King of Heng Mountain

The next morning, Zhou Cheng swallowed a Nine-Orifice Golden Pill. Under the potent medicinal power of the pill, his final meridian was finally unblocked.

The moment the meridian barrier was broken, Zhou Cheng's internal energy surged wildly, like a tsunami breaking through a dam, rushing and churning through his ten major meridians.

He had finally reached Qi Refining Level Ten.

As he broke through, Zhou Cheng felt the powerful, surging internal energy within his body and suddenly threw a punch.

The punch transformed into a beam of light, like lightning, striking a boulder as large as a person over twenty meters away.

Boom!

The boulder shattered, turning into countless specks of dust that drifted through the air.

This boulder was made of extremely hard meteoric iron, used by inner disciples to train their palm strength. It could withstand the power of a Qi Refining Level Ten cultivator, yet Zhou Cheng had just pulverized it into dust with a single punch from over twenty meters away.

With his current strength, he could easily kill a cultivator at Innate Level Three.

Zhou Cheng checked his system status panel.

Host: Zhou Cheng

Northern Dark Divine Technique: Qi Refining Level Ten, Progress 11

Primordial Boundless Scripture: Spirit Roaming Realm, Progress 64

Black Tortoise Divine Body: Minor Accomplishment, Progress 1

Indestructible Vajra Divine Body: Minor Accomplishment, Progress 1

In recent days, under his continuous consumption of Nine-Orifice Golden Pills, both divine bodies had broken through from initial completion to minor accomplishment.

However, after both divine bodies reached minor accomplishment, he found that swallowing Nine-Orifice Golden Pills no longer had any effect, so he had been stuck at 1 for the past few days.

As for the Demon-Subduing Saber Technique and the other two martial skills, they had all reached the peak of perfection. The Spirit Monkey Hundred Transformations Movement Technique and the Taiyi Sword Technique had both reached the realm of divine transformation.

At this moment, an inner disciple came to find Zhou Cheng, saying that the Great Feng Emperor Zhu Xuan had invited disciples who had contributed to the extermination of the Demonic Cult by the three major sects to the imperial palace. He wanted to personally reward the ten individuals who had contributed the most.

"A personal reward?" Zhou Cheng looked at the departing inner disciple.

Unknowingly, he had been away from the Capital City for over thirty days.

Returning to the Capital City this time, he could spend more time with his father and mother. That would be good.

Before leaving, Zhou Cheng visited his master, Xing Yao, for a while.

Afterward, he and Qin Meng and the other two rode their horses away from the Ten Thousand Stars Sect.

On the mountain peak, Gao Yi watched Zhou Cheng and Qin Meng's group ride away, his eyes filled with coldness.

Three days later.

That night.

Zhou Cheng and his companions stopped when they passed by Vicious Tiger Mountain in the Central Province.

Looking at Vicious Tiger Mountain, Zhou Cheng couldn't help but recall the scene of eradicating the Golden Snake Gang a month ago.

"Let's go up Vicious Tiger Mountain to take a look," Zhou Cheng said.

He and Qin Meng and the others returned to Vicious Tiger Mountain. They saw a scene of devastation, with ruins and scorched buildings everywhere.

Zhou Cheng went to the Golden Snake Gang's main hall, cleaned it up with Qin Meng and the others, and started a bonfire.

Sitting by the bonfire, Zhou Cheng entered a meditative state, his soul leaving his body.

Now, he was already in the mid-Spirit Roaming Realm, and his soul had grown much stronger than before, allowing him to roam at night.

Zhou Cheng's soul drifted outward like a falling leaf.

As he passed through the wall of the main hall, Zhou Cheng willed it, and his soul passed directly through.

The soul is formless and intangible, so it can pass through solid objects.

After coming outside, Zhou Cheng's soul continued to fly outward, and he accelerated his speed.

However, although Zhou Cheng's soul had been constantly strengthening in recent days, he still didn't dare to fly too fast. Once he went too fast, the wind resistance would cause his soul to feel a tearing pain.

Therefore, Zhou Cheng's soul could only reach the speed of a mortal's hundred-meter sprint at its fastest.

Any faster, and his soul could not bear it.

Zhou Cheng cultivated the Primordial Boundless Scripture, and his soul was more resilient than that of Spirit Roaming Realm cultivators of the same level. If it were any other Spirit Roaming Realm cultivator, their speed would be even slower, only able to jog like a mortal.

Zhou Cheng's soul drifted past the mountainous terrain outside, past the dense weeds, and finally arrived at the edge of a cliff.

Just as Zhou Cheng's soul was about to fly to the opposite bank, a strong gust of wind suddenly blew up from the bottom of the cliff. Zhou Cheng's soul was like being hit by a large cart and was blown away.

Then, another gust of wind blew, and Zhou Cheng's soul was blown away again.

After several gusts of wind, Zhou Cheng's soul was almost scattered.

With great difficulty, Zhou Cheng's soul finally returned to his spiritual palace.

Even so, those few gusts of wind had caused damage to Zhou Cheng's soul.

Zhou Cheng felt a wave of dizziness and a splitting headache.

Suddenly, a colossal deity appeared above Zhou Cheng's life palace. The deity was suffused with divine light, and bathed in its radiance, Zhou Cheng's soul finally recovered.

This deity was none other than the Primordial Heavenly Venerable, one of the three supreme gods of Taoism.

Only after Zhou Cheng's soul had fully recovered did the image of the Primordial Heavenly Venerable dissipate.

Zhou Cheng let out a sigh of relief, feeling his back drenched in cold sweat. Although he was now in the mid-stage of the Soul Wandering Realm and his soul was sturdier than it had been a few days ago, he still found it difficult to withstand a gale of that magnitude. He would have to be more careful in the future.

It was no wonder people said that cultivating the Tao was a hundred times more dangerous than cultivating martial arts; if one's soul was not firm, it could be scattered by a gale at any moment while flying in the Soul Wandering state.

Once the soul was scattered, there could only be one outcome: death and total annihilation.

At this moment, the Primordial Boundless Scripture began to circulate automatically, drawing upon the power of the stars in the night sky, which descended in continuous streams into the top of his head.

Cultivating the Tao was a process of constantly tempering and strengthening the soul through meditation, contemplation, and the channeling of heaven and earth energy, allowing it to grow steadily.

However, while other Taoist scriptures could generally only attract starlight to temper the soul at night, the Primordial Boundless Scripture could channel various forms of energy from heaven and earth to temper his soul regardless of whether it was day or night.

This was the very reason Zhou Cheng had broken through to the mid-stage of the Soul Wandering Realm so quickly.

At his current rate of soul cultivation, he should be able to break through to the Object Manipulation Realm by the time he returned to the Capital City in a few days.

A night passed.

Zhou Cheng and Qin Meng's group descended Vicious Tiger Mountain and continued their journey.

However, while passing through Salt City near Vicious Tiger Mountain, they heard many people discussing the affairs of the Golden Snake Gang.

"Nangong Xie, the leader of the Golden Snake Gang, was the younger brother of Nangong Xiong from Heng Mountain! Since Nangong Xie was killed, Nangong Xiong has dispatched experts to investigate the culprit."

"Nangong Xiong? The King of Heng Mountain?"

"Besides the King of Heng Mountain, who else would dare to be called Nangong Xiong?"

Listening to the crowd's discussion, Zhou Cheng's expression remained calm.

Nangong Xiong, is it?

In the Great Feng Dynasty, the southern Heng Mountain was a paradise for gathered bandits, with the number of bandit gangs in Heng Mountain reaching three to four hundred thousand.

The strongest and largest gang in Heng Mountain, the Flying Dragon Gang, boasted forty to fifty thousand members, possessing a formidable strength not inferior to the Demonic Cult at its peak decades ago.

The leader of the Flying Dragon Gang, Nangong Xiong, was hailed as the King of Heng Mountain.

Whenever Nangong Xiong was mentioned, every sect and faction in the Great Feng Dynasty would change color; even the three great sects would not easily provoke the Flying Dragon Gang.

Because there were hundreds of thousands of bandits in Heng Mountain, and they had been rooted there for many years in treacherous terrain, even the imperial court found it difficult to exterminate them, so the court could only turn a blind eye.

Zhou Cheng traveled without stopping, and four days later, the Capital City finally came into view.

At this time, it had been seven days since Zhou Cheng broke through to the tenth level of Qi Refining.

Zhou Cheng was already at the peak of the late tenth level of Qi Refining.