"What an overbearing technique."
At that moment, Ye Xuan was shaken.
The core of this technique was control over time and the theft of life force.
It forced an enemy to experience the passage from youth to old age in an instant, killing them outright with the power of time.
It was a skill that defied the heavens.
Ye Xuan didn't dare let up. He immediately focused his entire mind and began to analyze the technique with all his might.
If it had been anyone else, even a Sect Master from the Upper Realm, they would probably have needed to go into seclusion for years, perhaps even decades, to comprehend the original runes on this Supreme Bone.
That was because it involved the laws of time, one of the most abstruse and difficult Great Daos to understand.
But Ye Xuan was different.
He had Chaos Heavy Pupils.
The Double Pupils were a Divine Object that could see through illusions and look straight to the source.
On top of that, his soul belonged to the Innate Human Race, and his comprehension was already defying the heavens.
The effects of the two combined were astonishing.
The complex runes rapidly rearranged and evolved before his eyes.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
As time passed, the Chaos Qi in Ye Xuan's eyes swirled faster and faster.
A mysterious symbol gradually appeared in his Consciousness Sea.
It looked like both the character for "life" and the character for "death." In the end, its beginning and end connected, forming a ring.
The Cycle Ring!
"I understand."
After a long while,
Ye Xuan slowly closed his eyes, hiding the strange phenomenon in them.
When he opened them again, a trace of ancient weariness had appeared deep within his Double Pupils, as if he had just experienced an entire cycle of reincarnation.
"So this is the Cycle Treasure Technique..."
Ye Xuan stood up and looked at his right hand.
He wanted to test it out.
At a thought,
the runic secrets he had just comprehended immediately circulated through his body.
There was no awkwardness at all, as if he had cultivated this technique millions of times already.
"Buzz!"
A strange glow suddenly shimmered across Ye Xuan's palm.
It was neither gold nor silver, but a blend of gray and white, carrying an unsettling aura of time.
Ye Xuan turned and looked at a wild grass by the roadside.
It was a tender shoot that had only just sprouted, vibrant green and full of life.
He reached out and lightly pressed toward it from a distance.
"Reincarnation."
He murmured the two words.
The next second,
a bizarre scene unfolded.
Under everyone's watchful eyes, the tender green grass withered at a visible speed.
Its leaves curled up, its moisture drained away, and its stalk shriveled.
In the blink of an eye,
it had lived out its entire life. The tender shoot became a pile of withered grass, then crumbled to dust and scattered on the wind.
The theft of time!
Though he had used it on nothing more than a blade of grass, the implications were enough to make any powerful cultivator tremble with fear.
"This..."
Shi Yunfeng's scalp tingled.
Though he didn't know what kind of technique it was, he could feel the terror of that moment.
If that had been used on a person...
He didn't dare imagine it!
Beneath the willow tree at the village entrance,
Willow Deity had been silently watching. At that moment, even her hundreds of branches paused slightly.
She fell silent.
Of course she recognized what it was.
This was a natural treasure technique born from the Supreme Bone, one of the highest-level divine abilities in the world.
Normally, only the person who possessed the Supreme Bone could use such a technique. For an outsider to learn it was next to impossible.
But Ye Xuan...
He had learned it after only a few glances?
And judging by the move he had just performed, though its power was still weak, the way he had captured the flavor of its laws clearly showed that he had mastered its core essence.
"This boy's comprehension..."
A ripple stirred in Willow Deity's thoughts.
"Truly defies the heavens."
"Or is it because of the aid of those Chaos Heavy Pupils?"
"To think that observing the Supreme Bone with Double Pupils could produce such a wondrous effect."
For the first time, Willow Deity felt that the future of her unofficial disciple might exceed even her expectations.
This wasn't just taking on a disciple.
She had clearly stumbled upon a prodigy.
Ye Xuan withdrew his hand and looked at the lingering aura of time in his palm, nodding in satisfaction.
He had mastered the Cycle Treasure Technique.
Though his current cultivation limited him to stealing time from flowers and plants,
as his cultivation improved, the power of this technique would grow exponentially.
When the time came, facing those long-lived demon races of the Primordial Wilderness...
Heh heh.
Ye Xuan looked at Little Shi Hao, who wore a bewildered expression, and ruffled his hair again.
"Little Dot, the thing on your bone is amazing."
"Once you understand it, you'll be even stronger than Big Brother."
Little Shi Hao nodded, only half understanding.
"As long as I can help Big Brother!"
Ye Xuan smiled.
He had made a fortune on this trip to the Perfect World.
He had not only become Willow Deity's disciple and learned the Willow Deity Method, but had also tricked... ahem, learned the Cycle Treasure Technique.
Time slipped by like sand through one's fingers.
Over the next three days, Stone Village was unusually quiet.
Every morning, at the first hint of purple qi coming from the east, Ye Xuan would sit cross-legged beneath the charred willow tree at the village entrance.
The willow twigs swayed, and ethereal sounds of the Dao echoed through his Consciousness Sea.
Willow Deity was teaching him the Dao, explaining the essence of cultivation and the truths of life and destruction.
Ye Xuan listened, completely absorbed.
He possessed Chaos Heavy Pupils, and his comprehension already defied the heavens. Now, with an Immortal King Giant personally spoon-feeding him, his cultivation advanced by leaps and bounds.
The ten Cave Heavens within him had long since stabilized, floating in the void behind him like ten miniature suns.
As his understanding of the Willow Deity Method and the Cycle Treasure Technique deepened, the spiritual power within him began to undergo a transformation.
Spiritual power took shape, gathering and dispersing at will.
That was the hallmark of the Spirit Transformation Realm.
As Ye Xuan listened to the Dao, his aura naturally climbed, and he broke through that barrier as smoothly as water finding its course.
The middle stage of the Spirit Transformation Realm, the late stage... and finally, perfection!
In only three short days, Ye Xuan had reached the peak of the Spirit Transformation Realm.
If word got out, the First Generation Heavenly Prides of the Upper Realm would be so ashamed they would wish they were dead.
The sun shone brightly that day.
Ye Xuan finished his cultivation and rose to his feet, his joints cracking like popping beans.
He felt better than ever. Even the slightest movement seemed to draw on the force of the world around him.
"Phew..."
He exhaled a breath of stale air and glanced at the empty Martial Arts Arena.
Usually at this time, that bunch of little monkeys would be panting as they lifted stones.
Little Shi Hao in particular, would train harder than anyone else for a mouthful of animal milk.
But today, the village was unnaturally quiet.
"Oh no! This is bad!"
Shi Linhu's panicked shout came from the distance.
The burly man came running, drenched in sweat and clutching a broken stone axe.
"What happened?" Ye Xuan furrowed his brow.
"Little Dot... Little Dot sneaked out with Pi Hou and Er Meng!" Shi Linhu gasped. "The traps at the village entrance have been sabotaged. From the footprints, they went deep into the Great Wilderness!"
Ye Xuan heard him and helplessly rubbed the bridge of his nose.
Of course.
No matter what world they were in, or whether they had a Supreme Bone, the instinct of a little rascal to get himself into trouble was etched into his very bones.
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