But before the sound could fully erupt, a light flared brilliantly ahead. Under the shroud of this radiance, the body of a silver-white monster in front of them lit up, then dissolved into nothingness, vanishing completely.

He Yiming frowned, shook his head, and let out a soft sigh. "Failed again."

Mou Zilong grinned, clapping him on the shoulder. "Brother He, don't be discouraged. We've only tried a few dozen times; success wouldn't come so easily."

He Yiming let out a wry smile. Compared to these seniors of the Divine Path, his mindset indeed had some issues.

For the longest time, He Yiming's martial cultivation had progressed smoothly, almost never encountering significant setbacks. The reason he proposed helping Mou Zilong transform those eight thousand-plus Thunderbolt Spears into variant ones was precisely because he felt a degree of certainty.

However, he hadn't anticipated that the process would be far less straightforward than he imagined.

The power of light sealed within the Thunderbolt Spears was terrifyingly potent. Merely brushing against that energy, He Yiming understood that the original cultivator must have achieved the Pseudo-God Realm, and because they specialized in cultivating a single elemental technique, the sheer power of their light far exceeded his expectations.

He sighed deeply. The martial paths of the East and the West were, after all, vastly different, especially the cultivation methods for the light and dark elements, which formed entirely separate systems. They were far beyond what his own meager understanding could penetrate.

In contrast, He Yiming felt he had a relatively thorough grasp of the Five Elements techniques of the Eastern world.

Flipping his wrist, he took out another Thunderbolt Spear. He gently stroked the smooth, cold surface of the shaft, sensing the surging power within, murmuring to himself as if trying to deduce something.

Mou Zilong glanced toward the distance, where several pits marred the landscape. Some had already been filled by the shifting sands, while others remained starkly visible.

These pits were the result of He Yiming's failed experiments. Each pit once contained a silver-white creature of death, captured personally by him. While he longed to capture some golden monsters, with his current strength, unless facing a Pseudo-God Realm expert, he could only strike them dead, never subdue them alive.

Nodding towards the Divine Puppet standing guard just behind He Yiming, Mou Zilong said, "This old man will fetch another monster." Without waiting to see if the Divine Puppet could understand, his figure flickered slightly, and he was gone.

After a while, the sand below began to stir gently, and two low-level monsters surfaced. They traveled through the sand without any specific target; their emergence was merely an instinct to check the vicinity for any signs of life.

However, the moment their heads peeked out, two immense forces instantly descended, piercing deeply into their bodies.

The Divine Puppet, which had been standing behind He Yiming, had moved without notice. Its feet, sharp as blades, pinned the two creatures to the sand. An invisible force flowed from its legs into its body, connected through the one hundred and eight Sarira beads, eventually converging in the Divine Path Sarira.

He Yiming seemed to sense something. He looked down at the Divine Puppet, a strange sensation rising in his heart.

Using the Divine Path Sarira as the Sarira between his brows was a completely unique endeavor by He Yiming; even the Divine Path masters who first created this miraculous technique had been unable to achieve it.

Thus, when the Divine Puppet ascended to the Divine Path, it underwent a significant mutation. The most astonishing change was that every time it killed a monster, it absorbed a trace of the Death Qi into its body, ultimately hiding it within the Divine Path Sarira located at its brow.

The change was most obvious with the golden monsters. Whenever circumstances allowed, the Divine Puppet would suck them dry, leaving desiccated husks. And with every golden monster absorbed, the energy contained within the Divine Path Sarira seemed to grow stronger.

He Yiming hadn't anticipated this development either, but he did not stop it. The stronger the Divine Puppet became, the safer He Yiming was. If, one day, the Divine Puppet could advance to the Pseudo-God Realm ahead of schedule, he would wake up laughing in his sleep.

At this moment, holding the Thunderbolt Spear, he once again began to feel the power fluctuations he had experienced thousands of times. Yet, to this day, he still could not devise a way to replace the pure light power with his own force of Light and Dark Convergence.

Although the power of Light and Dark Convergence seemed slightly stronger than pure light power, the problem was that due to the unique caster, the pure light power inside contained a trace of specialized energy akin to sealing and domain power. Under the suppression of this energy, he could not destroy it without damaging the Thunderbolt Spear.

Of course, the sealed energy wasn't extensive. If He Yiming disregarded the spear, he could simply forcibly erase it. But doing so would shatter the weapon's core, rendering it useless.

Figures flickered in the distance; Mou Zilong had returned, carrying a silver-white monster in his hand. Although the creature had no restraints placed upon it, it remained utterly immobile.

Mou Zilong approached He Yiming, smiling broadly. "Brother He, no need to rush. Even if you miss this opportunity, you can take the next century to study it slowly."

He Yiming forced a bitter smile. "Another century from now, it will likely be useless."

Mou Zilong cast him a suspicious glance, his mind racing to guess the implication of those words, but no matter how he thought, he could not arrive at the true answer.

After all, sealing the passage was something no Divine Path expert could manage, and he didn't believe He Yiming could solve it alone.

Suddenly, a powerful fluctuation of world energy rolled in from afar.

This energy wave was even more immense and astonishing than when Ao Borui had advanced to the Divine Path previously. Even He Yiming was deeply shaken.

When a Divine Path expert advanced, a violent fluctuation of world energy would inevitably occur. It could be said that as long as one was on the same continent, such a fluctuation could not be hidden from others.

Having experienced it once before, He Yiming immediately understood what this wave represented.

He knitted his brow slightly, searching his memory for familiar names, but regretfully, he couldn't match any to the power signature.

Looking up, he glanced at Mou Zilong, whose expression was strangely complex, and He Yiming offered a wry smile. "Brother Mou, this energy is quite peculiar. I cannot guess who has advanced."

Mou Zilong slowly shook his head. "You wouldn't be able to guess."

He Yiming paused in surprise. "Why not?"

"Because this is not the advancement of the peak of the Human Path, but the advancement to the Void God Realm." Mou Zilong spoke with deep emotion.

"Void God Realm..." He Yiming gasped. "Someone has reached the Pseudo-God Realm?"

Mou Zilong nodded slowly. "This is a major event. For us, it increases our certainty of support by another fraction. It's just a matter of who was lucky enough to achieve it." His tone carried a hint of envy and loss, clearly regretting his own failure to advance.

He Yiming gazed forward, carefully sensing the strong and strange currents of energy.

A sudden inspiration struck him, and faintly, a gleam of light began to appear in his eyes.

The power of a Pseudo-God Realm expert was indeed different from a Void God Realm cultivator. The world energy fluctuation during their advancement was vastly dissimilar, and crucially, the Pseudo-God Realm power fluctuations seemed to possess an added component—this very component elevated the entire power system a level higher.

Although the attributes of this fluctuation were different from the light power, He Yiming vaguely sensed the most critical elements within it.

Gradually, his eyes grew brighter, for he had grasped something. While this understanding was incomplete and could not help him advance to the Pseudo-God Realm himself, it was more than enough to solve the problem with the Thunderbolt Spears.

Mou Zilong finished his contemplation and turned back, just catching the fleeting brilliance in He Yiming's eyes.

He started slightly, instantly understanding that He Yiming must have had an epiphany. The old man's heart grew more bitter, but considering He Yiming's actual age, he simply couldn't muster any jealousy.

He Yiming extended his hand, gently placing it on the base of the Thunderbolt Spear. The pure light power slowly flowed into it. This time, however, the light did not enter directly but diffused outward, slowly invading the spear in a manner that was simultaneously real and ethereal.

This was the Way of Reality and Illusion that He Yiming had deduced from his recent enlightenment.

The sealed energy within shifted slightly, then slowly began to flow backward. Guided by the force of Reality and Illusion, it poured directly into He Yiming's Dantian.

His eyes grew brighter still. This was divine power emanating from a Pseudo-God Realm expert, offering an indescribable, enormous benefit for He Yiming's future comprehension of the Pseudo-God Realm.

He had originally intended only to replace the internal power with his own Light and Dark Convergence; but after realizing the Way of Reality and Illusion during this episode, he had actually absorbed the power of a Pseudo-God Realm expert. This unexpected gain filled He Yiming with excitement.

Taking a deep breath of the somewhat coarse air, He Yiming struggled to calm himself. His inherent Light and Dark energy surged, slowly flowing into the Thunderbolt Spear.

This process was now quite simple and familiar to him; in an instant, the infusion was complete.

His eyes sharpened suddenly, and He Yiming's expression became solemn.

With a light wave of his hand, spear shadows materialized out of thin air. The variant Thunderbolt Spear flew from his grip, stabbing like a flash of lightning towards the unlucky silver-white monster Mou Zilong had thrown onto the sand...