Void Beast

[Ding! Detected that the host has gifted the mutated divine beast cub "Dark Lightning Roc King" to Qin Yu, a son of fortune. Tenfold critical return triggered!]

[Congratulations, host! You have obtained a super-mutated divine beast, Void Beast (infant stage)!]

Just as Qin Yu was happily playing with Xiaohei at the edge of the wooden tub, the long-absent mechanical voice of the system arrived as expected deep within Qin Chen's mind.

At the words "Void Beast," Qin Chen's heart abruptly skipped a beat, but his expression remained unchanged. He merely gave Qin Yu a few gentle instructions. "Yu, soak in your medicinal bath properly, and spend some time bonding with Xiaohei while you're at it. I'm going back to my room to cultivate."

"Got it, Brother!" Qin Yu's attention was entirely on Xiaohei, and he answered without even looking up.

Qin Chen turned and left the Detached Courtyard. His steps appeared steady, but in truth, he shrank the ground beneath his feet, covering great distances with each stride. Within a few breaths, he had returned to his quiet bedroom. He closed the door behind him and used Xiantian True Essence to lay a soundproof barrier around the room.

System, retrieve the reward! Qin Chen silently commanded.

The moment he finished, the empty space before him suddenly rippled like water without any warning.

"Buzzz-"

A slender silver fissure quietly appeared in midair. Immediately afterward, a small, furry paw, white as snowy jade, reached out of the rift in the void.

Then a tiny, delicate figure stepped gracefully out of the fissure and landed steadily on the desk before Qin Chen.

With its appearance, the spatial fissure instantly sealed, as though it had never existed.

Qin Chen looked closely. It was a creature that looked remarkably like a white cat. Its entire body was snow-white, without a trace of any other color, and its fur was as soft as the finest silk, giving off a faint shimmer.

Most striking of all were its eyes. They were not ordinary beast eyes, but a pair of silver eyes that seemed to contain endless galaxies. Deep within its pupils, mysterious void runes faintly flowed.

"Meow~"

The little white beast looked at Qin Chen and gave a soft, sweet cry.

Qin Chen held out his hand, and the little white beast obediently rubbed its head against his palm.

So this is a Void Beast? Feeling the softness against his palm, Qin Chen marveled inwardly.

According to the information supplied by the system, the Void Beast was an exceedingly rare super-mutated divine beast in the universe. Its bloodline was so noble that it far surpassed even the so-called high-grade divine beasts of the Immortal, Devil, and Demon Realm. It was born with a rudimentary grasp of Spatial Laws and possessed the innate divine ability Crossing the Void. Even in its infant stage, it could easily travel through all manner of formations and barriers, treating spatial walls as though they were nothing.

Even more terrifying was its other innate gift-devouring.

The Void Beast contained a self-contained void space within its body and could devour all things, converting them into energy for its own growth. Heavenly treasures, divine weapons, or even an enemy's true essence and spiritual energy-it could devour them all!

To test its ability, Qin Chen took an incredibly hard piece of black iron essence from his Storage Ring and placed it on the desk.

The little white beast twitched its tender pink nose, as though it had smelled something delicious. It opened its little mouth and gave a gentle suck toward the fist-sized piece of black iron essence.

Crack!

Without any chewing, the piece of black iron essence, which even a Xiantian expert would have needed considerable effort to cleave apart, actually shrank in an instant, turning into a streak of light that was sucked into its belly.

The little beast burped, a trace of satisfaction flashing through its silver eyes. Its aura seemed to grow a little more condensed as well.

"What an overpowering gift!" Qin Chen sucked in a cold breath, then wild delight blazed in his eyes.

With this little fellow, whether he explored in search of treasure or assassinated enemies, he would be like a tiger given wings.

"I gave Xiaohei to Yu, so you'll stay with me from now on. Since you're white all over, I'll call you Xiaobai." Qin Chen smiled and rubbed its head.

"Meow~" Xiaobai seemed quite pleased with this bluntly simple name. Its figure flickered, and it actually merged directly into the void. A second later, it appeared on Qin Chen's shoulder, curled into a ball, and contentedly closed its eyes.

Time slipped by, and another month passed in the blink of an eye.

Early that morning, Qin Chen arrived at the Martial Arts Field and saw Qin Yu staring blankly at a huge boulder, a faint trace of dejection on his face.

"What's wrong, Yu?" Qin Chen walked over and asked.

Qin Yu sighed and gave a bitter smile. "Brother, my External Cultivation has reached a bottleneck. I can exert five thousand jin of strength with one arm. But... because my dantian was born unable to accumulate internal energy, I still can't cultivate true qi like the rest of you. Master Zhao Yunxing said that without internal energy to support it, the limit of External Cultivation is Houtian Peak. I'll never be able to enter the Xiantian realm."

Seeing his younger brother's dejected expression, Qin Chen knew it was time.

The Ancestral Dragon Art passed down in the Qin Family was an extremely domineering Internal Cultivation method that only direct descendants of the Qin Family could practice. Qin Chen had long since secretly extrapolated and improved upon this art, removing its absolute dependence on the dantian and transforming it into a special method that nourished the exterior from within and tempered the physical body.

"Yu, don't lose heart." Qin Chen took a yellowed, thread-bound book from inside his robe and handed it over. "This is an ancient text I happened to obtain, called the Ancestral Dragon Art. I've made some changes to it. It doesn't require you to accumulate true qi in your dantian. Instead, it disperses the power of blood and qi you cultivate directly throughout your limbs and body to temper your tendons, bones, skin, and membranes. Give it a try. Perhaps it can break through your current bottleneck."

At his words, hope immediately blazed in Qin Yu's eyes. He accepted the book with trembling hands. "Brother, will... will this really work?"

"You won't know until you practice it." Qin Chen patted his shoulder.

The very moment Qin Yu opened the Ancestral Dragon Art, the system's voice exploded in Qin Chen's mind once more.

[Ding! Detected that the host has gifted the modified Ancestral Dragon Art to Qin Yu, a son of fortune. Tenfold critical return triggered!]

[Congratulations, host! You have obtained a cultivation art that leads directly to the Great Dao of the Nascent Soul stage-the Primordial Ancestral Dragon Art!]

Boom!

A vast, profound torrent of information instantly flooded Qin Chen's mind.

Qin Chen forcibly suppressed his shock. After offering Qin Yu a few reassuring words, he immediately returned to his private chamber and announced that he was entering seclusion.

Inside the private chamber, Qin Chen sat cross-legged and began digesting the Primordial Ancestral Dragon Art in his mind.

Not only could it allow one to cultivate Primordial Dragon Essence, which far surpassed Xiantian True Essence, but it could also condense a phantom of the Primordial Ancestral Dragon within the body. One could cultivate all the way to the Golden Core stage and the Nascent Soul stage, and it even held the potential for extrapolation to higher levels.

"Switch cultivation methods!"

Without the slightest hesitation, Qin Chen immediately began guiding the immense late Xiantian true essence within his body along the circulation pathways of the Primordial Ancestral Dragon Art.

"Roar-"

As the art circulated, a low dragon roar actually began to sound faintly from within Qin Chen's body.