The Quest for Immortality - Chapter 1164 (Patreon)

Chapter 1164: Teacher

Late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivation, with a twenty-two-pattern, Golden Core–class divine sense.

After breaking the bottleneck, his sea of consciousness expanded. Once his divine sense stabilized, Mo Hua could clearly feel his divine thought had grown stronger again.

Not only was his sea of consciousness deeper and his divine thought tougher and more precise to control, but—vaguely—his understanding of Golden Core–level power had also become a shade more profound.

To grasp Golden Core power while still in Foundation Establishment— even if that power was not spiritual power or blood qi but purely of the divine-sense domain—was rare and precious, and immensely beneficial to Mo Hua’s cultivation.

He even suddenly had an illusion.

Because he’d comprehended ahead of his realm—his divine sense stepping into a higher grade—the bottleneck for forming his core seemed it would be much smaller.

Before his body truly condensed a Golden Core, he already possessed a Golden Core’s divine thought.

“Golden Core…”

Mo Hua clenched his fair hand and murmured in his heart: “Just two more patterns, and I can learn the Glutton Pattern, cast the Lifebound Spirit Remains Array, and form my Golden Core…”

“This process is so long, so grueling, and has taken too much scheming.”

“I hope this Great Wilderness set of taboo Glutton Absolute Arrays won’t let me down…”

“Just two more patterns…”

Mo Hua’s eyes brightened slightly.

He had to admit: the faith-offerings of the Great Wilderness savage gods, nourished by incense power from believers, produced a mental-nourishing effect that was truly excellent.

So excellent it even surprised him.

The path of proving the Dao with divine sense is harsh. Otherwise, there was no way he could have advanced to twenty-two patterns in such a short span.

This chance was exceedingly precious. He had to seize the time and “eat” more.

Raise the realm of his divine thought as quickly as possible.

Only with divine sense enough could he pry into the boundless mysteries within the Great Wilderness Glutton Absolute Arrays, and begin to fathom the rule-power of the Golden Core realm.

The next day, in the command tent.

Mo Hua summoned Elder Zhamu and said, “Elder Zhamu, do something for me.”

Elder Zhamu saluted. “I will obey the honored shaman’s command.”

Mo Hua handed him a stack of hide paper. “Go survey the mountains around the Black Horn Tribe. Record the locations of all nearby tribes and, for each tribe’s savage god, write down its name, origin, and method of worship. Put it all on these sheets and bring them back to me.”

“I’ll send a few people to protect you. Be careful.”

Elder Zhamu respectfully accepted the hide paper. He hesitated a moment and then said slowly, “Honored Shaman, may this old one ask one thing?”

Mo Hua nodded. “Ask.”

“These savage gods… they…”

Elder Zhamu stopped mid-sentence, not daring to continue.

Mo Hua understood what he meant, and said solemnly:

“The grace of the savage gods comes from the Divine Lord. In the end, they all return to the Divine Lord’s source. That, too, is a form of salvation.”

Elder Zhamu’s expression shook; he nodded slowly. “This old one understands.”

Holding the hide paper bestowed by Mo Hua, Elder Zhamu went off to “register” the savage gods.

Mo Hua then summoned another elder of the Black Horn Tribe.

The chieftain of the Black Horns had been hot-tempered and stubborn to the point of preferring death; he had already died in the previous battle—beheaded with a single strike by Wusha, chieftain of the Wulu Tribe.

Besides the chieftain, the Black Horns had five elders.

Of the five, one had died and one had fled. Of the remaining three, the oldest and most knowledgeable was named “Jiao Hu.”

He was exactly the one Mo Hua had summoned to question today.

Wrinkles covered Elder Jiao Hu’s face. On seeing Mo Hua, he lowered his head and saluted. “Honored Shaman.”

Mo Hua gave him a once-over and asked, “Does your Black Horn Tribe possess a method for forging war-armor?”

This was a tribal secret. Elder Jiao Hu kept his mouth shut.

Mo Hua’s tone turned cool. “The Divine Lord’s grace demands piety.”

“To the impious, the Divine Lord also descends wrath.”

“The Divine Lord’s might reaches the heavens. A mere trace of that wrath can burn your Black Horn Tribe to ashes.”

Elder Jiao Hu’s heart lurched. He glanced up at Mo Hua’s calm, unfathomable eyes, and felt pressure settle over his sea of consciousness—his divine sense even tingled with pain. He no longer dared be careless and answered respectfully:

“Yes. Our Black Horn Tribe indeed has a method to forge armor.”

“Where did your armor-casting method come from?” Mo Hua asked.

“It has been passed down in my tribe since ancient times,” Elder Jiao Hu replied.

“Since ancient times…” Mo Hua was a little surprised. “How long is your tribe’s history?”

“According to our ancestral records, two thousand one hundred years.”

Mo Hua inclined his head slightly.

In this wild land, where tribes constantly battled and devoured one another, two millennia of history was indeed no short length.

However…

“With two thousand years of armor-crafting, your method amounts to only this?” Mo Hua was curious.

Elder Jiao Hu’s cheeks flushed—clearly ashamed and angry—and he argued, “That is our incompetence. We cannot recreate the glory of our ancestors; we cannot cast the Black Horn War-Armor or raise the Black Horn heavy troops. Hence this defeat—and even the chieftain met calamity and was parted from his head…”

Mo Hua smiled faintly. “You mean I was your ‘calamity’?”

Elder Jiao Hu lowered his head and said through clenched teeth, “I would not dare.”

“Take me to your forging place,” Mo Hua said lightly.

Elder Jiao Hu hesitated a beat, then gritted his teeth. “Yes, Honored Shaman.”

He led Mo Hua to a sealed cave in the back mountain of the Black Horn Tribe.

By now the cave had been forced open, and everything inside lay exposed.

This was the work of the Wulu Tribe when they plundered Black Horn property.

If not for that, Elder Jiao Hu would undoubtedly have kept it hidden—he would never have “led the wolf into the house” and brought Mo Hua into their armor-forging cave.

Inside the cave were several black, tough suits of war-armor.

There were also many scraps of material, along with half-finished leather and armored garments.

Mo Hua swept his gaze around and felt a stir in his heart.

He had previously considered forging armor for the barbarian soldiers under his command in the Wutu Mountain Domain, but when it came time to do it, he found it wouldn’t work.

First, while he possessed knowledge of artifact forging—and his eye and insight were not bad—

he was no artifact refiner. Frail since childhood, he couldn’t swing a great hammer, and he lacked hands-on forging experience.

In the Great Void Sect, his grades in the refining class had always been at the bottom.

So he could draw arrays—but not refine artifacts himself.

Second, the refining heritage of the Great Wilderness differed from that of the Nine Provinces.

The materials used, the casting means, the tempering methods—there were many differences.

Mo Hua knew little of these.

In this remote place he also had no way to acquire large quantities of refining materials. Thus the plan to forge weapons and armor had been set aside.

But the Black Horn war-armor before him offered him some openings and reference points.

Mo Hua paced the cave, circling once, and ran through the forging processes of the various armors, one by one, in his mind.

He even disassembled some suits on the spot to inspect their internal structures and formation patterns.

Elder Jiao Hu watched from the side, heart aching.

These were the rarest treasures of the Black Horn Tribe.

Yet Mo Hua simply looked when he wished to look, tore when he wished to tear—how could Elder Jiao Hu not feel bittersweet pain?

When Mo Hua had finished dismantling and studying, he asked, “Do you know the method for forging the Black Horn war-armor?”

“I know only a little,” Elder Jiao Hu said.

Mo Hua was taken aback. “You’re an elder—and you know only a little?”

He had thought this Jiao Hu, being the eldest and most senior, would surely hold the tribe’s core secrets.

But Elder Jiao Hu said, “The armor-casting method is our tribe’s most secret legacy. It is split into eight parts. The chieftain held the two most vital parts; I held two; and the other four elders each held one.”

“Only by combining them can you obtain the complete Black Horn armor method.”

He finished with half relief, half schadenfreude, and a trace of bitterness: “Now the chieftain has been killed by you, one elder is dead, and another has fled. This armor-casting method may be lost forever—never again to be known…”

“It’s fine,” Mo Hua said kindly. “If you don’t know it, I’ll tell you.”

Elder Jiao Hu froze.

He had no idea what this honored shaman was talking about…

Mo Hua took out brush and paper and sketched a refiner’s diagram, drawing the Black Horn Tribe’s most secret forging process for the Black Horn war-armor from beginning to end.

Elder Jiao Hu watched at his side, growing ever more alarmed, waves crashing through his chest, until he cried out in shock: “Th-this! How… how could you know this?”

Mo Hua’s expression was subtle.

To him, it was something you could see at a glance. He had no idea why Elder Jiao Hu was so astonished.

Mo Hua ignored him and kept drawing.

At the end, he casually added the Four Symbols Ox Horn Patterns involved in the Black Horn war-armor diagram.

Those few profound Ox Horn Patterns of the Four Symbols crushed the pride and faith within Elder Jiao Hu.

He seemed to turn into dust-laden wind and sand.

At last, he slowly raised his head. The shock drained away. He looked at Mo Hua with eyes full of reverence. “You… are you truly a shaman?”

Mo Hua was slightly surprised. “Why—do I not look like one?”

Elder Jiao Hu stared at Mo Hua in silence.

So young, a face as pale and clean as the moon, and not a single tribal totem inscribed on his body—what part of him looked like a “shaman”?

At first he had taken this youthful “shaman” for a charlatan.

This happened often.

In the Great Wilderness, every few decades, someone would act under the banner of “shaman,” and it was hard to tell truth from falsehood.

Some even truly believed themselves to be shamans.

But how exalted is the shaman’s station? How hard to become one? Those who truly became shamans served the royal court—how could they swagger about everywhere?

As for bringing peace and prosperity—nonsense.

However…

Elder Jiao Hu looked deeply at the formation lines under Mo Hua’s brush. Reverence filled his face; he couldn’t help bending at the waist and saying reverently:

“This old one truly did doubt your identity as shaman.”

“But such profound ‘sacred patterns’—besides a genuine shaman who serves the royal court—there could be no one who could draw them…”

Mo Hua’s heart stirred.

Sacred patterns…

Did he mean formation patterns?

Then he thought again—that wasn’t quite right.

At least the Five Elements and Eight Trigrams formation lines were not regarded by the tribes as “sacred.”

So “sacred patterns” referred to the native Four Symbols beast patterns passed down in the Great Wilderness from ancient times? And to the Four Holy Beasts patterns derived from the Four Symbols origins?

Mo Hua nodded slightly.

Framed that way, it made sense.

The title of “shaman” could be faked, but sacred patterns could not.

Formations are difficult. If you don’t know them, you don’t know them—no matter what. The ability to draw “sacred patterns” was the most convincing proof.

Moreover, because the Four Symbols system brushed against “yāo” (demons), almost no one dared to study it.

Back in Qianxue Province, the only person truly proficient in the Four Symbols beast patterns had been Mr. Tu.

Other sinister array adepts had learned only scraps.

It seemed he really did have the qualifications to be called “shaman”…

Mo Hua remained composed and said nothing more.

Elder Jiao Hu took that composure for granted and grew all the more certain.

Mo Hua asked again, “Is this all your Black Horn armor method amounts to?”

Elder Jiao Hu said, “Honored Shaman, that is all.”

Seeing a trace of displeasure on Mo Hua’s face, Elder Jiao Hu hurried to explain:

“Our Black Horn Tribe was once a great tribe, at its peak. The Black Horn troops made all tremble. But over two thousand years we declined; clansmen scattered; parts of the armor legacy were seized by other tribes. Thus our fall…”

Mo Hua nodded slightly and handed him the armor diagram. “Take this. Within ten days, cast three suits of armor for me.”

Elder Jiao Hu started. “Honored Shaman, you would bestow the Black Horn armor diagram upon this old one?”

“Mm,” Mo Hua said.

Elder Jiao Hu raised it above his head with both hands, accepting it reverently. His hands even trembled.

This was the complete armor diagram. Even the former chieftain of the Black Horns had not been entitled to hold it.

“Within ten days, I will give Honored Shaman an answer,” Elder Jiao Hu said.

“Good.” Mo Hua nodded.

Elder Jiao Hu, clutching the armor diagram, was about to leave when Mo Hua suddenly called him back. “One more matter.”

Elder Jiao Hu paused.

“Did you,” Mo Hua asked slowly, “hide the Black Horn children?”

Elder Jiao Hu shuddered and dropped to his knees at once. “Honored Shaman…”

Mo Hua did not blame him.

In tribal war, it is life or death. Hiding a few gifted children as “kindling” for the future is only human.

Of course, he didn’t blame Elder Jiao Hu.

But he would be taking those children.

Children are highly malleable—especially the younger ones who are simple of heart and have sound talent. To Mo Hua, they were the most precious “treasures.”

“Where are the children?” Mo Hua asked.

Elder Jiao Hu was silent.

Though he had come to accept that Mo Hua was a noble “shaman,” he still did not dare to loosen his tongue here.

The children were the Black Horns’ hope.

And no one knew what lay in this young shaman’s heart.

If he was like those other strange shamans—taking Black Horn children for sacrifice, pill-refining, gu-raising, or to “eat” for his own supplement—then the Black Horns would never again have a future.

But as he met Mo Hua’s eyes—those that seemed to see through human hearts—Elder Jiao Hu felt a sudden chill.

For the shaman to speak of the children at all meant he already knew where they were.

In other words, the Black Horn children were already in this shaman’s grasp.

Elder Jiao Hu’s face blanched. Kneeling, shaking, he could only plead: “I beg you, Honored Shaman… spare these children a path to live…”

Mo Hua sighed inwardly.

He did “eat” savage gods—but not children.

“Children are the tribe’s future,” Mo Hua said. “I will teach them personally. If any show excellent aptitude, I will pass to them the sacred patterns of the Great Wilderness.”

Sacred patterns?! Elder Jiao Hu was thunderstruck, unable to believe it.

Could sacred patterns… be taught? Did this shaman truly have such authority?! Or was he deceiving him?

But if he really would pass on sacred patterns, then this would be… a blessing the Black Horns might not meet once in a thousand years.

And yet…

Elder Jiao Hu’s heart swung between worry and wild joy. After a moment, seeing Mo Hua grow impatient, he startled and understood there was no room left to refuse. Bitter at heart, he kowtowed and said: “Thank you for your grace, Honored Shaman. I will bring the children at once…”

Mo Hua nodded.

Elder Jiao Hu withdrew and soon returned with more than forty children.

They wore animal hides, were filthy all over, and their faces were by turns blank, resentful, or afraid.

Yet without exception, their blood qi was healthy, their frames sturdy, and their aptitudes decent.

No wonder Elder Jiao Hu had hidden them away. For the tribe’s sake, he had indeed racked his brains.

Elder Jiao Hu looked at the children, eyes full of reluctance, then looked up at Mo Hua, uneasy.

Mo Hua merely said, “Don’t worry.” He soothed Elder Jiao Hu and sent him off to forge the Black Horn war-armor.

Afterward, Mo Hua had Xiao Zhatu take the forty-odd Black Horn children to wash up and gave them food. Only then did he gather them again.

With the grime washed away and bellies filled, the children calmed down.

And, seeing Mo Hua’s clear, bright gaze and gentle, handsome face, they developed a slight sense of closeness.

Mo Hua spoke warmly: “From today on, you will follow me—learn to read, cultivate the Dao, and refine your hearts. Be kind to one another. No insults, no brawling, no harboring private grudges.”

“If any among you have uncommon talent and work diligently, I will personally teach you sacred patterns.”

The children did not really know what “sacred patterns” were, but they sensed it must be the highest kind of learning.

In ordinary tribes of the Great Wilderness, most cultivation amounted to little more than fighting and killing. True lineages of the Dao were extremely rare.

Those who could read the tribal script, learn proper techniques, or various shamanic arts were few and far between.

Let alone a lofty legacy like “sacred patterns.”

“Yes…”

The children answered in a scattered chorus.

But they did not know how to address Mo Hua.

At that moment, one older—and taller—Black Horn child, who seemed to already know Mo Hua’s identity, cupped his fists and said:

“Yes, Honored Shaman.”

The others followed suit. “Yes, Honored Shaman.”

“Honored Shaman…”

Mo Hua nodded. After a moment, a thought moved in his heart. He said:

“You are not like others. You needn’t call me ‘Honored Shaman.’ You may call me…”

“Teacher.”

The Black Horn children froze, then cupped their fists one after another and rumbled:

“Yes, Teacher.”

Thanks for reading! If you’re enjoying Mo Hua’s slow-burn rise and the Great Wilderness lore, you’re my kind of reader. 💛 If you’d like to help me keep going (and get chapters early), please consider supporting me on Patreon—it truly keeps the lights on. And if you have a moment, dropping a rating or short review on NovelUpdates helps more fellow readers find this series. Much love!

Next Chapter >