Huo Ye made it to the clearing in a little over what he estimated to be two hours. He usually took about thirty minutes, but dragging the cart behind took time. Any person strong enough to ward off the negative effect of the fog would still need dozens of hours to breakthrough as their perception was affected. Ling Ye was not the average person. Not only did he have an innate GPS,¹Global Positioning System, in reference to his ability to navigate through the fog he physically fit from climbing up and down the mountain all the time. The only issue with Huo Ye’s plan was how fit he was. At the end of the day, he was still a skinny youth whose hands were still soft.

Huo Ye took a deep breath, lifting up the axe he had grabbed from the cart and took a hard swing. He ducked, wincing as the axe head flew over his shoulder. It was quite a stupid move even from his perspective, but he needed to know the effectiveness of regular tools against the spiritual trees.

He sighed and walked over to the tree. The slight gash on the tree which couldn’t even be defined by centimetres made him happy he had not lost his life in this trial otherwise he would have been too embarrassed to go to hell after having already escaped death once.

Huo Ye ran his fingers along the groove, before adjusting his plans. He grabbed the axe head, formed a pocket around it in his trouser leg by knotting the fabric together and walked into the forest.

After spotting a good enough tree, he climbed up onto one of its branches. Positioning himself over another branch about five centimetres in thickness, he shook the branch beneath him to see how much it would give. The branch bent slightly.

Satisfied by the result, Huo took his shirt off, wrapping his hands in the thin fabric. He held on tightly to the branch he was sitting on, then gently began to lower himself onto the other branch. After much manoeuvring, Huo Ye had firmly planted his feet on the thin branch, his heart pounding each time it sunk a bit further. He regretted cursing at Ling Ye for having such a body. The branch continued to dip until Huo Ye felt that it wouldn’t bend any further.

Risking being catapulted, Huo Ye lifted up his leg. He hurriedly grabbed the axe head and returned to his position. Tension mounted with each passing moment as he attempted to notch a mark beneath the branch he was hanging on to.

For what felt like hours but was really minutes, Huo Ye consistently scratched at one spot. When he had made a mark which was visible enough at a glance, he dropped the axe head to the ground and worked at pulling himself up. Using the recoil of the lower branch, Huo Ye was able to scramble up. It felt like a waste of effort when he had to climb back down immediately, but he preferred this to falling out of the tree, flung off the lower branch.

The second his feet touched the ground, Huo Ye collapsed, his chest heaving more from the mental strain than the physical exertion.

He rolled over, examining the edge of the axe head, now dull and not good enough for cutting anymore. He’d wanted to know just how tough the trunk was but knew that a regular axe just wouldn’t cut it. Using the stress of hanging on to the branch, he was able to use the blunt edge to make some progress. If he could get through a branch with a flimsy axe head, he could definitely get through the sturdy trunk with a spiritual axe.

After staring at the clouds for who-knows-how long, Huo Ye managed to gather the energy to get up. Ling Su had still not returned. Huo Ye looked longingly at the doorway, even the thought of that wretched bed was well welcomed.

The thought of failing to meet his deadline propelled him back into the woods, with his cart, to pick some rocks. It was quite obvious that ordinary tools just weren’t going to cut it. He became pensive as he thought of the right rock to choose.

A bit of metal would be better for the axe head but seeing as there was no convenient metal casually lying around, stone was the next best option. Huo Ye had no way of discerning which rock was better at a glance so had to resort to collecting different types of rocks of about the same size. After about an hour, he had gathered at least three each of every rock.

He walked back to the clearing with his new rock collection. This time, Ling Su was waiting for him at the doorstep. She was empty handed, but looking behind her, just about a metre into the forest were baskets of what he assumed were spiritual herbs.

Ling Su got up to welcome him, taking a few steps forward before stopping abruptly.

“Why do you have a cart? Furthermore, why do you have rocks in the cart?”

Huo Ye guessed that it must look a bit weird dedicating a whole cart to a bunch of fist sized stones.

“I borrowed it from Shao Zihan.”

Ling Su choked a bit. Don’t tell me his ultimate plan was to mooch off the Shao family?

It’s true he never promised to turn over a new leaf, but it was heavily implied.

“Xiao Ye…” “Don’t worry. It’s only for a week. Why don’t you get to work sorting out the herbs? I’ve used up all the money so we may not have enough for tomorrow.”

Ling Su looked like she wanted to ask more questions before she retreated into the woods.

Huo Ye then gathered up his rocks, grouping them according to type. He grabbed a stick, then lined up one of each rock. After labelling them with numbers in the sand, he picked up another No.1 rock, lifting it high above his head and smashed it into the No.2 rock. The No.1 rock in his hands split open, leaving a gash on his hand.

He stripped off his shirt and wrapped his hand in it. Grabbing his stick, he scribbled ‘No.1’ underneath the rock labelled No.2. He continued, smashing No.2 into a No.3 rock. This time around, the rock in his hand did not crack, but rather the No.3 crumbled instantly.

He once again wrote under the No.2 rock. Huo Ye added a greater than sign to his first result and scrawled ‘>>No.3’.

It was long work, trying out different combinations to find out which rock was stronger. He had to reverse the positions of the rock each time the gap in durability wasn’t obvious because the result sometimes varied vice versa.

The glare of the sun as it set roused Huo Ye from his slumber. He had fallen asleep right after completing his experiments and had skipped lunch. Having skipped breakfast as well, the pangs in his stomach told him to get over himself. A single meal of whatever that gruel was wouldn’t kill him. He dragged himself up, entered and smiled tiredly at Ling Su. Ling Su could see he was exhausted hence decided to leave all questions for the next day.

After downing his dinner, with much help from his guardian angel, Huo Ye ripped the only blank page out from the cultivation manual. He grabbed a tiny piece of charcoal from the drawer, which he had overlooked before, and went out to record his findings.

Out of eighteen samples, No.13 was proven to be the strongest, with No.7 following. After recording his findings he hunted down two melon sized rocks of No.7 and collected quite a number of fist sized No.13s. He was fully prepared for tomorrow.

He left the rocks in the clearing so that the spiritual energy would dissipate. With the sun gone down, the lone source of light was the candle Ling Su had stood on the windowsill.

Huo Ye was super motivated to go to bed now. Puffing out the candle, he crawled into the space between Ling Su, who was asleep on the bed, and the wall. Huo Ye was on the verge on collapsing and had no time to spare on thinking about morality and dignity.

It doesn’t matter. After all, she’s my sister. This was the last thought on his mind as he drifted off to sleep.