Only one day remained before the three-month deadline set by the Nether Spring Office.
Nothing but the quiet sound of wind remained in the courtyard assigned by the Heaven Patrol Office.
This time, Yi Yang was not cultivating in his room. He stood beneath the Old Locust Tree, his eyes half closed, while the mass of Inner Energy in his Qi Sea, tempered by pure and turbid return to origin, circulated along a special route.
It was not an outward release, but an inward withdrawal.
This was the cultivation process for Hidden Abyss, the first layer of the Concealed Breath Formless Art.
Holding the breath, sealing the meridians, stilling the heart-the three functions operated simultaneously.
Yi Yang's Yi Wood inner qi steadily retreated from his meridians, ebbing like a tide into the deepest recess of his Qi Sea.
At last, thirty breaths later, the fluctuations of qi around Yi Yang's body vanished.
They had not weakened, but disappeared completely from others' perception. Even Qi Shujian, at the third inner qi level, would not have sensed Yi Yang's presence through qi detection if he stood beside him now.
Having accomplished this, Yi Yang remained where he was, opened his eyes, and exhaled. He felt that, on some level, he had disappeared.
Then he tried revealing the aura of a Qi-Blood Realm martial artist.
As the art circulated, a perfectly measured layer of qi-blood fluctuations immediately rose around Yi Yang. Its thickness, density, and circulation frequency matched those of a genuine fourth-level martial artist without the slightest deviation.
There were absolutely no flaws.
Yi Yang was certain, because he had probed himself with his Inner Energy perception three times, and every result registered as the qi-blood fourth level.
Afterward, he tried imitating other levels of strength. Every one was exactly right, identical