[Three Fortuitous Encounters Brought Disaster, Not Blessings; Self-Based Qi Refining Aimed at Void-Proof]

[Self-Based Qi Refining could open the path beyond the Ninth Layer of Qi Refining limit-breaking?!]

["Heaven and Earth" could help him remove the restriction?]

[You immediately asked, "Could the restriction on limit-breaking beyond the Ninth Layer of Qi Refining have been imposed by [Heaven and Earth]?"]

["Chen Hei" answered, "If it is Self-Based Qi Refining, then that restriction was indeed imposed by [Heaven and Earth], but if not..."]

[He left the rest unsaid, but you understood. The waters here truly ran deep!]

[What mattered was not the restriction imposed by [Heaven and Earth], but Self-Based Qi Refining!]

[You then pressed him further:]

["Since Self-Based Qi Refining is so powerful, surely many beings used it to break through in the era before you fell victim to those schemes!"]

["Chen Hei" denied it:]

["That was not the case. In fact, during the [Third Era], before the [Supreme Dao Immortal Venerable] split me into three selves, no being had ever practiced Self-Based Qi Refining."]

["Some lower cultivators did put similar theories into practice, but none succeeded."]

["Then how do you know so much about it?!"]

[You were even more puzzled. By all rights, even Senior Lin Feng probably knew nothing about Self-Based Qi Refining. How did this fellow know?]

[Unexpectedly, "Chen Hei" replied meaningfully:]

["My lord, I actually do not know either, but my [future self], the one you call the Chen Family Ancestor, may have witnessed it firsthand, and even studied and improved upon the method."]

["After all, he was the one who left me this method!"]

[You did not pursue the matter. You kept feeling that "Chen Hei" was speaking in riddles, but you did consider it possible that the Chen Family Ancestor had witnessed Self-Based Qi Refining. After all, that old fellow was deeply mysterious.]

[You let the subject drop