Back in a house located in the center of the city, a cloaked man and a rarely seen beauty confronted themselves, this lady had bright golden hair and light rays could be seen flowing off her hair like a water fall, she had on the robes meant for the high priestess of the church and from her aura one could easily tell that she and long since formed a link with her God and fully entered the fourth stage, the amount of people who had reached this realm in the Sandflame city was not even up to 30!
"You gave him that method?" Zao Yue, the high priestess of the church asked with a dark frown on her face.
"Haha, you worry too much, have you forgotten who his father is? No top tier genius will have trouble with that method, I even gave him 30 pills to be used daily if he faces any problems." The cloaked man said without a worry in the world, the method of using the light energy to begin refining of the fleshy body was five times better than the normal conventional way. But it also came with a downside, if one was lacking in talent and therefore their control lacking, they could not quickly balance the input of energy with the refining, and this will cause damage to their core, they would experience an extremely painful sensation in their chest, and this pain could easily drive someone crazy!
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An Tongyi sat down cross-legged and eyes tightly shut in the cultivation chamber, droplets of sweat could be seen on his forehead as he tried to achieve a balance in his core, he held on for as long as he could but less than sixty minutes later a clash occurred and he felt an intense burning sensation, his face began to glow a bright red, he gritted his teeth and did his best to prevent himself from screaming out loud, the pain was truly unbearable!
He slowly reached into the sack by his waist and pulled out a pill and quickly popped it into his mouth. A cool sensation slowly spread in his body and his face calmed down.
A priest observing the future disciples had a slight frown on his face.
"Already using pills? Hmph, it seems having such a background can also be considered a talent after all." The priest said with a derisive smile.
"You can't really blame him after all, due to his status, we already gave him a chamber that has a concentration of light energy double the normal standards, and I am guessing the Lord is also secretly boosting it, maybe it has already reached triple! How do you expect a child who just turned 12 to endure that?" Another priest commented.
"Who asked him to be so greedy?" The first priest asked.
The second priest just shook his head and didn't bother with the other priest, a large number of the church was unhappy with the existence An Tongyi and the reason was pretty obvious.
The pills effect wore off after 24 hours, so An Tongyi had to pop another one in his mouth and continued cultivating, during these 24 hours several people had already left to rest and planned on continuing their cultivation the next day, while An Tongyi and a few other's were able to last for longer.
"It seems Luo Yin, He Lin, Xing Shun and Deng Yahui are very promising disciples in this batch!" Lai Su, the priest in charge of overseeing the disciples stated.
"Priest Lai Su, you seem to have skipped An Tongyi?" Priest Pan Li pointed out.
"What? He is quite talented, but you can't compare him to those who have gotten so far without any external help." Priest Lai Su replied.
Priest Pan Li just slowly shook his head, whenever An Tongyi used to come around and watch the older disciples train, Priest Lai Su had continuously attacked him behind his back, the way he acted one would think they had an unreconcilable grudge!
As the days passed, more people could no longer hold on and had to go and rest and this wasn't a shameful matter, as most people finished the first stage in around six months on average while some could gather energy for a hundred years and still not pass that stage!
Soon thirty days had passed and only 2 people had managed to last the whole time, Luo Yin and An Tongyi! An Tongyi reached into his pouch to bring out one more pill but found out that all the pills had been exhausted. 'Oh no! If I stop now, my refined core will start to slowly dissipate and elder already said those are all the pills he has!' Soon the pain started spreading once more throughout his body, 'Argh, if only I had 5 more pills, I could easily enter the second stage! Right now I have almost finished refining my middle layer, and only the outer layer of my body remains!' Refining the core saw no major improvements in strength, albeit a larger stamina and endurance, but his physical strength would still remain the same. Once the middle layer had been refined, an explosive increase in strength could be seen, one could easily defeat 10 non cultivators in a single breath, and once the outer layer had been refined, one would see a stronger defense and resistance, some who trained only their outer layer fully would find their skin could resist 20 strikes of a blade without receiving significant damage!
The pain had started to reach unbearable limits and An Tongyi began to feel he could no longer hold on, he willed upon the endurance he had just achieved from refining his core and continued resisting, he needed to hold for 5 more days and he started to feel that he couldn't even hold on for 1 more day!
Hour after hour passed and soon he started to feel his consciousness slipping. The pain was truly unbearable. His skin had turned red and his eyes glowing red, he started regretting his decision by following this method, but the elder had told him about the advantages he'd receive if he could fully finish this stage. He tried to hold on for longer but soon passed out.
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Priest Lai Su quickly noticed the commotion going on in one of the chambers. Upon seeing what happened a massive smile spread on his face!
"Haha, truly a genius, in just a month Luo Yin has already broken through!" He shouted with a wide smile on his face.
Priest Pan Li popped upon hearing the commotion decide to pop into the cultivation chamber.
"What happened?" He asked upon seeing the joyous mood Priest Lai Su was in.
"Haha, brother Pan Li, a new top tier genius has emerged in our church, Luo Yin has broken through!" Priest Lai Su said smiling from ear to ear.
"Wow, in just thirty days? What about little Yi? Is he about to break through too?" Priest Pan Li said with a happy smile, it was great news that a top tier genius had now emerged.
Upon hearing Priest Pan Li's words, a slight frown appeared on Priest Lai Su's face, he had been so engrossed in observing Luo Yin that he had ignored An Tongyi. He quickly ran to check up on his room and upon seeing An Tongyi's collapse body a look of horror spread all over his face, 'I'm finished! What have I done' His job was to observe the disciples and ensure nothing went wrong in their cultivation, but now he had made a massive mistake and from the looks of it, An Tongyi had let the energy run rampant in his body.
You could compare the first stage of cultivation to making a boiled egg, heat normally passes from the outer shell to the inner yolk, slowly cooking the egg, the route An Tongyi had take was like microwaving an egg, where the heat spreads from the yolk to the outer shell, and if one was not careful, the egg could explode!
Priest Lai Su hurriedly begun using a few healing techniques to rapidly mend An Tongyi's body, Priest Pan Li walked in and after seeing what happened, he didn't even have time to get angry and quickly began using his own healing techniques. He quickly contacted another priest to inform the Holy Priestess to come as soon as possible!
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"Have you seen what you've caused? You could have crippled his cultivation!" Fury was written all over Zao Yue's face, been suddenly called out of nowhere to receive news of what happened to her son had seriously affected her normally calm mentality.
The cloaked man stood facing the window, his black robes fluttering as the wind blew into the room. A slight frown could be seen on his face, 'What's going on, he should have been able to cultivate with no problems, unless...' a look of realisation flickered on his face as he turned around to face Zao Yue with a smile. He calmly pulled off the hood covering his head, and his blackish green hair stood out, his iris was the color of a bright jade.
"You worry about his cultivation been crippled, when I'm here?" The man said with a smile.
Zao Yue stared at him with anger still evident on her face. But the man did have a point, from how dark his hair was and the unholy aura around him, this man was clearly a devil cultivator! If news of his presence here was spread, the Sandflame city would experience a crisis. Luckily this man was a revered pill king with an unfathomable cultivation, no one in this city could discover him even if they turned the entire city inside out! But even all this could not deter her anger, the cultivation method he had given her child wasn't as simple as he had told An Tongyi!
"You feel no remorse for the suffering he went through?" She asked.
"You shouldn't blame me, I hope the priest on duty has been properly punished?" The Pill King said, even he felt truly sorry for what An Tongyi must have gone through.
"Of course! We have stripped him off his post and had him do some manual labour for 3 years, if I knew that priest was one to shirk off his duty I would have never allowed him to watch over the new disciples." She said, what the priest had done would have affected other disciples too, if one of them had their cultivation go haywire, without quick intervention, they would have ended up crippled.
"Good good, let me check up on him and see how he is doing" The Pill King said, he quickly left the room to avoid the nagging he would have received if he decided to stay.
Upon reaching the room meant for recuperation at the basement of the house, he looked around and saw the golden healing array located under the bed, An Tongyi was peacefully asleep and seemed to be in a deep dream, his little pet wolf was also seen sleeping next to him. As the Pill King observed him, he decided to try out the idea he had thought of previously, he quickly set up a formation and brought out a personal cultivation chamber, it was shaped like a tent, and he quickly used it to cover the entire bed.
"Ah to think I'd have a need for this old thing, but I guess this little kid is meant to inherit this after all" The Pill King said with a wry smile on his face, he observed the chamber for a little while then left the room.
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Early in the morning The Pill King opened his eyes from his short meditation, he was sitting down in a garden with his legs crossed and surrounded by plants of only one type, these plants had dark purple flowers which were currently all curled up. He looked up at the ceiling which had many miniature suns lighting up the garden and he smiled, 'one of the advantages of staying with a family adept in light huh?' he thought. He stood up and grabbed his robe and the medallion beside it, written on it was 'Peak Rank Pill King Can Zhi', looking at it, it was this medallion which had saved the lives of the mother and son back when they were in the Taiji Empire, the peak rank on it signified that amongst all those who were in the Pill King stage, he was at the peak!
He headed down to the basement, and with his cultivation, in the blink of an eye he was already removing the personal cultivation chamber and formations he had put around An Tongyi. Looking at him, Pill King Can Zhi let out a soft smile. 'He finally did it'.
An Tongyi slowly opened his eyes and saw Pill King Can Zhi staring at him, his head was still woozy, his little pet wolf woke up as well, seeing An Tongyi all hale and hearty it started licking his face to show his happiness.
"Haha, calm down buddy, calm down." He said with a smile on his face, he turned to face Pill King Can Zhi and happily greeted him, "Good morning elder, thank you for your treatment!" He was already used to the miraculous healing techniques this man could do, and seeing his body feeling stronger he could easily tell it was... 'Wait a minute, my body, this feels...'
He slowly put the wolf cub down, inhaled slowly and exhaled, soft light rays could be seen falling out of his mouth. His face beamed up, 'I, I, I, broke through?' even his thoughts were stammering at the joy he was currently feeling, he thought he had failed but it seems he succeeded?!
"What are you there staring in a daze for, you only reached the peak of the second level of the Energy Materialisation stage, what are you so happy for?" Pill King Can Zhi said with a smile.
"I'm in the, the, the second stage??!"