Chapter 88: The Long-Awaited Breakthrough to Foundation Establishment (Part 2)

'This process is taking much longer than I expected...' After several hours of continuously compressing the energy within his dantian, the first beads of sweat had already appeared on An's forehead.

'I'm almost at my limit... I can feel the resistance beginning to outweigh the force of the Qi I'm using to compress it.' Having compressed all the energy inside his dantian into a mass roughly ninety times smaller than its original size, he began to feel something awakening from within that compressed clump.

'I-is this the formation of a Qi droplet?' He watched as the particles in the center of the mass compressed so tightly that the only option left for them was to merge.

The particles, fusing with one another, began forming a dense droplet from within the mass itself. Very slowly, the droplet consumed the surrounding particles, growing larger and larger.

'Ugh! Th-the pressure is too h-high!' He was sweating more and more. He began to feel a burning pain in his head, a sign that his mind was being overloaded.

'A-almost there! Just a little more!' Using all his strength to contain the untamed energy being released by the droplet, he did everything to ensure the entire compressed mass was absorbed into it.

'Aaaah!' As the last particle was drawn in and transformed into part of the droplet, waves of energy began to burst from it. His dantian was wracked with intense pain.

Each time a wave exited the droplet, it struck the walls of his dantian, causing them to shudder and tremble, passing through them and shaking his entire physical body.

Each wave, at intervals of a few seconds, burst from his body and slammed into the cave walls. Each new wave grew stronger, tearing stones from the walls and turning them into sand. The plants around An, without even understanding what was happening, were reduced to dust by the very first wave, they didn't even have time to feel anything.

'H-hold on! I n-need to strengthen the dantian w-walls! To h-hell with my body!' Immediately, he began channeling the Qi he had reserved as a protective membrane outside his dantian directly inside, reinforcing the walls against the energy waves.

Clap! Pop!

With each new wave, his blood vessels burst. His remaining organs began to tear apart, completely flooding his insides with blood.

'Ugh! D-damn!' Realizing he had no strength left to even activate Qi Armor, not even enough to coat his organs, he focused entirely on what mattered most: protecting his dantian.

Fortunately, his healing factor was more or less keeping up, mending his wounds to some degree between the energy wave bursts.

'I c-can't hold on m-much longer! AHH!' All his clothes had already been shredded. Only his beast pouch and spatial pouch, having fallen to the ground, remained unaffected by the powerful waves.

Sitting naked, covered entirely in blood, each wave punched through his body, narrow holes as if pierced by long needles.

Through these wounds, though they healed quickly thanks to his regeneration, blood still managed to leak out and pool beneath him.

"Bleugh!"

Then, the strongest and final wave of energy burst from his dantian. Unable to withstand it, he vomited an enormous amount of blood mixed with chunks of flesh.

From exhaustion, no longer able to endure, An fell back onto the sandy floor, what had once been solid stone.

'Ah... I almost died there... I c-can't afford to relax!' Without getting up, still lying down, he closed his eyes again.

'Now the t-third stage...'

Focusing, he activated the Qi that still remained in his physical body, the Qi that hadn't been absorbed into the droplet. He began expelling it from his body, throwing it into the environment and dispersing it, completely purging his organism of gaseous Qi down to the last particle.

Completely cleansed of energy inside his body, he simultaneously felt an intense cold and heat. A state resembling illness, when your body begins to shake, your bones and muscles aching from the movement.

Lying in that position.

"Let's do this!" In a rough, hoarse voice, An shouted with all his might, though in reality, it sounded more like a strained whisper.

The droplet hovering inside his dantian, sensing his will, activated and, slowly, carefully, fully obeying its master, began to spread throughout his body.

Filling every hidden corner of his being, completely occupying every recess: his blood, muscles, bones, organs, vessels, everything and everyone within him. All began to slowly fill with new energy emanating from the droplet in his dantian.

'A-aaah!' The moment it began to spread, he finally felt the purity and density of the new Qi. Its weight, its power, he would never have imagined such a vast difference between his Qi in different realms.

Though he understood that the energy of a Qi Condensation cultivator and a Foundation Establishment cultivator were on completely different, incomparable levels, it was only now, feeling this surging power within himself, that he truly grasped the difference.

'...My physical strength is increasing too...' Observing the new Qi filling his muscles, he noticed they were becoming denser, more resilient.

His bones suddenly became much lighter but significantly stronger. What surprised him most, however, was that they began to lengthen, growing slightly longer and larger.

'Hmm? My physical body is changing.' With difficulty, he lifted his head and looked at his arms and legs. He noticed that his limbs had begun to elongate slightly, as had his torso.

'Is my body reaching a golden standard?' He realized that his body, in order to better utilize the new energy it had received, was accelerating its growth process, bringing him to an ideal age-based state.

'Judging by how slowly this stage is progressing... Sigh... I don't even have the strength to think... Two or three days, and the third stage will be complete.' Closing his eyes, he simultaneously rested and carefully monitored the changes in his body, afraid to miss even the smallest detail.

.

.

After more than thirty hours of continuous observation, An suddenly smiled.

'The remaining cells have finally begun to evolve... Just as I thought, once the cellular evolution process is complete, my physical traits will become permanent... Phew...' An felt the remaining cells, having received a dose of new energy, begin to evolve.

The moment the last cell in his body completed its transformation, all of his cells, which had stopped aging and dividing, seemed to freeze in place, motionless.

At the same time, feeling his new Qi modifying his body, he noticed his vitality beginning to grow at a terrifying rate. The speed of growth was so intense that he felt as though he was drowning, suffocating in this internal energy.

He became aware of his soul, drawing on this energy, this vitality, growing before his eyes, increasing and strengthening. The walls of his inner world, under the same influence, also began to strengthen, becoming much thicker.

'Ha! Hahaha! My lifespan has surpassed nine hundred years! Haha!'

'I heard from the disciples' conversations that only cultivators who devoted themselves to special techniques focused on increasing vitality and strengthening the soul, and who reached the Golden Core realm, could have a lifespan of around seven hundred years...' With a tired smile on his face, An couldn't help but feel joy, understanding that even while in the Foundation Establishment realm, he could easily live nearly a thousand years, a full millennium.

'Now I have so much time in my pocket that I can finally study and break down the Evergreen Technique thread by thread and rebuild it for my new realm... And no one will be able to stop me from doing that!'

'The only problem now is that if the Sect finds out I've broken through, they'll force me to sign a fifty-year contract by any means necessary, essentially making me a slave...' His smile immediately vanished. Remembering the grim fate awaiting him in the future, he fell into thought.

'My Qi Silence technique... I can modify it by changing the trace of my Qi to a new signature, one that could fool cultivators, possibly even someone like the Sect Leader, if I'm several kilometers away from him and his like... But what about the formation around the Sect? Does it have a detection function? It definitely does. Otherwise, it would be strange...'

Lying motionless for a few more hours, An noticed that the transformation process of his body was nearly complete. All of his new Qi had already circulated through his body hundreds of times, constantly refining and perfecting.

Waiting until the Qi droplet within his dantian calmed down and stopped spontaneously releasing energy, he finally attempted to rise from the sandy floor.

Standing up, he immediately realized he had grown taller. 'If I'm not mistaken, I'm now almost two meters tall... But I've gotten noticeably thinner...'

Raising both arms, he realized his muscles had tightened, making him appear slightly leaner. In reality, his muscles had become much denser and heavier, now capable of producing tens of times more physical strength.

'Heh... All my calculations for physical strength and soul strength can be thrown out now... Or I could start over, which is also a good idea.' Realizing that the old calculations he had made daily after completing his routine had become entirely obsolete after the complete evolution of both his physical body and his soul, An shook his head, trying to figure out how he should now track his changes as he cultivated.

'The only thing that's still relevant is the soul technique itself. It can still be used in Foundation Establishment, though the effect will be several times weaker. As for the physical body, that will have to wait until I leave this place and can start experimenting with new pill recipes.' With a slow, even uncertain gait, reminiscent of a child's, An shuffled closer to the pool to look at himself.

'Oh! It's like this isn't entirely my body... Now I understand why the fourth stage is necessary when breaking through to a new realm...'

The fourth stage, as old woman Doshu had told him, was the adaptation stage. When a cultivator needs time to get used to the new energy within their body. In An's case, he also needed to adjust to a new physical form. Though its dimensions hadn't changed drastically, there were far too many internal changes.

Approaching the water, he fell to his knees and looked at his reflection. 'I look like I did when I was about twenty in my first life... Just with more muscle... Heh! Though I do look a bit lean!'

Observing his slightly glowing green eyes in the reflection, partially hidden by his hair, An grinned and carefully rose to his feet.

'Aaah!...Now I'm a Foundation Establishment cultivator... I'm one step higher and closer to the end of this ladder... And at the same time, further away!' With a smile on his face, without activating any Qi, he began to hover, lifting off the ground and floating in the air.

'According to my calculations, about eight weeks have passed... Maybe nine weeks since this space opened. That means I still have about three months left.'

His smile immediately faded, and he fell into thought. 'So what am I supposed to do with all that time?'

Shaking his head, he remembered Baldi and his pouch, and looked toward one of the walls. Approaching it, he dug out two pouches from beneath the layer of sand, completely intact and undamaged. 'Phew... Good that everything's fine. But I need to check on fatty.'

Placing both pouches before him, An activated his Qi and sent only a tiny particle into the beast pouch to make sure the rooster was alright.

'Great. Looks like he had no idea what was happening outside. That's good, knowing his fearful nature...' Seeing Baldi lying comfortably on tall grass, dozing carelessly, greatly reassured him.

Sending his Qi into the spatial pouch, he retrieved a set of clothes. This time, he left the outer robe inside, only a shirt, pants, and shoes. Along with that, he pulled out two ropes: one for his waist, on which he hung the spatial pouch, and another for his belt, to which he tied the beast pouch containing the carelessly sleeping Baldi.

Looking around, he was about to sit back down on the floor and begin acclimating to his new energy when the entire cave began to shake. "What the f-?"

CRACK!

Beneath his feet, from deep within the mountain range, a deafening crack echoed.

Immediately, the entire ridge began to creak and tremble. The walls of the cave began to crack and collapse.

Pushing off the ground and hovering in the air, An looked at the floor in the direction from which the sound had come.

'Wait, there's a living creature directly beneath the ridge?' Feeling a pressure so heavy that he had never experienced anything like it in his life, An quickly rushed toward the exit.

'I need to get out of here... As fast as possible!'

Whoosh!

Wrapping his hand in Qi, a single touch against the massive stone slab blocking the entrance was enough to shatter it into pieces.

Flying out of the cave, An saw hundreds of different spirit beasts, having also sensed the energy of the underground creature, abandoning their dens and fleeing without looking back, trying to get as far away as possible.

'Damn, I'm not used to the new energy yet, my body still needs time... And I haven't upgraded the Qi Silence technique... I need to be extremely careful.' Looking around, An realized his only option was to ascend as high as possible and get out of there.

Like a rocket, tearing through the air and clouds before him, he began accelerating with all his might. The air around him began to crackle. Even his Sharpness aspect couldn't help him glide smoothly through the surrounding Qi. He felt the temperature around him rising due to the destabilization of the Qi and air itself. 'My speed is several times faster than before... And this is without using any Qi, just manipulation and interaction with the surrounding Qi... Hahaha!'