Night fell beneath a bright moon and sparse stars.
Xu Xuan sat cross-legged inside his cave abode. The Spirit-Gathering Formation around him was active, pouring vast spiritual energy into his body.
Five-colored Qi of Heaven and Earth had already gathered in his chest: Qi of Mountains, Qi of Rivers, Qi of Earthfire, Qi of Vegetation, and Qi of Metal Sharpness.
"That girl Qingchan... she pushed herself far too hard just to help me break through sooner."
Gathering the Five Elements Qi of Heaven and Earth had taken nearly twenty years less than he had anticipated.
He was now ninety-eight and had spent twenty-five years on Spiritual Expanse Mountain.
After cultivating across two lifetimes, he had finally reached the threshold of immortality once more.
He burned incense, bathed, and quieted his mind, waiting until every distracting thought had faded.
Only then did he begin refining these five strands of Qi of Heaven and Earth.
To break through and knock open the gates of immortality, he needed them.
The purer the Qi of Heaven and Earth, the better.
After obtaining the Qi of Heaven and Earth, Xu Xuan had refined it with his own spiritual power for forty-nine days, tempering it day and night, removing the dross and preserving the essence.
He repeatedly tempered the five strands of qi, purging their impurities.
Only a thread of their most fundamental essence remained.
The process was extraordinarily dangerous, for the five elements restrained one another.
The slightest carelessness could cause the strands of qi to clash and his inner world to collapse.
Fortunately, Xu Xuan possessed powerful divine sense and exceptional perseverance, with the Fortune Fate Talisman also protecting him unseen.
Only through these had he maintained the balance between the five strands of qi.
On this day, beneath the full moon.
Xu Xuan laid out a simple Spirit-Gathering Formation in the valley's forbidden grounds.
Several bottles of pills to aid his breakthrough stood before him.
He drew a deep breath, his gaze resolute.
Within his Life Palace, the five strands of Five Elements Essence Qi, tempered to their utmost purity, began slowly circling and drawing together like five tiny swimming dragons.
"The five elements turn, generating and restraining one another. Draw in qi and return to the origin. Knock upon the gates of immortality!"
Xu Xuan gave a low shout and drove his cultivation technique at full strength.
He guided the five strands of essence qi toward the center, sending them crashing together!
"Humm-"
A mysterious note of the Great Dao rang out from within him, and his Life Palace shook violently.
Five-colored radiance shot into the sky, bathing the entire forbidden grounds in shimmering splendor.
An aura far beyond the Spirit Treasury Realm slowly began emerging from Xu Xuan's body.
Deep within Spiritual Expanse Mountain, inside the forbidden grounds reserved for breakthroughs.
The wind and clouds had already changed!
Azure, crimson, yellow, white, and black radiance soared into the sky, interweaving into a canopy that bathed half the heavens in shimmering colors.
Within the forbidden grounds, spiritual energy surged wildly.
It even made strange rushing sounds like the tides as it converged ferociously toward the center.
Xu Xuan sat cross-legged at the formation's heart, his bearing solemn and majestic.
Within the ancestral aperture between his brows, the phantom of his Life Palace blazed with light.
Inside the palace were the five strands of Five Elements Essence Qi, gathered through years of painstaking effort and tempered to their utmost purity.
Now, held firmly under the guidance of his soul's power, they slowly drew together according to the most profound principles of mutual generation and transformation in the Treatise on the Fundamentals of the Five Elements.
At first, the five strands of qi still followed the rules, each keeping to its position.
As his cultivation technique reached its utmost intensity, that delicate balance finally broke!
The five strands of primal qi, utterly different in nature yet equally pure and vast, collided thunderously in the depths of his Life Palace.
The anticipated scene of heavens falling and earth splitting did not occur.
At the point of collision, darkness and light flashed in alternation.
Soon, a tiny five-colored vortex appeared.
It was like a singularity of the cosmos, cleaving heaven from earth.
The instant it appeared, it began ravenously devouring all the spiritual potency Xu Xuan had accumulated within his Qi Sea, Yellow Court, and Life Palace.
It also stirred the spiritual energy of heaven and earth gathered within the forbidden grounds and from dozens of li around.
Like a great whale drawing in water, it pulled everything into the five-colored vortex.
The meridians throughout Xu Xuan's body swelled and pulsed. His face alternated between flushed and pale as he endured immense pressure.
After the suction forcibly dragged his pure spiritual power, previously like mist and liquid, into the five-colored vortex, it underwent yet another transformation.
Gradually, it acquired a faint five-colored sheen.
Its substance grew increasingly solid and heavy, carrying an aura of profound mystery.
At the sight of this aura, Xu Xuan's eyes narrowed, and he exclaimed inwardly:
Mystic True Qi!
This aura differed from the true essence and magical power of ordinary Qi Refining practitioners.
Instead, it was a strange aura, more ancient and mysterious, bearing some kind of imprint.
The Evergreen Technique really does have a connection to Kunlun... this is a genuine ancient cultivation method!
Even when he had cultivated in Kunlun, he had never developed Mystic True Magical Power.
By that time, the connection between heaven and earth in Kunlun had long been severed, and all the secrets of antiquity had been buried in the river of years.
He had only heard that this special kind of magical power existed.
Though it was only a newly born thread, its purity and the might it contained exceeded Spirit Treasury Realm spiritual power by far more than tenfold!
There was no telling how long this transformation lasted.
It felt like an instant, yet also like a thousand years.
The sky-piercing five-colored radiance and tides of spiritual energy within the forbidden grounds gradually subsided.
Every extraordinary phenomenon withdrew into the figure seated cross-legged at the center.
Xu Xuan slowly opened his eyes. It seemed as though primordial chaos parted within them, and five-colored light flashed and vanished.
His aura had changed completely.
It was no longer deep and restrained as before, but fathomless as the sea.
His connection with the surrounding spiritual energy of heaven and earth had become incomparably intimate and harmonious, as though he himself were part of the workings of heaven and earth.
Every movement of his hands and feet could stir the spiritual energy of heaven and earth.
"Nearly a hundred years in this life, and at last, I have achieved Qi Refining."
Xu Xuan was no ordinary Qi Refining practitioner.
He had attained the innate state through the Qi of the Five Elements, and the magical power within him was five times that of his peers.
Combined with the special nature of Mystic True Qi, he was already no weaker than ordinary cultivators at the second or third level of Qi Refining immediately upon breaking through.
Qi Refining had twelve levels, each step a new heaven.
As he felt the Five Elements Mystic True Qi surging and circulating within him, endlessly renewing itself.
An indescribable sense of heroic pride rose in Xu Xuan's heart.
His foundation in this life was actually firmer and more substantial than before.
The quantity and quality of his magical power, and even its recovery speed, far surpassed those of others at his level.
"Congratulations, Grandfather (Ancestor), on your first attainment on the immortal path!"
Xu Qingchan, Xu Xingzong, and the other core lineage members had long been waiting outside.
When Xu Xuan's cave abode opened wide, they were overjoyed and bowed down one after another.
The Xu Lineage now had another genuine Qi Refining Cultivator!
Xu Xuan swept his gaze over them, feeling gratified.
But when he noticed Xu Qingchan's slightly pale face and somewhat unsteady aura, his heart sank.
"You're injured?" Xu Xuan's voice grew slightly grave.
Xu Qingchan forced a smile.
"It's nothing."
"Some time ago, when I went out to search for Qi of Rivers for you, Grandfather."
"I clashed with a group of cultivators by the Sinking Sand River and suffered some minor injuries."
"After two months of rest, I'm already fine."
With a slight movement of his divine sense, Xu Xuan detected blockages in her meridians and disordered water qi.
These were by no means merely "minor injuries."
Still, he did not question her further and simply took silent note.
He summoned Xu Xingzong to ask about the lineage's recent circumstances.
Inside the room, Xu Xingzong stood to one side and slowly recounted events.
"Ancestor Xuan, ever since Grandaunt Qingchan returned injured, a band of rogue cultivators has been roaming around Spiritual Expanse Mountain."
"I had some of them captured and brought back. They claimed to be fisherfolk from the Black Water Gate."
"The Black Water Gate..." Xu Xuan murmured.
He knew of this cultivation sect as well. It was one of the immortal sects of the Yue Kingdom, not far from Spiritual Expanse Mountain.
The Hundred Yue of the Southern Wilds were weaker overall than the Eastern Continent.
Here, even someone who had only reached Qi Refining could establish an immortal sect.
Rules were lax, and there was no order.
The Black Water Gate was just such a sect, founded by a Late Qi Refining Stage cultivator.
"The Black Water Gate seems to have already learned our background and origins."
"A few days ago, they sent another message demanding five thousand spirit stones for medical expenses."
"They also want us to surrender several fishing grounds near the Sinking Sand River..." Xu Xingzong continued.
"At the time, you were in the midst of your breakthrough, Ancestor, so I could only tell the lineage members to keep the mountain gates shut and strengthen our defenses."
"Five thousand spirit stones? Three fishing grounds?"
Xu Xuan sneered.
"Heh, what a Black Water Gate."
"Do they really take our Xu Household for a soft persimmon anyone can squeeze?"
Xu Xuan's gaze flashed like lightning. "Xingzong, stay here and guard the valley. Reassure the lineage members."
"I'll take Qingchan to the Yue Capital Immortal Market."
--
PS: He's reached Qi Refining, so this life's goal is accomplished. What Fate Talisman should I give the protagonist next life? Keep lying low, or go on a killing spree? He probably won't go back before Foundation Establishment.