The teleportation formation blazed with light, a brilliant pillar shooting into the heavens as Shi Yi's figure vanished amid spatial fluctuations. Hundreds of thousands of kilometers away, above a canyon shrouded in lightning, heavy thunderclouds churned like boiling lead and mercury, intermittently bursting with dazzling flashes. Deafening thunder echoed through the canyon like the roars of a beast from the Ancient Era, striking terror into the heart.
Thunderclap Valley had been forged by an ancient mighty cultivator who plucked a Nine-Heavens Thunder Star from the sky. It resembled a dormant dragon, winding across the earth. Within thunderclouds that never dispersed, savage lightning lashed down like the whip of a heavenly god, sweeping aside all resistance and blasting the already blackened cliffs full of holes. Every bolt left a lingering scar of lightning in the air, as though it would tear this entire stretch of heaven and earth apart.
Under such heavenly might, not a blade of grass grew for a thousand li in every direction. The few creatures that survived were unusual species tempered by years of lightning, possessing a natural affinity for its power. Though scarce, every one of them was ferocious.
Boom!
The teleportation formation suddenly erupted with blinding light. Powerful spatial fluctuations formed an enormous vortex of energy, grinding all the surrounding rubble to dust. A slender figure stepped slowly out of the pillar of light. The youth had sword-sharp features and eyes like stars. Within his gaze seemed to unfold the birth of a world from chaos, while runes circulated deep within his Double Pupils, as though he could see through all things.
Shi Yi stood with his hands behind his back, surveying this deadly domain of lightning. The cliffs on either side looked as though they had been carved by blades and axes. Thunderclouds cut across the waists of peaks that towered into the sky, with flickering lightning faintly visible at their summits. Silver-serpent streaks of electricity flashed across the valley floor, their sizzling mingling with distant, muffled thunder to stir an inexplicable dread.
"Stars as the foundation, lightning as the catalyst-what a grand undertaking, wresting creation itself from heaven and earth..." A keen light flashed in Shi Yi's eyes. Even with his current cultivation, he could not help feeling awed by this ancient relic. He clearly remembered the Double Pupils Woman's warning: he could hone his lightning arts here, but must never venture deep into the heart of the valley.
The teleportation formation's light gradually faded, yet Shi Yi remained absorbed in the spatial fluctuations from moments before. That wondrous shift through space had deepened his understanding of the spacetime runes within his sea of consciousness. For now, however, there was something more important to do.
"Temper my body with lightning, use the Lightning Wyrm Treasure Art as my foundation, and sense the laws of lightning here to develop even stronger lightning attacks." Shi Yi straightened his robes, his gaze fixed resolutely on the depths of the canyon. "If I can comprehend the true essence of the lightning Dao here, the gains from this trip will far exceed my expectations."
With that, he strode toward Thunderclap Valley. At every step, tiny sparks burst from the earth beneath his feet, as though welcoming this uninvited guest.
The moment Shi Yi stepped into the canyon, the silent valley abruptly awakened. Loose stones stirred without wind, and countless silver-serpent arcs of electricity burst between the cliffs, slithering and flashing across the rock faces with hair-raising hisses.
As he ventured deeper, the lightning power within the canyon grew increasingly savage. Dozens of Thunder Pythons as thick as buckets attacked from every direction, each strike carrying the terrifying might of the late Array Formation stage.
Shi Yi's Double Pupils flickered. His right fist blasted out, wreathed in spatial tremors, shattering the Thunder Python rushing straight at him. Yet more lightning followed one wave after another, blasting charred pits over ten meters wide into the ground-ground that had been tempered by lightning for countless years and was already harder than refined steel.
"Truly the most unyielding, most yang-aligned power between heaven and earth." Shi Yi was inwardly startled. He deliberately took a weaker bolt with his bare body, and it instantly left a scorched mark on his shoulder. This was only the outer region. If he continued deeper, even his Supreme Bone might struggle to withstand it.
By the time Shi Yi withdrew in exhaustion, lightning enveloped his entire body. Silvery-white electric serpents roamed across his skin, crackling explosively. As he sat cross-legged to regulate his breathing, his charred skin peeled away at a visible pace, revealing newly formed flesh beneath-after repeated tempering, his body's regenerative power had reached an extraordinary level.
"Again!"
Half an hour later, Shi Yi rose to his feet, the fighting spirit in his eyes burning even brighter. The canyon seemed to sense its challenger's presence, and the lightning patterns on the cliffs lit up in succession. This time, Shi Yi held nothing back, unleashing his Treasure Arts one after another:
A phantom of Bian threw back its head and howled, its might cowing the lightning on every side;
A Golden Crow beat its wings, blazing flames and lightning interweaving and annihilating one another;
Shi Yi's Double Pupils swirled with chaotic energy as he studied the lingering lightning scattered by Nether Annihilation. The power of spatial tremors slowly subsided in his palm. He murmured thoughtfully, "I can still neutralize lightning at the middle Array Formation stage. If this were a true clash of Treasure Arts..."
Before he finished speaking, muffled thunder suddenly sounded from deep within the canyon. Shi Yi keenly sensed that this lightning was stronger than before; without his noticing, its power had increased by more than twenty percent. His pupils narrowed slightly. "So that's how it is. This lightning valley actually seems to possess awareness. It senses when creatures enter and adjusts its power on its own."
A bolt as thick as a water vat crashed down. Shi Yi raised his hand and unleashed Nether Annihilation at full power. Spatial waves spread like ripples, erupting in dazzling light the instant they collided with the lightning. When the glare faded, ninety percent of the bolt had been dispersed.
"Interesting. I wonder whether a treasure that blocks perception would work in Thunderclap Valley." Rather than alarmed, Shi Yi was delighted, his lips curving into a smile brimming with fighting spirit.
He simply abandoned his defensive stance and allowed the remaining lightning to surge into his body. Amid the searing pain, the Primordial Chaos Heaven-Refining Grand Formation activated on its own, refining every trace of the lightning Dao laws that had invaded him. His Double Pupils, meanwhile, acted like a precise compass of the heavenly Dao, analyzing the path of every strand of lightning down to the finest detail.
Shi Yi sat cross-legged amid the lightning, electric serpents dancing wildly around him. As the bolts pierced his body, countless insights suddenly erupted within his sea of consciousness. Lightning was no longer merely a savage force of destruction. Beneath the scrutiny of his Double Pupils, it revealed a deeper resonance of the Dao-
Within that deafening thunder lay the world-creating might that split heaven from earth;
Within the dazzling lightning pulsed the primal rhythm of creation and life.
"So that's how it is..." Shi Yi murmured. The scorched marks on his body were peeling away at a visible pace. His new skin gleamed like jade, with lightning patterns faintly flowing across it. He suddenly recalled a passage from an ancient text: "Zhen is thunder; all things emerge from Zhen." Within lightning lay not only destructive power, but also the hidden mysteries of creation and ceaseless renewal.
A dead tree scorched by lightning could sprout fresh buds the following spring, growing more luxuriantly than the trees around it. At last, he understood: lightning was both the whip of heavenly punishment and the whip of creation-beneath its violence, which swept away the dead and rotten, lay a vitality that nourished all things in silence.
"Its might is thunder and lightning; its grace is rain and dew..."
This was the true essence of the lightning Dao: hardness and gentleness complemented one another, destruction and rebirth coexisted. Shi Yi felt the power surging through his body. Every heartbeat stirred a resonance with the lightning, as though all of Thunderclap Valley were responding to his enlightenment.