Chương 83: Chapter 82 – A Tangled Knot

The skies darkened above the Heavenly Sword Sect with occasional flashes of lightning. A strong wind picked up, a precursor to another of the storms that had started to become common. It raised no alarm, however, as everyone had adapted to them by now. With the protections against lightning that Ren still had on his mountain, he could afford to utterly ignore the storm overhead as he began to explore the changes in his cultivation. The first thing he noted was the battered condition of his dantian.

It was absolutely covered in cracks. Still, it wasn't so bad as to leak qi into the environment; it would just take time to close the cracks and heal before he could resume his cultivation. It would set him back a few weeks while he recovered. Ren realized he was procrastinating out of apprehension at what he may find, so he decisively moved his gaze deeper. He mutely examined his dantian in stunned disbelief. The changes wrought by the Stairs of Ascension were definitely not simple.

The qi that made up his spiritual sea had been condensed by nearly half! The gold specks had grown to almost take over the sea that represented his entire reserve of qi. It meant that the transformation that was supposed to happen during the breakthrough to the core formation stage had been initiated far earlier than normal.

'What were those stairs? What profound origins must that treasure artifact have that it can cause such life-changing miracles like this?!' Ren marveled. The resources of the inner sect had answered some of Ren's questions about his very first breakthrough. The golden specks that had formed during his breakthrough to the foundation establishment realm were a higher form of qi.

That higher-order qi wasn't just more powerful by itself; it also influenced the surrounding qi of his spiritual sea to change with each breakthrough. The 9 drops he had formed were an exemplary result that had indicated his potential. Fewer drops meant a slower transformation. But even with the best result of 9 drops, the qi wouldn't have reached nearly this level of transformation even at the peak of the foundation realm! The Stairs of Ascension had altered the course of Ren's destiny.

Now with his spiritual sea shrunk by half, he could absorb even more qi, which would also transform into the golden state more rapidly. He would continually be adding qi, then condensing it. He couldn't begin to imagine just how vast his qi reserves would be by the time he reached the peak of the foundation realm.

'No wonder my dantian is so damaged! The condensed qi must be exerting far more pressure on the walls of my dantian.' Ren had at least one question answered, luckily before he began to agonize over it. His dantian would need more time to adjust to the new norm. As it healed, it would grow tough enough to withstand the current levels only to face greater pressure as even more qi entered the dantian. The repeated refining would result in an incredibly strong dantian, which was another unforeseen benefit.

A strong dantian meant he would be more resilient to external damage, and it supposedly had another role to play in future realms of cultivation.

'Future realms… Realms above core formation… It sounds like a dream, but such a thing is no longer out of my reach. The Nascent Sprite Realm, also known as the Primordial Origin Realm, the 4th realm of qi cultivation. I've only encountered its name a few times in passing, in all that time I spent in the library. How would I even begin cultivating to such a realm when I know next to nothing about it?!' Ren started panicking in reaction to the discovery.

At times, it wasn't some beast or demonic cultivator that was truly scary. Sometimes, the thing called 'potential' was the most frightening because it brought with it such burdensome expectations. And even there, expectations of others were nothing compared to failing to live up to one's own expectations. It brought up all kinds of lonely memories of his childhood, being raised as the last hope of the Zhao clan and hated by all his cousins. It took some time, but he managed to regain control over his emotions.

Ren reminded himself that he was no longer the same Young Master. He hadn't come this far just because of his family but because he had found his own dao. He only needed to keep moving forward fearlessly. This potential wasn't something to be feared because he would eventually find a way to share it with others. His was not a lonely path anymore. Ren felt lighter and more at peace when he resumed the inspection of his dantian. He had briefly glanced at it earlier before choosing to address the lesser issue first.

Now that he had found his calm, he felt better prepared to handle the construct that represented his Fire of Life. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. The tiny sun was burning fiercely above his spiritual sea. There was a palpable sense of weight around it, which even now was slowly pulling in qi from his environment. The construct was unharmed, with the numerous karmic strands emerging from it. But that wasn't what caught his attention at first.

All around his Fire of Life, ephemeral strands representing weak karmic connections gathered in shimmering clouds. Long after his breakthrough was complete.' They are still here! Why haven't they faded like they normally do?! What does it mean? Have I started to see true karmic connections now?' Ren kept watching and hoping, but they didn't fade away. Hundreds of shimmering strands so thin, they faded in and out of view, sparkling in the light of the tiny sun.

Finally moving past the cloud of strands, Ren counted 32 solid strands connected to the Fire of Life, waving gently in an unseen breeze. This last breakthrough had spontaneously created 7 strands, far more than in any previous breakthrough! Even worse, he didn't know the provenances of those connections, although he detected a new, weak sensation when he looked closer. Perhaps if he were close to the person, he might be able to recognize which connection they represented?

He could only try this out later, so he moved on. The odds were that at least one of those connections would bring him karmic sin, but this time, Ren was wavering on whether to cleanly sever them or to keep them. In the past, after understanding what karmic sin meant for his cultivation, Ren had always severed any connections that were too burdensome beyond a point.

But in all that time, he had never made such drastic advancements as he did when karmic sin and merit were both refined and blended by his Fire of Life. In that brief period, he had broken through to the 4th layer. Then he fell into a pit where he encountered those bees that he used in one of the challenges. He had been struck by lightning and underwent an extremely challenging body cultivation breakthrough.

He had also survived the calamitous lightning storm that was the culmination of a lengthy process of filtering the dragon veins below his mountains. The same process that had provided him with so many treasures and such an extremely potent environment to cultivate in.

'After 6 months of slow and steady accumulations, perhaps it is time for some more explosive growth! The Golden Dharma Trial is surely the perfect opportunity. I cannot control fate, but I can time it to bring me the greatest benefit! And there was the plan I had come up with to prepare for negative threads of connection…' Long back when Ren had first recognized the risks that absorbing sin brought, he had come up with a few ideas of how to mitigate them.

After toying with different ideas, there was one he thought might work. The dense burning sun in his dantian had begun as a qi construct. So he just thought, what was preventing him from building another? This way he could nurture two flames, one for karmic merit and one for karmic sin. Ren was confident he could identify and rearrange the strands as needed. But that only separated the karmic connections he formed.

The reason he hadn't implemented it yet was because he couldn't see a way to utilize the second construct. Causality of Karma had a use for the construct in the core formation realm, and if he used the merit construct for that, what would he do with the other? Furthermore, if he attempted to breakthrough to core formation while having two separate constructs, he couldn't predict how it might affect things. What if he lost control over the second construct and ended up crippled or dead?

With the amount of energy involved in that breakthrough, it wasn't just plausible; it was quite likely. Ren almost groaned at where his thoughts were leading him. He couldn't believe he was actively contemplating inviting such turmoil into his life. He really had changed! But these were still plans for the future. He had more immediate decisions to make in the short term. Ren had been selected from hundreds of disciples for this opportunity, a grand achievement. But that meant he needed to prepare for the journey.

"That reminds me, wasn't there supposed to be some sort of reward waiting for me as someone who climbed to the 5th step? What place did I earn among the top 25?" Deciding to stop with his inspection there, Ren got up and looked around his mountain. He found a small pouch waiting for him near the flag that marked the entrance to his mountain abode. It was just a regular pouch, but it hadn't been approached by any spirit beasts. Inside was an unremarkable ring.

When he extended his senses to see what was so special about it, he gasped in awe. It was a spatial ring! The spatial treasure was extremely valuable, with the folded space inside it being over 10 times greater than that in a spatial pouch. Ren hadn't bought more because he made do with the one he had. It was almost always full, but since Ren didn't mind physically carrying things, it hadn't been much trouble. This ring unquestionably changed things!

He dripped a single drop of blood on it to establish his ownership and then wore it on his left hand. The space inside was equivalent to 3 large rooms. And anything he put inside, he knew precisely where it was located in the ring and could pull it out at a moment's notice. The ring would definitely prove its worth on this journey, and his heart filled with gratitude to the sect for this lavish reward.

He returned to his peak, where a small cloud of Corpse Silk Moths fluttered past, on their way to feed from the latest kill his arrays had made. He surveyed the scenic abode, with the lush trees, verdant fields, and nearly visible flows of qi all over that formed virtuous cycles. A light rain was still falling as the storm dissipated, bringing a rich loamy scent to his nose. Ren breathed deeply of the rich scent and let it out in a huff.

"Now then, let's get to work and begin preparations!"