Chapter Eight: Refining the Heartfire (Part One)

The little boy was, of course, Wang Luo. He was now five years old, and thanks to his cultivation techniques, he was full of energy—running, jumping, eating, and drinking with ease.

As for sleep, ever since his first cultivation session, Wang Luo had fallen in love with the sensation it brought. From then on, he replaced sleep with cultivation. He practiced both the nameless technique and a body-forging method simultaneously. In the process, Wang Luo discovered that no matter how hard he tried, the body-forging method could never surpass the nameless technique; at best, it could only keep pace with it.

By now, Wang Luo had reached the late stage of Qi Refinement—he had broken through just that morning. If not for this, Little White would have left him far behind in today's race.

Little White was the name Wang Luo gave the tiny white lion. The two were inseparable. Over the past five years, Wang Luo had grown much taller, but Little White seemed never to change, retaining its adorable, petite form.

Still, Wang Luo never underestimated the little creature. Despite Little White spending its days eating, drinking, playing, and sleeping, its strength was formidable. Wang Luo could only barely keep up with it through nightly cultivation, which always left him feeling a bit defeated, marveling at how abnormal Little White was.

After five years in this place, Wang Luo had fully integrated into the lion family and become one of them. Life during these five years was peaceful without being dull. Not only did the adorable Little White sometimes bring Wang Luo laughter, but the lion father was also quite the character.

Every time Wang Luo saw the lion father's doubtful gaze upon Little White, he couldn't help but find it amusing. All in all, Wang Luo was content with his current life.

Sometimes, Wang Luo would think of Li Lei and reminisce about the past, recalling how Li Lei once mentioned things like "century-old Core Formation" or "millennium-old Nascent Soul" in front of him.

Whenever he thought of this, Wang Luo couldn't help but wonder: Would he, too, need to cultivate for a thousand years and become some ancient monster?

After all, according to the classification of cultivation techniques, progress became increasingly difficult as one advanced. Perhaps he really would need a thousand years to cultivate. But could he even live that long?

Of course, these were just idle thoughts that Wang Luo entertained when bored, merely to pass the time. If he couldn't figure it out, he wouldn't bother thinking further.

A soft "woo-woo" brought Wang Luo out of his reverie. He looked down to find Little White calling for him. Snapping back to the present, Wang Luo pressed Little White into the water, leaving only its head above the surface, and began rubbing its fur, bathing it.

At the same time, he glanced at the two lions nearby, who were nuzzling each other affectionately. They sensed Wang Luo's gaze and looked over.

“Lion Dad, Lion Mom, Little White is hungry! It’s time for you to go hunting!” Seeing their attention, Wang Luo called out to them, while simultaneously squeezing Little White in the water. Little White immediately caught on and gave a few plaintive cries to the two lions.

Lion Mom gave a low growl to the two little ones, leaped ashore, and escaped Lion Dad’s playful grasp. Lion Dad glared at Wang Luo in annoyance, then followed her onto the bank, and together they dashed into the forest.

Just before leaving, Lion Dad dug a hind leg into the ground, sending a spray of mud flying toward Wang Luo in the water. But Wang Luo, anticipating this, had already ducked underwater and easily avoided it.

However, when he poked his head up, he saw his hide skirt on the shore had transformed into a flurry of beautiful butterflies fluttering through the air.

Wang Luo looked on helplessly at Lion Dad, who shot him a smug look. Smiling faintly in response, Wang Luo pointed to a large tree not far from the pool.

There, several hide skirts hung from the branches like triumphant banners waving in the breeze. Lion Dad paused a moment, then snorted coldly and hurried after Lion Mom.

With two heavy thuds, in less than half an hour, the two monsters dropped by the edge of the pool. Wang Luo and Little White, who had been playing in the water, turned to look.

The two beasts were three or four meters tall, five or six meters long, each with a half-meter crimson horn on its head, resembling enormous oxen. They lay quietly by the water.

Wang Luo was no longer surprised by such monsters. Over the past five years, every hunt Lion Dad and Mom returned from brought back some new creature.

There had been giant bears four or five meters tall, wolves with fiery red pelts, and now the red-horned oxen—so many varieties Wang Luo had never seen before.

Yet all these creatures shared one trait: in each of their skulls was a gemstone the size of a hen’s egg, the same kind of gems scattered all over the lion’s cave.

Wang Luo could sense that each gem contained a great amount of energy, but he had no idea what they were for. So, he simply paved the entire cave floor with them, making it dazzling and splendid, and used them for lighting and decoration.

“Lion Dad and Mom are getting more and more amazing!” Wang Luo exclaimed, giving them a hearty thumbs-up as the lion couple emerged from behind the slain monsters. Little White echoed his approval with cheerful cries.

At the praise from the two little ones, Lion Mom gave a smile almost human in its warmth, while Lion Dad answered with a proud, dismissive snort.

Wang Luo ignored Lion Dad, scooped up Little White, leaped from the pool, tied on his hide skirt, and picked up a sturdy wooden pole—about as thick as his arm and two or three meters long—which he had prepared earlier.

Standing beside the dead red-horned ox, Lion Dad raised a forepaw and, with practiced ease, sliced the carcass into neat chunks, which he threaded onto the pole.

Wang Luo rinsed the skewered meat in water, set it on a rack he’d built, and then fetched another stick, taking his place beside the ox.

With swift cooperation between Wang Luo and Lion Dad, the ox was soon butchered into skewers of meat, leaving only the crimson-horned head behind.

Little White scampered around Wang Luo in delight. When the ox was fully skewered, he crouched to the side in curiosity, stretching out his fluffy little paws to count the number of skewers. But perhaps his two paws weren’t enough, for he always ended up counting wrong.

After glancing at Little White, still fixated on counting meat skewers, Wang Luo sat cross-legged before twelve large ones.

His hands moved through a series of intricate gestures, and a wisp of crimson flame emerged mysteriously from his palm. In the air, it split into twelve streams, each striking a skewer. One by one, the skewers were enveloped in the red flame.

This crimson fire was the Heartfire, a flame born alongside the nameless technique he cultivated. Heartfire came in nine colors.

It started as red, and as its power grew, its hue would shift through the spectrum—orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet—before finally splitting into black and white, a most wondrous sight.

After glancing once at Wang Luo conjuring Heartfire, Lion Dad and Mom resumed their flirtation by the pool. They had seen this process many times and could recite it by heart.

Unable to keep track of the meat skewers, Little White soon gave up and began leaping from skewer to skewer within the circle of fire, playing to his heart's content.

Chapter Eight of Azure Dragon of the Otherworld: Heartfire (Part One) Complete!