Ambush

White Cloud Smoke, Roseglow Lament, exchange requirement: 1 point. Note: Practitioners required treasures and rare curios of the cloud and rosy-cloud attributes.

The prices and notes for the first two levels made Chen Wu understand that the cultivation requirements were the primary reason.

Originally, with the Primal Heaven Crystals that complemented the Primal Heaven Mirror, practitioners could absorb the natural energy within the crystals as an aid, without any risk.

However, where in this world could one find Primal Heaven Crystals?

One could only cultivate this art by consuming and absorbing pills and treasures possessing the same natural attributes.

This posed an enormous problem for martial artists cultivating this art.

Pills and rare treasures with natural attributes were precious to begin with and exorbitantly expensive. Only martial artists above the seventh rank could afford to obtain them.

Martial artists at that level could often suppress an entire small secret realm.

Unlike the Primal Heaven Mirror, however, which was restricted by the art's own attributes and the practitioner's cultivation, the first two levels—White Cloud Smoke and Roseglow Lament—were less offensive and powerful even than low-grade Yellow-rank arts. At most, they possessed a few auxiliary functions.

Only at the third level, Earth Kunlun, did it begin to reveal its sharp edge.

In the struggle among martial artists, every step was a race to take the lead.

If one could not break through to the sixth rank before the age of thirty-five, one would face declining condition and difficulty advancing further.

Not to mention cultivating without Primal Heaven Crystals. Though its power grew stronger with each higher level, so too did the danger.

Who would gamble their future on an uncertain art with a high threat level and high cultivation difficulty?

Moreover, seventh-rank martial artists had already formed their own martial systems. They would not cultivate the Primal Heaven Mirror, whose power was only beginning to show and which seemed somewhat like a tasteless morsel.

For all these reasons, there were exceedingly few martial artists who cultivated the Primal Heaven Mirror, resulting in its current awkward position—neither high nor low.

This was also the main reason why the first two levels of the art together cost only 1 point, despite both being classified as low-grade Yellow-rank.

This had also made many martial grandmasters who wished to cultivate this set of arts turn away at the sight of it. Martial artists capable of cultivating the Primal Heaven Mirror were even rarer.

Those who had achieved anything with it were virtually nonexistent.

Under all these conditions, the Primal Heaven Mirror had fallen into its present awkward state—neither high nor low.

This was the main reason its first two levels together cost only 1 point.

A single rare treasure possessing the cloud and rosy-cloud attributes cost more than the art itself.

Chen Wu even suspected that if arts were not limited to the four grades of Heaven, Earth, Profound, and Yellow, these two levels would probably have been downgraded even further.

Only with Earth Kunlun, which possessed offensive power, did its price and grade rise, reaching mid-grade Yellow-rank.

After all, the Primal Heaven Mirror contained transformations of attributes and the principles of heaven and earth. Even martial grandmasters could draw inspiration from it.

Chen Wu had found through his phone that several years ago, a second-rank grandmaster from Jin Province, known as Blazing Sun and specializing in the fire attribute, had used Golden Dawn from the Primal Heaven Mirror as a foundation. Combining it with his own circumstances, he created the exclusive Vast Sun Golden Crow Art, sweeping through the second-rank realm with few rivals.

Thanks to that man's existence, the value of the Primal Heaven Mirror had been proven, preventing this art from falling out of the Heaven grade. It remained a low-grade Heaven-rank art.

What Chen Wu valued was the Primal Heaven Mirror's ability to wield natural energy and embrace all things. Its compatibility with his Holy Demon Embryo could truly be called a match made in heaven.

When he watched dramas in his previous life, whenever the Heavenly Emperor Abandon acted, he wielded the might of heaven and earth, using the qi of heaven and earth as though a natural disaster had descended.

The issue of needing natural energy to assist in cultivating the Primal Heaven Mirror was no concern at all for Chen Wu.

The Holy Demon Embryo, which could directly absorb the qi of heaven and earth for its own use, should be able to easily draw in the natural energy it required with the aid of the three souls.

Without a trace of hesitation, Chen Wu directly spent 1 point to purchase the first two levels of the Primal Heaven Mirror.

Once the cultivation method for White Cloud Smoke was transmitted to his personal account, he could not wait to test it.

Everything was indeed as Chen Wu had expected. Empowered by the three souls, the Holy Demon Embryo effortlessly drew cloud-attributed qi from the spiritual energy between heaven and earth, allowing him to sense this natural power—light and agile, yet vast and boundless.

Cloud qi possessed such attributes as flowing, gathering form, and transforming into rain. Its forms changed in countless ways, never bound by convention.

For the first time, Chen Wu truly realized that the memories of his previous life were his real treasure vault.

With the Holy Demon Embryo as his foundation, he believed that he would surely make the entire Primal Heaven Mirror, including White Cloud Smoke, shine brilliantly in this world.

To put it in a cringeworthy phrase, "What is truly terrifying is my talent."

But those were matters for later.

Chen Wu had yet to open his sea of qi, so he would first cultivate the Profound Origin Art. Once he opened his sea of qi and formally entered the ranks, he would cultivate this set of martial arts.

Chen Wu specifically consulted the library's artificial intelligence regarding the subsequent arts of the Primal Heaven Mirror.

From the artificial intelligence, he learned that the nation possessed the arts up to the ninth level, but they were stored in the National Library. Only martial artists who had completed cultivation of the first five levels or reached the third-rank grandmaster realm were qualified to purchase and exchange them with points.

As for the final level, the most powerful yet most mysterious Profound Universe, he could find no related information. Whether the artificial intelligence lacked the authority or the nation had never obtained it, he did not know.

In any case, for Chen Wu, the road to becoming a first-rank martial artist had already been determined.

All he needed to do next was keep moving forward along the road he had planned.

After the two arts finished downloading, Chen Wu left the library.

Since leaving home that morning, he had first visited the Alchemist Association branch. Through the supreme-grade pills he had refined, he gained President Lu's favor and obtained the qualifications of a senior alchemist.

After that, he had gone to the library to select and purchase cultivation arts.

By the time he finished all that and came out, it was already noon.

Having been busy all morning, Chen Wu felt his stomach empty. He decided to find a random restaurant on the street and make do for now.

As he reached the entrance of a shopping mall, a middle-aged man approached him head-on.

At first, Chen Wu did not pay much attention.

But when they came within ten meters of each other, the middle-aged man suddenly lunged at him, snarling with a vicious grin, "Kid, it's your bad luck to run into me. If I'm getting out of this today, I'll be relying on you."

"Stop!"

The three plainclothes police officers nearby abandoned their plan and hurriedly moved to stop him.

Seeing the man charge at the youth without regard for anything, the young police officer leading them became frantic. His true qi surged, and his eighth-rank cultivation burst forth in full.

From the moment they received the tip-off, they had secretly tailed him all the way from the station.

Originally, the three of them had planned to slowly close in first, then act together once they reached an unpopulated area and subdue him in one stroke.

They had not expected that the man had long noticed their clumsy tracking. The reason he had not acted until now was simply because he had been seeking a chance to escape.