Rebirth

"Young master, Jack sent a telegram. He said that while the President was at the theater, he was targeted by an assassin disguised as an actor. Fortunately, Jack arrived in time and shot the assailant, saving the President."

Vane the butler stood about ten meters from the stone chamber where James was staying, relaying the news that had arrived from Washington.

James let out a long sigh of relief. It was good that they had made it in time. The accident and the regret regarding Victor had changed James forever; being able to save a friend's life made him feel at least a little better.

"There is also a telegram from the President. He expressed his gratitude for your help, is very concerned about your condition, and hopes to see you in person," Vane the butler continued.

"Send a telegram to Jack. Tell them to stay in Washington for the time being and take charge of President Lincoln's security. Also, send a message to the President saying that I cannot meet with him just yet, and tell him to take care of himself."

"By the way, Uncle Vane, help me find a quiet, uninhabited seaside spot. Build a house there and prepare some daily necessities," James said to Vane after a moment of thought.

"Young master, what are you planning?" Vane the butler looked a bit confused, and even more worried.

"Don't worry, it will be good for me."

Northern coast of Vancouver Island.

This year's hurricane season was exceptionally long. The island's residents were all indoors, bored, drinking wine, cuddling their wives, and occasionally spanking their children.

About four or five years ago, a group of people from who-knows-where built a small stone house on the northernmost tip of the island, on a hillside right next to the sea.

Although it was called a small house, if one looked closely, they would find it was the same size as the mansions of the wealthiest shipping magnates in town. It was three stories high and styled somewhat like a medieval castle.

That slope was right next to a cliff over dozens of meters high, a place rarely visited by anyone. Years had passed, and no one had heard of anyone discovering who lived in that stone fortress by the cliff. The northern coast of the island was mostly reefs and sheer cliffs, unsuitable for building ports, so it was largely uninhabited.

As time went on, even fewer people paid any attention to the stone fortress.

James walked out of the house shirtless and barefoot, wearing only a pair of oilcloth shorts commonly worn by sailors. His hair had grown a bit longer, and his physique remained as exaggeratedly muscular as ever.

In the distance, black clouds loomed and the hurricane howled. He stretched, ran lightly toward the edge of the cliff, and leaped, diving from a height of over fifty meters into the pitch-black sea.

James kicked his legs nimbly, swimming rapidly beneath the surface like a torpedo, diving deep toward the seabed, more than ten kilometers away from Vancouver Island. This was the most suitable deep-sea area he had found during his years of underwater cultivation.

To resolve his physical issues and re-enter the Huajin level of cultivation, James had basically lived in this cliffside stone fortress for several years. The training environment in the manor's basement could no longer satisfy his current physical strength. Considering space, time, and the unknown potential of his current flesh, using the pressure of the ocean was the most suitable and convenient place to train.

During his first dive, James reached a depth of about eight hundred meters; this was an estimate based on his diving time and speed.

The limit for unassisted human diving in the modern era was just over a hundred meters, but when James reached eight hundred meters, the greatest pressure was on his internal organs; his bones and muscles could still withstand much more.

He began practicing various fist techniques on the seabed. As he practiced, all the fist techniques gradually lost their original form. James extended his bone claws to adapt to their new shape, using that as a foundation to continue his cultivation.

The thick, boundless water pressure exerted immense force evenly on every inch of his body. This was more comprehensive than any training equipment, and James increasingly felt his control over his body beginning to recover.

Butler Vane would send people to deliver daily necessities, the latest news on the political situation, and requests for instructions on important business matters every so often.

In recent years, Daniel had also been helping to handle the Howlett Family's business affairs. He had visited James on Vancouver Island twice; although he still kept a certain distance, he could clearly feel that James's state had improved significantly.

The biggest realization was that when he was in the same space as him, he wasn't as afraid anymore.

The deep sea was a place of immense terror; only the boundless vacuum of the universe could evoke a similar feeling.

James felt he had reached the limit of his body, approaching a depth of three thousand meters. Every time he reached near this depth, his strongest bones would begin to feel physical deformation they could not withstand.

Under the training and adaptation of the past few years, especially his internal organs and tissues, he had improved significantly. But facing the high pressure at three thousand meters deep—a depth even whales could not enter—he relied entirely on his ability to heal desperately at every moment to maintain basic mobility.

With his current body's oxygen absorption capacity, he could last nearly an hour and a half underwater without needing to surface for air after a full breath.

Relying on the deep sea to deprive him of some of his senses, and with ten thousand tons of water pressure, every movement felt like shaking an invisible mountain. The blood and energy in his body pulsed wildly toward every inch of his frame. James finally felt the state of mastering his entire body's power once again.

While James endured the unbearable creaking of his bones under the heavy burden of water pressure, he thrust his arms out extremely slowly, like an old man practicing Taijiquan. His two pairs of bone claws had evolved into natural weapons that integrated both offense and defense.

Fist techniques were originally derived from cold weapon combat. After James fully accepted his instinctual power and comprehensively combined the fist techniques of his past life, these innate weapons finally found the true meaning of their existence.

Thump, thump, thump.

His heartbeat accelerated, and the muscles of his heart even began to suffer damage and bleeding, but James's current healing speed was almost equal to the speed of the damage.

He braved the omnipresent pressure, forcing his blood into every tissue of his body. With the experience of his first time achieving full-body energy circulation, his head and face were no longer a bottleneck. In an instant, James seemed to break free from the constraints of the deep-sea pressure. His speed in punching and kicking suddenly increased; he wanted to rely on this desperate burst of power to break through the barrier in one go.

BOOM!

On the seabed, James silently erupted with his internal energy. He raised his claws high, and the seawater was pushed back by the energy erupting from every inch of his skin, forming an oval vacuum environment with a radius of about two meters. After lasting for more than ten seconds, the energy retracted, and the seawater instantly rushed back in.

James relaxed his entire body, naturally floating upward with the buoyancy of the water. He retracted the exoskeleton on his arms. Along the fissures between the bone claws, arm shields, bone spikes, and his skin and muscles, strands of dark red, glowing blood flowed out, staining the surrounding seawater and turning it into a blood-colored ribbon that slowly coiled around James.

Under the stimulation of his energy, his bones began to show signs of marrow-cleansing once again. The first time James's fist technique reached the Huajin level, his bones had shown signs of transformation, and his bone density and strength had increased, but it seemed the "energy" was not enough to completely shed his old self and be reborn.

This time, combined with the full power of Sabretooth, James's bones and muscles began to squirm on their own. The process of marrow-cleansing was very fast and extremely painful.

His skin began to peel off continuously, oozing dark, filthy substances. His tooth roots also became loose and itchy, only to be pushed out by new teeth. James scratched his entire body in agony; he couldn't help but open his mouth to howl in pain, but only a string of bubbles emerged.

He could gradually see light above his head, and the pain in his body slowly subsided, replaced by a wave of comfortable numbness and relaxation.

Pfft!

James finally surfaced. He exhaled the turbid air and inhaled the fresh, moist sea breeze. After the storm, the sky was exceptionally pure and clear.

He lay flat on the surface of the sea, letting the waves rise and fall, looking at the azure sky, as if reborn.