CHAPTER 41 TASK

When Darren woke up, he found himself already back in his room.

His meridians were shattered and he was in severe pain. He found it difficult to even sit up.

"I have a lot to do to improve my cultivation base by assimilating spiritual energy. My talent of the Black

Degree can be used to comprehend cultivation methods. But as of now, it can't be used to absorb

spiritual energy yet," murmured Darren with a bit of a pity, evaluating his current state.

He then sat up slowly and took out a healing pill.

'I do not know whether or not this healing pill will help with my injury. I can't take it directly, the spiritual

energy inside it might damage my meridians, ' he thought.

Considering it for a while, Darren decided to directly assimilate the healing pill.

After a moment, a puff of white smoke rose out from his body.

"Well, that worked. I feel a little better."

Darren found assimilating the healing pill helpful. He then assimilated two more. In a few minutes, he

found himself feeling so much better than before.

Darren slowly got off his bed, feeling a bit worried.

If he were to improve his cultivation base by assimilation, he would need plenty of resources. Where

could he get them?

Just as he was thinking, the door to his room opened.

"Darren, are you feeling better?" asked a soft voice. It was Fiona, the girl Darren had met on the road

before.

She looked around cautiously for fear of being seen.

"Fiona, why are you coming here?" asked Darren.

"I came to see you. It's really unfortunate for you to have to suffer so many bad things. Someone from

the School of Blade Skill told me what happened and... Oh, forget it!" Fiona said, embarrassed.

"Ha-ha, did they all say that I would not live long?" Darren said with a smile.

Several books told of how fusing the sword intent seed and the blade intent seed caused someone to

gather an immense amount of power for a limited amount of time before the force killed him internally

because of broken meridians. Looking back at his fight with Karl yesterday, Darren did realize how

powerful he was. Given that, she felt quite sure that he was about to die soon.

Fiona felt bad about what Darren had to go through. She nodded slowly.

"I'm really sorry that something like this has happened to you, Darren. Although you and I have not

known each other very long, I still feel very sad for you," Fiona said sincerely.

"It's all right. I might find a way to survive it," Darren replied calmly. In his mind, as long as he did not

absorb spiritual energy from the outside world, he should be able to properly protect his meridians.

"I hope so," Fiona replied sadly. "Well, here are the superior spiritual herbs that I got from the School of

Blade Skill. They might be something useful for you."

Fiona took out three superior spiritual herbs that she got as a reward when she chose a school of

martial arts skill. Now, they were Darren's.

"Oh no, Fiona, you should keep those for yourself," insisted Darren. He knew that Fiona only got a few

spiritual herbs every month. Those were very precious to her. Besides, the three spiritual herbs she

gave him were not going to do him much good. He really needed a lot of resources.

"Just take it! I have to go now," Fiona said anxiously. "The people from my school are biased against

you. If they find out that I came to see you, I will be in trouble. Take care, Darren."

Without even waiting for Darren's reply, Fiona slipped away as quickly as she came in.

Darren looked at the three spiritual herbs and shook his head. He understood how valuable these could

have been for her. The gesture moved him deeply.

Then and there, Darren decided that he would do whatever he could if Fiona ever needed his help.

In no time, Darren finished completely assimilating the three spiritual herbs. He had to do it right away

as their exposure to air would make their spiritual energy disappear if they weren't consumed on time.

After assimilating them, he accumulated a little sword and blade internal force in his body. Although it

was not enough to make him recover completely, it still managed to help him walk.

"I need to find a lot of resources that contain spiritual energy fast. It looks like I have to go to the sect to

take on tasks," he murmured to himself.

This was the only way Darren thought he could get the resources he needed.

Immediately, Darren headed towards the task distribution area of the Ilmen Sect.

By the time he arrived he found that there already were many people surrounding the list that contained

a hundred tasks.

Seeing Darren coming, many people started whispering to each other.

"Look, that's Darren, the guy who has a talent of the Black Degree," one person said.

"Oh! Now that he is just an ordinary person, I will go and make fun of him," another voice said.

"Stop, you're crazy! You didn't see what happened yesterday. If you were there, you'd know that that's

a bad idea. He killed a disciple at the third stage of the Spirit Realm even though he was just at the first

stage," someone added.

"What the fuck... Really? Was he the guy in the news yesterday? Good gracious! Good thing you told

me. I would have been killed by him too!"

"Yeah, you were planning to provoke him? Ha-ha!".

Darren walked past the gossiping crowd and ignored the comments. He started to scan the list.

"There's a task of collecting fifty spiritual herbs that has to be done in three days. The reward would be

a spiritual herb," he read to himself.

"That's too little," murmured Darren. He shook his head and continued to look for better tasks.

After scanning the list for a long time, Darren found that the tasks were ones that mostly just required

physical labor and that their rewards were quite insignificant.

Immediately, he looked at the top of the list where there were three tasks marked with red lines. These

attracted his attention.

"All three missions involve going to the Barren Wasteland," murmured Darren.

"Wow, what a nice reward! One hundred superior spiritual herbs and one Star Spiritual Stone!"

Darren suddenly perked up with interest. One hundred superior spiritual herbs were already precious

enough. The Star Spiritual Stone added to the package was even comparable to the Holy Star Herb. It

contained so much spiritual energy.

"The first task is going into the Barren Wasteland and killing a level-7 diabolic beast!"

The diabolic beast was the evolution of a beast. A level-7 diabolic beast was comparable to a human at

the ninth stage of the Spirit Realm. Darren shook his head because this was something that he was not

confident he could do.

Furthermore, he found that there were already several people who wanted to claim the task. It was very

likely that someone already did it.

"Dalton took the task? It's said that he is a genius who has the talent of the third level of the Black

Degree," whispered Darren. He had heard of his name in the square.

Darren continued to check the second task. It was also a task that involved the killing of diabolic

beasts. It was already taken too.

The third task had a reward much better than the first two tasks, but in Darren's view, its difficulty was

much lower.

The task wrote, "Go deep into the Barren Wasteland and explore. If you find something strange, come

back and report it immediately!"

Looking at the task, Darren felt like it was something he could finish successfully. He had heard that the

Barren Wasteland was dangerous. He had only entered the outskirts of it before. Still, it should be easy

enough if he only needed to explore. Besides, if any danger arrived, he could just escape it.

Without hesitation, Darren wrote his name under the task and took it on.

Seeing Darren take on the task, the mouths of the disciples around him all fell open with surprise.

"Oh my goodness! He has taken on that task. I heard it was related to fiends. Dalton wanted to take it

on recently, but Elder Alan severely scolded him because he thought that accepting the task was

suicide," one disciple said.

"Yeah, I also heard that deep within the Barren Wasteland, people found corpses of the cultivators in

the Wonder Realm. Rumor has it that the corpses were half eaten. Horrible, right? I can't believe

anyone would dare to accept that task!" another commented.

Darren frowned at the remarks.

"Congratulations, brother! You have successfully taken on the task. I wish you every success on your

endeavor. This is the task token. When you finish the task, you may go to the Resource Pavilion to

claim your reward. Here you are!" A disciple who was in charge of the task list handed the task token to NôvelD(ram)a.ôrg owns this content.

Darren immediately for fear that he would back out.

The truth was that Darren started to worry a little when he heard the people talking about the task. At

the same time, it intrigued him even more. Besides, he was in desperate need of the resources. If he

entered the Barren Wasteland, he might even be able to slay some level-9 beasts. He could then

assimilate their talents and spiritual energy from their cardiac cores.

With those thoughts, Darren put away the task token and went on his way, ignoring the others.