Hao Gongming sighed with relief after solving the problems with her harem.
"Now it's time to reach the Root Realm!" she thought.
Under normal circumstances, it would take a long time to reach the 6th step, but with the system, it's much easier!
Hao Gongming started to create a skill.
It was called "6th Step Permanent Improvement: The host reaches the 6th step permanently in one go! (-633401 reality points)"
Hao Gongming frowned.
"It takes too many reality points to reach the 6th step directly."
She thought for a moment and decided to try again!
After deleting the last skill, she created a new skill that cost much less:
"Peak of 5th Step: The host will reach the peak of the 5th step permanently in one go. (-63340 reality points)"
Then she smiled!
She already had a root, and as soon as she absorbed it, she would easily be promoted to the 6th step!
After reaching the 6th step, she even had the option of removing this skill and reclaiming all the reality points!
That's because the peak of the 5th step is only required to absorb a root, and after absorbing the root, she no longer needed the skill.
Deleting it wouldn't cause her realm to regress, as she knew from historical records and the books she had read.
In the past, during a battle, a 6th step mage completely lost his body, and only a small part of his soul managed to escape!
But his root realm remained undisturbed, and after absorbing source energy for a while, he eventually recovered back to the 6th step!
He regained his strength as before!
That's a function of the root, making recovery much easier!
With this skill prepared, she confirmed it and the skill was created.
Immediately, she felt an unprecedented strength!
"So this is the 5th step!
In the 1st step, one can become powerful within a world and destroy countries and even continents!
In the 2nd step, one can destroy entire planets!
In the 3rd step, one can obliterate entire worlds!
In the 4th step, worlds are like bubbles, popping them is easier than snapping one's fingers.
And in the 5th step, the truth of everything would be revealed. One can destroy anything in the soil and even create worlds easily by combining bubble worlds. It reaches a point where one understands that everything here is fake, like a bubble or a dream that can be destroyed with a simple wish.
Hao Gongming felt that she could destroy the entire bubble world if she wished!
"If it weren't for the three 6th steps prohibiting such random acts of world destruction, the bubble world in the soil could have been destroyed by 5th step powerhouses."
Although the soil world is vast, after billions of years, its destruction would have been inevitable.
After all this, she took the root out, looked at it, and without hesitation, she swallowed it!
Then, she felt nothing!
"Is it fake?" she thought doubtfully.
"Gray thought it is real, so it should be..."
Suddenly, she felt a piercing pain in her stomach!
"What? It shouldn't be painful!"
In fact, it should have been completely painless, even joyful, when one reaches the 6th step!
This pain indicated that something had gone wrong!
What Hao Gongming failed to notice was the size of the piece of root!
It was way too big!
Normally, it should be the size of a pinky finger's fingernail.
But the root that she swallowed was the size of a fist!
She had made the mistake of being too arrogant and thinking that if anything went wrong, she wouldn't die, and with the system, everything would be fine!
This piece of root had been found by Gray on the body of the worm creature.
It could have been split into 20 pieces, and each one could have enabled an entity to reach the Root Realm!
By consuming such a large piece of the root, Hao Gongming was on the verge of exploding due to the massive excess energy.
However, the system intervened at the critical moment!
Normally, the system would not take any action because even if she were to die, she would be replaced with a clone. But now, with the survival skills deleted, if she were to die today, it would be a true death.
This transformed the situation into a genuine life-or-death scenario, triggering the activation of the system's skill "Indestructible."
Immediately, she felt much better and began absorbing the root.
However, the pain persisted, and Hao Gongming screamed in agony.
The entire desolate world she had come to for this promotion was completely obliterated. Hao Gongming was now screaming into the void.
Soon, nearby worlds began to be affected and destroyed by her screams.
Even though she had made great efforts to restrain herself from screaming and causing the destruction of the worlds around her, the worlds around her kept getting destroyed.
She was very upset by this; After all, those worlds were filled with her future harem members!
Though the worlds themselves were fake, the people within them were real. That was why she could gain reality points from the people in her harem.
With the destruction of each world, countless real people perished.
After a while, around 1,000 worlds had been destroyed by her screams, and finally, she began to feel better and opened her eyes.
"Damn, these bubble worlds are so fragile. They burst just from my screams!"
Then she looked around and sensed the real world above the soil.
"I'm in the 6th step! Finally, I can escape from the soil! But wait, I have a feeling that I can leave the soil right now. Shouldn't reaching the peak of the 6th step be a requirement?"
She pondered for a while and summoned Gray.
Gray looked at her and said, "Master."
Hao Gongming said, "Gray, I'll release a bit of my aura, and you assess my realm."
Then she released a tiny bit of her aura.
Gray's expression changed, and he exclaimed, "Quasi 7th step! Master, you are incredibly powerful!"
"What? How did I reach the quasi 7th step? What was that root you gave me?" Hao Gongming inquired.
Gray explained, "That root was found in the creature's body, Master. As you know, after swallowing the root, it grows within the body. it was on an 8th step creature's body, so it was quite grown! That particular root was large and could have helped many people reach the 6th step. Did you consume it all and survive, Master?"
Hao Gongming contemplated for a moment and then smiled. "Yes, anyway, why only quasi 7th step and not 8th step like the worm creature?"
Gray responded, "That root was nearly decayed when I found it, and much of its power had diminished. That might be the reason."
"Okay, Gray, go and collect every 'haremable' creature from accessible worlds," Hao Gongming instructed.
Gray looked at Hao Gongming curiously and asked, "What does Master mean by 'haremable'?"
Hao Gongming clarified, "I mean any creature that can be a member of my harem! This includes elves and dwarves but excludes worm monsters and anything too far from the human shape. If any creature can transform into a human shape, they are also considered haremable. Go and collect all of them, then bring them to the Hao Harem Sect. If they are considered children in their race, give them to Su. He will provide a space for them to grow, and then they can enter the harem. Also, inform Original Sin and Shang Lu of my orders."
After taking a breath, she continued, "Once the haremable members from each world are collected and transferred, gather the essence of that world and give it to one of my clones to enhance the world I created. I plan to leave the soil with my entire harem, and the more essence my world possesses, the better."
After all, her world was also a bubble world. However, she intended to improve it to the point where it could survive above the soil.
Gray took note of all the orders and departed swiftly.
Hao Gongming sighed and looked around. Now she could see clearly that everything, except for living things, was fake. It was like a simulation set up by the real world to extract talented individuals from it. In the 6th step, one could perceive this reality clearly.
...
Her orders were carried out, but it took a considerable amount of time to collect all those haremable creatures.
…
10 years later,
It took 10 years for the work to be completed. Now, all accessible worlds had been emptied, and their essence had been added to her own world. Her world had become vast beyond anything that had existed in the soil world before.
Hao Gongming examined her system information:
Reality Points: (1,560,641/3,955,731)
Physical Power: 98,512,637,205,183
Magical Power: 72,649,503,817,256
Soul Power: 72,485,693,147,028
System Skills:
Outsider: This skill allows the host to create her own skills using Reality Points. All previous skills had been removed, and the host now had the freedom to remove any self-created skill, which would return all associated Reality Points.
Lord of Harem: The number and cultivation level of harem members directly affect the host's number of Reality Points. The host also has the ability to accept women into her harem, and with each new member, the upper limit of Reality Points increases. Other methods of acquiring Reality Points, such as absorbing source energy from killing creatures or devouring bloodstones, remain unaffected.
Indestructible: The host can never be killed. The worst that can happen is being sealed.
Reality Body: The host possesses a foundational strength that will never weaken. Each point is now equivalent to 1 billion stat points in the previous version of the system. The reality body can be further enhanced through the permanent consumption of Reality Points at a ratio of 10 to 1.
She smiled when she saw it! Now, her harem members numbered in the 70 digit range, and she was acquiring more than 10,000 points per day.
She looked at Su, who was nearby, and asked, "How many children do you have now?"
Su solemnly looked at the pages of documents for a moment and replied, "It should be around 65 digit range, according to the latest information."
Hao Gongming smiled and said, "I look forward to their growth and their entry into the harem."
Then she declared, "Let's go."
…
Soon, they moved to a room where everyone present was at least at the 5th step, with three 6th steps standing at the top.
There were over 1,000 people present.
These were all 5th step cultivators from worlds not dependent on those strange beings like "The Great."
5th step cultivators had an almost limitless lifespan, so it was expected that there were many hidden ones around. In these 10 years, they had been discovered and brought here in preparation for venturing into reality.
Because until now, the only way to leave was to become a root, but now, Hao Gongming, who was at half 7th step, wanted to help them leave as well. Of course, everyone here had voluntarily come, willing to take their chances.
Hao Gongming asked Gray, "Is everything ready?"
"Yes, Master," Gray replied.
Hao Gongming nodded and said, "Now, you stay here. I'm going to go and kill 'The Great' and the others. They could be a problem if left alive."
She continued, "After I've dealt with them, you will go once again to explore and collect haremable creatures in their worlds. Then, we will proceed to one last place, the body of the worm, and explore."
Taking a deep breath, she declared, "After that, we will ascend to reality!"
Everyone indicated that they understood and nodded seriously.
Hao Gongming nodded in return and opened a portal herself directly to the location of "The Great"