Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower

Standing atop a small hill, Xiao Ling looked ahead. What entered his view was a sunken stretch of terrain. Within that depression, an enormous black tower was buried deep underground, with only its spire and a pitch-black entrance exposed above the surface. This was the very essence of the Inner Academy—the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower.

The entrance to the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower was already surrounded by a dense sea of people. This sight made Xiao Ling reassess just how popular the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower was within the Inner Academy.

Without further hesitation, Xiao Ling squeezed straight into the crowd. Relying on his powerful physical strength, he quickly pushed his way to the front and found an open spot with few people to stand in.

Seeing the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower from closer up, Xiao Ling noticed that the space surrounding the tower seemed faintly distorted and wrinkled.

This Space Lock must have been left behind by Mang Tianchi long ago. After so much time, he still hasn't come back to maintain it. Han Feng only needed to bring a few Dou Emperors to break it. Recalling the plot of the original work, Xiao Ling grumbled inwardly.

Time trickled by as they waited.

Dong!

An ancient bell toll suddenly resounded through the area, and as it rang out, the noisy chatter in the crowd came to an abrupt halt.

"Open the tower!"

After the bell's toll faded, an aged voice seemed to drift out from within the tower.

Not long after the old voice fell silent, the tightly shut black doors slowly opened with a creak. A faintly scorching aura seeped out, raising the temperature of the surrounding air slightly.

"Enter the tower!"

The aged voice rang out once more. The sound of rushing wind followed as figure after figure shot toward the tower gates like a tidal wave.

Seeing this, Xiao Ling set off as well and walked into the tower. Remembering that one's first entry would bring discomfort, he took out a third-tier Clear Heart Pill and put it in his mouth, intending to swallow it the moment he felt unwell.

The instant Xiao Ling's feet landed on the ground beyond the tower gates, his body suddenly stiffened. His fair face turned red like burning charcoal, while wisps of pale white vapor seeped from his body with a sizzling sound like roasting meat.

Sensing the abnormality in his body, Xiao Ling did not hesitate. He immediately swallowed the Clear Heart Pill in his mouth, and the discomfort within him vanished at once, leaving him feeling utterly refreshed.

Although the abnormal reaction had temporarily disappeared, Xiao Ling still sensed a cluster of strange flames that had suddenly appeared within his body for no apparent reason. This flame was formless, shapeless, and colorless. It should have been a Branch Flame of the Fallen Heart Flame. He needed to find a room and cultivate for a while, allowing his body to adapt to this as soon as possible. Otherwise, once the Clear Heart Pill's effects wore off, his body would be harmed. At best, he would need several days of rest; at worst, his meridians would be damaged, leaving him unable to cultivate Dou Qi.

He muttered inwardly, What is the academy thinking? They didn't even warn new students about this danger. If I hadn't read the original work and prepared beforehand, then without Heavenly Flames protecting my body like Xiao Yan, I might have been seriously injured immediately.

Some of the people around him recognized Xiao Ling. They knew he was the one who had robbed the old students of all their fire energy during the Fire Energy Hunt Competition. When they noticed his earlier reaction at the entrance to the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower, they had paused, intending to enjoy his misfortune. So what if his talent was exceptional? Wouldn't he still have to suffer before the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower?

It seemed these people had long known what Xiao Ling would encounter upon entering, yet had deliberately kept silent because they wanted to see him make a fool of himself.

But what they had not expected was for Xiao Ling to break free from the burning of the heart fire in an instant. Back then, they had all suffered terribly here before they could enter and cultivate.

Xiao Ling gave these people, who had wanted to see him embarrass himself, a casual glance before walking straight into the depths of the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower.

"How did he recover in an instant?"

"He actually broke free from the heart fire's burning on his own. How did he do that?"

"Is this the difference between geniuses and us?"

Upon arriving for the first time at this Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower, which was buried deep underground with only its spire exposed, Xiao Ling found the interior far more spacious than he had expected. As he walked along, he realized that the first floor alone could likely accommodate five hundred people cultivating at once.

Training rooms of varying sizes had been built throughout the circular tower interior. However, most of them were already occupied, and small red plaques hung above the doors. The words on the plaques differed. Xiao Ling stopped to look and found that they bore the terms high-level, mid-level, and low-level, representing three different ranks. These were presumably the classifications of the training rooms within the Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower.

As he slowly walked from east to south, Xiao Ling discovered that all the high-level training rooms seemed to be near the center of the tower. Mid-level training rooms were distributed around them, while the low-level training rooms lay even farther out.

Looking at these training rooms, Xiao Ling muttered inwardly, The fire energy cost on the first floor is the same, yet the academy has divided the training rooms into ranks. To fight over better rooms, there must be plenty of conflicts here every day. Jia Nan Academy truly displays the law of the strong devouring the weak to the fullest.

As he walked, Xiao Ling's steps suddenly halted. Following his gaze forward, he discovered that he had reached the center of the tower...

Xiao Ling stared in stunned disbelief at the bottomless black hole before him. He slowly stepped forward twice, came to its edge, and cautiously glanced down. Pitch-black darkness stretched all the way to the limits of his vision. That strange darkness, nearly devoid of even the slightest trace of light, made Xiao Ling's head feel slightly dizzy.

This black hole seemed to run through the entire Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower. If not for the tower spire covering it, this pitch-black abyss might have been clearly visible from the sky at a glance.

If one sensed carefully within this dark abyss, one could seemingly detect that the air here was far more scorching than elsewhere. It felt as though something at the bottom of the abyss was continuously radiating heat to supply the entire Heavenly Flame Refining Qi Tower.

This should be the passage leading to the underground Magma World. Inside are two Fallen Heart Flames, the soul of a Dou Zun, countless Flame Lizardmen, an Ancient Void Dragon at the Nine-Star Dou Sheng level, and the Ancient Emperor's Cave Mansion that countless people yearn for. Thinking of the opportunities within, Xiao Ling's heart grew somewhat heated.

Shaking his head, he stopped thinking about such irrelevant matters. He was only a minor Da Dou Shi now and did not even possess the strength to come into contact with those opportunities. For the time being, he still needed to raise his own strength as quickly as possible.