye waved his hand and checked his own condition. He wasn\'t too worried about his injuries; a few days of recuperation would suffice. His spirit force had been significantly depleted in the recent battle and needed replenishing. Surprisingly, he noticed some loosening in the barrier of his 26th orifice\'s spiritual orifice.

Previously, he had cultivated up to the fullness of the 25th orifice and hadn\'t yet attempted to break through to the 26th. It seemed likely now that the turbulent surge of spirit force in the intense battle with Zharng Wu had impacted the spiritual orifice barrier.

This was a fortunate occurrence as it saved him some cultivation time.

However, before that, he needed to fully replenish his spirit force. In such a perilous environment, being in optimal condition was crucial; he never knew when he might be forced into a fierce battle, and there would be no time for recovery then.

Yet, he didn\'t rush into cultivation but instead gave Yiyi a meaningful look.

Understanding his cue, Yiyi patted Amber\'s head, and the human and tiger immediately split up to scout both ends of the corridor.

This way, with the two monitoring the corridor, Lu Ye wouldn\'t likely be trapped in the corridor, thus allowing him room to maneuver in case of danger.

After Yiyi and Amber walked away, Lu Ye looked down at the back of his hand again. When he activated his spirit force, the back of his hand was covered in blue light, which formed several lines of large characters.

Name: Lu Ye.

Status: Disciple of the Righteous Blood Sect.

Cultivation: 25th orifice.

Merit: 34.

Lu Ye stared at the row of numbers for merit, unable to understand how the number 34 came to be.

Previously, in Qingyun Mountain, he had earned eight merit points from that fair-skinned man and Liew Ruyin; this time, having killed four people, his merit increased to 34. In other words, those four people added a total of twenty-six merit points for him.

Lu Ye still did not understand the usefulness of the merit points. He had asked Yiyi, but she seemed unclear about it too. Her memory was severely impaired; she understood some things, but there were others about which she knew nothing.

This thing must be useful, but how and where it could be utilized would have to be explored slowly.

Not understanding it, he didn\'t bother to think further.

Lu Ye popped a Spirit-Nurturing Pill into his mouth, refining the pill energy to replenish his spent energy, and his spirit force gradually recovered.

Previously, Lu Ye had found that the efficiency of recovery and cultivation, as well as the consumption of elixir pills, varied greatly. Recovery alone was much faster than cultivation and required much less consumption.

The most direct comparison: Lu Ye currently had opened 25 orifices. He had spent nearly over two hundred elixir pills and almost three months in total. However, if his spirit force was exhausted in battle, it wouldn\'t be possible to consume as many as two hundred elixir pills, nor would it take three months to replenish.

If that were the case, the price a cultivator had to pay after a battle would be too great.

In cultivation, much of the pill energy is lost, and polishing the spiritual orifice also takes a lot of effort. An orifice progresses gradually from opening to Perfection. But once an orifice reaches Perfection through cultivation, recovery becomes much simpler and easier.

Time passed, and pill after pill was consumed; two days later, Lu Ye had fully recovered, but now he was left with only about twenty elixir pills.

There was no movement from Yiyi and Amber\'s side, which indicated they were still relatively safe for the time being.

Lu Ye wasn\'t in a hurry to leave; not knowing the outside situation, leaving rashly would only complicate matters.

Currently, Lu Ye was only two orifices away from reaching Spirit Stream Level 3; the barrier of his 26th orifice was already loosening, and he had enough elixir pills, so he decided to advance his cultivation by a full level first.

If he could handle Zharng Wu in Level 2 with Yiyi and Amber, his strength would increase even further if he reached Level 3, which would be greatly beneficial given his current circumstances!

Moreover, his injuries had not yet fully healed—it was a good opportunity to continue recuperating for a few more days.

Having made up his mind, Lu Ye continued to consume elixir pills and directed his spirit force towards the barrier of the 26th orifice.

Five days later, seated cross-legged in the mountain cave, Lu Ye appeared solemn. The day before, he had opened his 27th orifice, and after spending some elixir pills, he had cultivated it to Perfection. Today was the day to advance to Spirit Stream Level 3!

With the experience of the previous two times, this process was familiar to Lu Ye now. Starting from the 19th orifice, he guided his spirit force along the prescribed route through the 20th orifice, the 21st orifice, and up to the 27th orifice.

The spirit force circulated unceasingly among these nine major spiritual orifices, repeating continuously, and speeding up until a certain moment when he broke through a bottleneck. Seated in meditation, Lu Ye\'s body suddenly trembled, and his spirit force surged around him.Nôv(el)B\\\\jnn