Fifty Thousand Years, the Limit of the Death Edict

Roger remembered that in the original novel, Beirut had used the essence blood of the Four Divine Beasts to create the Four Ultimate Warriors, allowing humans to possess divine beast bloodlines.

The fact that he had accomplished that showed that Beirut had some talent for research.

And Beirut had done it through his own research, despite having no talent for the Death Edict.

Roger did not know how Beirut had managed it, but he knew that divine beasts were not the only ones capable of using the Innate Divine Ability.

As long as the appropriate conditions were met, those abilities could be replicated with divine beast essence blood.

The most obvious examples were Orloff and Wette.

As Roger cultivated, he gradually found his progress in the Death Edict growing slower and slower.

Naturally, the first way to increase his strength further was to become a Paragon.

Once he possessed Willpower, his strength would undergo a qualitative transformation, making him virtually invincible among gods.

But that was also the hardest path.

At present, Roger had no confidence whatsoever that he could cultivate to the Paragon level.

Unless the Jade Disc evolved again and continued to improve Roger's talent and comprehension.

Otherwise, with his current comprehension, Roger had no confidence at all in becoming a Paragon...

The more he cultivated, the more Roger felt the vastness of the Edicts and the slowness of his progress.

"No wonder there were only twenty-odd Paragons in the original novel after more than a thousand grand cycles. The difficulty really was no joke."

Roger shook his head and continued the work at hand.

Extracting essence blood was delicate work as well.

Fortunately, Roger's soul was now strong enough, and after the Jade Disc's successive enhancements, he could handle the task with ease.

A day later.

Roger looked at the crystal bottle filled with essence blood that gleamed a watery blue and smiled in satisfaction.

"An entire Bashé yielded 180 drops of essence blood. Not bad."

As an ordinary divine beast, the Bashé yielding that much essence blood was within his expectations.

Putting the crystal bottle into his Interspatial Ring, Roger resumed separating soul fragments and analyzing soul structures.

There seemed to be no end to this work, and Roger did it whenever he had time.

As a result, he now had more soul fragments on hand than he could use.

He had even selected some to distribute as rewards.

Their appeal to those Midgods was simply off the charts.

Of course.

Roger also had some soul fragments sent back to Netherlo City for Hagson, Beverly, and the others to use.

Roger never treated poorly those longtime followers who had accompanied him along the way.

Time continued to pass.

The divine beast essence blood in Roger's Interspatial Ring steadily increased, and his research into the Innate Divine Ability of divine beasts grew ever deeper.

"It's a shame there are no ordinary beings below the Sanctuary level to be found in the Netherworld. The teleportation arrays haven't appeared yet either, so even finding test subjects is difficult."

Over the years, Roger's research into divine beast essence blood had entered a new stage.

He was preparing to try replicating the Innate Divine Ability in ordinary humans.

But there were two difficulties with this step.

First, ordinary humans' souls lacked the region that produced "innate energy."

Second, ordinary humans' bodies lacked the essence blood needed to support the use of the Innate Divine Ability.

Roger already had preliminary ideas for both difficulties and needed to continue conducting large numbers of experiments to refine his theories.

But that was where the problem lay.

There were no ordinary humans below the Sanctuary level in the Netherworld...

Although newborn infants had not reached the Sanctuary level, their physiques were overwhelmingly superior to those of ordinary humans in Material Planes in every respect. Otherwise, they could not even survive.

As such, the Sanctuary-level humans in the Netherworld were unsuitable as test subjects.

This was the conclusion Roger had reached after many attempts.

It reminded Roger of a saying: creating on a blank sheet of paper was easiest.

Because of their environment, although the Sanctuary-level humans in the Netherworld were of human ancestry, after ages of evolution, their bodies actually contained the bloodlines of other divine beasts or Special Life forms.

Those bloodlines were very faint, but they did exist.

This prevented Roger from transplanting pure divine beast essence blood into them.

At least, he could not do it at his current stage...

Roger had also experimented on his own saint domain true body.

He had the same problem himself.

Human ancestry accounted for ninety-nine percent of his bloodline, but the remaining bloodlines were a complicated mixture.

Whether he tried transplanting essence blood from a supreme divine beast like Mia or an ordinary divine beast like the Bashé, those mixed bloodlines fiercely rejected it, preventing even a trace of essence blood from integrating.

Left with no other choice.

Roger could only give up.

He merely observed the forms and structures of the divine beast essence blood and tested the differences between essence blood from different divine beasts.

After all, Roger still could not remove the mixed bloodlines from his own body.

That task was no easier than separating soul fragments.

Roger was more proficient with souls, after all, and was still sorely lacking when it came to operations involving physical matter.

My analysis of the experimental data still isn't fast or precise enough, and the experimental equipment needs further refinement too. Studying all things really is a difficult path...

Roger sighed inwardly.

When he had read the novel before, he had not thought much of it. He had simply felt that Orloff and Wette were amazing for being able to replicate the Innate Divine Ability of divine beasts.

Only after setting foot on that same path himself did Roger realize just how difficult it was.

The Jade Disc... It looks like my last hope still lies with the Jade Disc.

Sensing that the Jade Disc Fragment deep within his consciousness was still growing by absorbing divine power and soul power at a constant rate, Roger felt exceptionally calm.

As long as the Jade Disc evolves a little further and improves my comprehension once more, perhaps things will be completely different then.

Roger looked forward to the Jade Disc's next qualitative transformation.

Time continued to pass.

Before he knew it, tens of thousands of years had gone by.

Over those years, every one of Roger's clones had been busy cultivating.

His death clone had reached the limit of the Asura level long ago and was only one step away from becoming a Paragon. Yet even after more than thirty thousand years, he remained stuck at that bottleneck.

As for his four clones of earth, fire, water, and wind, all had reached the Asura level, and his wind clone had even reached its limit.

Inside a secluded chamber.

Roger's death clone was in secluded cultivation, striving to become a Paragon.

Suddenly.

A disturbance came from the Jade Disc deep within his consciousness.

Hum!

In an instant.

The Jade Disc Fragment shook violently, and mysterious energy poured into Roger's soul once more, beginning the familiar transformation.

"Mm..."

A long while later.

The Jade Disc stopped releasing energy.

Its size settled at eighty percent of its original size.

"Fifty thousand years. The Jade Disc has finally undergone another qualitative transformation."

Roger closed his eyes and sensed the world around him.

This time.

He could clearly feel that the Jade Disc had improved his comprehension more than ever before!

What was a little regrettable, however, was that Roger had gained no new cultivation talent this time.

"So be it. I've already gathered the four most important clones: earth, fire, water, and wind."

Roger was not disappointed by this.

His current five clones were already enough.

Having more would not make much difference.

He quietly savored the sensation of his transformed soul for a moment.

Then Roger took out a bottle of Soul Gold Beads, and his death clone swallowed one.

Surging soul essence spread through him.

But Roger's soul could no longer absorb it.

"What a shame. I thought my soul strength might be able to increase again."

Roger put away the jade bottle, a trace of regret appearing on his face.

"But although my soul strength can't increase, I've gained plenty of new inspiration for my cultivation. The Paragon level is right before my eyes!"