Archfiend

This call to break jolted the underground! Everyone outside stood up in excitement.

“B-Breaking the bodily limiter… He’s breaking the bodily limiter!” Li Mu excitedly walked back and forth inside the room as if the advancement was his own. Even his voice was somewhat hoarse. “Once he charges through this barrier, h-he’ll be a middle-stage cultivator! The middle stage! The middle stage!”

The other two didn’t say anything, but they were the same, unable to even stand. Instead, they perceived the sea of spiritual light in the air that had reached a zenith at this moment, their feelings a series of complications.

This was the most significant barrier of the initial stage of Qi Condensation. 

Strictly speaking, the bodily limiter was the only obstruction that existed in the advancement of a minor boundary in Qi Condensation. The others were all cumulative. As for this accumulation, it depended on a person’s aptitude. They had already guessed that while Xu Yangyi’s aptitude was astonishing, the bodily limiter still caused one to harbor apprehension within their heart.

“F-Fellow Daoist Xu seems not to have brought a supplementary medicine!” Suddenly, Zhang Gongchang couldn’t refrain from shouting, “H-He’s using pure strength to challenge the bodily limiter?!”

Once these words were given voice to, everyone was rendered dumb. In other words… this advancement wasn’t of Xu Yangyi’s planning? That was to say… he had felt he could break through and immediately attacked? Therefore… the other hadn’t taken anything! Including supplementary pill elixir?!

“Careless! Too careless!” Wang Chunlai sighed deeply, his worry exhibited in his speech as if he was the one breaking through. “If he doesn’t rely on pill elixir, how is he going to break through the bodily limiter?”

“Fellow Daoist Li, how about you bring in a bottle?” Just as Li Mu said these words, he recalled something and immediately pulled out a jade bottle. “This is the regular advancement pill elixir. If Fellow Daoist Xu doesn’t mind it, wouldn’t it be better for Fellow Daoist Li to take it in?”

Even if this person didn’t achieve the middle stage, his potential was astonishing. In case he did attain the middle stage… there would be many benefits without a single disadvantage in them setting up good relations!

Birds of a feather flock together. Fringe cultivators like them were at the very bottom of the barrel. Everyone they knew were all at the initial stage, and one or two middle-stage cultivators were as rare as phoenix feathers and qilin horns. Was there even any better opportunity to get into their employer’s good graces than witnessing him advance?

These words seemed to remind everyone, and Wang Chunlai’s eyes shimmered, and he also pulled out a jade bottle. “Inside this is pill elixir I prepared for myself. Its name is the Azureflower Jadewater! Fellow Daoist Xu surely needs this right now!”

“I… I…” Zhang Gongchang was sweating up a storm. To them, this opportunity could certainly be said to be considerable, yet in a reversal, he presently hadn’t brought any pill elixir!

Didn’t you guys come to do accounting?! What the heck did you bring pill elixir for?!

He really did want to curse. Yet before their voices even fell, time seemed to suddenly draw down to a hundredth of a second, in the entire basement. While it was quite fleeting, everyone sensed it! Not waiting for them to react, a light echo akin to breaking glass resonated within the basement, in a twinkling! Each present cultivator understood what this was.

The bodily limiter had been shattered! But!

The time apart from just as Xu Yangyi shouted “break” was merely a few breaths! At this moment, Li Mu’s and Wang Chunlai’s raised hands appeared to be terribly amusing. 

“This… This is…” Wang Chunlai fell back several steps, the jade bottle grasped in his hand somewhat unsteady. “One blow… One blow to shatter the limit…”

Li Mu looked sluggishly at the closed door. If a cultivator’s aptitude was to be discerned, advancement time was the best occasion for examination, apart from specialized tests. The size of the spiritual-light sea was the most important basis. A cultivator’s bodily storage wasn’t just dependent on the qi sea. While the qi sea was a major factor, the flesh and bones were likewise capable of storing qi. Else not, how could those terrifying divine abilities be resisted at Foundation Establishment and Core Formation? Would death not come from just sweeping the corner hem of a jacket?

Only during advancement would the natural world sense how much qi a person was capable of storing and reciprocate this amount. Over ten meters, and every major clan would show consideration with great effort and attentive nurture. Twenty meters was a true genius plucked out from among ten thousand. Thirty meters was the category of a provincial paragon of Heavens Law! Forty meters… Renowned on the entire nation’s ranking!

As for fifty meters...

His back grew cold; it was simply unheard of! Moreover, there was the limit-breaking time.

The more formidable a cultivator, the faster the limit-breaking time. There were also some cultivators that didn’t rely on external forces to break the limiter. He once heard that the bodily limiter was an invisible membrane. He had asked a few times, and a middle-stage cultivator who had answered him only rolled their eyes. 

“What’re you asking so much for? When the time comes, you’ll know.”

Yet this wait was ten-somewhat years. Even though he hadn’t experienced it, he knew that Xu Yangyi’s limit-breaking speed… was astonishingly fast! The limit break still looming overhead, it answered a following command and was cleaved through!

In this space of time, they could only say nothing but a few words! Several seconds of time!

“Fiend…” Zhang Gongchang collapsed onto a chair, with a thud. All in all, so long as he thought of this undisguised gap, his confidence would suffer an enormous blow. 

Swish swish swish… In the cultivation room, Xu Yangyi had already stood up. He had also heard that noise a little while ago. In that twinkling, he felt that the world seemed to drone. Subsequently, while unseen, he sensed what appeared to be like breaking glass that transformed into motes of qi and scattered in the breeze.

But this qi didn’t fade away at all, rather it was immediately attracted into his frantically absorbing qi sea! It became the remuneration of his advancement! He also felt that the world had become even more distinct.

Currently, he even thought that he could use his eyes to discern the most difficult to differentiate of pixels. At the same time, his body lightened. Originally, when he hadn’t broken this bodily limiter in the past, he didn’t feel any restrictions. Yet now, he felt that his prior existence was fettered! 

His body appeared to float softly like a child of the wind. It seemed that with a stirring of a thought, he could go forth in any direction. However, this fluttering softness wasn’t a weakness. He was able to simultaneously feel a hidden power within his body that far exceeded the one of the past!

If he was up against those three scouts right now, he wouldn’t need a Spirit Traversing Talisman. He could merely rely on his own speed to chase them down! At this instant, all that remained of the revolving sea of spiritual light around him was the last ten meters. Without delay, it charged towards his body, striving to overtake itself!

He promptly used Innersight, and with a glance, a spirited light flashed in his eyes. His qi sea was possibly… about 1.5-times greater than an ordinary middle-stage cultivator’s! It had transformed into a tremendous qi-transmission device!

Within his meridians, all blockages had completely dissolved. Externally, this change didn’t appear to be great, yet he knew the resiliency was many times stronger than the past!

“Alchemy requires the powerful support of qi and keen spiritual sense to act as the bridge. Not enough qi, then the spiritual sense won’t have the acuity to transport it where it should go. Not enough spirit stones, then while there’ll be qi throughout the air—a place to work won’t be able to be found…” He sensed the powerful strength within his body and clenched his fist. “The reason why the Eternal Alchemy Canon broadens the qi sea… is only because my qi sea is far from attaining the requirements for pill concoction… As long as advancement speed follows, this shouldn’t be a problem at all, and it’ll also be unlikely to cause my qi to make my body explode.”

“At the same time, as the qi sea grows bigger, the contained qi will become greater. Battle perseverance will last longer,, and the meridians clearer. Qi transfer speed will grow faster, and arts even faster… While it still can’t be seen for now, as long as there are more divine abilities, once it reaches four to five…”

Xu Yangyi inhaled deeply and continued to use Innersight.

Concerning his internal organs, bones, and each of his muscles, their external appearances seemed to be the same as in the past. However, beneath Innersight, he could see a layer of misty-white light within. This was qi reinforcing and transforming the manifestation of his body.

“But…” He mumbled as he looked into his qi sea, “what’s this?”

In his qi sea, there was a brownish-yellow object the size of a small stone suspended in the air. What this item was couldn’t be certainly said, and it was dull without the least bit remarkability. The exterior was like a peach pit, and its surface was glossy and smooth. Yet as for this object that emerged within his qi sea, apart from a golden core and qi, what else could it possibly be?

“Could it be… this is a product of cultivating the Eternal Alchemy Canon?” He was unable to make heads or tails of it. Only he cultivated this arcane effort and was the sole inheritor. Since this was his choice, he had to confront it. 

Meanwhile, the kiosk proprietor looked on in astonishment at the region of fluctuating qi as the qi naturally weakened. However, it didn’t disperse but was rather absorbed.

“S-Success?” Somewhat reluctant to believe, he looked on at that place, a cottage no higher than two stories tall. There was actually a middle-stage cultivator concealed within? Furthermore… one that had surprisingly succeeded?!

A total of half an hour was in accordance to the initial stage of Qi Condensation’s advancement, however, that was the conforming theory of the “shortest” time of an initial-stage cultivator’s advancement!

“S-Such intense qi vibrations… H-He actually broke the bodily limiter in the fastest time?” As this thought bubbled forth in his mind, his first reaction was disbelief! However, recalling a fact, he discovered that this… was quite possibly true!

“H-H-How!”

“If it really is such a fiend, how could he come to a backwater place like this?!”

“No way! I have to go see it for myself!”

Somewhere else, an old farmer also scurried towards the small house.

“Good god… The sea of spiritual light that he drew upon definitely isn’t small! Half an hour… Merely half an hour! That’s the fastest theorized advancement time… Could he be a monster?!”

“When did such an amazing cultivator come to this backwater village?!”

“Nuh-uh, I have to go take look! If I don’t go, how can I be at peace?!”

At the same time, following the heavy droning of the door, the basement finally opened.

“Congratulations on the end of your seclusion, Fellow Daoist! Henceforth upon advancing to the middle stage, may you enjoy eternal happiness as the immortals, and your cultivation bound forwards unbridledly!” Xu Yangyi narrowed his eyes, still not having the time to carefully perceive his surroundings as he heard four orderly and deferential voices outside. 

No one dared to be disrespectful. At the instant the door swung open, the spiritual pressure of the middle stage of Qi Condensation spilled out like torrenting quicksilver. More importantly… was that Xu Yangyi’s present qi contained a searing heat!

A broiling heat that was difficult to put into words. It seemed that if he was willing, Xu Yangyi was capable of using this broiling heat to transform all things before him into flying ash!

What was happening?

Zhang Gongchang and the other three secretly sent each other meaningful looks. In the modern age, the characteristics of arcane efforts and so on were a total non-secret. The internet had surpassed the paper crane’s transmission of information, and there were many, many flying swords spreading knowledge. Even though it couldn’t be said that the attributes of familiar arcane efforts had been seen, they were still heard of. Yet at this moment, they were all incapable of seeing through these characteristics!

What was the arcane effort that Fellow Daoist Xu cultivated? Via the senses, there was no doubt it was a fire-related arcane effort! However, how could a fire-related arcane effort possibly give off  such a feeling from spiritual pressure?

Spiritual pressure was a kind of suppressive force. For example, if you were facing a leader, you would feel the other’s aura, merely, spiritual pressure was almost tangible. Nonetheless, was one able to sense what kind of person someone was through their aura?

Impossible!

Likewise, spiritual pressure was also basically unable to tell the attribute of another’s arcane effort. It ended here!

Xu Yangyi’s entire being appeared to be serene like a lake, completely detached from a fire-element arcane effort. And yet his spiritual pressure oddly carried a kind of roiling heat that could cause the heart to palpitate! He seemed to be a smelting furnace in human form! A blaze made human!

It was too strange… What the heck was this cultivated arcane effort? What was he doing inside? His clothes were still somewhat tattered and his facial hair was still long, an appearance of just coming out from seclusion. But at this moment, not a single person dared to look straight at him! The trio dared not open their mouths again.

They understood that it was the other’s state of just advancing and his cultivation having yet to stabilize that caused this leak of spiritual pressure. Such a situation wouldn’t appear in cultivators already in the middle stage for a couple years. Their spiritual pressures could be restrained and unleashed at will. In any case, as they recalled there was possibly a silent, fierce beast in human form standing besides them, everyone felt their backs grow somewhat cold.

Xu Yangyi didn’t speak, slowly walking instead. The world resembled a newborn’s, seemingly novel. Each advancement wasn’t limited to cultivation, but also an upgrade in spiritual sense. Of course, the needed qi for the next advancement would be greater. Otherwise, the spiritual sense wouldn’t upgrade, and moreover be unable to keenly sense worldly qi. If greater amounts couldn’t be assimilated faster, then how would Foundation Establishment seniors and Core Formation masters break through?

He knew that in a Core Formation cultivator’s true seclusion, an expanse of qi within a range of a fifty kilometers would tremble in wake with their breathing. It was in no way comparable to his current piddling absorption.

He was silent and suddenly launched a fist towards Li Zongyuan.

Swish! Li Zongyuan simply didn’t react. This was a genuine blur of the eye; a fist came before him! It was a single millimeter away from the tip of his nose!

“M-M-M-Master…” His voice quavered, and his legs shook. But before he finished speaking, all of his hair blew back because he was next welcomed by an intense gust of wind! He couldn’t even open his eyes!

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Three successive crisp echoes rang out in the air. Places that this fist had waved over. Xu Yangyi pulled his hand back, nodding in satisfaction. 

“The fist arrives first and the wind follows…” Zhang Gongchang swallowed his saliva. The passion, admiration, and envy in his eyes were nearly unconcealable! This was a middle-stage cultivator’s might! That fist of moments ago seemed to be no more than inconsequential posturing, but it was a heavy sword without edge, needless of overt power to manifest great skill. Initial-stage Qi Condensation cultivators would find it absolutely difficult to resist this fist!

For fist wind to cause Li Zongyuan’s hair to rise back, one could imagine Xu Yangyi’s strength! There was also that banging sound. It couldn’t be anything else… It was the sound of breaking wind! The actual speed of this fist had cleaved through the air!