Cultivation: Start From Simplifying Martial Arts Techniques

The tendrils of flesh carried a bone-chilling coldness that made Chen Fei’s entire face feel completely stiff.

Yet colder than his face was Chen Fei’s heart.

Just moments ago, he had narrowly avoided disaster. If he hadn’t reacted in time, his true self would have stepped into this place.

The reason Chen Fei had been so cautious, using his consciousness, his phantoms, and even summoning clones from Thousand Geese City, was precisely because he feared the unknown dangers in this space.

Chen Fei had layered his defenses heavily, even stacking several layers in his soul.

However, such defenses were effective only against opponents of the same realm. Against someone slightly above, like a practitioner of the Sun Moon Realm, this method of defense would only prolong Chen Fei’s survival by a few moments at best.

As for realms higher than the Sun Moon Realm, Chen Fei’s defense was akin to paper.

Despite all the assessments that suggested no immediate danger, Chen Fei’s true self still hesitated to take risks.

Life was his own, and methods like Blood Rebirth were only useful if he couldn’t escape in time, merely delaying the enemy’s destruction of him.

Because of this bottom line in his mindset, when Chen Fei felt confident enough to allow his true self to enter, he immediately sensed something was amiss and promptly activated the true spirit within the Xuanyuan Sword.

In the sea of consciousness of Chen Fei’s clone, there also resided the Xuanyuan Sword, but the quantity of true spirits within depended entirely on how much Chen Fei’s soul could bear.

The soul in Chen Fei’s clone could handle only slightly more true spirits than in his phantoms, naturally unable to bear much of the Xuanyuan Sword’s true power.

Otherwise, if Chen Fei’s clone had been here for so long, it wouldn’t have taken until now to sense that something was wrong.

If it were Chen Fei’s true self here, he could likely have immediately broken through the illusions with the Xuanyuan Sword’s true spirit. But whether he broke through or not seemed to make little difference.

They were already in this space with nowhere to escape.

Whispers continued to echo in Chen Fei’s clone’s ears. The true spirit of the Xuanyuan Sword in his sea of consciousness flickered, while in Chen Fei’s true self at the Corpse Cliff Mountain, various illusions appeared before his eyes.

Ripples spread across the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele. Despite the attempt of the flesh-eye’s power to influence Chen Fei through the void, urging his true self to step into the stele.

If even the clone could momentarily break through the illusion, how could Chen Fei’s true self possibly be deceived?

Moreover, with a void separating them, even though the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele served as a conduit, the power of the flesh-eye was greatly diminished.

In the unknown space, Chen Fei’s clone looked up directly at the flesh-eye.

“Hum!”

In Chen Fei’s clone’s soul, it seemed a storm had stirred. He involuntarily took a step back, his breath decreasing significantly.

Just now, Chen Fei finally saw the full appearance of this flesh-eye.

It really was just an eyeball, with a diameter of over ten meters. Chen Fei’s clone was smaller than even one of its twisted tendrils.

The Xuanyuan Sword trembled violently in his sea of consciousness. Chen Fei’s clone used all his strength to control the true spirit of the Xuanyuan Sword, maintaining his consciousness.

But Chen Fei knew that he couldn’t hold on like this for long.

This flesh-eye didn’t need to do much. Its simple gaze alone made Chen Fei feel like he was losing control of his body.

Chen Fei’s clone stepped back with his right foot, using his innate teleportation skill, instantly disappearing in front of the flesh-eye.

When he reappeared, Chen Fei’s clone was already in front of the collapsed buildings.

While everything else was desolate, the buildings hadn’t turned to dust.

In the rotting wood, the maggots saw Chen Fei appear and opened their sharp mouthparts, silently roaring at him.

Fourth-Tier beings—these maggots in the rotting wood had such a realm, which was simply incredible.

It seemed Chen Fei’s current clone might not be able to hold on much longer.

It wasn’t because of those maggots, but because of the gaze from that flesh-eye just now.

Despite the protection of the Xuanyuan Sword’s true spirit, as mentioned earlier, there was too little soul and thus too little Xuanyuan Sword’s true spirit. At this moment, Chen Fei could clearly sense that a contamination had already wrapped around his clone.

Completely integrated with the body and the divine palace, if it weren’t for the Xuanyuan Sword’s true spirit, Chen Fei wouldn’t have been able to perceive that he had long been contaminated.

Bending down, Chen Fei grabbed two pieces of rotting wood that the maggots hadn’t crawled on. He tried to teleport, but found himself unable to move—the rotting wood was too heavy.

Setting down one piece of wood, Chen Fei disappeared in the next moment, reappearing in front of the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele.

Chen Fei threw the rotting wood in his hand into the stone stele and instinctively looked back.

In the sky, densely packed flesh-eyes, numbering in the hundreds, filled the sky.

These flesh-eyes completely obscured the entire sky, their tendrils swaying in the wind, sending chills down one’s spine.

With just one flesh-eye possessing power of fifth order or higher, what kind of place was this with so many flesh-eyes?

Why did the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele teleport people to such a bizarre scene?

Seemingly aware that Chen Fei’s clone couldn’t leave here at all, these flesh-eyes allowed Chen Fei to do as he pleased, silently watching.

A gentle breeze blew, and Chen Fei’s clone turned into ashes, dissipating into nothingness.

The Dragon Elephant Stone Stele rippled slightly, then the spiritual light dispersed.

At Corpse Cliff Mountain, Chen Fei closed the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele directly.

Just like the altar at the Thousand Feathers Alliance, if the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele weren’t strong enough, those flesh-eyes couldn’t have been transported over. Otherwise, the Middle Continent would have truly fallen into its darkest hour right now.

Compared to the arrival of the Black Divine, even the Black Divine wasn’t a big deal.

After all, now that the Black Divine’s origin was damaged, its strength was only at the fourth order. It would take some time to reach the fifth order.

But hundreds of mysterious Fifth-Tier entities, in the Boundless Sea, were capable of challenging even gods.

Chen Fei slowly exhaled a breath of relief. The outside world was too dangerous.

Chen Fei looked down at the rotting wood at his feet. Trading such a piece of rotting wood for an clone at the initial stage of the Mountain Sea Realm, he wasn’t sure if he had gained or lost.

However, for the time being, Chen Fei wouldn’t open this Dragon Elephant Stone Stele again.

Unless this rotting wood was extremely valuable, forcing Chen Fei to reconsider!

A sword shadow appeared in front of Chen Fei, with landscapes and vegetation engraved on its blade—it was the Xuanyuan Sword.

A golden light enveloped the three-foot-long rotting wood in front of him. After a moment, the Xuanyuan Sword disappeared, leaving the wood devoid of any strange energy or insect eggs.

Chen Fei opened his celestial eye on his forehead and carefully inspected the rotting wood again, finding nothing unusual. He then grabbed it in his hand.

Among the collapsed buildings, there were many pieces of rotting wood. Chen Fei selected two that were completely free of insect damage.

However, absence of insect damage didn’t necessarily mean high value, as they could naturally be of lower grade, something that Fourth-Tier insects would scorn.

Despite this, Chen Fei ultimately chose this kind of wood.

What Chen Fei didn’t anticipate was that such small pieces of rotting wood would be so heavy. His clone couldn’t even move them, so he could only choose one in the end.

Chen Fei tapped the wood with his hand, eliciting a dull sound.

Though called wood, its texture differed greatly from ordinary timber—it had a metallic quality with the luster of jade.

In the space by the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele, the actual scenery was a barren land as far as the eye could see, completely dried up—a zone devoid of life.

Despite the rich spiritual energy of heaven and earth, there was always a lingering sense of death that couldn’t be dispelled.

In such an environment, for this piece of wood to retain its current state, one can imagine how extraordinary it must have been when its spiritual essence was still intact.

Previously, in front of those collapsed buildings, there weren’t many pieces of wood like this, just five or six at most that caught Chen Fei’s eye.

This was also why Chen Fei chose it—sometimes, quantity signifies rarity.

However, now that the spiritual essence within this spiritual material has completely dissipated, how can it be used?

Regardless of any celestial treasures or earthly treasures, the spiritual essence is crucial. Even spiritual treasures used by martial practitioners, if lacking in spiritual essence, are just scrap metal or may even turn to dust.

This wood, without its spiritual essence, is still very hard in texture, comparable to ordinary Fourth-Tier lower-grade spiritual materials.

But if it’s just that, its value is not great.

Chen Fei tried to draw in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth and infuse it into the wood, but the wood showed no response.

He then infused his own elemental force into it, causing a faint shimmer on the surface of the wood, but that was all, without any further changes.

Frowning slightly, Chen Fei pondered for a moment, then activated his talent Endless Regeneration, drawing in the unceasing flow of spiritual energy from the void, and then infused it into the wood.

Actually, whether it’s in the Boundless Sea or within the void, the difference in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth isn’t significant; at most, there’s a slight variance in purity.

With the infusion of the void’s spiritual energy at this moment, the piece of wood unexpectedly floated up on its own, its surface shimmering with flowing lights. Compared to the fleeting glimmer earlier, several beams of light now repeatedly circulated.

Chen Fei’s expression twitched slightly, surprised that this wood would react so strongly to the void’s spiritual energy.

A faint glow flickered at Chen Fei’s brow as he observed the wood. He noticed that despite the spiritual essence within the wood having long been exhausted, there seemed to be a trend of recovery.

However, this trend was very weak. The current response of this piece of wood seemed more like an innate reaction of the spiritual material itself to the void.

“To think it would be a spiritual material related to space, but unfortunately, it’s already damaged!”

Chen Fei’s mind flashed with a thought.

In the Boundless Sea, almost any spiritual material related to space was controlled by experts at the Sun Moon Realm level, because at that level, they began to attempt to comprehend the power of space.

Of course, merely understanding the rules of the Boundless Sea’s space was nothing compared to the intensity of the rules in that unknown space earlier. Even Sun Moon Realm experts would struggle to break through such rules, let alone comprehend them.

Chen Fei’s gaze shifted, and in the next moment, his figure disappeared, entering into the space’s rifts.

Within a few steps, he arrived before the thin film of the void. This time, he didn’t need to break through the void film; Chen Fei could already sense the calling of the Dragon Elephant Stone Stele.

Chen Fei lifted the piece of wood in his hand and pressed it against the thin film of the void.

With a tremor induced by his innate talents of Teleportation and Endless Regeneration, the wood penetrated into the void.

A tremendous force surged forth, but Chen Fei, experienced in such matters, quickly stabilized the wood.

As he watched the power of the void press down on the wood, causing more and more flowing lights to shimmer, a smile appeared on Chen Fei’s face.

Initially concerned that the wood might be crushed outright, Chen Fei now realized that to restore some semblance of functionality to this spiritual material, it had to be within the realm of the void.