Late Golden Core Stage

Within a secluded cave deep on the deserted island, dark golden light flowed as though tangible, casting flickering light across the dim stone walls.

Qin Chen sat cross-legged, his skin a frightening crimson, like a peerless piece of divine iron being hammered furiously in the great furnace of heaven and earth.

He gripped the Star Flare Stone tightly in both hands. The violent energy of a constant star's core surged into his body through his arms like magma bursting through a breached dam.

The circulation route of the "Heavenly Cycle Star Body" was incomparably domineering. This supreme body-refining art, which transformed the body's cells into cosmic stars, was now revealing its insatiably greedy side.

"Condense!"

Qin Chen clenched his teeth, veins bulging on his forehead. Enduring the excruciating pain of violent energy tearing through his meridians, he forced the terrifying torrent of heat-which could burst an ordinary Golden Core stage cultivator in an instant-toward the third crucial acupoint within his body: the Qihai Acupoint.

Boom!

An extremely muffled boom sounded within his body, like the first thunderclap at the dawn of creation. Within the Qihai Acupoint's once-chaotic void, a faint point of starlight suddenly kindled, radiating an eternal aura.

The third micro star-dust had ignited!

As this star-dust lit up, Qin Chen's physical strength surged once again. Fine, dark golden Star Runes began to emerge across his bones, and his blood thundered like surging rivers, its roar deafening.

Yet this was only the beginning.

"Keep going!"

Qin Chen did not pause. Once the first Star Flare Stone's energy was exhausted and it crumbled into ash, he unhesitatingly grabbed the second, then the third...

Time flew by amid monotonous, agonizing cultivation.

By the time all ten Star Flare Stones had turned to ash, the fourth micro star-dust within Qin Chen's Baihui Acupoint had finally been ignited with great difficulty.

"Still not enough! The energy of the Star Flare Stones is too violent. It's mainly useful for breaking through barriers, but filling the energy voids within the star-dust still requires vast amounts of pure spiritual energy!"

Qin Chen swept his hand sharply, and the ten thousand Top-Grade Spirit Stones returned by the system instantly filled the entire cave.

Top-Grade Spirit Stones were exceedingly rare strategic resources in the cultivation world. Each was crystal clear, as though an ocean of spiritual energy had been sealed within it.

"Devour!"

The "Primordial Ancestral Dragon Art" and the "Heavenly Cycle Star Body" simultaneously unleashed terrifying suction.

A spiritual energy storm instantly swept through the cave. Hundreds upon thousands of Top-Grade Spirit Stones shattered in midair, becoming a white mist of spiritual energy so dense it would not disperse, pouring furiously into Qin Chen's body through every pore.

Some of this supremely pure spiritual energy went toward stabilizing the newly ignited Qihai Acupoint and Baihui Acupoint, while Qin Chen guided the vast majority to charge like thousands of troops and horses toward the Yongquan Acupoints in the soles of his feet.

One day, two days, three days...

The Top-Grade Spirit Stones dwindled at a rate visible to the naked eye.

Three thousand... five thousand... eight thousand...

When the last supreme-grade spirit stone crumbled into powder and drifted down, Qin Chen's feet jolted violently. Two brilliant shafts of starlight burst from his Yongquan Acupoints and shot straight toward the rocky ceiling.

The fifth micro star-dust had ignited!

By now, Qin Chen had successfully ignited five micro star-dusts within his body. Together, they faintly formed a miniature circulating formation, endlessly nourishing his flesh.

"My physical strength has reached an entirely new bottleneck. Next comes a breakthrough in cultivation."

Qin Chen slowly exhaled a breath of stale air, which pierced a hole of unfathomable depth into the stone wall like a sharp sword.

With a turn of his hand, he took out the perfect-grade pill the system had returned at tenfold quality-the Nine-Turn Creation Pill.

The pill was perfectly rounded, with nine naturally formed Pill Patterns flowing across its surface. It emitted a strange, delicate fragrance that brought comfort throughout the body with a single whiff.

Without the slightest hesitation, Qin Chen tipped back his head and swallowed the Nine-Turn Creation Pill.

The pill melted upon entering his mouth, becoming a gentle yet boundless power of creation that instantly coursed through his limbs and bones before gathering within his dantian.

Within Qin Chen's dantian, his Golden Core-already several times larger than an ordinary person's, with an ancestral dragon phantom coiled around its surface-began spinning and expanding furiously under the nourishment of this power of creation.

The "Primordial Ancestral Dragon Art" circulated furiously, greedily absorbing the perfect medicinal power, which had no side effects whatsoever.

Crack-

It was as though some invisible shackle had broken.

Qin Chen's aura began climbing steadily, smashing through the Golden Core mid-stage barrier like a force crushing rotten wood.

Late Golden Core stage!

And his aura did not stop there. It continued rising until it reached the peak of the late Golden Core stage, only a hair's breadth from Golden Core Paragon, before slowly settling.

Hum!

Qin Chen's eyes snapped open, and two streaks of cold lightning seemed to flash through the pitch-black cave. A terrifying pressure erupted from him, directly shattering the Concealment Formation and defensive formations he had set up around the cave.

"Whew..."

Qin Chen stood and casually stretched. A dense series of cracks like roasting beans immediately sounded within his body. Every inch of muscle and every bone contained terrifying power capable of destroying heaven and earth.

"Five micro star-dusts, plus late Golden Core stage cultivation..."

Qin Chen clenched his right fist and suddenly punched the empty air before him.

He used no true essence whatsoever-only pure physical strength!

Boom!

The air ahead instantly compressed to its limit, releasing a piercing sonic boom. A visible blast of compressed air struck the cave wall, and the entire deserted island shook violently. The hard stone wall yielded like tofu as a massive hole several dozen feet across and of unfathomable depth was blasted through it, allowing sunlight to stream in from outside.

"So strong."

Qin Chen looked at his fist, a trace of satisfaction flashing in his eyes.

Now he dared call himself the Strongest Below Nascent Soul. He was confident he could fight even someone at the early Nascent Soul stage. If he encountered that old man from the Liu Family again, he probably would not need to run.

"But the consumption really is terrifying."

Qin Chen glanced down at his completely empty storage pouch and could not help giving a bitter chuckle.

Ten Star Flare Stones, ten thousand Top-Grade Spirit Stones, and a perfect-grade Nine-Turn Creation Pill.

On the Qianlong Continent, such an enormous stockpile of resources would have been enough to forcefully produce several Nascent Soul stage cultivators.

Yet for him, it had only been enough to ignite three micro star-dusts and raise his cultivation by one minor realm along the way.

The further he cultivated the "Heavenly Cycle Star Body," the more its resource requirements would grow exponentially.

"Looks like building a cart behind closed doors won't work. I have to go out and plunder more resources."

A sharp, cold gleam flashed in Qin Chen's eyes.

The cultivation world had always been a place where the weak were prey to the strong. To reach the very summit, one had to advance over countless bones and resources.

"Meow~"