The Passage of Fifty Years: The Peak of the Third-Tier Qi Sea Realm

Time flowed on, and fifty years flashed by in the blink of an eye.

Deep within the imperial palace, the stone door to the treasury slowly opened after lying silent for countless years.

Blinding sunlight fell upon the dust motes dancing in the air, casting golden shafts of light.

A figure emerged from the radiance, taking slow steps forward.

He was still dressed in black, still bearing the same handsome, extraordinary face of a young man.

But compared to fifty years ago, his hair—turned gray-white from burning his life force—

had now become completely silver, white as snow.

Time seemed to have left no wrinkles on his face.

Yet it had settled a deeper aura in the depths of his eyes.

He was Lin Hanzhou.

This seclusion had lasted a full fifty years.

To an ordinary person, fifty years was half a life gone by.

It was enough for a newborn infant to grow into a middle-aged adult who could stand on their own.

When Lin Hanzhou stepped out of the treasury and saw Li Yuechan waiting outside once more,

even with the composure he had gained over more than a century, he could not help feeling a pang of melancholy at how much had changed.

The woman before him was no longer the youthful girl she had been fifty years ago.

She wore a splendid golden phoenix robe and an imperial crown, her figure graceful and elegant.

But time had, in the end, left its traces upon her exquisite face.

Fine lines had appeared at the corners of her eyes.

Yet all traces of youthful innocence and dependence had long since faded from her gaze.

In their place were the majesty of one who ruled the world and the calm confidence of one who held everything in her grasp.

She had gone from a girl in need of protection to a true, capable sovereign.

To put it plainly, she had changed from a shy young girl into a mature, alluring woman.

"State Preceptor, you... have emerged from seclusion."

At the sight of Lin Hanzhou, uncontrollable excitement and joy welled up in Li Yuechan's majestic phoenix eyes.

She hurried forward and bowed deeply to him.

Over the past fifty years, she had grown accustomed to the presence of this Protector Grand Master.

Though he had been in seclusion all this time, whenever she remembered that he was quietly there, deep within the imperial palace,

Li Yuechan felt an overwhelming sense of reassurance.

"Rise. How many times have I told you? An emperor need not bow to a subject. You just never listen."

A gentle smile touched Lin Hanzhou's lips.

"The State Preceptor is too modest. Without you, there would be no Great Gan as it is today, nor would I be who I am now."

Li Yuechan spoke with utmost seriousness, her heart filled with gratitude toward Lin Hanzhou.

She knew all too well that if Lin Hanzhou had not intervened back then, she would have long since become a pile of bones.

"Fifty years apart, and Your Majesty still looks as radiant as ever."

Lin Hanzhou's smile did not fade. He stepped forward and helped Li Yuechan to her feet.

"Yue Chan... has grown old."

Holding Lin Hanzhou's hand, Li Yuechan gave a bitter smile.

The only reason she had managed to maintain such a youthful appearance was her exceptional cultivation talent.

Back when she was sixteen, she had already been a peak first-rate martial artist.

That rate of cultivation surpassed that of the vast majority of martial artists.

Over the past fifty years, she had successfully advanced to the Grandmaster Realm, gaining three hundred years of additional life.

With the immense resources of the entire imperial house at her disposal, achieving this had not been difficult.

What was more, Lin Hanzhou had occasionally emerged from seclusion to offer her guidance.

Every time he instructed her, he cut straight to the heart of the matter, pinpointing the most crucial issues.

For Lin Hanzhou, who possessed the Martial Arts Prodigy talent, this was no difficult feat.

With his understanding of the cultivation methods in this world, he could even create Grandmaster-level techniques himself.

One had to know that Grandmaster-level techniques were rare treasures, even among the three great sects with their thousand-year-old legacies.

The fact that Lin Hanzhou could create such precious techniques at will showed just how profound his martial arts attainments had become.

With attainments like his, guiding someone else's cultivation was naturally a piece of cake.

Thanks to this, Li Yuechan had not only broken through to the Grandmaster Realm, but had now reached the advanced Grandmaster level.

Given a little more time, advancing to the Great Grandmaster Realm would be no difficult matter for her.

Once she broke through to the Great Grandmaster Realm, she would have the strength to suppress the entire world with her own hands.

By then, even if Lin Hanzhou left, she would be able to stand on her own.

She would no longer need to rely on him for everything.

Lin Hanzhou's cultivation, too, had reached an unprecedented level over these fifty years.

The peak of the third-tier Qi Sea Realm!

The golden sea of qi within him had long since expanded to its utmost limits.

The golden spiritual energy within had been compressed to the extreme, containing terrifying power enough to destroy heaven and earth.

But he had also touched the ceiling of this world.

He could clearly feel an invisible barrier above his head.

It was a wall formed by the laws of heaven and earth, firmly holding him back.

No matter what he did, he could not take another step forward and break through to the fourth-tier True Origin Realm.

He knew this was not a problem with his talent.

With the boost of his blue Martial Arts Prodigy talent, his cultivation speed and comprehension had long since surpassed every genius in this world.

The problem lay with the world itself.

This low-level world known as the Great Gan Dynasty had a feeble origin and incomplete laws.

The limit of individual power it could sustain was the peak of the third tier: the Great Grandmaster level.

A fourth-tier martial artist simply could not be born here.

Unless they were an unparalleled prodigy, one not seen in ten thousand years, capable of breaking the world's restrictions.

Only a genius like that would have even a sliver of a chance to force their way through the bottleneck.

But after countless attempts, Lin Hanzhou had to admit that he clearly could not do it.

After failing to break through again and again, he gradually accepted this fact.

So he began cultivating movement techniques and martial skills, bolstering his foundations.

Over the past fifty years, he had already brought everything he could cultivate to the utmost level.

Whether it was the high-grade Black Rank movement technique Floating Light Glancing Shadow, learned from the imperial treasury,

or the fist technique Great Sun Divine Fist, borrowed from Vajra Temple, he had mastered both completely.

As for the Flowing Cloud Sword Technique, his greatest specialty, it seemed on the verge of evolving on its own,

breaking through the restrictions of the Black Rank and rising to the higher Earth Rank.

All of this was thanks to the heaven-defying boost of the Martial Arts Prodigy talent.

Besides that, he had also cultivated countless strange and unusual skills from every obscure corner.

Disguise techniques, bone-shrinking techniques, breath-concealing methods...

It could be said that there was hardly anything left for him to cultivate.

In this world, he had reached the end of the martial path.

Since he could not take another step forward, he might as well go out and look around. That was why he had emerged from seclusion.

After bidding Li Yuechan farewell, Lin Hanzhou quietly left the Capital City.

He wanted to see what the prosperous age he had personally protected for more than fifty years looked like now.