Gradually Perfecting His Power

Yang Yu had split a hundred-ton boulder with a single slash, and he still looked fairly relaxed. Not even a trace of sweat appeared on his forehead.

Yet at that moment, he seemed dissatisfied.

Disappointment naturally settled over his face.

Yang Yu shook his head and murmured, "The power still isn't enough. There was an instant of hesitation when the five attacks overlapped into one. It should have been more perfect than that. The cut surfaces of these two halves aren't smooth enough, either. They're rough, and even the edges have chipped."

"Although the Thunder Blade Art has advanced to the second stage, it seems I still haven't fully stabilized it."

"It's still a little too forced in execution."

"If I encounter a true expert in battle... a blade technique with these tiny flaws won't do. They could easily spot that split-second opening and exploit it!"

"I need to adjust my training schedule a little and spend more time perfecting the Thunder Blade Art."

"With my current Earth Rank strength, cultivating the Thunder Blade Art to the second stage is pretty much my limit... I have to unleash five attacks in rapid succession, each at drastically increased speed, then completely overlap those five attacks, delivered at different moments, so they strike as if they were a single attack! The demands that places on my body are too severe."

"The third stage of the Thunder Blade Art requires nine consecutive attacks in the same instant!"

"Nine attacks perfectly overlapped, instantly unleashing three or four times the power of a normal attack... to reach that level, my body would need to be at least at Heaven Tier to bear the strain."

"This will do for now. I'll stabilize the second stage of the Thunder Blade Art first. My blade skills have also reached their current bottleneck. All I can do is keep practicing patiently and wait for an opportunity to break through. Once I finish cultivating the Thunder Blade Art, I'll devote everything to bringing my Fate Soul power to its peak."

Yang Yu's Fate Soul power was already far, far stronger than it had been a month earlier.

He had listened to the second piece of the Hundredfold Soul-Tempering Score over a hundred times. Every session was agonizing. The raging Dark Force stirred up by the music pierced his mind and soul until they were riddled with holes, after which they healed and recovered... through this repeated process, Yang Yu's Fate Soul power had grown to at least ten times its former strength!

The Giant Mantis Beast force he had raised had also grown considerably, now numbering two hundred and fifty.

"It won't be long now."

Yang Yu glanced toward Shangjing City and murmured to himself.

"You fools from the Ghost Infant Sect, we'll be meeting again soon."

With that, Yang Yu cast every thought from his mind.

He threw himself into another round of cultivation... today, he would extend his blade practice by another two hours!

Fierce winds rose once more in the Wasteland Stone Forest.

Layer upon layer of thunderous blade shadows appeared, sometimes elusive, sometimes light and nimble, sometimes overwhelmingly dominant as they crashed down with the crushing force of thunder!

Time slipped away during cultivation, and two weeks passed in the blink of an eye.

Two weeks later, Yang Yu finally stabilized the second stage of the Thunder Blade Art completely, doubling the power of all his blade attacks.

With the blade art mastered, Yang Yu changed his cultivation plan again.

From that day onward, he significantly shortened his blade practice, cutting it from four hours a day to just one... that hour was mainly intended to keep him familiar with the battle blade in his hand and prevent his skills from growing rusty.

Cultivation was like rowing against the current. Even after mastering a secret blade art, even after advancing his blade skills... if he let things slide and neglected them, he would still grow rusty and regress.

An hour each day spent familiarizing himself with his battle blade and maintaining his mastery of the secret blade art was already enough!

Setting aside his feverish training in the Thunder Blade Art, Yang Yu plunged into cultivating his Fate Soul.

At the same time, his experiments on various wasteland insects became more frequent.

Underground, a small but fully equipped laboratory had quietly been completed.

Yang Yu could not cultivate the Hundredfold Soul-Tempering Score continuously. Listening to the second piece placed considerable demands on his body and forced him to endure inhuman pain at every moment. After each hour or two of cultivation, he would rest for a while.

Those rest periods were when Yang Yu conducted biological experiments on various wasteland insects and beasts.

Feverish experimentation.

Frenzied cultivation... in the days that followed, both Yang Yu's Fate Soul power and his command of Life Energy grew stronger, and he wielded them with increasing ease.

By the time he had spent two months and nine days in the wasteland, he had even discovered a new way to use Life Energy.

It was a technique for extracting genes and modifying organisms!

The Insect Race's legacy information had mentioned this power. Every Insect Race cultivator took a different path in using Life Energy, with different insights and different future developments.

Life enhancement!

Gene extraction!

Life modification!

There were even more wondrous ways to use Life Energy, each capable of opening a promising path forward.

As the inheritor of the Insect Race's legacy, Yang Yu had to explore and master all of this himself.

One day, when his Life Energy evolved to an incomparably powerful level, Yang Yu's standing in the universe would likely become just as formidable, enough for him to reign over a domain of his own.

In a dimly lit Quiet Room within the underground space.

Yang Yu sat cross-legged on the floor, cultivating.

No one disturbed him here. Zhao Zixuan was busy over in the laboratory as well. As Yang Yu's assistant, she was responsible for watching some of the insects and venomous creatures undergoing experiments, constantly observing the changes they experienced as Life Energy permeated them.

At that moment, dust and loose stones on the floor trembled inside the airtight Quiet Room.

As Yang Yu sat cross-legged and motionless, a subtle, mysterious power occasionally surfaced around his body. Sometimes violent, sometimes peaceful, it faintly stirred and influenced his surroundings.

And Yang Yu?

His face was horribly contorted. Every pore across his forehead and body had opened, and beads of sweat kept seeping out.

Clearly, he was enduring tremendous pain.

That pain was dozens or even hundreds of times more intense than the cruelest torture in the world of ordinary people!

Nothing less could have reduced Yang Yu to such agony, now that his body had been strengthened to the peak of Earth Rank and he could even fight ordinary Heaven Tier experts head-on.

Haaah...

Haaah...

His chest heaved and contracted, his breathing sounding like a bellows with a tear in it.

Five minutes, ten minutes, half an hour...

Yang Yu held on. After an hour, he finally opened his eyes and exhaled a stale breath, relaxing his entire body.

"The second piece of the Hundredfold Soul-Tempering Score is becoming less and less effective."

"A few more days of cultivation, and I should reach my current limit. I won't be able to increase my Fate Soul power any further."

Yang Yu murmured in the darkness, a strange gleam rising in his eyes.

More than two months had passed.

Most of the summer had gone by. Outside, the sweltering heat was now in its waning days.

At last, he had brought his strength close to the fullest level he could currently achieve.

Soon, he would be able to return to Shangjing City without any reservations.

Yang Yu was filled with anticipation.

After hiding for more than two months and suffering in this remote wilderness, he had a bellyful of anger.

That pent-up fury needed to be washed away with blood!

As he pondered, Yang Yu suddenly frowned. He turned his head toward the Quiet Room's entrance.

Rumble...

The Quiet Room's stone door trembled and slowly opened.

Zhao Zixuan walked in, dressed entirely in white, as beautiful as an immortal.

"Master, you're awake?" Zhao Zixuan looked at Yang Yu in surprise.

Yang Yu looked at her, displeasure showing between his brows.

"Didn't I tell you not to come in here unless it was important?"

"What is it?"

"Don't be angry, Master." Zhao Zixuan stuck out her little tongue. "Naturally, I came to disturb you because I have good news to report. There's been progress in the laboratory. After half a month of cultivation and conversion, some of the genes extracted from the three hundred and seventy kinds of insects and venomous creatures under experimentation are finally ready for use."

"Some of those genes are quite impressive, and they're perfectly suited to the Giant Mantis Beast force."

"With these, I'm sure the overall combat strength of the Giant Mantis Beast force can rise another level and become even more formidable!"

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