Another hundred and fifty years passed.
During those years, Zhou Qing followed his earlier plan and continued plundering the True God and first-tier True Immortal prisoners.
Considering that both the true body and the Second Primaltwin of his Wu Xian avatar had third-tier Jindans on the Qi Refining Path, he first targeted True Immortal Qifeng, who possessed the Waterflame Jindan Refining Technique, a method for improving Jindans.
Faced with Zhou Qing's long-range harassment, True Immortal Qifeng ran out of magic power in less than ten years and bowed his head in submission.
This did not surprise Zhou Qing.
By his calculations, a True God prisoner could generally withstand his harassment for anywhere from seventy to a hundred years with divine power.
A first-tier True Immortal like True Immortal Qifeng fared much worse. First-tier True Immortals had to use magic treasures to defend themselves, so they consumed magic power far faster than True Gods consumed divine power and could hold out for no more than a dozen years or so.
After obtaining the Waterflame Jindan Refining Technique, Zhou Qing continued plundering the other prisoners.
True Gods and first-tier True Immortals were no longer minor figures in the Nine Directions Chaos Kingdom, so Zhou Qing had heard a little about quite a few of the prisoners among them.
Thus, he knew some basic information about certain prisoners: which True Gods had mastered precious divine abilities, which first-tier True Immortals possessed astonishing wealth, and which True Gods and True Immortals had backgrounds that reached the heavens.
Armed with this information, Zhou Qing could plunder the prisoners with clearer targets in mind, rather than wandering aimlessly like Ji Ning.
He focused his efforts first on prisoners who were relatively weak but had astonishing wealth and backgrounds.
Such prisoners were often worth a fortune and had a much stronger will to live, making them more inclined to compromise with Zhou Qing.
Following this approach, Zhou Qing plundered nearly a hundred True Gods and first-tier True Immortals over those hundred and fifty years, bringing him a vast fortune.
In terms of wealth, he was confident he now ranked among the richest in the Three Realms.
During this time, Zhou Qing also sent his Wu Xian avatar's Second Primaltwin to the World Prison to cultivate the Eighteen Fiendgods of Taowu.
After cultivating the Eighteen Fiendgods of Taowu and gaining avatars, the Wu Xian avatar's Second Primaltwin became much better at preserving his life and more efficient at comprehending the Dao.
At the same time, on the strength of his contribution in discovering the Annihilation Dark Gold mine, he took a million jin of Nine Flame Paste from the Daoist Sect's treasury.
Needless to say, this was to cultivate the Waterflame Jindan Refining Technique.
The Waterflame Jindan Refining Technique, a method for improving Jindans, required two chaos marvels: Nine Flame Paste and Ice Heart Marrow.
He had obtained the Nine Flame Paste from the Daoist Sect, so he was only missing the Ice Heart Marrow.
But unlike the relatively common Nine Flame Paste, Ice Heart Marrow was exceedingly rare in the chaos near the Three Realms. Only the Moonlit Pool had a certain quantity.
That was no trouble, however. Zhou Qing had already planned to visit the Moonlit Pool before breaking through to True God.
The Fiendgod Body Refining method he currently cultivated, the Sudden Enlightenment Meditation Sutra, only went as far as the Ancestor God stage. He would have to look elsewhere for methods for the World God stage and beyond.
And the Moonlit Pool happened to contain a Fiendgod Body Refining method called the Withered World God, which led straight to the perfection of the World God stage.
The Netherworld, Fengdu City, the Six Paths of Reincarnation.
While the true body of Zhou Qing's Wu Xian avatar plundered prisoners in the World Prison, his Second Primaltwin had been comprehending the Dao beside the Six Paths of Reincarnation.
Over those hundred and fifty years, with the aid of the Six Paths of Reincarnation and the Nine-Layer Chaos Restriction, his comprehension of the Dao had improved greatly.
His Time Power in particular had risen from the first layer to the third.
After combining third-layer Space Power with third-layer Time Power, he felt that its might was barely comparable to the fourth layer of a Primordial Power with weak offensive strength, such as Nine Nether Power-that is, might equivalent to the very peak of Empyrean Gods and True Immortals.
That was no small improvement.
Although he had been able to reach the very peak of Empyrean God and True Immortal combat strength for a short time before, he had relied on Heartforce and a divine ability that unleashed a burst of divine power.
Once his Heartforce and divine power were exhausted, he could no longer maintain that level of combat strength, and his staying power was abysmal.
But Primordial Powers such as Space Power and Time Power were different. They came from the vast Chaos Universe and were virtually inexhaustible.
That meant Zhou Qing could maintain combat strength at the very peak of Empyrean Gods and True Immortals for a long time.
However, his greatest gain over these years was not raising Time Power to the third layer, but...
At this thought, Zhou Qing could not help raising his right hand.
A strand of brilliant light could be seen flowing from the tip of his right index finger.
It was none other than first-layer Power of Time and Space!
The next moment, with a thought from Zhou Qing, the strand of Power of Time and Space at his fingertip shot out like lightning and vanished into the distant void.
But Zhou Qing, whose Heartforce enveloped the Netherworld, saw that on a desolate mountain in the Netherworld, the strand of Power of Time and Space flashed out of the void and landed on the mountain.
A violent explosion followed. A few breaths later, Zhou Qing saw that the mountain had been reduced to powder by the rampaging strand of Power of Time and Space, and a bottomless pit had appeared in its place.
Zhou Qing nodded in satisfaction at the sight.
As expected of the Power of Time and Space. The first layer alone was comparable to the second layer of other Primordial Powers.
Just after Zhou Qing had demonstrated the results of his work, he suddenly felt time and space shift around him.
What was this?
He instinctively started to resist, but then he heard an old man's voice.
"Do not resist. I will impart the remaining three parts of Time and Space to you."
As soon as the words ended, before Zhou Qing could respond, he was taken away.
Meanwhile, in an inconspicuous minor world in the Three Realms, an old man was fishing from a boat on a river that stretched for a thousand li.
After an unknown amount of time, a fish finally took the old man's bait.
Just as he was about to lift his fishing rod, his hand suddenly trembled, frightening away the fish he had just hooked.
The fish he had nearly caught escaped, but the old man remained expressionless and merely murmured, "That boy Wu Xian has disappeared..."
Indeed, this old man fishing was Elder Yuan, a mighty figure famous throughout the Three Realms. He could also be called Heart God General.
Ever since discovering Zhou Qing's talent, he had been watching him, preparing to find an opportunity to try to control this newly risen disciple of a Daoist Sect leader.
Zhou Qing's sudden disappearance naturally caught his attention. After a brief investigation, he looked thoughtful.
"Interesting, this fluctuation of time and space... it seems to be Bodhi's..."
Seeing that Zhou Qing had become connected to another of the people he paid particular attention to, Elder Yuan smiled meaningfully.
After Patriarch Bodhi took him away, Zhou Qing felt dazed for a moment, then sensed the dense power of chaos around him.
Where was this?
He looked around and discovered that he had arrived on a chaos star.
"Taixu, look here."
At that moment, Zhou Qing suddenly heard the old man's voice again.
Following the sound, he saw an old man with white hair and a white beard on a small mountain in the distance.
From what the old man had said, Zhou Qing guessed that he was Patriarch Bodhi, a mighty figure famous throughout the Three Realms.
"Senior."
Zhou Qing went over to Patriarch Bodhi and immediately bowed.
"Mm, in a mere hundred and fifty years, you have taken your first steps on the Path of Time and Space. Your talent truly is extraordinary."
Patriarch Bodhi looked at the man before him with a satisfied expression.
Then he came straight to the point. "I am very satisfied with your talent. I happen to be in need of an inheritor of my Path of Time and Space. Would you be willing to take me as your master?"
"Greetings, Master."
Since Daoist Sanqing and Patriarch Bodhi had already agreed on this, Zhou Qing did not think much about it and immediately performed the rites of discipleship.
"Good, good, good. Rise."
Patriarch Bodhi smiled.
"To guard against ears on the other side of the wall, I brought you here to the boundless chaos. Only here can I feel at ease passing on to you everything I know related to time and space."
Zhou Qing understood what Patriarch Bodhi meant.
The Lord of Heart Demons had merged with the Heavenly Dao and was everywhere. If the method were taught in the Three Realms, there was a strong chance the Lord of Heart Demons would leak it to the Seamless Gate.
However, Zhou Qing felt that it was not the Seamless Gate that coveted Patriarch Bodhi's time and space method most, but Heart God General.
Heart God General was, after all, a peak Ancestor God with very discerning eyes. Even he drooled over Patriarch Bodhi's time and space method, enough to show how precious it was.
Next, Patriarch Bodhi spent the night teaching Zhou Qing the entirety of the Time and Space method.
Time and Space had four parts in all. He had already studied the first, Spirit Terrace, which mainly dealt with the basics of the Path of Time and Space, such as how time and space fused.
The second part, called Slanting Moon, dealt with the mysteries of the second and third layers of the Power of Time and Space.
The third, called Square Inch, dealt with the mysteries of the fourth layer of the Power of Time and Space.
The final fourth layer, called Three Stars, was the true essence of the Time and Space technique and expounded the mysteries of the fifth layer of the Power of Time and Space.
As expected of the foremost master of time and space in the Three Realms.
After learning the full scope of the Time and Space method, Zhou Qing felt deep admiration for Patriarch Bodhi's attainments in time and space.