"Even a basic martial technique could unleash tremendous power if cultivated to a high enough level."
Clutching the Dragon Sparrow Sword, Shen Mo felt a surge of excitement.
But as that excitement began to fade,
a hollow feeling welled up inside him.
"Ugh."
He let out a muffled groan, feeling aches spread rapidly through his body.
The sudden pain and weakness left him unable to stay on his feet. He dropped straight down onto the ground.
"That sword strike just now... used up all the true essence in my body."
He examined his current condition with his inner vision, then gave a bitter smile.
While in a state of sudden enlightenment, he had successfully unleashed a sword strike unlike any he had ever performed before, causing his Supreme Clarity Sword Technique experience points to soar.
But the amount of true essence and spiritual energy the move required was terrifying.
He had nearly been drained dry after just one strike.
He hadn't noticed how depleted he was because he'd been too excited.
Now, the side effects had quickly begun to surface.
Grrr!
He hurriedly pulled a large handful of the Qi Recovery Pills he had refined from his Qiankun Pouch and swallowed them whole, like a mouthful of beans.
Whoosh!
As the medicinal power spread through his body, gradually seeping like spring rain into his meridians, dantian, and internal organs,
his body, overtaxed to the point of exhaustion, slowly began to recover its vigor.
"This sword move is powerful. It even surpasses a lower-grade Profound-rank immortal art, but the cost is far too great."
"Until I reach the Qi Gathering Realm and can store large amounts of spiritual energy within my body, every use will be a drain on my strength."
As Shen Mo cultivated and circulated his energy to replenish the spiritual energy and true essence he had depleted, he silently considered the matter.
Although improving his Supreme Clarity Sword Technique proficiency could greatly increase his combat strength and give him a powerful killing move,
his cultivation couldn't keep up. Before reaching the Qi Gathering Realm, forcing himself to use it would leave him with no strength to fight after that single strike.
That would be fine during routine martial drills and cultivation. But if he were in a dangerous place, using up all his strength with one strike would be tantamount to suicide.
Whoosh!
The Qi Recovery Pills gradually took effect, and the hollow feeling inside Shen Mo began to fade.
But he didn't stop circulating the Heaven Origin Technique.
He could feel that, after this sudden enlightenment, something had changed in the bottleneck to the next realm within him.
In recent days, Shen Mo had made the Heaven Origin Technique his foundational cultivation method and consistently focused on raising its proficiency.
Though he hadn't devoted as much attention to it as he had to the Supreme Clarity Sword Technique, his daily cultivation had still brought the Heaven Origin Technique to the realm of mastery.
At this level, the Heaven Origin Technique absorbed the spiritual energy of heaven and earth much faster and more efficiently than before.
With every breath, it seemed to devour the world, swallowing rivers and mountains.
Huff! Huff!
As he breathed, his chest rose and fell, and a faint dragon's roar seemed to rumble within him.
Invisible chains seized the surrounding spiritual energy and drew it in without end.
"I'm about to break through!"
As spiritual energy continued pouring into him, Shen Mo's blood and qi began to seethe.
It was a sign that a breakthrough was imminent.
"Then let's break through!"
He exhaled a long breath of stale air, his gaze resolute, and gradually guided his spiritual energy toward the bottleneck within him.
Unlike before, his foundations were now exceedingly solid. He wasn't forcing growth before its time.
After breaking through to the eighth level of the Body Tempering Realm at the Zhao Family and receiving Chen An's warning, Shen Mo had resolved to build a firm foundation through repeated tempering.
So even when he felt his cultivation had grown enough to challenge the realm's barrier, he hadn't tried.
Instead, he had kept suppressing his progress and strengthening his foundation.
Now his foundation was secure, and his cultivation could no longer be held back. Only then did he let the breakthrough proceed.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
Within him, his surging blood and qi began to boil now that Shen Mo was no longer suppressing them.
The vast force of his blood and qi, no longer deliberately restrained, surged like the Yellow River bursting its banks, unstoppable once unleashed.
The barriers blocking Shen Mo's breakthrough were crushed like dry weeds before such overwhelming force.
Muffled booms sounded repeatedly within his body.
Each boom marked an unopened chakra in Shen Mo's body being completely cleared by the rush of blood and qi.
"I've broken through to the ninth level of the Body Tempering Realm!"
When the tenth muffled boom sounded, Shen Mo's whole body shuddered.
The strength that had already filled his body surged once more.
"Wonderful!"
Feeling the increase in power that came with the breakthrough, he was swept up in the sensation, his excitement lingering long afterward.
"At this level, I've reached the final stage of the Body Tempering Realm!"
"All I need is to build up my strength a little more, and then I can try to form a dantian!"
A keen, eager look appeared in Shen Mo's eyes. "I heard Uncle Chen say that most cultivators who reach the ninth level of Body Tempering need to have at least two thousand jin of strength to be considered up to standard."
"I wonder how strong I am now!"
Needless to say, with Destiny's blessing and all the solid accumulation he had built up, Shen Mo's strength was naturally far greater than that of an ordinary cultivator at the same level.
But he would have to test himself to find out just how much greater.
"Talisman!"
He searched through his Qiankun Pouch and took out a pale green talisman, then activated it.
Hum!
The moment it activated, the talisman transformed into a vast azure curtain that appeared in front of Shen Mo.
This was a Strength Testing Talisman, one of the talismans commonly used by cultivators.
Its main purpose was to measure a martial artist's strength.
Bang!
As the curtain formed by the Strength Testing Talisman appeared, Shen Mo threw a punch without hesitation.
His powerful fist struck the pale green curtain, sending ripples across it.
At the same time, a number appeared at the very top of the Strength Testing Talisman.
[Strength: 3,571 jin.]
"More than three thousand five hundred jin of strength." Shen Mo was quite satisfied with the result. "That means I'm nearly twice as strong as a cultivator at the same level!"
Strength didn't just determine how powerful a person's attacks were.
It also offered an indication of a cultivator's physique and how much blood and qi they had accumulated.
Shen Mo's result was already outstanding.
"With a foundation like mine, and the Purple Sun Vermilion Fruit, I can say with confidence that I'll be able to form two dantians in the future. If fortune smiles on me, maybe... I'll even have a chance to form all three!"
At first, Shen Mo's highest goal had been to form two dantians, putting him a step ahead of other cultivators and giving him a better starting line.
But now, as his strength and foundation gradually neared perfection, he couldn't help but look forward to more and dream bigger.
"I'll think about that later. For now, I should get something to eat!"
After a thrilling bout of imagining what lay ahead, he brought his thoughts back to the present.
He rubbed his stomach and felt a little hungry.
He had experienced sudden enlightenment and then broken through to a new realm. All that had taken a heavy toll on Shen Mo's energy.
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