Tai Yan’s wildly surging aura abruptly ceased, then retreated into her body like a receding tide.
“Seventh-Grade Spirit God!”
After sensing for a moment, Tai Yan broke into a flower-like smile and cried out in delight.
“Tai Yan, how do you cultivate? You jumped from Fifth-Grade Spirit God to Seventh-Grade Spirit God in just eight months?”
The gourd, with its round body, bobbed about, its eyes gleaming with envy.
Beside her, Yu Longyue, Qing You, and Lan Ling also paused their cultivation, their gazes full of pleasant surprise directed toward Tai Yan.
Cultivating within this "Co-Color Divine Realm," their progress was rapid, a thousand miles a day. In these eight months, Yu Longyue had reached Fifth-Grade Spirit God; Qing You had broken through to Third-Grade Spirit God; Lan Ling had weathered her Third Spiritual Tribulation to ascend to Spirit God, while another had only just managed to advance from First-Grade to Second-Grade Spirit God.
However, compared to Tai Yan, their speed was significantly slower.
Tai Yan’s cultivation progress was akin to covering ten thousand miles a day, vaulting from Fifth-Grade Spirit God directly to Seventh-Grade. Such divine speed naturally left Yu Longyue and the others utterly astonished.
Among them, only Qing You could vaguely grasp a hint of the reason.
When Nie Kong had journeyed to the Abyss of Lan Luo, Qing You had followed the entire way and was well aware of Tai Yan’s origins.
Tai Yan was born from the manifested form of the Great Evolution Spirit Venerable—the "Reminiscent Grass"—and that Great Evolution Spirit Venerable was a super-expert who stood frighteningly close to the Grand Venerable status. Because of this heritage, once Tai Yan advanced to the Spirit God realm, her cultivation would encounter no hindrances, allowing her to recover to the absolute peak of the Spirit God realm with remarkable ease.
“Could it be because there’s a little baby in my belly?”
The gourd floated onto Tai Yan’s leg, its single eye peering intently at her abdomen. Seeing the gourd’s behavior, Yu Longyue and Lan Ling couldn't help but let out soft chuckles.
Tai Yan, however, instinctively raised her right hand and gently stroked her lower abdomen a few times, a trace of worry clouding her features. During this period, she could clearly feel the tiny life inside growing daily, yet after eight months, her abdomen remained perfectly flat, showing no sign of protrusion whatsoever.
“Whoosh!”
A graceful silhouette appeared several meters away. It was Gu Xian, arriving with equal measures of astonishment and delight. “Tai Yan, you broke through to Seventh-Grade Spirit God?”
Over these past months, Gu Xian, Tai Yan, and the others had become fast friends.
“Mm.”
Tai Yan nodded, her face wreathed in smiles. “Gu Xian, how is my brother’s condition?”
“Master Ancestor and Master have sent me to invite you all to the entrance of the Immortal Domain. It seems Uncle-Master Nie Kong will be emerging soon,” Gu Xian said with a beaming face.
“That’s wonderful news.”
Excited cheers erupted, and several figures shot out of the valley like streaks of lightning toward the Seven-Colored Immortal Domain.
“Whoosh!”
Nie Kong shot forward like an arrow loosed from a bowstring toward the mass of swirling mist.
Within the churning fog remained only the final strand of “Chaos Immortal Qi.” This strand was as thick as a finger, stretching dozens of feet long, ranking first among all the immortal qi present.
The other thirty-two strands of immortal qi had all been absorbed by Nie Kong.
Through repeated condensation, the Chaos, which had initially spread across the majority of Nie Kong’s body, had shrunk into a ball the size of a fist, yet the power it contained had multiplied several times over.
Once he absorbed this final strand of immortal qi, Nie Kong was confident he would advance to Ninth-Grade Spirit God.
Hoo!
As Nie Kong entered the mist, that strand of immortal qi roared toward him, moving as fast as a shooting star.
Slightly tilting his body, the immortal qi grazed past Nie Kong’s chest and rushed past.
At almost the same instant, Nie Kong’s right hand, already charged and ready, flashed out. He gripped the head of the immortal qi, and the Heavenly Fire immediately engulfed it.
Hoo! Hoo! Hoo…
The immortal qi writhed like a fiery serpent, its dozens-of-feet-long body thrashing violently, continuously slicing through the surrounding mist.
However, Nie Kong’s palm held it like an iron vise, gripping its vital point tightly. No matter how hard it struggled, it could not break free from the restraint.
Having already absorbed the thirty-two strands of “Chaos Immortal Qi,” and with Nie Kong now outside the area of the radiant glow, this final strand, despite being the thickest and longest, had its resistance lowered to its absolute minimum.
Nie Kong’s hands moved swiftly, twisting the immortal qi into a compact ball, much like twisting hemp.
A spherical immortal qi was definitely easier to refine than a long, sinuous form because it had less room to thrash, causing its resistance to drop even further.
This was an experience Nie Kong had deduced during his fourth refinement attempt.
He had used this precise method ever since; indeed, the speed of refining immortal qi had increased dramatically. Otherwise, there would likely be three or four extra strands of “Chaos Immortal Qi” lingering in this space right now.
“Boom!”
Nie Kong pinched the two ends of the immortal qi and pressed down with his boundless Chaos Divine Power. The fire ball, initially one to two meters wide, exploded instantly, expanding nearly tenfold.
Crimson flames enveloped the immortal qi and Nie Kong’s own body.
It took only about thirty to forty hours before this final strand ceased struggling and was completely refined. Nie Kong willed it, drawing the mass of immortal qi into his body.
Fine, misty white energy spread out, merging into his Divine Power.
That ball of Chaos continued its slow process of condensation…
“Crack!”
Roughly fifteen minutes later, as the very last trace of immortal qi integrated into his Divine Power, the mass of Chaos, like a balloon expanded to its limit, suddenly burst apart.
The misty white energy radiated outward frantically, centered on Nie Kong’s Yaochi Acupoint.
In moments, it spread across his chest, abdomen, waist, hips, and limbs, but it halted abruptly at his neck. At this point, every part of Nie Kong’s body, save for his head, was occupied by that misty white Chaos, and within this Chaos pulsed extraordinarily pure Divine Power.
“This is Ninth-Grade Spirit God!”
Nie Kong broke free from his “Crimson Star Battle Form.” After absorbing the final strand of “Chaos Immortal Qi,” the amount of Divine Power his body could accommodate, and the intensity of that power, was at least ten times that of his Eighth-Grade Spirit God state.
He even felt that if the power within him were unleashed in its entirety, he would have no equal beneath the Grand Venerable.
Eighth-Grade Spirit God and Ninth-Grade Spirit God, though both considered the peak of the Spirit God realm, possessed a completely disparate sensation of might.
To date, the number of Spirit Gods in the Grand Venerable Spirit Realm had accumulated to several hundreds, yet Ninth-Grade Spirit Gods were exceedingly rare. Now, Nie Kong truly understood why: between a Ninth-Grade Spirit God and the Grand Venerable lay a chasm, a heavenly barrier, but the gulf between an Eighth-Grade Spirit God and a Ninth-Grade Spirit God was equally arduous to cross.
“Dark Night Divine Venerable will surely head toward the ‘Primal Heaven Grotto’ this time. If I encounter him, I must fight him,” Nie Kong felt a stirring within his heart.
He knew clearly that if he entered the “Primal Heaven Grotto,” those Divine Venerables might target him, perhaps even uniting to eliminate him.
Nie Kong was unconcerned by this prospect.
Immense strength nurtured immense confidence. Should matters escalate to that point, deciding who would eliminate whom would be far from certain! Nie Kong took a deep breath, suppressing the urge to battle the Dark Night Divine Venerable and the like, and raised his gaze toward the opposite spatial wall, where a colossal, seven-colored vortex had manifested.