"Xia He, I need your help with my cultivation!"
Inside an exquisite, elegant villa, Lin Xian and Xia He were alone together. Without a hint of politeness, he got straight to the point.
Lu Liang was dumbfounded outside. Was this senior really that desperate?
"Men." A trace of contempt appeared in Liu Yanyan's bright eyes. No matter how old they were, they were all the same.
Three seconds later, the alluring Xia He emerged from the room with a resentful expression. Her crimson lips trembled slightly, making her look bewitching and radiant enough to stir one's soul and make one want to steal a kiss.
Not only Lu Liang, but even Liu Yanyan was stunned, muttering unconsciously, "That fast?"
It was over in three seconds.
"He's in seclusion," Xia He said irritably. This was the first man completely unmoved by the Bone-Scraping Blade. Even that little ox-nosed Taoist from Mount Longhu had fallen at her feet. How could someone like this exist?
Xia He's eyes shifted, and she could not help but entertain the most malicious possibility. Could it be that time had passed for so long that that thing had already rotted away?
"In seclusion?!"
Liu Yanyan's eyes immediately lit up. "Sister Xia He, let's use this chance to run!"
"Run?"
Xia He glanced at this girl, who was so naïve she was almost stupid, then sneered and turned away. At her level, she wanted to join Quanxing? She would probably not even realize it if someone sold her off.
"What do you mean?" Liu Yanyan froze where she stood.
Adjusting his glasses, Lu Liang stood up with a laptop in his arms and said calmly, "Take a guess. Why does this senior live near the company?"
Liu Yanyan's face instantly turned deathly pale. She looked out the window, where drones occasionally flew past with a buzzing hum.
This was no remote wilderness. It was one of the company's outposts.
Even the most arrogant Quanxing fiends would not dare barge in here to rescue anyone.
Causing trouble and courting death were two entirely different things.
Inside the room, a faint flush appeared on Lin Xian's fair face beneath his black robes. He resisted the lust Xia He, the Bone-Scraping Blade, had left behind, silently reciting, There are no women in my heart, and my blade shall naturally become divine. Women will affect the speed of my Immortal Cultivation. The first step toward immortality is to sever...
He was testing the abilities of Qi-State Origin-Flow. Could the Qi Infant inside his body transform even Xia He's Innate Supernatural Ability into the purest primordial qi?
If the Shrouding the Heavens Universe was considered the Dharma-Ending Era, then this world was almost entering the Age of Severed Spirits. Cultivation was incomparably difficult; whether it was life essence or the spiritual qi of heaven and earth, both were pitifully sparse.
If Qi-State Origin-Flow could truly deconstruct every kind of spell and technique, without even Innate Supernatural Abilities and divine powers being exceptions, and convert them all into primordial qi...
Then this technique would become the foundational art that allowed him to travel through the Myriad Realms.
A thousand techniques, endless Great Daos—all transformed into one qi, the Dao returning to Primordial Beginning.
"Could one of the Eight Extraordinary Skills from an ordinary world truly be this heaven-defying?"
Lin Xian observed quietly. Within the Wheel of the Sea Secret Realm, an infant almost identical to him sat cross-legged, its eyes half-open and half-closed as it floated above the Sea of Bitterness. The Life Wheel behind it emitted a faint glow, hanging like a flawless bright moon, or like the pure halo behind an immortal's or Buddha's head.
The pink qi belonging to Xia He gradually invaded, bewildering the mind and drawing it into lust, yet the infant ignored it all.
"To carry the soul and embrace the One—can they remain undivided? To concentrate the qi and attain softness—can one be like an infant?"
"To give birth and nurture, yet not possess; to act, yet not rely upon it; to grow, yet not dominate—this is called profound virtue."
Humans were born without good or evil. Only after becoming stained by the dust of the world did the Innate Primordial Spirit become eroded by acquired Dao, giving rise to the seven emotions and six desires. This was a kind of Dao contamination.
Only by Severing the Dao to See the Self and discarding all acquired distractions could one witness the Innate True Self.
In order to reach the profound realm of preserving the Origin and embracing the One, of Taishang's forgetfulness of emotions, every school and sect had created various methods: observing the Eight Precepts, Three Corpses Severing, severing the Red Dragon and cutting off the White Tiger, subduing the Mind Monkey and taming the Will Horse.
However, those methods required climbing step by step. They were far inferior to Qi-State Origin-Flow, which, from the moment it was created, touched upon the essence of life and pointed directly at the World Origin.
Only the Nascent Soul was without desire or pursuit. It allowed all things to grow and multiply, gave rise to all things, nurtured all things without claiming them as its own, and stood as the leader of all things without ruling them.
That was the mindset of heaven itself. I am the firmament, treating all things as straw dogs, neither invading nor possessing.
The Nascent Soul governed the Sea of Bitterness, remaining unmoved. No matter how the pink supernatural ability charged and rampaged, it could never escape a single domain. It could only sink into the Sea of Bitterness, eroded by its deathly stillness and darkness, assimilated into a part of this world within his body.
The Wheel of the Sea Secret Realm possessed both the Life Wheel and the endless Sea of Bitterness. The Life Wheel was a force that sustained life's existence, while the endless Sea of Bitterness was also a force, extinguishing all vitality, grinding away every foreign thing, and devouring all energy.
Having digested the supernatural ability, the endless Sea of Bitterness stirred up waves and sought to cover the Life Wheel. The Life Wheel bloomed with brilliance and rose another zhang. The Sea of Bitterness continued to expand, continuing to whip up wind and waves.
Thus, when the demonic rose one foot, the Dao rose one yard; when the Dao rose one yard, the demonic rose one foot.
An endless cycle, like Tai Chi.
The facts proved that Qi-State Origin-Flow truly deserved its title as the pinnacle of techniques. It could indeed dismantle all manner of arts and divine powers, dissolving every trace of the pink energy Xia He had planted within him.
Though the energy had dispersed, that pure lust remained.
It was like getting worked up while watching a film. After having a basin of cold water thrown over one's head, one began to sober up. The desire might fade, but the little movie that had triggered it was not turned off and continued to affect the person at every moment.
However, without the energy to amplify and influence it, this ordinary lust was something normal people could handle.
"The seven emotions and six desires, the Three Corpses and six worms."
"Untainted by a speck of dust, I am the Nascent Soul."
"Could the Eight Extraordinary Skills truly be techniques created by humans?"
In the quiet chamber, the black-haired youth spoke softly and opened his eyes. They were clear black and white, without the slightest impurity. They were eyes as pure and simple as an infant's, free of desire and gentle to the extreme.
At first, Lin Xian had believed Qi-State Origin-Flow was a technique like the Northern Darkness Divine Skill or the Star-Absorbing Great Art. Yet the more deeply he studied it, the more abnormal Qi-State Origin-Flow seemed.
The upper limit of Qi-State Origin-Flow was simply too high. It could even be said that it had almost no upper limit.
This was absolutely not a technique humans could have created.
Rather than saying Zhang Huaiyi had created Qi-State Origin-Flow, it was more accurate to say that Empyrean had used Zhang Huaiyi's hands to present Qi-State Origin-Flow to the Human World.
This was an immortal art that touched the origin of life and involved the deepest depths of the world!
It was one piece of the puzzle behind the mystery of Immortality.
"This is a Longevity Calamity..."
A strange look appeared on Lin Xian's face as he thought of another world.
The Longevity Calamities of the Shrouding the Heavens Universe had all been caused by Human Dao Supremes pursuing immortality.
The Eight Extraordinary Skills were the same: another kind of Longevity Calamity.
No wonder some called them arts that brought chaos. When ordinary people possessed Longevity Calamities, they were not merely courting death—they were inviting chaos.
Such techniques were things only immortals, or those one step away from immortals, could possess.
If one's virtue did not match one's position, disaster was inevitable.