Foundation Establishment!

The feeling of controlling everything and being omnipotent left Chu Yuan a little entranced;

Whether they were the low-ranking Day of Vengeance followers inside the city, who killed everyone they saw, the Supernatural Realm Warriors at the other five formation nodes, or the main force outside the city... all of them had been refined in an instant by the immense might of the Blood Sea Soul-Locking Array!

Like ants...

One by one, glistening beads formed from refined souls and infused with some special power appeared around Chu Yuan. He collected them;

Vigorous qi and blood continued pouring into him, and Chu Yuan's aura climbed higher and higher!

The eighth level of the Qi Refining Realm, the ninth level... He soon reached the threshold of Foundation Establishment;

Chu Yuan circulated the Evergreen Foundation Establishment Method with all his might, while a thick cocoon of blood enveloped him...

He had wondered whether he would need something like a Foundation Establishment Pill to break through, since that was what all the cultivation novels he'd read in his previous life said;

But with a source of life force so vast it beggared description, what bottlenecks or barriers could there be? They all seemed like a joke!

The sea of qi in his dantian was compressed again and again, gathering into spiritual liquid that fell drop by drop;

His brow swelled, as though something were about to burst forth...

Qi Da stared blankly at the blood cocoon in the sky. He could sense Chu Yuan's aura growing stronger by the moment;

Considering what he'd seen earlier and the Blood Sacrifice Array... it wasn't hard to guess where Chu Yuan's newfound strength had come from.

Still, they were just rebels. If they'd been sacrificed, then they'd been sacrificed;

He wasn't so rigid that he thought Chu Yuan was wrong to "eat people."

Qi Da was only wondering what excuse he should come up with afterward.

Some of the school's teachers and students had died when the Blood-Sucking Array drained them, but most were still alive, though they'd long since fallen unconscious;

A few teachers at the Internal Breath Realm had managed to stay barely conscious, but Chu Yuan had planned ahead. As soon as he took control of the array, he knocked them out too.

That way, they wouldn't see anything they shouldn't...

So, the only people who knew what had happened were him and Chu Yuan;

As long as he came up with a convincing lie, it shouldn't be too hard to cover things up...

Just as he was working out the wording, a powerful aura suddenly sped toward First High School.

Qi Da's expression changed. So soon?

He glanced once more at the blood cocoon hanging in the air, gritted his teeth, and was about to go meet the newcomer and stop them;

Suddenly, the blood cocoon shattered, revealing Chu Yuan within...

"Thanks."

"I should be the one thanking you." A faint smile appeared on Jiang Fei's pale face. "Why do I feel like you've gotten stronger again?"

Chu Yuan played the lucky guy: "I just happened to make a tiny breakthrough... It's fine now. Hurry and take her to get treated."

Jiang Fei glanced at the azure sky. "How do you know it's fine now? Do you know what happened?"

The calamity had ended not long after Chu Yuan left... but no ordinary person would have thought to connect it to him;

"Our principal took care of it. I don't know the details." Chu Yuan kept his answer vague;

"All right... Want to exchange terminal contacts?"

"Sure."

Jiang Fei didn't waste time. After exchanging contacts, he carried Chen Yun away;

Chen Yun was badly injured. Her physical wounds weren't even the biggest problem; the real trouble was the damage to her mind—or, more accurately, her soul.

After being possessed by something uncanny, surviving at all was already remarkable. It was inevitable that her mind had been hurt.

She would need precious medicine to recover...

Something like the soul-refining beads Chu Yuan had;

But he obviously wasn't going to bring those out.

Jiang Fei was one thing, but Chu Yuan had no real connection with Chen Yun;

The Martial Suppression Bureau had deep pockets. There was no need for him to stick his neck out...

As he walked back with Han Cui and Chu Ying, Chu Yuan looked down at the city beneath his feet;

It didn't look too badly damaged, really. The Blood-Sucking Array and Blood Sacrifice Array had mainly targeted living beings, not destruction;

Only some buildings had collapsed due to the aftermath of the fighting...

The main battlefield had actually been outside the city, and only a limited area inside had been caught up in it.

Someone else would naturally handle the aftermath: rebuilding what needed rebuilding and repairing what needed repairs;

As for those slaughtered by the Day of Vengeance followers...

Chu Yuan couldn't be bothered with matters that had nothing to do with him. All he wanted now was to hurry home and stabilize his cultivation;

Driven by the immense source of life force, his cultivation had already reached the middle stage of Foundation Establishment.

Of course, it wasn't that the source of life force from all those high-level Warriors could only take him this far. He was simply stuffed and couldn't absorb any more!

Another reason was that the Evergreen Foundation Establishment Method only went as far as the Foundation Establishment Realm;

If he wanted to keep cultivating, he would have to find a new technique!

He hadn't wasted the remaining source of life force. Instead, he'd used the Blood Sea Soul-Locking Array to refine it into Blood Pills, which he had on him now...

Compared with the Qi Refining Realm, the Foundation Establishment Realm not only brought greater combat strength and endurance, but also two important traits;

One was the ability to fly with his physical body;

The other was the birth of Spiritual Sense!

Of the two, Chu Yuan cared more about the latter!

For a cultivator, Spiritual Sense was an all-around, omnidirectional radar that could be switched on and off at will!

Whether searching for things, fighting, or exploring... it brought an enormous boost;

And all it consumed was a bit of mental energy...

His Spiritual Sense was still quite weak, with a range of only a few hundred meters around him;

But who knew? Maybe one day, a single thought would let him cover the entire planet.

"You're saying that, using a treasure you found earlier in a Secret Realm on the Outer-Heaven Battlefield, you not only seized control of the Blood Sacrifice Array but also changed its nature? You made it capable of instantly killing Fifth Realm Warriors and the uncanny?" Ma Hui said quietly;

Qi Da drew a deep breath and replied with ringing conviction, "That's right!"

"..." Ma Hui was speechless for a moment. "You might as well say that a mysterious powerhouse happened to pass by, took a dislike to the Day of Vengeance, personally seized control of the array, and then handed it over to you..."

Qi Da frowned in confusion. "I don't understand what you're talking about.

"I've had that treasure tucked away for a long time, saving it as a trump card... Using it here today means it didn't go to waste!"

"Principal Qi... this is an array, not a living being!

"If you said some treasure could seize control of a living being's consciousness and raise their realm... that would make sense!

"But this is an array!

"Are you saying your 'treasure' can summon a bunch of tiny array masters to alter the array patterns on the spot?!"

Qi Da blinked. "Yeah. Isn't that amazing?"

Ma Hui's temple twitched. "I think your mouth is even more amazing..."

"I saved Chenyang City, and that's how you talk to me?"

"...Sorry."