Ninth In the World

Di Jiu didn’t know that Han Qingyi had suspected him of having the Book of the World. If he had known, he would have felt severely maligned. The reason he had become both an Array King and an Elixir King wasn’t really the Book of the World. The main reason was the golden Dao Law in his Spiritual Sea. This also had something to do with Qian Fenghua and Ji Ming. Qian Fenghua had imparted Array Dao to him, and Ji Ming had imparted alchemy to him.

At the moment, Di Jiu was completely focused on his goal. By using the Tribulation Convergence Elixir, he had to break through to the Life Tribulation Realm as fast as possible.

Four hours later, Di Jiu re-entered the spirit stone mine. He had never planned to take away the spirit stone mine. However, now that he wanted to reach the Life Tribulation Realm, this was the most suitable place to do so.

Di Jiu’s favorite cultivation method was to madly absorb the Spirit Qi during Tribulation Transcendence. The bigger the Tribulation Thunder, the faster his cultivation speed would be.

After exiting the Small Central World, Di Jiu would very soon be joining the True Province Genius Tournament. Thus, he hoped to improve his strength as much as possible on the Small Central Planet.

He wanted to join the True Province Genius Tournament, not only because he wanted to deal with the geniuses of the True Province, but also so that he would be able to handle the experts of the True Province. He had to be wary of both the Skygold Domain Lord, who had always had some suspicions against him, and the support behind Han Qingyi.

Di Jiu believed that Han Qingyi’s supporters would not harbor thoughts against him after his identity as an Elixir King had been exposed. As long as he was threatened, he had to have the ability to defend himself. In Di Jiu’s opinion, it would be ideal if he attained the True Form Realm after leaving the Small Central Planet.

After finding a good place for Tribulation Transcendence in the spirit stone mine, Di Jiu snappily took out two supreme-grade spirit meridians. Then, he set up an offensive saber array in the center of the Tribulation Transcendence. Once the Thunder Tribulation struck, he would activate the offensive saber array to attack the streak of Thunder Tribulation.

While anyone else would have hoped for the streak of Thunder Tribulation to be weak during the Tribulation Transcendence, Di Jiu hoped that it would be strong. The stronger it was, the better.

Once everything was ready, Di Jiu adjusted himself and popped two Tribulation Convergence Elixirs into his mouth at the same time. When he had attained the Ekayāna Tripod Realm, he had learned that one Tribulation Convergence Elixir wouldn’t bring about the Thunder Tribulation.

Di Jiu had planned to swallow the two Tribulation Convergence Elixirs first, feel for the Life Tribulation Realm, and then take four more Tribulation Convergence Elixirs to bring about the Thunder Tribulation in one shot.

However, he hadn’t expected that after he swallowed two Tribulation Convergence Elixirs, they would form a Spirit Origin that felt like two vast rivers gushing down. Nobody else would have been able to handle that frightening aura of spirit energy. The concentration of the spirit energy of the Life Tribulation Realm Dao Runes in the body felt like a roaring river—if it could not find an exit, it would tear and crush Di Jiu’s meridians.

At the prospect of such a dramatic effect, Di Jiu didn’t dare swallow the third Tribulation Convergence Elixir. He just madly circulated the Galaxy Art. The galaxy meridian quickly swept away the two streaks of frightening spirit energy formed by the Tribulation Convergence Elixir and attacked the cultivation barrier of the Life Tribulation Realm.

Just this once, Di Jiu came into contact with the cultivation barrier of the Life Tribulation Realm. He sighed silently— this was indeed an excellent elixir. Although he was someone who had immense difficulty trying to come into contact with the next realm, he could easily touch the Life Tribulation Realm after consuming two Tribulation Convergence Elixirs. It looked like the Creation Cauldron could perform alchemy that defied the laws of nature.

Di Jiu, who had been sitting in the spirit stone mine, suddenly saw two more supreme-grade spirit meridians by his side. When he touched the entry barrier of the Life Tribulation Realm, the galaxy meridian swept up the almost concrete Spirit Qi. In an instant, Di Jiu boomed down a giant thunder streak.

It was coming. The well-prepared Di Jiu used all his might to circulate the Galaxy Art and absorb the Spirit Qi.

Boom, boom, boom! As the first wave of thunder streak came down, Di Jiu activated the offensive saber array.

Judging by Di Jiu’s original rhythm of Tribulation Transcendence, his first wave of Thunder Tribulation would consist of nine strikes, the second wave would consist of 18 strikes, and so on and so forth, until the end of the ninth wave.

Although Di Jiu had yet to attain the Life Tribulation Realm, his offensive saber array had already initiated an attack against the Thunder Tribulation streak. This provocation immediately made the roaring in Di Jiu’s head get stronger and stronger. His Thunder Tribulation lost its rhythm completely. As endless thunder streaks formed continuously, there was no distinction between the first and the second wave.

Di Jiu considered himself lucky. If it hadn’t been for his immortal-like body, this frightening Thunder Tribulation would have been head-numbing to watch.

The Thunder Tribulation was frightening, and its effects were very obvious. Meanwhile, Di Jiu’s cultivation improved by leaps and bounds. It almost felt like the Thunder Tribulation could sense that Di Jiu was making use of it. When the continuous strikes of the Thunder Tribulation couldn’t do anything to Di Jiu, it suddenly became even thicker.

Crack! Di Jiu’s body was finally torn by the thickened Thunder Tribulation streak, revealing a wound while his skeleton cracked. Almost at the same moment, Di Jiu broke through to the Ekayāna Tripod Realm and attained the first-stage Life Tribulation Realm. The extremely concentrated spirit energy finally found a way out and Di Jiu’s cultivation level advanced.

Di Jiu, who had been worried, immediately swallowed a few more elixirs. He started executing saber arrays like crazy while using all his might to absorb the Spirit Qi.

The continuous thick Thunder Tribulation streaks engulfed Di Jiu. If there had been any onlookers looking at the Thunder Tribulation, they would have fainted from fright.

There were no traces of Di Jiu in those thick Thunder Tribulation streaks. If it hadn’t been for the existence of a Spirit Qi whirlpool in the center of this dense thunder streak, nobody would have believed that there was a living person amid this Thunder Tribulation.

After attaining the Life Tribulation Realm, the sight of Di Jiu absorbing the Spirit Qi became even grander. Di Jiu, who was already in the spirit stone mine, now had two complete supreme-grade spirit meridians. He was in a world entirely made up of pure, dense Spirit Qi. Thanks to the addition of the distinct Heavenly Dao Laws and the raging Thunder Tribulation, he broke through to the second-stage Life Tribulation Realm in an extremely short time.

Di Jiu was exhilarated. He was sure that this ongoing trend would definitely help him attain the fourth-stage Life Tribulation Realm during this round of Thunder Tribulation.

He had only entered the Small Central Planet a little over two years ago. Thus, there were still more than seven years to go. Perfecting the Life Tribulation Realm wouldn’t pose a problem.

What disappointed Di Jiu was that as soon as he broke through to the second-stage Life Tribulation Realm, the Thunder Tribulation suddenly dispersed. Even though the Spirit Qi was still surging like crazy in the surrounding area, Di Jiu no longer sensed the delightful feeling of cultivation. The next realm became blurry. Only time would ultimately make the next realm clearer.

What was the matter? Di Jiu frowned at the sky, which had calmed down. He didn’t understand what had happened.

However, he calmed down very quickly. Although he was disappointed, he also knew that such shortcuts were only temporary. Without the Thunder Tribulation, his cultivation speed slowed down quite a bit. Fortunately, it was still faster than that of the people outside.

He had come to the Small Central World with only two goals. The first was to find high-level spirit herbs and attempt to become a Grade-Nine Elixir King. Although he had yet to become a Grade-Nine Elixir King, there was no need to get anxious—it would only be a matter of time.

His second goal was to work hard to improve his strength. He had entered the Small Central Planet at the third-stage Ekayāna Tripod Realm and was now already at the second-stage Life Tribulation Realm. Although his cultivation level had improved greatly, this was not enough.

Di Jiu didn’t leave. Instead, he chose to continue his reclusive cultivation there.

…

The Small Central Planet wasn’t small. As the spirit herbs that could be found on its surface were gradually taken away, more and more cultivators entered reclusive cultivation just like Di Jiu.

Geng Ji also wanted to find a place for reclusive cultivation. However, before that happened, he had to find Brother Jiu. During his first year on the Small Central Planet, he had already perfected the nine stages of the Void Spirit Realm. Without the Spirit Rive Elixir, he would not be able to enter the Pioneer Sea Realm.

Brother Jiu had told him before that it would be better if he advanced without the use of an elixir. However, he had no way of even coming into contact with the cultivation barrier of the Pioneer Sea Realm without using an elixir. Thus, he had no choice but to look for Di Jiu. He believed that Di Jiu could help him resolve all the cultivation-related problems he had.

After wandering around on the Small Central Planet for more than a year, Geng Ji had still not heard any news related to Di Jiu. He currently stood next to an almost dried-up swamp with a level-three Metallic Lotus Flower in the middle.

The Metallic Lotus Flower, which was of a very low class, didn’t have much use. If it had been outside, some cultivators might have dug for it. However, on the Small Central Planet, not even the poorest cultivators would enter a swamp to dig for a level-three Metallic Lotus Flower. Only Geng Ji would do something like that.

Geng Ji didn’t have a concept of bad and good. He had heard Di Jiu say before that if he saw a spirit herb, he should get it first, regardless of how good or bad it was, and deal with it later.

Therefore, when Geng Ji saw this Metallic Lotus Flower, he entered the swamp without hesitation and dug it up.

When Geng Ji dug up the Metallic Lotus Flower, he was nearly stunned. There was another spirit herb underneath the Metallic Lotus Flower. Geng Ji recognized this spirit herb— it was the Spiritual Sea Fruit. The Metallic Lotus Flower had formed a natural invisibility restriction that had wrapped around the Spiritual Sea Fruit. If the Metallic Lotus Flower had not been dug up, the Spiritual Sea Fruit wouldn’t have been found.

Geng Ji was really excited that he had actually found a Spiritual Sea Fruit on the Small Central Planet. Many cultivators would choose this fruit if asked which was the most valuable level-six spiritual object.

The Spiritual Sea Fruit was the only spiritual fruit that could rival the Spirit Rive Elixir in terms of effect. It could give a cultivator at the Void Spirit Realm a very high chance of attaining the Pioneer Sea Realm. In terms of value, the Spiritual Sea Fruit was over 10 times more valuable than the Spirit Rive Elixir.

The Spiritual Sea Fruit could not only increase a cultivator’s chances of advancing to the Pioneer Sea Realm, but also expand the cultivator’s Spiritual Sea. The key was that it was a natural spiritual fruit.

Geng Ji had been eager to attain the Pioneer Sea Realm for a long time. On the Small Central Planet, Pioneer Sea Realm cultivators were considered to have above average strength. If he could attain the Pioneer Sea Realm, he could go to more places.

Therefore, when he got the Spiritual Sea Fruit. Geng Ji couldn’t wait any longer. He consumed the fruit right away.

Geng Ji had a pure Thunder Spirit Root, so his potential was innately great. On top of that, he had also wandered around the Void Spirit Realm for a year or two. As soon as he swallowed the Spiritual Sea Fruit, he could feel the cultivation barrier of the Pioneer Sea Realm summon the Thunder Tribulation.

Although Geng Ji’s Thunder Tribulation was not as frightening as Di Jiu’s, it was still much more powerful than an ordinary cultivator’s. Fortunately, his cultivation technique had improved thanks to Di Jiu, who had used the golden Dao Law before. Thus, even though the Thunder Tribulation was powerful, it didn’t cost him his life.

In only a few days, Geng Ji had overcome the Thunder Tribulation and attained the first-stage Pioneer Sea Realm. Meanwhile, he had stabilized his cultivation.

A small section of a green spirit meridian showed up at the position of Geng Ji’s Tribulation Transcendence. Geng Ji was preparing to leave when he noticed this spirit meridian.

The green spirit meridian emitted a Spirit Qi with a strong medicinal fragrance. Geng Ji was no fool. He could tell that this was no ordinary spirit meridian. It was also easy to guess how this spirit meridian had gotten out. The Small Central Planet had natural restrictions all over the place. One of them had probably been struck open by the Thunder Tribulation and let a spirit meridian out. This was nothing strange.

“Herb King Meridian?” a surprised voice asked before a fair-skinned man sped towards Geng Ji. Before the man could reach him, a Dharma treasure had already been flung at Geng Ji.