"How exactly am I supposed to succeed at this thing?"
Lu Xuan stared at the Asura God Sword before him.
His voice carried a trace of barely concealed exhaustion.
The Asura God Sword let out a clear ring.
Then it slowly floated up, its tip pointing straight at the hard floor.
With a grating screech, sparks flew everywhere.
It carved a number into the floor with strokes like soaring dragons and dancing phoenixes-99.
"You mean... I have to cycle through this endless slaughter 99 times."
"And remain completely conscious from beginning to end, without ever losing myself?"
Lu Xuan drew a deep breath and asked in a strained voice.
The Asura God Sword bobbed its blade up and down, giving him an affirmative answer.
Lu Xuan slumped against the cold wall and helplessly closed his eyes.
The sensation of his soul being torn apart, like death by a thousand cuts, still lingered in his mind.
But he knew he had no way back.
An unknown amount of time passed.
The deathly silence in the secret chamber was broken.
Lu Xuan slowly opened his eyes. The confusion and fear in them had been replaced by absolute resolve.
He sprang to his feet and stared straight at the divine sword. "Keep going!"
The Asura God Sword showed no mercy.
Blood-red light blazed from its blade once more.
Without hesitation, it dragged Lu Xuan back into that mountain of corpses and sea of blood.
This time, Lu Xuan struggled desperately to endure the cycles.
He gritted his teeth until they shattered, fiercely guarding the last flicker of clarity in his mind.
However, when the cycles reached the twenty-sixth repetition...
The slaughtering urge and soul-deep exhaustion, accumulated to their limit, finally crushed him.
"Hum-"
White light flashed, and Lu Xuan was ejected back into the secret chamber again.
"Hiss... what's happening to my body?"
The moment he returned, Lu Xuan sucked in a breath of cold air, keenly sensing that something was terribly wrong.
He looked down at his once-fair skin.
At some point, faint blood-red lines had appeared, packed as densely as a spiderweb.
As these lines flickered, excruciating pain penetrated his bones and spread throughout his body.
Had anyone else been present, the sight would surely have made their scalp crawl with horror.
Lu Xuan's body now looked like a puzzle on the verge of breaking apart!
Those blood-red lines were the framework of cracks dividing his flesh.
It seemed that after just a few more failures, this body would become like building blocks stripped of their adhesive.
It would collapse on its own, disintegrating into a floorful of shredded flesh.
Lu Xuan immediately activated his Life Energy and tried to repair it.
To his horror, he discovered that these cracks seemed to be branded into the very laws and could not heal at all!
This also meant one spine-chilling fact.
If he failed a few more times, his body would be completely dismantled and obliterated!
"Are these the God-King-level Nine Divine Trials?"
Cold sweat poured from Lu Xuan's forehead, his heart still filled with lingering fear.
Utterly terrifying!
These so-called Divine Trials were by no means easy.
He finally understood.
For all these years, Lu Xuan...
Had always taken pride in being a transmigrator who knew the plot.
And so he had forgotten.
The world he lived in was real.
With the slightest carelessness, he could die at any moment.
With this realization...
Lu Xuan became extremely cautious, no longer daring to charge blindly into attempts on hot blood alone as he had before.
After all, he had precious few chances for trial and error.
Once he crossed the line, he really would be reduced to ash and scattered smoke!
Time flew like a shuttle; within the secret chamber, he could not sense the succession of sun and moon.
Gradually...
Two years quietly slipped away amid the repeated tug-of-war between life and death, lucidity and madness.
At this moment, Lu Xuan sat cross-legged in the center of the secret chamber like an old monk deep in meditation.
His appearance was wretched beyond measure.
His entire body was completely covered in glaring, scarlet blood-red lines.
Those cracks were deep enough to expose bone, and blood constantly seeped from them, turning him into a figure drenched in blood.
His flesh teetered on the brink of collapse beneath the pressure of the laws.
It seemed that a mere breeze would reduce him entirely to dust the next instant.
Yet, at this very brink of collapse...
"Boom!"
In the next instant, a brilliant and sacred pillar of blood-red light descended from the sky.
It enveloped Lu Xuan completely!
He opened his eyes.
Those eyes, once bloodshot from endless slaughter, were now as clear as mirrors, holding the depth of one who had seen through life and death.
"At last... it's done!"
His cracked lips parted slightly, and a voice as hoarse as scraping sandpaper echoed through the secret chamber.
Immediately afterward, a majestic, mighty voice thundered through his mind.
[Asura Nine Trials, Second Trial: Slaughter Body Tempering, completed!] [Reward: Asura God affinity increased by 15%, Soul Power increased by 5 levels! Total affinity: 30%.]
As before, the details of the Third Trial did not immediately appear.
As the blood-red light enveloping Lu Xuan gradually faded...
A gentle yet immense surge of divine power flowed into his limbs and every part of his body.
Soothed by this power, the bloody lines covering him like cracks in shattered porcelain miraculously healed and faded at great speed.
At last, his body returned to a perfect, flawless state.
Feeling the newborn power surging like an ocean within him, Lu Xuan quickly calculated in his mind.
78 + 5 = 83.
In other words...
He had now crossed the threshold of eight rings and needed to absorb his Eighth Soul Ring!
The instant this thought arose...
A strange blood-red orb abruptly appeared in midair within the secret chamber, hovering quietly above Lu Xuan's head.
It radiated a terrifying pressure that made his heart tremble.
It was a God-bestowed Soul Ring!
Before Lu Xuan could ready himself, the Asura God Sword, silent beside him, suddenly moved.
Without the slightest warning, it aimed its broad blade at the blood-red orb and smacked it hard!
"Crack-"
The orb shattered instantly.
It became a blood-red mist so dense it would not disperse, tightly enveloping Lu Xuan.
Violent energy instantly surged into his meridians.
"Holy shit! If you're giving me a Soul Ring, at least do it properly!"
Assailed by the sudden, excruciating pain, Lu Xuan could not help cursing aloud.
Getting stuck with a speechless "examiner" like this was eight lifetimes' worth of rotten luck!
It explained none of the rules, leaving him to stake his life on figuring everything out himself.
And now, look at this.
Even with something as life-threatening as absorbing a Soul Ring, it forced the transaction on him.
It would not even give him a countdown to prepare!
Complaints were complaints.
Lu Xuan dared not delay in the slightest.
He immediately held his breath and focused, guiding this enormous energy through his body with all his strength.
As time passed, he gradually absorbed every last wisp of blood mist in the secret chamber.
Hum-!
With a hum that shook the soul...
A dazzling orange Soul Ring, radiating terrifying pressure...
Slowly rose from beneath Lu Xuan's feet and circled his body.
A Ferocious Beast-level Soul Ring over 200,000 years old!
Feeling the terrifying power within him, Lu Xuan slowly exhaled a breath of stale air.
Although he had absorbed this top-tier God-bestowed Soul Ring, his Soul Power had already reached the extremely high level of 83.
His Soul Power Level did not make a substantial leap as a result.
Instead, it became thoroughly stabilized at this realm.
Before you continue