BWFoster78

Chapter 165 – Vengeance

Jin LiJuan tried not to hate spirit beasts, but the task was difficult. She was highly motivated, though. Master didn’t ask much of her, just that one thing.

She hadn’t understood why Master even asked her not to kill beasts in anger. Th...

Chapter 164 – Goodbye Home

Benton grinned. He had the core of his sect placed. The Administration Hall, the Library, the Lecture Hall, the Amphitheater, six pavilions, and a couple of auxiliary buildings had been installed near the eventual gate. A short distance away was t...

Chapter 163 – Placemaking

12/22/24 A/N: Sorry for being a little late in my posting. I'm traveling for the holidays, and there was a glitch with the wifi and my mother-in-law's house.

Benton frowned as he received a notification. Not a half hour had passed since he ...

Chapter 162 – A Slippery Solution

The Trials Pagoda immediately approved Yang Xiu’s request to be attempt a trial to improve her shield technique, and the next thing she knew, she was standing in a room that was unfamiliar to her. The floor was covered with some sort of springy ...

Chapter 161 – Volunteer

Nighttime neared as Benton watched over the fifty newest inductees into the Rising Tide Sect while they all writhed in agony. He dearly hoped they all would be as positive that improving their spiritual roots was worth the pain after they finished...

Chapter 160c – Arc 2 Prologue

When Teng Wuying imagined climbing to a high position in the Jade Chameleon Sect, he never envisioned quite so much paperwork. As he signed one report and picked up another, his assistant stepped into the room.

“Your Esteemed Brother, Teng...

Chapter 160b – End of Arc 1 Important Characters

Chapter 160a – Arc 1 Epilogue

12/17/24 A/N: Okay, this is kind of a weird way of doing things, but I'm combining three of what would be chapters in a novel into a single post. The first is this epilogue, which is almost long enough to stand alone. The second, though, is a tabl...

Chapter 159 – Trials and Tribulations

Kang Lin waited in the stands of the arena, eagerly anticipating Master’s presentation to begin. When he announced that there would be rewards, she was sure that, considering the source, it would be something over the top and nearly impossible.<...

Chapter 158 – Celebrate Good Times

Despite Benton’s reservation about the Trial Pagoda being a point sink, he pulled the trigger, confirming that reward as his selection, and the System stowed the building in his spatial ring. The time taken to bathe and deal with the prompts all...

Chapter 157 – Well Played

Benton slowly lessened the effect of his gravity burst, lowering him to the ground. Once he landed, he stowed the cyclops’ corpse in his spatial ring. It occurred to him that the fight would have gone a lot better had he known about the beast’...

Chapter 156 – High Tide

Benton hated that he would have to risk everything in a fight that he wasn’t assured of winning. What was the saying? It was something like, if the outcome of a fight is in question before you start, you’ve already messed up.

Well, he’...

Chapter 155 – Unexpected Revelation

12/10/24 Author's Note: I wasn't really satisfied with the ending of the last chapter. In particular, the reason that Kang Lin attributed to Yang Ru's interruption made no sense whatsoever in the context of the story. I've been stewing over how to...

Chapter 154 – Alright Stop, Meditate and Listen

Zou Tian stepped out of the light and into Shadow. As he anticipated, the badger began moving as soon as he’d fully entered the alley.

It was decision time. Would it go for his throat or the coins? With the creatures extreme speed, especia...

Chapter 153 – Attack a Creature a Major Realm and a Half Higher Than Me? Sure.

Yang Ru was a step away from the shadowed alley when he heard the call to stop. Already primed to react to the slightest stimulus, Yang Ru halted. Cupping the shaft of his spear around the pile of spirit coins in his hands, he brought his weapon u...

Chapter 152 – An Aura of Success or Failure?

Benton dropped Stealth just before loosing the bowstring simply because it felt more sporting to give the eagle a chance in lieu of having the swift arrow appear literally out of nowhere. Not that it mattered. His Foundation Establishment level ar...

Chapter 151 – Into the Danger Zone

Benton stood atop a cliff, looking over a wide valley. In the distance, a single snow-covered peak rose, ascending into the clouds. The qi signature at the top was so strong that it almost overwhelmed his spiritual sense even from miles away.

Chapter 150 – The Badger Strikes

By the time Benton found the eighth wave, he still hadn’t gotten any notifications indicating advancements from his sect members. He was beginning to get worried. There was absolutely nothing he could do about whatever was going on with his disc...

Chapter 149 – Alert!

Benton grew concerned as he continued his search for the eighth wave. His disciples should have long since been able to dispatch the two rank six beasts that attacked the village and followed that fight up with consolidating their gains. So far, t...

Chapter 148 - Worst Nightmare

Finally, Benton found the seventh wave at the edge of his spiritual sense, and he Quickstepped several hundred yards in front of them, placing himself between the beasts and the village. Immediately, he activated his Stealth technique and Quickste...

Chapter 147 – The Kobayashi Maru

Ye Zan watched the two injured cultivators leap back over the wall. The cheetah jumped after them, but the shield held, repelling it.

He struggled with what he’d just witnessed. Frankly, Yang Ru and especially Kang Lin had been lucky to es...

Chapter 146 – That Didn’t Work

It wasn’t long after Benton sensed the last of the rank five beasts near the village dying that he received the notifications. Yang Xiu advanced her attack technique to Large Success. Even better, Yang Ru did the same for both his primary techni...

Chapter 145 – A Turtle, a Fork, and a Shell

The fight between Kang Lin and the turtle continued. Most of her thrusts landed, but the damage they caused was trivial for a rank five beast with such high defense and vitality.

Its head blurred toward her, and she dodged. It was slow to mo...

Chapter 144 – Razor’s Edge

11/25/24 A/N: I'm on vacation this week. I didn't anticipate that impacting my release times, but I posted this chapter and the last a little later than intended. I'm hoping to return to my normal practice of releasing the night before for the res...

Chapter 143 – Shut Up

Benton was not encouraged with the way the beast tide was progressing. The first three waves had been great. Better than great. Awesome. Perfect.

His sect members had dispatched the creatures with barely any assistance from him and had advan...

Chapter 142 – Better to Lose a Fortune

The fast approaching fourth wave worried Benton greatly. The beast tide was not likely to crest at rank six, and any higher than that was the equivalent of Golden Core and above. Fighting such an opponent near the village was a bad idea.

The...

Chapter 141 – Saving Resources

Benton watched his sect members engage the third wave at melee range. The heaviest hitters were Ye Zan’s two guard groups, but Zi Delan and his team did surprisingly well. Other assorted fighters who’d advanced to the peak of Bronze Body Culti...

Chapter 140 – Good as New

The second wave passed in much the same manner as the first. About two-thirds as many beasts hurled themselves at the village wall. They were slightly more powerful than the previous attackers, but both the wall and the shield held. Increased toug...

Chapter 139 – Many a Slip

Zou Tian danced around the edges of the pile of spirit beasts, his dagger flashing as he killed a creature with every strike.

The rest of the sect members he’d exited the village with were all inundated by the creatures, but his Hide Prese...

Chapter 138 – Waxing Tide

Benton felt pretty good about himself. His barrier worked perfectly, and the morale of all the villagers and the sect members defending the wall seemed to be high.

Pan Jiang, in particular, was grinning like the proverbial cat who’d ate th...