Daybreak pierced the sky.
A thin veil of mist still hung over the wilderness.
Heaven and earth remained shrouded in haze, not yet fully distinct.
In the wilderness.
Jiang Ning reached into the Heavenly Soldier's chest and abdomen, grasping the fist-sized Immortal Essence Stone that glimmered with a pearly white light.
It felt smooth and warm, yet carried a trace of chill.
Although the energy within had been mostly exhausted, with only a few wisps of immortal essence fused into the stone itself, he could sense that the energy it contained was of an extremely high grade, far beyond ordinary heavenly treasures.
"Can this Immortal Essence Stone be refined and absorbed for my use?" His heart stirred, and without hesitation, he put the Immortal Essence Stone into his mouth.
Crack—
Crunch—
The incomparably hard Immortal Essence Stone let out crisp cracking sounds between his teeth.
Even with its energy depleted, its material was still extraordinary, far tougher than ordinary refined iron. If normal blades and weapons struck it, only the blades would snap and shatter.
Yet Jiang Ning's physical body had long surpassed the peak of first-rank martial arts, and his teeth were the hardest part of the human body. He forcibly bit it apart, then ground it into dregs.
Once the fragments entered his stomach, a surge of pure and vast energy was drawn out and absorbed within him.
The total amount of this energy was not great, only exceedingly faint threads lingering in the Immortal Essence Stone fragments. But once they entered his stomach, he squeezed every last bit out of them, and the quality of that energy was astonishingly high.
Once extracted in his abdomen, it flowed through his limbs and bones like sweet spring water, nourishing every inch of flesh, tendon, and bone. Every part of