Breakthrough, Apprentice Rank!

After handing the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber to Yan and explaining how to consume it, Yue Guan offered a few encouraging words before sending him away.

Back at his training quarters, Yan took off his shirt and removed the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber from the jade box.

Whale Rubber was naturally golden in color, and the piece in Yan's hand was an absolute treasure among Whale Rubber.

Its golden hue was exceptionally pure and deep. Under the light of the training room, it gleamed with a warm, oily luster, like the finest amber beeswax.

Yan summoned his Flame Overlord martial soul. Behind him, the phantom of a stone giant wreathed in crimson flames instantly appeared.

A dense, domineering, scorching aura that seemed to come from ancient savage times immediately filled the entire training room, twisting the air slightly under the intense heat.

Such a powerful aura was nothing like that of a martial soul that had only just awakened. This was the phenomenon caused by the remnant origin of the Flame Emperor merging with Yan's body and resonating with his martial soul.

The original Flame Overlord possessed both fire and earth attributes, but neither was anywhere close to the ultimate level.

However, bolstered by the Flame Emperor's remnant origin, the fire element of Yan's Flame Overlord martial soul was endlessly approaching the ultimate realm.

With a thought from Yan, the giant phantom behind him loosely clenched its palm, and a dark-red flame of Soul Power—far more condensed and much hotter than an ordinary soul master's fire—rose in his hand.

Without the slightest hesitation, he placed the incomparably precious ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber directly above the scorching dark-red flames.

The instant the flames came into contact with the Whale Rubber, a strange sound rang out.

The chunk of ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber, hard as gold and stone and colored like warm jade, rapidly softened and deformed on the surface under the searing flames.

Its deep golden color also transformed into a more translucent, crimson-gold gelatinous substance.

A peculiar fishy fragrance began to permeate the training room. Merely smelling it made one's blood and qi churn slightly and one's skin grow hot.

Yan's gaze was steady and focused. Once the Whale Rubber had completely melted into gel, he sent it straight into his mouth and swallowed it in one gulp.

Accompanied by a strong scent of the sea, the scorching crimson-gold gel seemed to come alive. A warm current arose within it, swiftly transforming into a surging heat that burst throughout his body.

In an instant, Yan felt as though he had been thrown into an erupting volcano.

The increasingly violent heat exploded with a roar, becoming countless scorching torrents that charged savagely toward every limb and bone in his body.

Every meridian and every inch of flesh felt as though it had been filled with violent medicinal energy.

The impact made Yan let out a muffled groan, but rather than being alarmed, he was delighted. The stronger the medicinal power contained in the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber, the more his strength would increase!

Yan steadied his mind and endured the pain within his body as he began circulating the Yan God Body Tempering Technique.

The immense medicinal power instantly turned his skin red, like a boiled shrimp.

Fine blood threads and gray impurities mixed into reddish-brown sweat that was expelled from Yan's body. It was soon evaporated by the high heat generated by the Flame Overlord's possession, forming a faint mist.

Yan felt his muscles spasming and swelling uncontrollably, while his blood vessels throbbed violently beneath his skin, as if magma were flowing through them.

This was the phenomenon of the Yan God Body Refining Technique operating at full force. After a year of training, his physique had already reached a level no weaker than that of a two-ring Soul Grandmaster.

Though the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber's medicinal power was strong, its nature was not violent. Yan's physique could withstand it completely.

At this point, rather than allowing the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber's medicinal power to slowly dissolve and be absorbed within Yan's body, it was better to accelerate the process directly.

The side effect of Whale Rubber would cause an uncontrollable primal restlessness.

However, that was merely an abnormal reaction caused by unabsorbed medicinal power remaining in the body.

Yet with the Yan God Body Refining Technique running at full force, nearly all the medicinal power produced by the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber was converted and absorbed. Even if there was some slight restlessness, Yan could suppress it without revealing anything unusual.

Just then, the intense fluctuations of power within his body unexpectedly stirred activity in Yan's sea of consciousness.

Deep within it, the dark-gold inheritance heat current belonging exclusively to the Flame Emperor was drawn out. For the first time, it actively separated a wisp of power and slowly merged it into the surging torrent of medicinal energy.

The addition of that wisp of power was like throwing a Core Flame into a boiling pot of oil.

Within Yan's body, the medicinal power that had gradually begun to calm seemed to ignite in an instant, being refined and purified in a higher-dimensional manner.

Wherever the dark-gold heat current passed, the medicinal power of the ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber was dispersed and absorbed more thoroughly.

Its violence and impurities were ruthlessly crushed and assimilated by that higher-level power, transformed into purer life energy that was easier to absorb.

It merged more deeply and thoroughly into every cell of his body, tempering his muscles, bones, skin, membranes, and internal organs.

The pain instantly intensified by more than tenfold!

It felt as if countless red-hot steel needles were stirring within his marrow, while magma surged through his veins.

Yet at the same time, an unmistakable sensation of rebirth was also washing over him.

Yan could feel his muscle fibers tearing apart and reforming under the cleansing of the medicinal power. His bone density was increasing madly, faintly taking on a pale golden sheen.

His meridians were also being widened and reinforced, and even the blood flowing through his body seemed to carry a faint luster.

This was not a leap in the level of life itself, but it was undoubtedly an elevation of his life's origin and a tremendous strengthening of his physical foundation.

The training room was filled with blistering heat and swirling white vapor.

Yan's figure flickered in and out of view through the mist.

Only his suppressed growls, like those of a wounded beast, and the tooth-aching crackles and muffled pops continuously coming from his body proved what an astonishing transformation he was undergoing.

His endurance was increasing, his strength was growing, and his physique was becoming even more powerful.

Who knew how long passed? It felt as long as an entire century.

The scorching aura in the training room gradually subsided, and the white vapor slowly dispersed. At its center, Yan's figure became clear once more.

He still sat cross-legged, but his entire bearing had become utterly different.

The crimson beneath his skin had faded. His smooth, taut skin appeared no different from before, but only he knew what kind of power lay hidden beneath it.

When he slowly opened his eyes, two dark-gold flames, condensed to the extreme, seemed to flash through the depths of his dark-red pupils before vanishing.

Wherever his gaze fell, the air itself seemed to twist slightly.

He slowly rose and stretched his body. A series of crisp cracks rang from his bones like popping beans, echoing through the silent training room.

With a sudden punch, the air around his fist let out a deep explosive boom.

Without using Soul Power, his sheer physical strength alone seemed capable of crushing refined iron.

He vaguely sensed that an invisible bottleneck had been broken.

Though he had not tested it, that wisp of the Flame Emperor's inherited origin power had increased his punching strength by at least several hundred kilograms, and his Martial Artist realm had risen from its former unranked state.

Apprentice Rank?

Yan's eyes blazed, as though flames flowed within them.

In his original estimation, to advance his Martial Artist realm to Apprentice Rank, he would need to absorb at least two Soul Rings and reach the realm of a Soul Grandmaster.

He had not expected the immense medicinal power of a single piece of ten-thousand-year Whale Rubber to stir the Flame Emperor's power, elevating his origin and turning him from a novice just beginning down the path of a Martial Artist into an Apprentice Rank Martial Artist in one leap.

Yan clenched his fist, explosive strength contained within it.

He felt that with his physique alone, he could contend with high-level Soul Elders. He might even be qualified to fight some weaker Soul Ancestors!