Ocean World Stone, Breakthrough!

Qie Qiong's Spiritual Force quickly swept across the metal palace below.

As expected, he found reserves far greater than those of God of Vajra: mountains of extraordinary ores in every color, rare treasures of thunder, and... a full eighty thousand catties of Origin Stones.

There were even several scrolls recording deeper mysteries of thunder and knowledge of formations.

It seemed the account in God of Vajra's records was true: God of Extreme Thunder's ancestor had gained the greatest benefit.

A great many things here clearly weren't from this native world. They were things God of Vajra hadn't possessed.

Soon, his Dou Qi clones also sent messages one after another.

They had completely found the remaining core treasuries left behind by Fire God, God of Hurricanes, and Sea God, and were returning with their spoils.

The clones transformed into golden rainbows and flew toward Qie Qiong.

Bzz!

The golden light reached Qie Qiong and, without pausing at all, instantly merged into his body.

The sliver of his soul origin carried within the clones returned to his soul.

Along with it came the information he had previously been able to sense only vaguely.

Qie Qiong closed his eyes and focused for a moment, absorbing the information.

Especially the parts concerning the legacies of Sea God, Fire God, and God of Hurricanes.

"Quite a haul..." he murmured, and with a wave of his hand, several Space Rings floated before him.

Even just these Space Rings were worth several hundred million gold coins, if not more.

Of course, Qie Qiong had long since become a Transcendent. Mortal possessions had already lost all meaning in his eyes.

Qie Qiong's thoughts swept over the vast resources, enough to form a small mountain, as he slowly finished counting them.

Leaving aside the extraordinary materials whose value he couldn't accurately assess for now,

just the most straightforward wealth, Origin Stones, amounted to a hundred and forty thousand catties.

It was a fortune that a Saint Rank Transcendent in any Material World would basically be unable to amass in an entire lifetime.

A full hundred and forty thousand catties of Origin Stones, of which God of Extreme Thunder alone had contributed more than eighty thousand.

This also showed the gap between Extreme Thunder and the others.

This heaven-sent fortune was all Qie Qiong's now.

Waves stirred in his heart, and his thoughts churned.

With these resources, not only could his own Dou Qi quickly rise to Early Saint Rank, he could even raise his Dou Qi realm to Demigod.

There would also be more than enough to support his parents' cultivation.

Qie Qiong wasn't worried about his father, Qie Yunzhou. After all, he was a talent in his own right. He was only concerned that his mother might not keep up, but with these resources, they would be more than enough to make her a Sky Realm Transcendent.

Next came the mountains of extraordinary materials. The rest didn't matter; most importantly, in Sea God's Space Ring, he had found a strange jade stone with a distinct chunk missing.

It looked as though someone had bitten a piece off it.

The jade was entirely ocean-blue. Just looking at it made even Qie Qiong, a Saint Rank Transcendent with formidable self-control, want to take a bite out of it.

It was an instinct of life.

It was unmistakably an Ocean World Stone, which had appeared in the original novel.

"I wonder which is bigger, this World Stone or the one Dongbo Xueying obtained."

Qie Qiong hadn't expected the Extreme Thunder World to have nurtured an Ocean World Stone.

One World Stone alone was worth the equivalent of fifty thousand catties of Origin Stones, and it was priceless even at that.

This World Stone had the benefit of assisting cultivation and helping one break through bottlenecks.

Transcendents treated treasures that aided cultivation as precious as their lives.

Even Demigods would be tempted.

In the original novel, it was said to be steeped in water and drunk. But for Qie Qiong, he would probably have to take a bite while cultivating. Steeping it in water might maximize its benefits, but for Qie Qiong, that was too slow.

The Sea God Palace elder in the original novel had drunk it for more than a thousand years before reaching Peak Saint Rank, the same realm as Qie Qiong now.

A thousand years was too long for Qie Qiong, who was only in his twenties. He had no idea what realm he would have reached a thousand years later.

He would have to think carefully about what to do with this Ocean World Stone.

There were also the information-bearing scrolls and a formation set. He had looked it over; it was a formation for isolating auras.

That was also why the formation hadn't been used. After all, its owner was one of the most powerful people in this world, so there was no need to hide anything with a formation that isolated auras.

He picked up the records of the four again and compared them with Vajra's.

He confirmed the account of "mysterious outsiders descending from beyond the heavens, bringing Dou Qi seeds, and ultimately being besieged and killed." It matched God of Vajra's records.

His earlier guess had now been completely confirmed.

It had indeed been the work of the Space-Time Temple.

Those mysterious people really had come from the legendary Space-Time Temple.

They were a reincarnator team carrying out a mission.

This finally gave Qie Qiong a trace of a sense of crisis. All this time, he had kept his eyes on the small patch of land that was the Material World, but had forgotten that this world wasn't only the Material World.

There were even more powerful worlds beyond it. The appearance of the Space-Time Temple had served as a wake-up call.

"Space. I must grasp the rudiments of True Meaning of Space as soon as possible," Qie Qiong murmured inwardly.

He had to grasp the rudiments of True Meaning of Space as soon as possible. Otherwise, he would have absolutely no right to refuse a compulsory summons from the Space-Time Temple.

Only by becoming a Grade Two True Meaning Transcendent would he have the right to refuse the Space-Time Temple's summons.

The First Level of True Meaning of Metal was already a fairly powerful ability in the Material World.

But it wasn't even the most powerful force in the Material World, let alone in the Space-Time Temple.

If he wanted the leverage to negotiate or refuse when they tried to summon him by force, True Meaning of Space was the barrier he had to break through right now.

Next, once he finished dealing with matters in this Transcendent World, he would have to begin comprehending True Meaning of Space as soon as possible.

The deaths of the five native Saint Rank Transcendents had left behind not only mountains of Origin Stones and materials, but also this Transcendent World, where quite a few Sky Realm Transcendents still remained.

In Qie Qiong's eyes, these Sky Realm Transcendents needed to be dealt with immediately. After all, to mine the Origin Stones in this Transcendent World, he would need to summon people from his family.

But those people he summoned would lack the strength to do it, so these native Transcendents would have to be inconvenienced by dying.

After all, establishing a force and subduing them would be too troublesome. Transcendents were Transcendents, not as easy to control as mortals.

So their only value now was to disappear completely, ensuring that Qie Qiong's mining operations in the Extreme Thunder World would be absolutely safe and smooth.

He acted as soon as the thought arose.

Bzz!

His vast Spiritual Force probed the surroundings. Although Qie Qiong couldn't inspect the entire Transcendent World with a single thought,

he could search it bit by bit.

Those "Demigods" who still didn't know that their so-called "Deities" had all fallen

were like prey on an open plain, with nowhere to hide, before they could even react.

"Found you." Qie Qiong murmured. His figure abruptly disappeared from where he stood, turning into a golden streak that merged with space itself.

Qie Qiong's actions were like the most efficient scythe. He never said a word to those Transcendents.

From spotting his target to killing them, collecting the body, and leaving,

the entire process took no more than three breaths.

If the corpses hadn't still been of some use, he wouldn't even have bothered with that step.

The whole process was so fast it left one breathless. Often, in the blink of an eye, the pillar of a powerful force had vanished completely.

Fear spread through the Transcendent circles like a plague. They didn't know why the five "Deities" still hadn't descended, and could only wait quietly for death to come.

In just two days,

the twenty-three Sky Realm Transcendent powerhouses originally in the Extreme Thunder World had all been slaughtered by Qie Qiong.

If he hadn't spent some time searching for them, he wouldn't have needed nearly so long.

The entire power structure of Transcendents in the Extreme Thunder World had been knocked into the dust.

All that remained were Meteor Rank knights, along with even weaker tribal warriors and mortals.

Apart from Title Rank fighters, who could interfere with the Qie Clan's upcoming operations, everyone else posed very little threat.

Qie Qiong stood in the air and nodded with satisfaction. The purge was complete, and his worries for the future had been temporarily eliminated.

With a wave of his hand, a Golden Thunder Dou Qi clone took shape behind him.

This Dou Qi clone didn't even have any soul power. It was merely a pure Dou Qi clone, able to act only according to orders, and its strength was lower still—it was only comparable to a Sky Realm Transcendent.

This was also why Qie Qiong had needed to clear out those "Demigods."

Splitting off his soul would interfere somewhat with his upcoming cultivation.

The Dou Qi clone had a cold expression. Although it was only a Sky Realm Transcendent in strength, it was enough to suppress this broken world, which had lost its top combatants.

It flew toward the Origin Stone vein he had discovered over the past few days while searching for native Transcendents.

Having arranged all this, Qie Qiong had nothing left to keep him there.

He flew into the forest where the Space Gate was. His figure merged with the Space Gate, and the next moment, he appeared in the familiar abandoned mine tunnel of the Qie Clan's mine.

"Fang Yun." Qie Qiong's voice directly entered the mind of Fang Yun, who was working some distance away.

"Patriarch!" Startled by the sudden voice, Fang Yun shuddered all over, then hurried toward the abandoned mine tunnel.

"Gather the most loyal members of the Qie Clan's core knight corps, along with all the miners. Keep the numbers as high as possible," Qie Qiong ordered, quickly and clearly. "Prepare all the tools and supplies needed for high-intensity mining. Come here and assemble in one month."

"Yes! This subordinate will take care of it at once!" Fang Yun accepted the order without the slightest hesitation and went off.

He acted quickly. That was also why Qie Qiong had promoted him over the past few years.

Qie Qiong's figure flashed, and he headed toward the depths of the Qie Residence in Cloud Sea Prefecture City.

Soon, he was in the quiet chamber where he cultivated in seclusion.

He waved a hand, took out the array formation that isolated auras from among the spoils of war, and set it up inside the quiet chamber.

Now, it was time to begin his transformation.

He sat cross-legged and took out all the resources he would need.

"Now, let's begin." Qie Qiong's eyes burned with eagerness.

At the same time, Fang Yun began carrying out Qie Qiong's orders.

He issued the Qie Clan's order to assemble the miners. After that, all that remained was to wait for everyone to gather a month later.

As for the knight order, of course, they were the private soldiers the Qie Clan had maintained over the years. Their family had been a single line for a thousand years, and they had spent almost all their remaining resources on raising the knight order.

In those thousand years, the knight order had even produced Transcendent Knights!

Just ask around Cloud Sea Prefecture City—who wouldn't say a word in praise of the Qie family?

After all, the Qie family had few members to begin with. If their reputation had been any worse, even those one or two members who failed to live up to expectations wouldn't have survived until now.

An astonishing quantity of Origin Stones poured out, filling the quiet chamber in an instant.

The Heaven and Earth energy grew so dense that it was almost turning into a liquid mist.

A full fifty thousand jin of Origin Stones, glowing with a soft white light, were piled at the center.

"To break through to Saint Rank with the body, these are the provisions!" At a thought from Qie Qiong, a gigantic golden vortex formed and completely enveloped the hill of Origin Stones.

The pure energy was forcibly drawn out like a rushing flood, transforming into countless streams of white light that the golden vortex sucked into Qie Qiong's body.

"Ugh!" Even Qie Qiong's willpower couldn't stop him from letting out a muffled groan.

If he had absorbed it bit by bit, it wouldn't have been like this.

But ever since the intelligence about the Space-Time Temple had emerged, Qie Qiong could no longer afford to care about that.

A vast quantity of pure energy poured into every limb and bone, deeply tempering and evolving the level of his life essence.

Three full days and nights!

The hill of Origin Stones visibly shrank. Amid the Heaven and Earth energy, Qie Qiong's body grew stronger with every passing moment.

When the last trace of the core Heaven and Earth energy had been absorbed, the mighty torrent of energy in the quiet chamber finally subsided.

Saint Rank early-stage physical body, achieved!

At this moment, relying on the terrifying strength of his physical body alone, he was already strong enough to defeat an ordinary Saint Rank Transcendent.

With every gesture, his terrifying power made space itself tremble.

But this was only the beginning.

Qie Qiong took out the Ocean World Stone.

In the end, he had chosen to eat the World Stone directly. It was one of the best resources from a small Transcendent World, and it could greatly strengthen the essence of the soul.

Now that Qie Qiong was a Saint Rank Transcendent, there had already been few transcendent items capable of strengthening his soul.

If he advanced further and became a Demigod, then by that time, it would be hard to say whether even this Ocean World Stone would have as much as a tenth of its original effect on him.

As for saving it for the family, once he grew stronger, he would have even better resources. Besides, wasn't he himself the Qie Clan?

Looking at the Ocean World Stone before him, which already had a bite taken out of it, Qie Qiong instinctively felt a strong desire.

"Shhk!" Qie Qiong held his fingers together like a blade. Golden Light flashed at his fingertips, and without the slightest hesitation, he cut off about one-third of the Ocean World Stone.

He raised his hand and put the piece of Ocean World Stone, shimmering with a fantastical blue light, into his mouth.

An indescribable sensation instantly exploded through Qie Qiong's body and soul.

It was as if his soul had been struck hard.

An unprecedented clarity emerged in Qie Qiong's perception.

Countless insights into the True Meaning of Space and a deeper understanding of the True Meaning of Metal became clearer than ever as they were washed by the essence nurtured within this small Transcendent World.

Qie Qiong had a feeling that his speed of comprehension had increased by at least half compared to before.

One should not underestimate that half. He had already been a Saint Rank Transcendent, and half of his speed was an enormous change.

After his soul reached the limit of its transformation, a vast surge of energy still remained.

He guided this vast, refined energy into his dantian and qi sea.

Not a trace of the vast energy was wasted. He swiftly guided it toward a higher level, launching an assault.

That was right: Qie Qiong no longer needed to wait. With resources in abundance, he would break through to become a Demigod right now.

He had already reached the required level in his cultivation; he had simply lacked time and resources. But who could have imagined that the sudden appearance of a small Transcendent World would provide what he had been missing?