Primordial Five-Element Lotus

Fortunately, the pills found on the Iron Garb Sect young master were of decent quality. Su Chen's injuries had already begun healing rapidly at a visible rate.

The true qi within his dantian also gradually recovered to full under the effects of the qi-restoring pills.

Su Chen meditated through the night, and his injuries recovered seven or eight tenths of the way. Early the next morning, he found a stream to wash his face, changed into a clean set of clothes, and continued on his journey.

Following the direction from his memories, he headed deeper into the mountain range, drawing ever closer to the location marked on that map.

Another day and a half later, Su Chen finally arrived at the place marked on the map in his memories.

The place lay at the foot of a cliff face. Looking up, he could see the mountain wall opposite him. The cliff was covered in moss and creeping vines; viewed against the light, the entire wall was bluish-black, seemingly nothing out of the ordinary.

Yet Su Chen was certain there had to be something here. The source from which he had obtained the map in his previous life had been extremely reliable; the map could not have been false.

He carefully surveyed the cliff face and suddenly discovered an exceedingly inconspicuous cave entrance.

The entrance was tucked into a corner of the cliff and concealed by numerous vines. Combined with the moss covering the rock wall and the fact that it was in shadow, it looked like nothing more than a patch of darkness. Had Su Chen not deliberately searched so carefully, he would certainly have overlooked it.

"It should be there." A flicker of delight appeared in Su Chen's eyes.

The cave was not low, sitting over a dozen zhang above the ground, but naturally that posed no challenge to the current Su Chen.

Clinging to the vines, he moved swiftly up the cliff face like a nimble ape. When he was only a little over one zhang from the entrance, Su Chen sprang upward and easily leaped into the cave.

Inside the entrance was a winding rock tunnel that sloped downward.

The tunnel was extremely dark and damp, its floor covered with moss and slick beyond measure. One careless step, and a person could slip all the way to the bottom of the cave.

Su Chen advanced cautiously as he observed his surroundings. Before long, he finally arrived at the bottom of the cave.

At the bottom was a huge, empty cavern.

Looking out through the faint light, the cavern was utterly bare, with nothing inside.

Su Chen circled the entire cavern, feeling along every inch of the stone walls with his hands. At last, he discovered a small mechanism on one section of the wall.

Without hesitation, Su Chen pressed the mechanism. Immediately afterward, he heard the rumbling sound of a stone door opening.

Su Chen was somewhat surprised as well. There had actually been a stone door hidden in the wall.

Once the stone door opened, it revealed a stone chamber within.

The chamber was small, only as large as an ordinary room. In its center stood a stone platform, upon which rested an object emitting a faint glow.

The instant Su Chen's gaze fell upon that object, he sharply sucked in a breath. It was as though he had been struck by lightning, and for a long while he could not recover his senses.

In a single stride, he rushed forward and scooped up the object from the stone platform. Examining it closely, disbelief gleamed in his eyes as he muttered, "Primordial Five-Element Lotus! It's actually a Primordial Five-Element Lotus!"

Looking closely, it resembled a lotus, yet not quite. Its shape was that of a lotus, but every petal was crystalline like jade, as though carved from the finest jade stone. The entire "lotus" radiated light in five colors: gold, green, blue, red, and yellow.

Perhaps no one in Clear River City, or even throughout the entire Cloud Abyss Empire, would recognize this thing. But Su Chen, who had been a Pill Emperor in his previous life, naturally knew it better than anyone.

In the Pill Domain, it had a name: the Primordial Five-Element Lotus!

The Primordial Five-Element Lotus could not be summed up by the simple phrase "heaven-and-earth treasure." Ordinary heaven-and-earth treasures merely contained vast amounts of spiritual energy, allowing martial artists to greatly increase their cultivation after consuming them.

This Chaos Five-Element Lotus ought to be called a divine treasure of heaven and earth. Once consumed by a martial artist, it could remake one's very body and bones—its effect was tantamount to defying heaven and changing one's fate!

That was not the slightest exaggeration. At the very least, in Su Chen's previous life, he had personally witnessed Martial Emperor powerhouses fighting until their heads bled over a Primordial Five-Element Lotus for the sake of their juniors.

What shocked Su Chen most was that the Primordial Five-Element Lotus had actually appeared in this place!

Given his understanding of the Cloud Abyss Empire, the spiritual energy of heaven and earth here should not have been capable of nurturing a divine treasure like the Primordial Five-Element Lotus.

Could this land of the Cloud Abyss Empire be hiding some unknown secret?

Shaking his head, Su Chen stopped dwelling on it. Instead, he examined the Primordial Five-Element Lotus in his hand and muttered, "It seems that martial artist from my previous life must have accidentally fallen into this cave and inadvertently triggered the mechanism, only then discovering this Primordial Five-Element Lotus."

That also explained why that martial artist's strength had suddenly soared in his previous life, allowing him to rise like a meteor and become a powerhouse in his own right.

For the Primordial Five-Element Lotus truly possessed such miraculous effects on martial artists. It could turn mediocrity into genius and allow geniuses to climb another flight of stairs.

At this moment, Su Chen's heart was filled with excitement. Who would have thought that, after being reborn, he would receive such a tremendous opportunity and obtain the Primordial Five-Element Lotus!

Without further hesitation, Su Chen immediately sat down cross-legged and prepared to consume the Primordial Five-Element Lotus.

The Primordial Five-Element Lotus was a divine treasure of heaven and earth, so naturally it was unlike ordinary heavenly treasures; its spiritual energy would not continuously dissipate with time. Even so, to avoid unforeseen complications, the sooner he consumed it, the better.

Su Chen was currently at the Tenth Layer of Qi-Attraction Realm. After consuming the Primordial Five-Element Lotus, the immense spiritual energy within it could even allow him to charge toward the Essence Condensation Realm.

At once, Su Chen swallowed the Primordial Five-Element Lotus and began circulating the Chaos Immortal Record to absorb its spiritual energy.

The spiritual energy contained within the Primordial Five-Element Lotus was exceptionally violent. In almost no time at all, it all transformed into true qi within Su Chen's dantian, swelling his dantian to an unprecedented extent.

At this moment, Su Chen's dantian was filled with true qi. His entire body felt somewhat swollen, like a balloon. Naturally, this was an illusion; only because too much true qi had accumulated within him did he feel as though he were about to burst apart.

Just like a balloon filled with air, if a hole was not pierced into it to release the air, it might explode.

"About time to charge toward the Essence Condensation Realm."

Su Chen knew that once this sensation of nearly bursting appeared, it meant he could begin breaking through to the Essence Condensation Realm.

Take a balloon full of air, for example. If the air within were compressed into a substance with a smaller volume and greater density, the balloon would no longer burst.

The Essence Condensation Realm was the extreme compression of the true qi in one's dantian into Essence Energy, which had a smaller volume but far greater power.

The reason Qi-Attraction Realm martial artists could never defeat Essence Condensation Realm martial artists, no matter how strong they were, was because Essence Energy was vastly more powerful than true qi. To put it simply, a Qi-Attraction Realm martial artist fought with a wooden sword, while an Essence Condensation Realm martial artist wielded a treasured blade that sliced through iron like mud.

The sign of entering the Essence Condensation Realm was for true qi to condense into Essence Energy, and for Essence Energy to gather into an Essence Core!

An Essence Core was a rapidly spinning core condensed from Essence Energy, equivalent to the true qi vortex of the Qi-Attraction Realm. Once an Essence Core formed, it was like a high-speed motor, constantly delivering Essence Energy outward.

When one first entered the Essence Condensation Realm and formed the first Essence Core, one was at the First Layer of Essence Condensation Realm. From there, it continued in the same fashion; upon forming the tenth Essence Core, one reached the Tenth Layer of Essence Condensation Realm.

At once, Su Chen controlled the true qi within his dantian and began condensing it into Essence Energy!