Wu Long left the Yin Yang Unity Palace with Wu Mengqi the next day after letting Luo Mingyu experience as much of his Weapon Intents as possible, repeating some with a different approach for reference. This way she would be able to contemplate on them while he was in the capital of the Azure Eagle Empire.
He also oversaw the training of everyone one by one, giving them advice and comments, confirming their progress as well as giving a few more skills to Cao Xiang and Cao Mei who succeeded in learning the basics he gave them earlier.
They traveled for two days at a relatively comfortable pace and reached the Storm Passage. At the current moment, no one really knew that Wu Long was on the continent since he arrived from the sea directly to the sect, and the way they traveled was too fast for tracking to be possible.
As they arrived in the town in bamboo hats and travel coats, they were like any ordinary two travelers.
And while Wu Mengqi lodged in the same inn the Yin Yang Unity Palace members stayed in on the last trip to the Imperial Capital, Wu Long ascended the rocky ridge on one side of the passage.
"Heh, just like I thought"
He looked at the peaks which were made of completely black stones, as lightning from the storm clouds continuously hit them.
These were a mineral called Thunder Baserock, a mineral that would, if exposed at a high enough altitude but still connected through the mineral vein to the Spiritual Qi current of the earth, once a year become highly active and summon thunder clouds that would accumulate and stay in the area for extended periods of time, which was the reason this area got extremely rainy every autumn.
The whole ridge was likely created by a strong impact from the center of the former united continent that raised the vein of Thunder Baserock high into the sky and exposed it from the normal rocks that were encasing it.
Wu Long suspected this possibility when he heard of the consistent heavy rains in this specific area each year.
He started running the Battle Cultivation Scripture and circulating the Chaos Refining Body Tempering Art as he slowly approached the area hit by lightning. He refined the Spiritual Qi around as well as the static electricity in the air around.
The deafening sound of an extremely high voltage current constantly hitting the solid black rock was making the air shudder in the whole area as sparks ran along the streams of water that poured from the peaks that were washed over by rain.
Soon, he stepped upon water that a current ran through and it instantly struck him which he quickly sealed and subsequently refined with the Chaos Refining Body Tempering Art.
He slowly drew closer as he refined more and more currents that ran through him, not allowing them to do any damage, and strengthening him instead.
'Mm, I should be able to start now'
He thought as he arrived in front of a place directly hit by lightning, and stepped under a bolt of light that rushed to him. The circulation of techniques was now completely accelerated and prepared like a properly heated up furnace of an alchemist.
He raised a steel spear that he prepared beforehand for this occasion, and the lightning immediately struck it, passing through to his arm and being manipulated from then on.
He refined bolt after bolt of lightning, trying to find the way to extract a Lightning Dao Rune, the fundamental symbol of the Heavenly Dao that governed the lightning element.
Finally, after spending three days on that peak he felt the lightning he stored up coagulate into a mass, a blob that seemed to have it's own will as it struggled to escape the confines of his Chaos Refining Body Tempering Art.
As he concentrated on the blob, he felt a single but incredibly profound symbol inside that was morphing and changing and at the same time something about it remained constant. A smile came up on his face as talismans flew out of his hand and a barrier diverted the lightning way from him as he pierced the spear into the rock beside him and sat down, closing his eyes in meditation.
"Lightning Dao Rune, the Dao gave birth to Duality and then Duality gave birth to the Trinity..."
He mumbled as he found the missing piece of the puzzle. Since lightning was an energy he concentrated on extracting a rune of energy, but neglected that it was the air that conducted its travel from heaven to earth, as well as that a Dao Rune was a spiritual existence of its own. A Dao Rune required all three aspects of Energy, Matter and Spirit to exist, and both the Yin and Yang as well.
None of the components could be missing.
Though the Dao Rune itself was more ethereal, not completely existing in the same plain as the physical world, he confirmed that it could be manifested.
'Then, to host a Dao Rune, I must also use the three aspects...'
He thought as he first decided on the Matter, which was his flesh and blood which was the easiest of the three, he had to let the Dao Rune freely run through his body as if it was its environment.
As he realized that he eased the seal of the Chaos Refining Body Tempering Art, slowly expanding the area that the Lightning Dao Rune could travel through.
He felt a pang of pain as it started coursing through his flesh, eventually using the blood vessels as it was the best conductor, though he controlled the damage with the technique.
He then started using his own Spiritual Qi to replace the natural Spiritual Qi in the air to feed the Dao Rune, which it initially rejected, but as he slowly started cutting it off from the Spiritual Qi outside, it had to rely on his Spiritual Qi to maintain its existence.
This gradual process took one entire day as he sat with closed eyes in a lotus position, sparks of electricity flashing atop his skin from time to time.
Then, as he completely made the Lightning Dao Rune reliant on his Spiritual Qi cutting off the natural Spiritual Qi from the outside the pain subsided as the Lightning Rune became more docile.
Every time it made a move that was damaging to Wu Long instead of just passing through the bloodstream he slightly decreased the Spiritual Qi he fed to the Dao Rune, eventually making it simply run through his blood, like fish in water.
"Hmm, it's a bit risky to try soul connection at the moment"
Wu Long opened his eyes with a smile.
Being hasty could bring him a lot of trouble, so he preferred to keep using the same method to gradually make his body into the natural environment of the Lightning Dao Rune, not using Soul Power to completely obtain it now since it could slip into his Niwan Palace where it would not be bound by Matter and Energy and slip back into the natural world, merging with it.
"That's enough progress for now"
He chuckled as he stood up, retrieving the spear and dismissing the barrier as he stepped and appeared on the edge of the rocky peak. He made good enough yields to say that he succeeded, so he was in an elevated mood.
He then stepped down and his figure appeared and disappeared in different placed down the steep slope and cliffs of the mountain ridge, eventually arriving at the base.
Wu Mengqi greeted him back with a hug and then as she looked in his eyes her own filled with joy as she understood him without any words.
"Congratulations, honey"
She tightened her hug and he embraced her back with more tenderness as they celebrated this achievement. It was a small step, but one that was definitive in the way his power could be expanded in the future.