Nine cycles of spring and autumn passed.
Xu Xuan showed ever more signs of age.
The Lingyan Xu Lineage flourished with each passing day.
Among its younger generations, those possessing spiritual roots sprang up like bamboo shoots after rain, one after another.
Within the cultivation school, young children could often be seen drawing qi into their bodies, spiritual light flickering around them.
There was no shortage of those with outstanding aptitude.
The sight filled the entire lineage with joy and encouragement.
These were all the Xu Lineage's future seeds of Qi Refining.
The current lineage head, Xu Xingzong, unexpectedly encountered an opportunity at the age of sixty.
He refined a wisp of acquired sharp metal qi!
Riding its momentum, he broke through the barrier between immortal and mortal in one stroke.
He became the Xu Lineage's third Qi Refining immortal master, after Xu Xuan and Xu Qingchan!
This acquired sharp metal qi was neither as profound as heaven and earth mother qi nor as pure as a concordance object.
Yet it imbued his magical power with an unstoppable sharpness, greatly increasing his killing power.
Moreover, Xu Xingzong had always practiced body tempering alongside his other cultivation, giving him a powerful physique and surging qi and blood.
Now that he had broken through before completing his first sixty-year cycle, his foundation had not yet declined, and he could glimpse a chance of Foundation Establishment in the future!
Seeing the lineage prosper, with successors to carry it forward,
the string stretched taut in Xu Xuan's heart for a hundred years finally began to loosen.
He no longer clung to his own cultivation and settled into a peaceful old age.
Atop Spiritual Expanse Mountain, he watched the clouds rise and fall and the lineage's young children play.
After a lifetime of scheming and a lifetime of struggles, he truly felt weary at heart.
He only wished to find a moment of peace amid the legacy he had built with his own hands, and quietly await his allotted end...
Chaotic mist surged.
Xu Xuan's consciousness fully coalesced within the wondrous space of the Book of Time.
Light flowed across the page representing his third life.
Scenes flashed rapidly across it before finally freezing-
Wang Tong, a tenant farmer of Hundred Fragrance Valley, awakened the wisdom of his past lives amid hardship, his eyes filled with the weariness of long years.
As a medicinal garden menial, he patiently lay low, making his mark through the art of cultivating spiritual plants.
As an outer sect steward, he leveraged circumstances to lay his plans, took charge of the Cloud Arrival Trading House, and stirred the winds and clouds during the grain famine.
He led his lineage south, forging a path in ragged clothes and a rough cart, and established the Lingyan Xu Lineage's foundation for a hundred generations in the wilderness.
The final scene froze atop Spiritual Expanse Mountain.
Within the scene,
the white-haired old man looked back over the sea of clouds beneath the setting sun, his gaze profound, as though piercing reincarnation and looking across the ages.
The journeys of three lives, love and hatred, gratitude and vengeance, schemes and struggles,
coalesced into a magnificent, sweeping Life Chart.
At the same time, golden light gathered before him, and ancient seal-script characters appeared:
"Your third life has ended."
"In this life, you possessed a five elements spiritual root. Though you awakened late, your will was steadfast, and you were skilled in planning and decisive in action."
"You first established yourself through spiritual plants, gradually took control of resources, secretly formed a trading house, and accumulated strength."
"Later, you led your entire lineage far into the Southern Wilds, cut through thorns and brambles on Spiritual Expanse Mountain, spread branches and leaves, and established a cultivation lineage's foundation for a hundred generations."
"Your bloodline continued, your inheritance passed down in order, and your ancestral incense remained unbroken."
"Though the limits of your foundation halted you at Qi Refining, your plans reached far, the flame was passed down, and your deeds benefited a hundred generations."
"You are granted the white register, 'Luminous Insight.'"
"The register declares: within the spirit's small sanctum, perceive as clearly as watching fire; illuminate the heart and see your true nature; dispel falsehood and preserve truth."
The tiny golden characters dispersed, becoming a clear, limpid streak of light that merged into Xu Xuan's true spirit.
Luminous Insight...
Xu Xuan's true spirit trembled slightly, and he instantly understood the register's wondrous effects.
This register did not directly increase magical power.
Instead, it acted upon his fundamental spiritual intelligence.
It could keep his spiritual sanctum perpetually clear, free from the confusion of external things, greatly strengthening his comprehension and insight.
In cultivating and comprehending the Dao, studying cultivation methods and secret arts, distinguishing opportunities from traps, and even seeing through illusions and inner demons,
it bestowed an indescribably wondrous enhancement.
Just as he thought this bestowal had ended,
the Life Chart unexpectedly changed again.
A ray of light, crimson as blood and blazing as flame, burst from the depths of the chart.
It swiftly condensed into another line of crimson seal-script characters, even more ancient and carrying the aura of the wilderness:
"Your ambition for a hundred generations has been observed, with bloodline as your vessel and ancestral incense as your fuel."
"You are granted the crimson register, 'Dragon Vigor and Tiger Might.'"
"The register declares: primal yang abundant, qi and blood like a furnace, sinews and bones strong, impervious to all evil."
The crimson seal-script characters scattered with a roar.
They became a scorching, surging torrent that merged into Xu Xuan's true spirit!
This power did not strengthen his soul.
Instead, it acted directly upon his true spirit.
It branded upon it a special mark concerning life.
Crimson register.
Dragon Vigor and Tiger Might.
Xu Xuan's true spirit shook violently.
He felt the blood-qi mark surge deep within his true spirit, as though it could burn mountains and boil seas.
This register could actually strengthen the body's foundation directly.
It would grant a physique far beyond ordinary people, with qi and blood as vigorous as dragons and tigers.
Three lives of accumulation: one extended lifespan, one increased fortune, one awakened insight.
The Book of Time's gifts each have their purpose, secretly matching what is needed on the road to immortality.
Understanding dawned in Xu Xuan's heart, and he looked forward to his next life all the more.
As for this crimson register, Dragon Vigor and Tiger Might...
Could it be that because I had no offspring in my third life, even the Book of Time could not bear to watch?
So it specially granted this register to help me spread branches and leaves in my next life and accelerate the accumulation of my bloodline?
At that thought,
Xu Xuan could not help feeling unsure whether to laugh or cry.
In his next life, with this crimson register,
whatever cultivation method he practiced, he could hold every advantage in close combat.
His physique would be powerful enough to subdue mountains and rivers with his fists!
I could also take many wives and concubines, spread branches and leaves, and accelerate the accumulation of my bloodline!
He seemed already to see himself in his next life, relying on a body endowed with dragon vigor and tiger might to advance triumphantly along the path of cultivation.
What a splendid Dragon Vigor and Tiger Might!
Exactly what I wanted!
His true spirit was enveloped by the pulling force from the blank page of his new life and cast into a new reincarnation.
Not a trace of regret remained in Xu Xuan's heart.
There was only boundless anticipation for the future and blazing fighting spirit.
Luminous Insight will help me comprehend the Dao, and Dragon Vigor and Tiger Might will help me strike down my enemies.
In my next life, I shall prove the Dao through strength and punch open the road to immortality!
Great Yue.
Autumn of the twenty-seventh year of Peaceful Harmony.
The northern frontier, the Marquis of Martial Might's Estate.
The autumn wind blew bleakly, sweeping up the yellow leaves covering the ground.
Yet heat steamed from the training grounds deep within the marquis's estate.
A boy stood in the grounds, his upper body bare.
His name was Xu Chen. Only twelve years old, he was the Marquis of Martial Might's son by his principal wife.
His figure was already as tall and straight as that of a boy of fifteen or sixteen.
His muscles had smooth contours and were filled with explosive power.
Beads of sweat slid down his back, leaving wet trails on his bronze skin.
His face was handsome, yet not a trace of childishness remained in his features.
His eyes were calm, occasionally flashing with sharpness, nothing like a child's.
"Hah!"
Xu Chen exhaled with a shout.
He threw a punch, his fist surging like a dragon and whipping up a fierce, cutting wind.
Qi and blood surged throughout his body, while faint gleams of gold and yellow flowed beneath his skin.
Stranger still,
the instant he exerted his strength, the space behind his back seemed to twist.
A blurry phantom of a serpent with wings on its back flashed into view and vanished.
The phantom exuded a cold, sinister aura that made the heart quail.
This was Xu Xuan's fourth life.
He had been born with a metal and earth dual spiritual root.
He had also awakened the bloodline totem, "Exotic Beast Soaring Serpent."
His mother came from the imperial Chen Lineage.
Though she was only a commandery princess from a distant branch, her bloodline was still noble.
Her marriage to the Marquis of Martial Might had originally been a celebrated match.
Unfortunately, when Xu Xuan was born, he had already manifested the anomalous signs of his totem.
This totem was not part of the orthodox four spirits totem inheritance of Great Yue's imperial lineage, but instead carried a fierce, baleful aura.
The imperial household was deeply displeased by it and regarded it as an ill omen.
As a consequence, the Marquis of Martial Might was also ostracized at court.
Thus, Xu Xuan had left the capital, that place of strife, as a young child and grown up in the marquis's fief on the northern frontier.
This place was far from prosperity. Though cold and quiet, it also had fewer constraints.
Bearing the registers bestowed in his previous lives, he was exceptionally gifted.
As he grew older, the wisdom of his past lives gradually awakened, and memories of his former existence slowly surfaced.
Thus, at six years old, he began practicing the Evergreen Technique again, using it to nourish his metal and earth dual spiritual root.
With such practiced familiarity as time passed, his foundation had become incomparably solid.
Besides cultivating, Xu Xuan also found a scroll of the Body Rebirth Technique in the estate's library.
This cultivation method did not increase cultivation, but it was a rare, orthodox method of body tempering.
It was just right for fully unleashing the potential of his Dragon Vigor and Tiger Might.
It tempered his sinews and bones and refined his qi and blood.
Though he was only twelve, he already possessed copper skin and iron bones.
The vigor of his qi and blood far surpassed that of martial artists his age.
Luminous Insight also gave him extraordinary comprehension.
Whether cultivation methods or martial skills, once they reached his hands, he mastered them as soon as he learned them and understood them with the slightest hint.
From one example, he inferred three more, progressing at an astonishing pace.
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This life, he could go for something big. Please vote.