An hour later!
Boom...
With a muffled rumble inside his body, He Pingsheng finally broke through to the First Layer of Qi Refining Stage.
This...
Drenched in sweat, He Pingsheng wore a look of astonishment and delight. Isn't this far too heaven-defying?
I cultivated for a whole month without the slightest progress, and now I've broken through after just an hour?
The cultivation method produced by the Treasure-Gathering Basin was naturally extraordinarily heaven-defying, but it was nowhere near as miraculous as He Pingsheng imagined. His breakthrough had come so quickly because he had spent the past month tirelessly practicing Qi Drawing into the Body.
Without that foundation, even with the Lihuo True Method, Qi Drawing into the Body would have taken a full day.
Doing it in a single hour would have been utterly impossible.
This is...
He Pingsheng was suddenly stunned.
After breaking through to the first level of the Qi Refining Stage, He Pingsheng suddenly felt as though he could "see" inside his body.
He saw his flesh, his meridians, and his dantian.
Inside his dantian, a tiny crimson vortex of Fire Attribute qi, only as thick as a finger, slowly revolved.
"Could this be inner vision?" He Pingsheng was utterly astonished.
It was said that cultivators developed Divine Sense upon reaching the Qi Refining Stage.
That Divine Sense was extremely weak, but it was enough to look inward and see the state of their own bodies.
This is wonderful.
Before, Qi Drawing into the Body had relied entirely on feeling. Now I can watch myself cultivate.
Won't that make it even faster?
Despite his delight, He Pingsheng did not forget the perils on the road ahead.
The path of cultivation stretched endlessly before him. How far had he really come?
So... he still had to keep cultivating.
He opened the second section of the Lihuo True Method and began studying it carefully.
This second section described the method for cultivating from the First Layer of Qi Refining Stage to the Second Layer of Qi Refining Stage.
By evening, He Pingsheng had finally mastered the method in the second section.
After dinner, he sat cross-legged and began cultivating according to the second section.
Cultivation at the second level of the Qi Refining Stage differed from that at the first.
For the first level, he only needed to draw qi into his body and gather it in his dantian.
But advancing toward the second level required accumulating a sufficient quantity. He had to continuously absorb Spiritual Power from heaven and earth to fill his body.
No sooner had He Pingsheng begun cultivating toward the second level than his expression turned bitter.
His Spirit Root was too poor.
The problem now was that he was not slow at absorbing Spiritual Power from outside.
Large quantities of Fire-Attribute Spiritual Energy entered his flesh through his skin!
Then it passed through his flesh into his meridians and Spirit Root.
But once it reached his Spirit Root, a problem arose.
His Fire Attribute Spirit Root was too thin to allow much Spiritual Power through at once.
So no matter how quickly he absorbed Spiritual Power, it was useless.
It simply could not get through!
And then there were his meridians!
Spiritual Power from his Spirit Root entered his meridians and began circulating and being refined.
The problem was that, although his meridians were circulating it, the Spiritual Power within them always remained in short supply.
It was still the same problem: his Spirit Root was too thin.
It was like channeling water from a large reservoir into a small one.
The Spiritual Power between heaven and earth was like the large reservoir, while his meridians were like the small one.
There was no shortage of water in the large reservoir outside, but the small reservoir never had enough.
The reason was that the pipe connecting the two reservoirs was too narrow, making the flow too slow.
That was exactly what He Pingsheng's cultivation was like now.
No wonder those with a single Spirit Root cultivated quickly. By looking inside his body, he finally gained a more direct understanding.
Would a badass cultivation method solve it?
No!
No matter how badass the method is, all it does is refine Spiritual Power faster!
If spiritual qi enters too slowly, or none enters at all, what good is an excellent cultivation method?
Then again, does having a Five-Element Spiritual Root really mean I can't cultivate?
Not necessarily!
If some form of Spiritual Power could enter his meridians without passing through his Spirit Root, he could still refine it very quickly.
What kind of Spiritual Power could enter his meridians without passing through his Spirit Root?
Pills!
And all sorts of Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures that provided nourishment from outside.
After cultivators swallowed these things, they did not enter the meridians only after being filtered through the pores, flesh, and Spirit Root, as the Spiritual Power of heaven and earth did. Instead, they entered the meridians directly after digestion.
This would allow him to bypass the drawback of his poor Spirit Root.
Then again, did that mean cultivators without a Spirit Root could also cultivate by relying on pills?
The answer was no!
The meridians and dantian spoken of in cultivation were not the same as the vessels carrying blood through the human body. They were extensions of the Spirit Root.
Without a Spirit Root, there were no meridians.
Thus, those cultivators born without any Spirit Roots could not cultivate even if they had pills.
He Pingsheng understood these rudimentary facts about cultivation.
What should I do next, then?
He Pingsheng stepped out into the courtyard and looked around.
Under cover of night, he tightly sealed all the gaps around his door and windows, then smashed a bottle of fragrant oil. Only then did he dig the two jade bottles out from beneath his bed and take out a Supreme Qi-Gathering Pill!
A rich medicinal fragrance instantly spread throughout the little room.
He Pingsheng hurriedly crushed the pill, keeping only one-tenth of it and putting the remaining nine-tenths back into a porcelain bottle.
He then placed that tenth of the pill in a large porcelain bowl and filled it with water.
In an instant, the powdered pill dissolved in the water.
The medicinal fragrance around him abruptly vanished as well.
He Pingsheng buried the jade bottles underground again, then drank a mouthful of water and began cultivating.
Boom...
As the water filled with pure energy entered his stomach, that vast, surging energy flooded into his meridians from every direction.
At that moment, He Pingsheng felt as if his meridians were about to explode.
In truth, they would not.
Compared with other pills, the Spiritual Power within a Qi-Gathering Pill was the purest and gentlest.
Even swallowing an entire pill at once would not cause him to explode.
The medicinal energy he could not refine in time would simply dissipate into the void, wasting valuable resources.
He Pingsheng hurriedly circulated the Fire Attribute [Lihuo True Method], frantically refining the energy.
After one circuit through his meridians, the Spiritual Power was refined and gathered into the qi vortex within his dantian.
Then the remaining energy filled his meridians again, and he refined it once more, gathering it into his dantian.
The cycle repeated, over and over.
That single bowl of water sustained He Pingsheng's cultivation for a full three days.
Although those three days of cultivation did not bring him to the Second Layer of Qi Refining Stage, when he looked inside his dantian, he found that the crimson vortex of Fire Attribute qi had more than doubled in size.
Two months later!
After consuming roughly two Supreme Qi-Gathering Pills, He Pingsheng finally achieved a breakthrough in his cultivation.
He advanced from the First Layer of Qi Refining Stage to the Second Layer of Qi Refining Stage.
Over roughly another six months, He Pingsheng consumed seven more Supreme Qi-Gathering Pills.
His cultivation finally broke through to the Third Layer of Qi Refining Stage.
It had taken him eight months to advance from the First Layer of Qi Refining Stage to the third.
He had consumed nine Supreme Qi-Gathering Pills in total!
"I've finally reached the Third Layer of Qi Refining Stage!" He Pingsheng took a deep breath. "My cultivation has already surpassed where Senior Brother Hao Yun was back then!"
He pushed open the door!
The world outside had turned silvery white.
"It's snowing... and the New Year is almost here!"
"It's time to offer incense to my parents, Senior Brother Hao, and the others!"
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