Late at night.
Qingyun Back Cliff.
At this very moment.
Within Ye Ping's mind.
The image of the universe emerged.
Boundless and endless, infinite beyond measure.
This was the heaven and earth within Ye Ping's heart.
The four directions and above and below were called space; from ancient times to the present was called time.
The universe was infinitely vast, yet infinitely minute.
In the universe within Ye Ping's heart, vast and boundless, a God-Demon who observed the heavens appeared.
This God-Demon could not be watched, could not be looked upon directly. An aura of ultimate terror radiated from head to toe; even a single wisp could make the universe rumble.
The God-Demon's body seemed forged from divine iron, indestructible. It stood across the universe, grasping the Great Dao in its hand, treading upon the five elements, yin and yang beneath its feet, with eyes that saw through all things.
This was a Great Dao God-Demon.
Ye Ping was utterly shaken.
As he gazed upon this God-Demon in his heart, countless wondrous methods appeared in his mind in an instant.
They were the supreme method for beginning God-Demon Body Refining.
"Take heaven as the hammer, earth as the furnace; embrace all things, shed the mortal frame and exchange the bones."
An ancient voice rang within Ye Ping's mind.
Ye Ping had attained enlightenment of the complete God-Demon Body Refining method.
An hour later.
Ye Ping opened his eyes.
He already knew how to cultivate the God-Demon Body Refining Art.
Contemplate Gods and Devils in the heart, draw upon heaven and earth to form a divine hammer and furnace, and temper oneself.
The Primordial God-Demon Body Refining Art was divided into five realms.
Lesser God-Demon, Greater God-Demon, Supreme God-Demon, Great Dao God-Demon, Great Dao Ancestor God.
The cultivation method currently in Ye Ping's mind was the Lesser God-Demon chapter. Using the Heavenly Hammer, Earthly Furnace to temper the flesh eighty-one times would bring it to completion, allowing one to condense a Lesser God-Demon body.
At that time, the strength of the flesh would be like that of a true dragon, the blood and qi as flourishing as the sun, with essence, qi, and spirit all complete.
The God-Demon Body Refining Art had two crucial elements.
The first was contemplating Gods and Devils in the heart. If there was no image of Gods and Devils in one's mind, then no matter what methods one exhausted, one could never truly temper a God-Demon body.
The second was the Heavenly Hammer, Earthly Furnace. This was a method that used qi to draw the spirit, spirit to draw the body, heaven as the hammer, earth as the furnace; standing within the blazing furnace, one endured a thousand hammerings and a hundred temperings.
After one possessed the image of Gods and Devils in one's heart, one had to rely on this method, using spiritual qi to communicate with heaven and earth, borrowing the power of the earth to transform it into a supreme furnace, then turning heavenly might into a divine hammer to strike the body and forcibly temper out a God-Demon body.
This process was exceedingly perilous, but the method was simple. As long as one had sufficient spiritual qi, one could temper oneself once.
But without an exceptionally powerful will, one's Primordial Spirit could easily collapse and one's flesh crumble during the tempering process, leaving one dead without even a burial place.
"I thought attaining enlightenment was difficult. I never expected cultivation itself to be even harder. Still, that makes sense. The more powerful the cultivation method, the more difficult it is. If it could be cultivated so casually, wouldn't everyone be a cultivator?"
After attaining enlightenment, Ye Ping could not help but sigh.
However, a problem arose.
To condense the Heavenly Hammer, Earthly Furnace, he needed a great deal of spiritual qi. But the issue was that he had no spiritual qi.
These past days, he had been attaining enlightenment in sword techniques every day and had not cultivated at all. Naturally, it was impossible for him to have condensed spiritual qi.
Moreover, the further one progressed in the God-Demon Body Refining Art, the more massive the amount of spiritual qi required.
Most importantly, his greatest problem was his poor cultivation aptitude. That was truly troublesome.
Ye Ping understood his own cultivation aptitude fairly well. Over half a year, he had participated in more than fifty Ascension Conventions, and hundreds of sects had tested him, all concluding that he had No Spiritual Roots.
Therefore, Ye Ping felt that his talent in the sword dao might not be too bad, but his cultivation aptitude was probably the worst possible.
"What should I do?"
Trouble had descended, and Ye Ping's head ached.
"Should I ask Senior Brother?"
Ye Ping thought to himself, but quickly rejected the idea.
"No. My cultivation aptitude is already poor. If I go to Senior Brother on my own initiative, and it turns out my aptitude is too terrible, I might make Senior Brother dislike me."
"But if I don't ask Senior Brother, I can't cultivate. And if I can't cultivate, then I can't cultivate the Primordial God-Demon Body Refining Art."
Ye Ping furrowed his brows, deep in thought.
"Eh? Senior Brother gave me some Qi Cultivation Pills before. I wonder whether these pills will work."
All of a sudden, Ye Ping thought of this.
With that thought, Ye Ping immediately took out the bottle of Qi Cultivation Pills.
He poured a pale white pill from the pill bottle.
The pill was tiny, no larger than a grain of rice. Its surface was white, and it emitted a delicate fragrance without any medicinal smell.
However, just as Ye Ping was about to swallow the pill, he suddenly froze.
"Every medicine carries some poison. This is a Qi Cultivation Pill, and I haven't entered the Qi Refining Realm yet. I don't know whether something will happen. I can't act rashly."
All of a sudden, Ye Ping remembered that he had yet to enter the Qi Refining Realm. He did not know whether he could take this kind of pill.
What if swallowing it made his body explode?
Thinking of this, Ye Ping placed the Qi Cultivation Pill back into the Jade Bottle.
There was nothing wrong with being cautious.
In this world of immortal cultivation, cultivators were divided into seven great realms.
Qi Refining Realm, Foundation Establishment Realm, Golden Core Realm, Nascent Soul Realm, Spirit Soul Realm, Tribulation Crossing Realm, Mahayana Realm.
Between every realm lay an uncrossable chasm. Above stood immortals; below remained mortals. The suppression was absolute.
Although Ye Ping had never cultivated immortality, he had more or less read some information about it.
Unable to cultivate the God-Demon Body Refining Art, Ye Ping did not continue to dwell on it. At least he had now attained enlightenment of the method; whether he cultivated it was merely a matter of sooner or later.
Very soon, Ye Ping began attaining enlightenment of the Sword Mark again.
He wanted to comprehend the Four Thunders Sword Intent as soon as possible.
And so, the next day arrived.
Su Changyu came.
Ever since teaching the Primordial God-Demon Body Refining Art to Ye Ping, he had spent the last three days painstakingly studying the River Sword Technique. Unfortunately, the falling flowers yearned while the flowing water remained indifferent; Su Changyu had not closed his eyes for three days and three nights.
Yet he simply could not understand it. It made Su Changyu miserable. The Four Thunder Sword Technique alone would take him decades to comprehend, and now there was another River Sword Technique. Though it was a little inferior to the Four Thunder Sword Technique, he simply had no talent at all.
Thinking of this, Su Changyu could not help growing angry.
Why did they have to make him learn sword techniques? Could they not teach Ye Ping something else?
Yet that was not even the most infuriating part. The worst part was that he did not dare voice his anger.
Grand Hua Daoist was now waiting for him to teach Ye Ping the River Sword Technique. But if Grand Hua Daoist discovered that he had not learned it at all, even if he did not die, he would lose a layer of skin.
Su Changyu had guessed Grand Hua Daoist's intentions.
He wanted Ye Ping to participate in the Qingzhou Sword Dao Convention.
But Su Changyu felt that this idea was a tiny bit unreliable.
Although Ye Ping's sword dao aptitude was very strong.
The problem was that Ye Ping had no magic power. Though the Qingzhou Sword Dao Convention stipulated that only cultivators below the Foundation Establishment Realm could compete in sword dao.
Most participants were at the Qi Cultivation Seventh Layer or Eighth Layer, and some had even reached the completion of Qi Refining.
Even if Ye Ping had condensed Sword Momentum, he had not the slightest bit of magic power. If he encountered cultivators at the fifth or sixth layer of Qi Refining, he might still have a chance of winning.
But if he encountered truly powerful Sword Cultivators, it was hard to say whether he could win.
Of course, the main reason was that Su Changyu himself did not know how powerful the Four Thunder Sword Intent was. In his eyes, there were only two kinds of people.
Those weaker than himself.
And those stronger than himself.
Therefore, in order to make Grand Hua Daoist abandon the idea, Su Changyu decided to continue teaching nonsense.
Yes, that was right. River Sword Technique or not, Su Changyu had decided to teach Ye Ping in his own way.
Last night, he had rewritten a sword manual.
Part of it contained the essentials of the River Sword Technique, while most of it was nonsense he had made up himself.
He refused to believe Ye Ping could still attain enlightenment from this.
If Ye Ping could attain enlightenment from this, he would chew up and swallow every participant's sword at the Qingzhou Sword Dao Convention.
And so, Su Changyu arrived at the Back Cliff.
Before you continue