One hour passed and Huang Xiaolong was delighted, the extreme cold element of the dark azure wind was gradually dispelled by the Thousand Demon Engulfing Destruction Array inside the Thousand Beast Cauldron.
The refinement process went on for ten long hours before all the extreme cold element was expelled. When it finally ended, Huang Xiaolong was ecstatic and relieved at the same time, his eyes sparkled staring at the cloud of refined azure green wind inside the Thousand Beast Cauldron. Although the cold element had been separated, it did not affect the spiritual benefits it would bring.
Then, Huang Xiaolong opened the lid of the Thousand Beast Cauldron, revealing within an azure snake about ten meters long and thick as an adult's arm that flew out, trying to escape. Dazzling azure energy flashed in midair, filling up an area of a hundred zhang in azure light, emanating a pulsating vibrant spiritual energy.
Such a dense natural spiritual energy!
Huang Xiaolong's eyes lit up as he quickly sat down in a meditative pose, running the Asura Tactics. He opened his mouth and sucked in akin to a whale drinking water, swallowing the cold azure energy flow into his body.
Not only did Huang Xiaolong not feel cold when the azure energy entered his body, instead, he felt extremely warm and comfortable, to the point of almost groaning aloud. Huang Xiaolong made every effort to run the Asura Tactics, controlling it to refine the azure natural spiritual energy. Instantly, Huang Xiaolong felt the fog pool of battle qi accumulated within his Qi Sea rumble violently.
Above his Qi Sea, the three mandate shapes―golden Primordial Divine Dragon, Archdemon, and the Golden Buddha shone brightly, while battle qi roared inside every inch of his meridians and veins.
Further down, Huang Xiaolong's dantian glowed a hazy aureate as the internal force in his dantian increased rapidly.
One hour, two hours…
In a mere two hours, Huang Xiaolong's battle qi cultivation broke through a small order. Gold, azure, midnight ink, and ember colored glows whirled endlessly around him.
Three days and three nights passed.
Huang Xiaolong, who had been sitting in a meditative pose, suddenly opened his eyes, a dark azure light flashed and disappeared in midair as the four-colored lights of gold, midnight ink, azure, and ember dissipated.
Huang Xiaolong immersed his spiritual sense internally to check the situation inside his body and cultivation and was delighted to discover that after three days of refining and absorbing the azure energy, his cultivation broke through from mid-Xiantian Seventh Order to peak mid-Xiantian Seventh Order.
Moreover, the internal force in his dantian was more abundant, with signs of transforming into a liquid state. This was the precursor to internal force evolving into true origin force!
This made Huang Xiaolong unable to calm down for a long time.
If his internal force could evolve into true origin force, it meant that he could successfully step into a stage where generations of Huang Family ancestors had failed, becoming 'Immortal' as civilization on Earth would term it.
An atmosphere of strong confidence burst forth from Huang Xiaolong's body.
Huang Xiaolong turned to look at the remaining azure cold wind hovering in the space above. Previously, the Thousand Beast Cauldron only sucked and refined in a tenth of the extreme cold wind. Once again Huang Xiaolong guided the Linglong Treasure Pagoda to approach the hovering azure cold wind and initiated the Thousand Demon Engulfing Destruction Array inside the Thousand Beast Cauldron to expel the cold element within.
Once the cold element was eliminated, Huang Xiaolong absorbed and refined the Xiantian spiritual energy within, time and again, repeating the same steps.
It was slightly over a month later that Huang Xiaolong finally finished refining the azure cold wind, propelling him to break through to Xiantian Eighth Order, reaching peak early-Xiantian Eighth Order at the end.
If word got out that someone broke through to peak early-Xiantian Eighth Order from a peak mid-Xiantian Seventh Order in slightly over a month's time, it would be hard to imagine the stir it would cause in the cultivation world.
Before arriving at the bottom of the rift, even Huang Xiaolong would find it hard to believe it himself.
Not only his battle qi, even his internal force took a great leap forward, the fog-like internal force in his dantian turned dense and viscous, floating above his dantian.
This was definitely a sign that his internal force was on the verge of turning into liquid form! Just a little bit more was needed to succeed.
Nourished by the half-formed true origin force in his dantian, Huang Xiaolong felt that with every breath he took, his flesh and body grew stronger visibly. Once the force in his dantian was fully turned into true origin force, his flesh and body would continue to be nourished at all times, every minute, every second, being strengthened. This was more beneficial and effective to Huang Xiaolong than taking grade eight or grade nine spirit pellets that enhanced physical strength.
Now that I've advanced to Xiantian Eighth Order, I wonder how many giant puppets I can control now. Huang Xiaolong mused. Not wasting time, he disappeared from the spot, entering the Linglong Treasure Pagoda's third layer. Running the Ancient Puppetry Art, he started gathering spiritual force to brand the seventh giant puppet's mind. It didn't take long for him to succeed.
He then moved on to the eighth puppet. When Huang Xiaolong finished branding the tenth puppet and wanted to control the eleventh puppet, his spiritual force was unable to support him and the attempt failed. Only then was Huang Xiaolong willing to stop, but he was still satisfied with the result.
He realized that to fully control all nineteen giant puppets, he had to break through to the Saint realm. After branding the tenth giant puppet, Huang Xiaolong appeared inside the rift, exploring the ground by flying with Godly Mt. Xumi.
After flying slowly for half an hour, all he could see was barren ground the entire way. Not a single leaf of green grass. In an environment dominated by the azure cold wind, not to mention plants, even a Saint realm expert could not survive in such conditions for long. Still, the path stretched further, the end had yet to be seen even after an hour of flight.
Although Huang Xiaolong had refined the azure cold wind, the frigid cold air remained, thus he continued to explore using the Godly Mt. Xumi. What baffled Huang Xiaolong was, the deeper he went, the stronger the cold atmosphere seemed to grow.
Another half an hour passed before Huang Xiaolong detected a small lake, perhaps a cold spring would be more accurate. The water bubbling up from the spring was dark green in color, whereas above the spring were flows of azure cold air that formed endlessly.
"This, could it be…?!" Huang Xiaolong was stunned. Did the azure cold wind at the bottom of this rift originate from this cold spring?!
What was this cold spring exactly! There was a hundred zhang distance between them and he was inside the Godly Mt. Xumi, yet Huang Xiaolong felt the terrifying extreme frigid air coming from the cold spring.
However, just as terrifying the extreme frigid air was, it also contained abundant spiritual energy. Huang Xiaolong activated the Eye of Hell to search within the small lake and saw that there were actually fish swimming within!
Fish!
But these weren't normal fish, they were something transformed from the natural spiritual energy in the air. Fish born from natural spiritual energy!
Huang Xiaolong was overjoyed, this was a treasure even a Saint realm expert would go crazy for, ah. Taking one could not only enhance one's strength, it also tempered one's flesh, muscles, and bones, akin to being reborn from the soul to every inch of the physical body, including internal organs, even to the ends of the hair. Removing the body's impurities, when one cultivated later on, it brought unimaginable benefits, especially in terms of absorbing spiritual energy.