Natal Stellar Force, Life Transformation!

Night. Stars dotted the sky.

Pale moonlight descended from above, spilling across the silver steps.

On the rooftop of a residential building in an ordinary community in Outer City, Seventh Ring, a tall, straight-backed youth sat cross-legged.

His eyes were closed, his upper body upright as a pine. His features were strikingly handsome, sword-like brows reaching his temples, a high nose bridge, and lightly pursed lips. Bathed in moonlight, he looked like an immortal banished from the heavens.

He sat with his five centers facing the sky, his chest rising and falling gently. With every breath, it seemed as though he could draw upon the omnipresent stellar energy between heaven and earth, strands of it flowing into his nose and mouth to be absorbed.

"Breathing methods are techniques of breathing and energy circulation."

"Using a unique breathing rhythm together with a specialized guidance technique, they draw the wondrous cosmic stellar energy between heaven and earth into the body. The flesh bears it as water bears a boat, complete and without flaw..."

Recalling the profound principles of the Starry Sky Breathing Method he had just obtained, Lin Yuan clearly sensed the cosmic stellar energy that he had previously been unable to perceive continuously gathering toward him.

His body frantically absorbed this wondrous higher cosmic energy. Every cell cheered, transformed, and evolved toward a higher level of life!

The entire process would last a long time.

"A mortal body undergoes four stages of tempering—Skin Tempering, Tendon Refining, Blood Tempering, and Marrow Cleansing. Even after reaching Body Tempering Grandmastery and complete perfection, one only possesses ten thousand jin of strength."

"But after absorbing cosmic stellar energy, it is as though the body's Genetic Lock has been opened. The flesh can continue transforming and strengthening, becoming even more powerful!"

Basking in abundant moonlight, Lin Yuan could clearly feel the transformation accelerating. His body was evolving at a frenzied pace, and his absorption speed for cosmic stellar energy far exceeded the normal rate recorded in the cultivation manual.

Normally, this transformation would last seven days and seven nights before the body became "full" again and reached a temporary limit.

Even peerless geniuses with outstanding talent, known as Martial Prodigies, required at least a full day and night to complete the transformation.

Yet this was only Lin Yuan's first night of cultivation. Less than six hours had passed, and he already felt that his body was about to become "full"...

He did not open his eyes.

But he vaguely sensed the reason in his heart—

"The eleventh Talent Trait—Swallowing the Starry Sky!"

"Effect: Greatly increases the speed of absorbing cosmic stellar energy, allows stellar energy to be refined in any extreme environment, and can actively absorb all stellar energy in the surroundings, greatly increasing combat power for a short time..."

It was an absurdly powerful Talent Trait.

Combining a "cultivation accelerator," "terrifying survival ability," "superb endurance," and "explosive combat capability," it could be called one of the most top-tier Talent Traits.

This was the final Talent Trait he had obtained in the Wilderness Zone. Previously, he had only practiced Body Tempering, which did not involve stellar energy, so it had never shown its true potential. Now, at the crucial moment when Lin Yuan officially broke through to become a Starry-Sky Warrior, it finally revealed its edge.

"Crack, crack..."

After an unknown amount of time, Lin Yuan's body swelled slightly. The lines of every muscle seemed to have been nourished, becoming hard as steel and iron, glimmering with a cold sheen beneath the moonlight.

At last, he opened his eyes and slowly rose to his feet.

As he moved, his body let out violent cracking sounds. A terrifyingly heavy pressure silently spread outward.

"Life transformation..."

Lin Yuan stared at his current body, clearly sensing the tremendous changes.

"Physical strength..."

He clenched his fist and felt a weight ten times greater than before.

"One hundred thousand jin!"

With a casual swing of one arm, he possessed one hundred thousand jin of divine strength.

This was the powerful physique of a true Starry-Sky Warrior!

With this formidable body alone, no Hunter or ferocious beast could compare.

A punch carrying one hundred thousand jin of force would not merely leave someone bruised and battered. Even the most powerful Tyrant Ferocious Tiger in the Wilderness Zone would probably be blasted into pieces by such a punch...

"And then..."

Lin Yuan raised his hand and stared at his palm.

Whoosh!

A warm current surged within his body. At a thought, it spiraled upward and gathered in his right palm, shining with a brilliant blue radiance.

Stellar force!

Natal Stellar Force!

This was the extraordinary power exclusive to true Starry-Sky Warriors!

"A mere strand of Natal Stellar Force is actually this heavy..."

Lin Yuan looked at the azure stellar force in his palm, seemingly harmless and gentle as water, and felt incomparably astonished.

This seemingly insignificant strand of stellar force also weighed one hundred thousand jin!

What did that mean?

His physical body possessed one hundred thousand jin of strength.

His Natal Stellar Force possessed one hundred thousand jin of strength.

That meant that a true Starry-Sky Warrior, even the weakest kind who had only just broken through, could unleash a full two hundred thousand jin of force at maximum power!

This was the nearly insurmountable gap in strength between Starry-Sky Warriors and Body-Tempering Apprentices.

"Finally, I've taken this step..."

Lin Yuan let out a deep sigh. Yet even his calm expression could not suppress a trace of unrestrained exhilaration.

He smiled silently, his eyes brimming with youthful spirit.

Three months!

Only three months.

Three months after awakening his True Self, he had completed the ultimate transformation he had failed to achieve over the previous eighteen years.

From an ordinary graduate who had regretfully failed the June Joint Exam, from a Body-Tempering Apprentice who had only just entered the Blood Tempering Stage, he had transformed into a true Starry-Sky Warrior who now wielded two hundred thousand jin of divine strength!

The feelings involved were impossible to explain to outsiders.

"Talent Traits..."

He glanced at the Game Panel deep within his mind, the thing that had changed his fate.

Player: Lin Yuan

Level: 11

Experience: 1/2048

Lifespan: 18/335 (136 years of lifespan plundered)

Talent Traits: "Swordsmanship Mastery" "Martial Prodigy" "Transcendent Comprehension"...

After returning, he had not opened his personal panel for a long time.

Now that he looked at it, he noticed the changes immediately.

"My lifespan has increased by one hundred years..."

Lin Yuan calmed down and looked thoughtfully at the clearly displayed 335 years in the lifespan column.

It seemed to have been 235 years before. Through the effect of his tenth Talent Trait—Life Plunder—he had slain countless ferocious beasts in the Wilderness Zone and plundered more than a hundred years of lifespan!

And now, after breaking through to become a true Starry-Sky Warrior, his lifespan had naturally increased by another hundred years.

"The transformation of a Starry-Sky Warrior truly is a transformation of life. Once one breaks through, they gain two hundred years of lifespan?"

According to the brief information described in the Breathing Method cultivation manual, though, this was only the beginning.

Tempering the first strand of Natal Stellar Force, undergoing the body's first transformation, shedding the mortal frame, and gaining one hundred thousand jin of divine strength—this was the First Realm of the Stellar Martial Path—

"The Mortal Transcendence Realm!"

It meant shedding one's mortal frame and formally stepping into the Star-Martial Domain.

"Merely reaching Mortal Transcendence grants two hundred years of life. If I continue breaking through, could I truly live as long as heaven?"

"Or perhaps... achieve immortality?"