What I Visualize Is Myself?

The young man sat cross-legged in a wooden basin, his chest rising and falling slightly as faint streams of air flowed through his nostrils with every breath.

At the same time, gentle currents of energy from the medicinal liquid in the wooden basin slowly entered Xiao Yan's body. After being transformed, they became wisps of Dou Qi.

"With the experience from my previous life, my cultivation speed in this life can be much faster than before."

A faint smile rested on Xiao Yan's lips.

With his tens of thousands of years of cultivation experience, he could already control his body perfectly.

How to control his breathing, how to adjust his condition to maximize cultivation efficiency—these were all things his previous self had been unable to accomplish.

Therefore, even in cultivating Dou Qi alone, Xiao Yan was more than twice as fast as he had been in his previous life.

"At this pace, perhaps I can attempt to break through to Dou Zhe again within half a year at most."

Xiao Yan was quite satisfied. Cultivating in the Dou Qi stage was already the slowest phase. Once he crossed this threshold and entered the Dou Zhe realm, his cultivation speed would enter another period of rapid growth.

"It took me twenty-two years in my previous life to become a Dou Emperor, excluding special places like the Heavenly Tomb. I wonder how long it will take to reach that step in this life."

Xiao Yan no longer dwelled on it. Instead, he calmed his mind and adjusted his body to absorb the medicinal power as efficiently as possible. At the same time, an immense, endless Flame Lotus emerged within his mind.

He could not neglect physical cultivation, but his soul cultivation had to keep pace as well. In his previous life, he had not obtained even a crude Soul Cultivation Method until he arrived at the Alchemist Tower.

Yet in this life, Xiao Yan possessed a Soul Cultivation Method from the very beginning—and one that ranked among the finest in the Great Thousand World and even this universe.

This was a cultivation art Xiao Yan had created himself, called the Emperor Flame Refinement Art. As its name implied, it used the immense power of Emperor Flame to temper the soul, making it purer and stronger.

However, let alone Emperor Flame, he did not even possess a wisp of Beast Fire at present. Fortunately, the first layer of Xiao Yan's Emperor Flame Refinement Art required only visualization.

After all, this technique was not cultivated by Xiao Yan alone. Many experts of the Great Thousand World also relied on this secret art to cultivate their own divine souls.

Created by the Flame Emperor—Heavenly Sovereigns all said it was good.

The first stage of the Emperor Flame Refinement Art was the Visualization realm. Practitioners would receive an Emperor Flame Contemplation Diagram passed down by the Flame Emperor. Though it was an illusion, it possessed the miraculous effect of tempering the soul.

One only needed to visualize the might of Emperor Flame day and night, and the soul would grow purer and stronger with each passing day.

In truth, when it came to laying foundations, Yuan Venerable Zhou Yuan's Chaos God Grinding Contemplation Method from the Heavenly Origin World was more suitable. However, Xiao Yan's Soul Power was currently limited. Simply remembering the technique he had created himself was already no easy task.

Who knew when he would be able to recall the Chaos God Grinding Contemplation Method.

As he thought this, an immense Flame Lotus had already appeared in Xiao Yan's mind.

The Flame Lotus was breathtakingly beautiful, with hundreds of thousands of densely packed petals. Every petal displayed a different color. Some colors appeared similar, but upon closer observation, they emanated entirely distinct auras.

Hundreds of thousands of colors intertwined, forming a dazzling and incomparably beautiful sight. Yet beneath that splendid beauty lay a terrifying power that made one's heart tremble.

This was Emperor Flame, the ultimate form Xiao Yan had condensed after tens of thousands of years of accumulation, gathering all manner of powerful flames.

Emperor Flame floated quietly within the boundless chaos, yet its terrifying heat caused the surrounding Chaotic Void to continuously form and perish.

The might of Emperor Flame could burn gods!

Those words were no empty boast. Xiao Yan had truly used Emperor Flame to burn away a deity comparable to a Sovereign realm expert. It was that battle that established his reputation as the foremost master of the flame path in this universe.

By the later stages of his cultivation, Xiao Yan had long since fused with Emperor Flame. Emperor Flame was him, and he was Emperor Flame. Yet after being reborn, he had to visualize himself to increase his Soul Power. It truly felt rather strange.

Observing Emperor Flame with one's soul brought the terrifying agony of truly being scorched by high temperatures. Visualizing Emperor Flame was not something an ordinary cultivator could accomplish.

That dreadful flame power made one feel as though their soul were being seared. The pain was ten times worse than having one's physical body burned.

Should one fail to endure such pain, their soul could be incinerated by the terrifying might of Emperor Flame. Thus, in the Great Thousand World, even many Earthly Supremes did not dare cultivate the Emperor Flame Refinement Art recklessly.

However, as the creator of this cultivation method, Xiao Yan naturally had nothing to fear. Had he not suffered the agony of blazing flames burning his soul countless times before? By now, it had long become as commonplace as a daily meal.

The jade-like liquid swirled within the wooden basin. The young man in the basin remained calm, while only the pale flame in the old man's hand shifted constantly.

After a sleepless night, the young man slowly opened his eyes when the first ray of sunlight entered the room the next morning.

Deep within those black pupils, however, a brilliant flame seemed to be flickering gently.

After getting up and dressing, Xiao Yan found that Yao Lao had placed four jade bottles on the table beside his bed before slipping back into the ring to rest.

"Two bottles of Foundation Establishment Divine Liquid and two bottles of Foundation Establishment Spirit Liquid. It may not be much, but these resources should be enough to sustain my cultivation for a while."

Xiao Yan nodded in satisfaction, carefully storing away the four bottles of medicinal liquid before lying on the bed to rest with his eyes closed.

With his current physical condition, he still could not go without sleep or food. He needed proper rest to recover.

As for the Foundation Establishment Spirit Liquid, there was no rush to sell it. Refining the medicine in a single night would still be somewhat too shocking for Ya Fei.

After resting for a full hour or so, Xiao Yan finally stretched lazily, leaped out of bed, and left the room, heading toward the Xiao Family's Back Mountain.

Cultivation alone was not enough. He also had to temper his body, or this physical body would simply be too fragile.

Unfortunately, he did not even possess Dou Qi yet. Though he knew many body-refining methods, he could only temper his body through the most primitive Body Tempering Technique.

Xiao Yan spent the entire morning searching for and setting up a training ground that belonged solely to him.

After taking a simple rest at noon, he began the most brutal and straightforward physical training once the afternoon weather had cooled somewhat.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

By dusk, when the bright moon had just risen, Xiao Yan was covered in bruises. His little face was filthy, yet his eyes remained as bright as ever.

"Young Master, the master says there is a family dinner today. He asked you to come and eat."

When he returned to the small house, an old servant was already waiting outside his door.

"I understand."

Xiao Yan nodded slightly. After washing up, he appeared in the family's grand dining hall shortly afterward.

The instant he pushed open the door, the eyes of dozens of young men and women, along with his father Xiao Zhan and several elders, fell upon him.