Chapter 143: Chapter 143 Achievement 99 (Part 1)
Mo Cloud Cave.
A hundred feet underground.
Zhou Yi cast a spell to break open a tunnel, diverting the waters of the Yan River in reverse, then setting up Formation and Prohibition to create an artificial subterranean river and lake.
Rainbow lotuses with their leaves and roots transplanted into the lake, he arranged the Spirit Gathering Array and other formations, and all that was left was to wait for the flowers to bloom and bear fruit.
"What a pity the rainbow lotus is of a watery nature, otherwise I could keep ripening it to eat as candy beans."
"Two hundred years is just enough time to perfect the Nine Revolutions Spirit Refinement Art and the Spirit Condensation Art, and then harvest the tiger demons' essence blood from the mountain to cultivate my transformation into a tiger!"
It has been nearly three hundred years since Zhou Yi obtained the Spirit Refinement Art, and he had only just completed the sixth revolution. The Spiritual Energy in his body was sixty percent more solid than the ordinary Foundation Establishment cultivators, which is why it could be viscous like paste.
"Once the Spirit Refinement Art and Spirit Condensation Art are perfected, each will increase by ten percent. With the Dragon Nine Transformations Body Refinement and Five Spirits True Script gathering all five elements, there will be at least another twenty percent growth, bringing my Core Formation success rate up to a cumulative eighty percent!"
"Other cultivators would surely choose to form their Golden Core with great joy. I, however, am not in a hurry, for there are still ways to further my growth, such as seeking another Core Formation Spiritual Object, and setting up formations to defend against the tribulation!"
Zhou Yi carefully calculated that there were still many things he could do, so he continued his retreat for intensive cultivation.
...
Time flies, and the years wait for no one.
Zhou Yi focused on cultivating the Spirit Refinement Art, and every so often, he ordered his tiger demon troops to present their essence blood.
The number of demon soldiers under the command of the Five Mountains and One Water continued to grow, mainly consisting of jackals, wolves, tigers, and leopards, cycling through blood donations without much impact. One clever tiger demon, seizing the opportunity, made frequent blood offerings to see the great king in the cave.
It offered a few sly, thoughtful remarks, flattering the great king.
"Great King, you're the handsomest under heaven and above earth!"
"No, no, no, this king can only be second best. The first is the dear reader!"
Zhou Yi was not one to indulge in flattery, but seeing the tiger demon's sincerity and diligence, bestowed upon it Spiritual Medicine and Magic Artifacts.
What happened once could happen again.
The intellect of the demon soldiers was generally not high, and they had no shame, so they immediately copied the flattery. Those with quicker minds, knowing the wit of the human race, went to the villages to learn how to curry favor slickly.
These were the amusements of leisure time; ninety-nine percent of the time was spent in arduous cultivation.
In addition to practicing his Cultivation Technique daily, he also habitually consumed his lifespan to divine fortunes, ripen Spiritual Medicine, and arrange multilayered formations to prepare for the minor forty-nine Heavenly Tribulations.
Twenty years passed in a flash.
The Spirit Refinement Art had not yet reached the seventh revolution, but the Spirit Condensation Art had already reached completion first. Zhou Yi's Divine Sense spread over an area more than two hundred yards in radius.
"Is this the limit of Divine Sense for the Foundation Establishment Stage? In this way, it severs the path to surpassing the Divine Sense of Golden Core and Nascent Soul."
Zhou Yi had once thought about accumulating Divine Sense over thousands of years to reach the level of Nascent Soul or even Divinity Transformation and then practice soul-attacking secret techniques to possess part of the high-level combat strength.
The only aim of cultivating immortality was to protect the Dao, so improving combat strength and realm had no difference.
Now that his Divine Sense had reached the peak of his realm, with no growth for a number of years, a realization dawned faintly on Zhou Yi.
"The advancement of realms, like Qi Refinement progressing to Foundation Establishment, isn't just about Mana condensing into liquid; it also produces Divine Sense under the influence of the Dao foundation. Thus, without forming the Golden Core, the Divine Sense can only cover two hundred yards, any higher and it surpasses the carrying limit of the Dao foundation."
"Cultivators are like containers forged of essence, energy, and spirit; Divine Sense is the water. To grow further, the container must be expanded!"
"Since its inception, the path to immortality has gone through innumerable years of evolution, becoming an extremely tight system, not something one person can break."
Zhou Yi would rather slowly grind at the bottleneck of the immortal path than search for a new path of cultivation.
The archives record that just in inviting Spiritual Energy into the body, the human race has tried tens of thousands of approaches, costing numerous predecessors their lives, and after generations of cultivators' improvements, we have today's basic Cultivation Techniques.
Later generations, standing on the shoulders of their predecessors, can see higher and farther, and are prone to unwarranted confidence—it really shouldn't be so!
...
Moyun City.
Since the takeover by the buffalo over three hundred years ago, it has been expanding unceasingly and now occupies most of the mountainside.
The outer defenses of the fortress were no longer low stone walls; after three or four generations of effort, they had finally built walls twelve feet high.
Beyond the walls, they had dug moats two or three zhang wide and filled the bottoms with spikes, leaving only a wooden bridge to the city gate. The attacking beastly creatures could neither climb the walls nor survive the traps and arrows, often becoming an extra meal for the human tribe within the city.
The sun blazed fiercely.
Warriors clad in Mystic Iron Armor stood ready atop the walls, not daring to relax their vigilance in the slightest.
At that moment,
a figure slowly approached from a distance, revealing itself to be a white-furred giant wolf some thirty or forty feet in length.
The warriors sounded the alarm, and immediately, dozens of soldiers gathered, with others rushing to warn the women and children in the city to be on their guard.
Only when the figure drew closer could they see clearly that there was a person beneath the giant wolf, a young man in his twenties. His black hair, wild as a lion's mane, flowed freely; his beast skin clothes were torn and tattered. He carried a wolf corpse over his right shoulder and held a long spear in his left hand.
The warrior captain drew his bow and nocked an arrow, sending a Mystery Iron Arrow as a black streak that embedded itself precisely three steps from the young man.
"Who goes there?"
Some demon tribes were skilled in the Art of Transformation, such as snake demons and flower demons, who could take human form and infiltrate the city to harm people. Three years ago, a powerful fox demon from the demon tribe sneaked into the city and drained people's yang energy, leading to several deaths before it was discovered.
After tearing off its disguise, the fox demon killed dozens in the city before making an escape.
This incident served as a stark reminder for the human tribe, which had been peaceful and slightly lax, revitalizing their sense of crisis and always remembering they were in the heart of the Hundred Thousand Mountains.
Read exclusive chapters at m|v-l'e,m p y r
"Jin Jiu."
The young man replied, "My master is Jin Ang."
As he spoke, he circulated his Qi-Blood, and a layer of crimson emerged on the surface of his body, gradually transforming into the shape of armor.
"Jin the Master's technique of Qi-Blood, he's definitely one of the human tribe."
The captain leaped from the city wall and, after confirming up close, ordered the city gate to be opened.
"Brother Jin, you've traveled a thousand li, why are you still carrying a wolf?"
"This Wolf Demon blocked my way; I had no choice but to stab it dead with a spear!"
Under the captain's guidance, Jin Jiu registered his name in the city, left the Wolf Demon carcass in the city's public warehouse, and then set out for Mo Cloud Cave to seek an audience with the Demon King.
...
Matters inside the cave were usually handled by Chancellor Turtle. When he heard it involved Jin Ang and the legacy of the martial breakthrough in the Divine Aperture, Chancellor Turtle didn't dare to decide on his own and took Jin Jiu to the third level of the cave dwelling to meet with Zhou Yi, who was in secluded cultivation.
Zhou Yi looked at Jin Jiu for a moment and asked,
"Calculating his age, Jin Ang must be nearly one hundred and fifty, how is his health?"
"Reporting to the Demon King, my master was already old and frail when I left. The steep mountains barred him from coming personally to bid you farewell."
Jin Jiu's gaze reddened slightly as he spoke. He took out a volume bound in tanned beast skin from his bosom and presented it respectfully, "My lord, recorded here are the methods for breaking through the Condensation Stage. My master asks if you would bestow a name upon it?"
"Let me see."
After perusing the pages, Zhou Yi couldn't help but exclaim, "With this method revealed, in terms of combat alone, it could rival a True Person at the Foundation Establishment Stage."
As the beast skin volume states, after storing Qi-Blood in the acupoints and continuously accumulating and compressing it, it eventually transforms into a Blood Pill.
Theoretically, each acupoint could condense a Blood Pill, but due to Jin Ang's lifespan and the influence of the immortal cultivation method, he had only been successful in solidifying one in his Dantian.
In combat, calling upon the Qi-Blood from the Blood Pill not only made it more robust and resilient but also allowed it to leave the body for several zhang, taking on any form at will.
"My master said that it's sufficient for close combat with powerful demons, but against True Persons in battle, one would surely die by Magic Artifact or talisman."
Jin Jiu sighed, "Especially since lifespan has not increased; after condensing the Blood Pill, one could at best achieve the lifespan limit of an ordinary person, a hundred and fifty years."
"A mere hundred-plus years, and a new cultivation method emerging from nothing to something that can be compared to Foundation Establishment is already incredible. If later generations continue to supplement and perfect it, who's to say they won't eventually increase lifespan!"
Zhou Yi pondered for a long while before slowly saying,
"As for the name of this stage… let's call it 'Cradle the Pill'."