The Immortal Ruins Chapter 71 The Gold-Ringed Lingbao Fruit

Jiang Shaoliu stood barefoot, his pores wide open, his two life rings rotating slowly as the true qi flowed through his meridians.

His arms and fists crossed in the air in a mysterious ever-changing pattern, while the air spiraled and surged around him vigorously.

Boom!

Jiang Shaoliu struck, flinging a surge of crackling shockwaves to a distance of ten meters.

The Monkey King, observing from the side, shook it head doubtfully.

"Hey, hey," Jiang Shaoliu humphed at the Monkey King, "The air is less stable than water and what I've leaned is much more difficult than yours."

It nodded thoughtfully. After a moment, the monkey threw a punch too.

Boom!!!

The air in front of its fist exploded like a condensed, screaming hurricane, knocking over a few trees in the distance.

The Monkey King blinked and looked to Jiang Shaoliu expectantly.

Jiang Shaoliu limbered up his arms and said, "With this skill, it is able to concentrate all its strength into one point through the air, which will explode with great destructive potential."

"Gentle power, flexibility, eruption…" Jiang Shaoliu closed his eyes and breathed in slowly, slowly tightening his arm muscles. Then he punched.

The fist stopped in the air but there was no wild explosion. Jiang Shaoliu opened his eyes excitedly and shouted, "I did it."

Bang!

A huge volume of air suddenly exploded in all directions some distance in front of him.

The powerful shockwave struck the two, which waved the Monkey King's air and billowed Jiang Shaoliu's combat suit.

The Monkey King scratched its head and punched into the air.

Boom boom boom boom…

Waves of crackling explosions burst forth, not quite what Jiang Shaoliu did.

"Hehe, Monkey King, you need to think it over and practice some more."

Jiang Shaoliu went over to the vine ball.

Xiao Bai was guarding the ball, surrounded by piles of empty wine bottles. Its breath reeked of alcohol and it looked quite satisfied even just sniffing the wine off the bottles.

"You better no try to learn anything from the Monkey King; I've no money to buy wine for you too." Jiang Shaoliu pushed Xiao Bai's head out of the way and glared at the vine ball with bright, piercing eyes: "This time, I'll show you which of us is stronger!"

Xiao Bai scuttled back and watched him expectantly.

Even the vine seemed to feel the looming danger, winding and tightening around itself until it was only just over half a meter in diameter. It was starting to look more and more than a large, black, iron cannonball.

"Hmmph, it's so small! Now I'm afraid I might damage the fruit inside." Jiang Shaoliu muttered to himself.

After practicing a few more times, the Monkey King joined him, panting for breath, and plopped itself on the ground.

"If I damage the fruit through the vine, it'll weaken its beneficial effects. I need to keep the last layer of the vines so the fruit stays whole..." Jiang Shaoliu carefully checked the vines from every angle, tapping on them with his fist here and there. "Hmm, uniform density and strong elasticity. It'll be much easier to transfer the power to the core of each vine than to blow up it through the air."

Jiang Shaoliu took up a firm posture and allowed his true qi to begin condensing into the meridians of his right arm, while his two life rings cycled steadily to transfer even more true qi to his fist.

The ground beneath his feet began to crack as energy radiated from his body. Xiao Bai nervously scurried back even further, while the Monkey King carefully watched Jiang Shaoliu without blinking in order to catch every little detail.

Jiang Shaoliu began to punch.

Time seemed to slow as his torso twisted, flinging his arm and shoulder forward with infinite power concentrated on the fist. His fist impacted the vine ball almost gradually, as if he were trying to push a giant boulder.

The ball shook slightly, without any visible changes on its surface. After a moment, the penetrated energy erupted.

Boom!!

A dull explosion rang out from inside the vine ball and all the vines burst, throwing small bits and pieces in all directions.

Jiang Shaoliu panted for breath, staring at the remains of the vine ball with satisfaction.

The Monkey King stood still despite the fragments peppering its face, gaping with eyes opened wide. Xiao Bai lay low, twitched its nose at the marvelous fragrance that began to spread in the air.

The wrecked shell of the vine ball lay on the ground ahead. Only a thin mesh of tattered vines in a roughly circular shape remained, enclosing the fruit within.

The rare fruit that caused the incredible phenomena on Liang Duan Mountain was glowing faintly within the vines. It was shiny and almost translucent, with three distinct golden rings surrounding it. Its powerful fragrance excited everyone's life rings and true qi.

Jiang Shaoliu went up and pulled aside the broken vines. He looked at the fruit thoughtfully for a short while, then tapped a few buttons on his smartwatch. "Hmm, what are the effects of a Lingbao fruit..?"

"Lingbao fruit can be used to improve life ring quality. According to descriptions of high-quality Lingbao fruit, the fruit's skin shows two faint golden rings. One master with three silver life rings reported improving his first and second life rings to gold quality, but it caused no changes to his third life ring."

Looking again at the three golden rings on the Lingbao fruit, Jiang Shaoliu excitedly turned to the Monkey King and shouted, "Come on, take a bite out of this thing and let's see what happens to you!"

"Ooh ooh…"

The giant monkey shook its head. Then it poked the fruit and pointed to Jiang Shaoliu's head.

"You want me to have it? But it's useless for me! The golden hoop won't let me condense any gold life rings, and it'll just be wasted on me since I can't even metalize."

Xiao Bai knowingly came up and ingratiatingly rubbed his snout on Jiang Shaoliu.

"The Monkey King and I don't want it, so you want to take it?" Jiang Shaoliu considered it for a moment and then decisively shook his head: "This fruit is used to transform silver rings into golden rings. What if it blows up your stomach since you only have bronze rings?"

Xiao Bai crept around the fruit hesitantly, sniffing it suspiciously.

"Oooh!" The Monkey King poked Jiang Shaoliu in the gut and made a circle with its palms, slowly lowering it over him while tapping the ground excitedly with its tail.

Jiang Shaoliu's eyes opened wide. "You mean, I could condense another life ring?"

The Monkey King nodded vigorously.

"Aha…" Jiang Shaoliu grinned and looked at the Lingbao fruit again. "Looks juicy. I wonder what it tastes like?" He rolled up his cuffs and broke off the remaining vines still clinging to the fruit, then picked it up and took a bite.

It was crisp, and the warm, thick, juicy pulp melted in his mouth, being fully absorbed immediately upon entering his stomach, only to be transformed into a special stream of true qi flowing through his meridians to condense in the liver.

"That's why they call it a golden abyss. I can digest anything!" Jiang Shaoliu hungrily bit into the bulky fruit again and again.

The new true qi rapidly made its way into his liver, condensing into a gold circle which was in turn quickly pressed down to bronze by the golden hoop. Later, many tiny new pores appeared on the surface of his Liver Channel, emerging from the liver and leading to the feet.

Gradually, his body started feeling increasingly light, almost floating.

With his third life ring condensed, Jiang Shaoliu put his hands on his hips and beamed with joy.

There was now only a small piece of the Lingbao fruit left. Xiao Bai stared at it with the concentration of a sniper, a small waterfall of drool falling from his huge jowls.

"Oh fine, you can have some too," Jiang Shaoliu laughed and handed it to him.

Chapter end