Xiantian Realm

Over the next few days, Wang Hong went to the library again and found a copy of the "Henglian Liuhe Gong."

This cultivation technique had nine levels in total. When cultivating it, one circulated the technique while striking the entire body. Levels one through three required striking the body with a wooden rod; after one's cultivation advanced to the fourth level, one switched to an iron rod, and upon reaching the seventh level, to a thick iron bar. After every round of striking, one tempered the body with medicinal herbs that relaxed the sinews, unblocked the channels, invigorated the blood, dispersed stasis, strengthened the tendons, and fortified the bones.

Cultivating the first three levels only required ordinary medicinal herbs, which could be bought at any major pharmacy. From the fourth level onward, however, one needed relatively precious Chinese medicines that had grown for many years, making it no small expense. If not for the support of his space, Wang Hong would never have dared cultivate such a technique.

In the days that followed, Wang Hong cultivated day and night. Whenever he grew tired from practicing the "Thunderclap Spear," he drank some Medicinal Wine to recover his strength, then practiced the "Muscle-Tendon Cleansing Cultivation Method." When sleepy, he entered his space to sleep for a while. Upon coming out, he continued practicing the "Henglian Liuhe Gong," while also setting aside time to read in the space.

Combined with the grain and medicinal meals from his space, Wang Hong's progress was astonishingly swift. In just three months, he opened the Chong Mai among the Eight Extraordinary Meridians.

More than two years passed amid intense cultivation. Over those two years, Wang Hong had also grown into a strapping young man.

During the first year, Wang Hong followed the teams into the mountains dozens more times before finally gathering all the medicinal herbs needed to cultivate the "Henglian Liuhe Gong," planting them all in his space.

During this time, the turmoil caused by the immortals' descent finally began to subside. The main reason was that enough people had died; those hotheaded fools had mostly perished, and those remaining had begun to learn calmness.

More importantly, the academy possessed the strength to make them calm down. Once, more than a hundred wandering martial artists at the Houtian Stage arrived. Several student formations organized by the academy charged and slew them. How could such a rabble stand against disciplined military formations working in seamless coordination? Within a few exchanges, the invaders were completely massacred. That battle further established Qingyang Academy's formidable reputation.

Over the past two years, Wang Hong had cultivated the "Henglian Liuhe Gong" to the sixth level. Now, even if he stood still and let others attack him, ordinary Houtian Realm Martial Artists would find it difficult to injure him. Even steel blades could only cut a small opening in his skin.

His internal cultivation had also opened all Eight Extraordinary Meridians, bringing him to the peak of the Houtian Realm. Now, as long as he accumulated strength for a few more years and encountered an opportunity, he could break through the Houtian Realm and reach the legendary Xiantian Stage.

After more than two years of growth, the earliest batch of medicinal herbs planted in the space had already reached one hundred years of age. Medicinal herbs that were thirty to fifty years old or seventy to eighty years old grew everywhere.

During this period, Wang Hong had read most of the books in the library. In particular, he had mastered the books on medicine and martial arts so thoroughly that he knew them like the back of his hand. In terms of theory alone, even the academy's instructors were inferior to him.

In a medical text, Wang Hong found a prescription that increased cultivation. The prescription was called the "Dragon Tiger Elixir." It used hundred-year Ginseng and hundred-year Purple Ganoderma as its main ingredients, supplemented by more than ten other medicinal herbs to harmonize the medicinal potency. It was said that swallowing one pill could increase one year's worth of cultivation.

Wang Hong prepared to make a batch and try it. In any case, he did not lack medicinal herbs now. He took a hundred-year Ginseng and a hundred-year Purple Ganoderma from the space and ground them into an extremely fine powder. He decocted the more than ten supplementary herbs in water to extract their juice, concentrated the liquid into a paste, added honey along with the hundred-year Ginseng and Purple Ganoderma powder, and mixed everything evenly before rolling it into pills. After spending most of the day, he finally obtained twenty-five pills the size of pigeon eggs.

Wang Hong immediately swallowed one. The pill slowly dissolved in his stomach, its medicinal potency refining into streams of vigorous, violent Internal Energy that rampaged through his meridians.

He guided this Internal Energy slowly downward to his dantian, then through his meridians. With every circulation, the violent energy within it diminished by a fraction.

He then guided it along the Eight Extraordinary Meridians, where it was gradually absorbed by his meridians and acupoints during circulation.

Meridians and acupoints were like rivers and lakes, while the Internal Energy cultivated by martial artists was like the water flowing through them. When Internal Energy was sufficient, it accumulated in the acupoints for storage. Only when enough Internal Energy had been stored in the acupoints could it flow into the meridians and open the next section of meridians. Once a meridian had been opened, such as when Internal Energy was needed in battle, the Internal Energy stored in the acupoints could also be mobilized to flow into the meridians.

When the medicinal potency of one "Dragon Tiger Elixir" had been fully absorbed, it only made the Internal Energy in his meridians and acupoints a little fuller. Without hesitation, Wang Hong swallowed another pill. Yet even after digesting it, he still failed to break through to the Xiantian Realm. He did not dare eat another, however. The meridians and acupoints throughout his body were painfully swollen. If he ate one more, he estimated that he would explode.

Wang Hong fetched an iron rod and, using all his strength, smashed it against the back of his left fingertips. Without changing expression, he brought the iron rod down again upon the back of his left hand. Starting from his left fingertips, Wang Hong used the iron rod to viciously beat every inch of his body. Some of the Internal Energy in his meridians was shaken into the muscles, tendons, and bones throughout his body, where it was absorbed.

Wang Hong carefully sensed his body and found that the swelling pain in his meridians had eased somewhat. Excited, he picked up the iron rod and continued beating himself. There probably were not many people under heaven who could beat themselves with such excitement.

After beating his entire body six times, he prepared another large bucket of boiling water. Wang Hong poured in the medicinal powder he had prepared, stirred it a few times, then jumped straight in. Holding his breath, he sank to the bottom, even his hair submerged in the medicine-infused water. After a while, he raised his head to take another breath before sinking back beneath the water.

Thus, he swallowed two pills each day, first cultivating his internal energy to increase his cultivation, then giving himself a savage beating with an iron rod. On the seventh day, the "Henglian Liuhe Gong" broke through to the seventh level. The iron rod he used to beat himself every day was also replaced with a thick iron bar, and each session increased from six rounds to seven.

On the tenth day, Wang Hong swallowed his second pill and circulated his cultivation technique. When his Internal Energy reached the middle dantian, a small stream entered his lungs, and a cool sensation spread throughout them. It circulated several times within his lungs, gradually weakening until it was about to disappear.

Wang Hong immediately swallowed another pill. As the cultivation technique circulated, another surging stream of Internal Energy poured toward his lungs.

This Internal Energy nourished and moistened his lungs again and again. After a long while, a stream of Internal Energy finally flowed out from his lungs, entering the Hand Taiyin Lung Meridian along the left side. It slowly flowed to the Zhongfu acupoint, circling there for a quarter of an hour. The Zhongfu acupoint gradually grew hot and swollen, as though a warm current were slowly filling it.

Afterward, this hot, swollen sensation slowly traveled along the Hand Taiyin Lung Meridian toward the Yunmen acupoint. Once it reached the Yunmen acupoint, it stopped moving entirely.

Wang Hong slowly withdrew his cultivation and exhaled deeply. Once Internal Energy entered the Taiyin Lung Meridian, it meant he had officially become an Innate Martial Artist. Even if he had only opened the Zhongfu acupoint on the left side, it still counted.

Wang Hong wrinkled his nose. He could smell the sweat on himself, as well as the medicinal meal he had made in the kitchen, distinguishing every scent of the various medicinal herbs and seasonings within it. He could even smell the various weeds in the courtyard lawn. And... why could he smell the latrine from so far away? Why was it so foul?

Wang Hong felt a wave of nausea and held his breath. Only then did he discover that he could control the opening and closing of the pores throughout his body, using them to breathe faintly.

"Could this be the legendary Fetal Breathing?"

After martial artists entered the Xiantian Stage, each time they opened one of the five viscera—the liver, heart, spleen, lungs, and kidneys—along with its meridians, the corresponding facial features and parts of the body would be strengthened.

Wang Hong had opened his Lung Meridian. Since the lungs opened into the nose, his sense of smell had strengthened, allowing him to detect scents from several li away. The lungs also governed the skin and body hair, strengthening the functions of his skin pores. The Fetal Breathing that countless people dreamed of was now easily achieved by him. If Wang Hong submerged himself in water and breathed through his pores, he could remain underwater for half a shichen without surfacing for air.

For more than ten consecutive days, he had swallowed over twenty Dragon Tiger Elixirs, and today he had finally reached the Xiantian Realm. Across the entire State of Chu, with a population of more than a billion, there were fewer than a hundred Xiantian Realm martial artists.

As for a Xiantian Realm martial artist under twenty years old, he was absolutely without equal. At the very least, none had ever appeared in the recorded history of the State of Chu.

If word of this got out, it would surely shake the world. Wang Hong secretly reveled for a while, then decided it was better to keep a low profile and conceal it for now, lest he invite unnecessary trouble upon himself.