Chapter 3 - The Blessed

After a successful attempt at absorbing qi, Nie Feng found himself filled with a newfound strength. If receiving the blessing made him healthy, this session of absorbing qi filled him with power.

Nie Feng feels like he could open the city gate with his bare hands alone. That said, he had been absorbing qi since noon and it was now nighttime.

Decided whether to find a place to spend the night or rush back to the city since this area was not that far. He chose to do the latter.

He could feel he had enough energy to do it. And after looking around to see the general direction of the city, he scampers toward a direction, feeling optimistic about the future.

If he ran at this pace, he could arrive at the city when it was almost daylight.

And after hours of running, the night sky was slowly turning bluish, and Nie Feng could see the city wall in the distance. He immediately sprinted towards the city gate.

••••••

Meanwhile, after blessing Nie Feng, Heaven had gone to a few other realms before finally stopping blessing more people. then He went back to the continent and starts to observe all the people he had blessed.

Heaven had been to all of the realms, choosing people and blessing them. This was just the start. There will be more to be blessed, but for now, one individual for each realm was enough.

Every single one of them had the same blessing and they started at the same starting point. The only thing that will set them apart would be their efforts in cultivation.

If one of them slacked, they will be left behind even though they wouldn't know it. Only time will tell them.

As Heaven observes all of them, some of them had absorbed enough qi to fill their dantian. While the majority of them are still doing their best in absorbing qi, only a handful of the rung still trying their best to meditate.

They might have the same blessing, but their comprehension ability differs for each person. Those who had a strong perception would acquire clearer images from Heaven's Blessing.

They were also the ones who had filled their dantian the fastest.

As for Nie Feng, even though he was one of the blessed with strong comprehension, he didn't immediately fill his dantian to the brim. Only Nie Feng knows why he didn't.

Years passed as Heaven observes all of the people he blessed. It was time for the second phase.

Most of them had reached the peak of the Qi Condensation stage while the rest varied. Some stayed at the early stage, some at the middle stage, and some are still at the late stage. The majority at the late stage still wants to advance, and only the minority doesn't want to.

But even if they didn't advance, their abilities are still above normal people and because of that, each of them had created legends in their respective realm.

As Heaven observe all of these, it was time to bless the second batch of people. Only those who had reached the peak receive enlightenment regarding the next stage.

Heaven went around the world and blesses 5 more individuals for each realm. Then he resumed observing the realms.

A few more years passed.

When the second batch of blessed individuals appears, all of the realms were shocked. They thought only one blessed existed. But it was natural since none of them was even aware that there were other realms. Since there was no path connecting to other realms, they didn't know that each realm has one blessed individual. Perhaps there was speculation about it, but in the end, it's just speculation.

If they know, they might not be so surprised.

Those who were previously at the peak of the Qi Condensation stage had a breakthrough to the Foundation Building stage.

In this stage, they need to refine their body. Each individual has a different way of refining their body, but the end goal was essentially the same, building a foundation for the future, hence the name.

At the moment, only a few had advanced since only a few years had passed since they received the enlightenment of the second stage.

And while they advance, those who had just been blessed were still in the process of condensing qi inside their dantian. None had reached the peak.

The first batch of the blessed was surprised to see the second batch appear. They thought they were the only ones. But soon they calmed down.

Only those who didn't advance started to panic since many of them knew this new batch of people will surpass them sooner or later. It was then they started to cultivate seriously since no one wanted to be left behind.

From this, Heaven found out that they need a stimulus for people to have the urgency to do something.

More years passed.

This time, those who had reached the peak of the second stage had been waiting for the knowledge of the third stage. Then, it arrived at the same time as the third batch of blessed individuals.

The third stage was the Core Formation stage. They must form a qi core inside the dantian. As for the third batch of blessed, there were ten people for each realm.

This time, the living beings weren't surprised, they were instead jealous since it wasn't them. Meanwhile, some of the blessed had caught on to a pattern, it was those who had reached the peak.

Every time they reached the peak of a stage, the knowledge for the next stage will come at the same time as the new batch of the blessed.

And although such were their thoughts, there were still some doubts. They have to reach the peak of this third stage to confirm their thoughts.

A few dozen years passed.

This time, those at the forefront of cultivation took a long time in reaching the peak of the third stage.

When they reached the peak, the knowledge for the next stage came along with the fourth batch of blessed individuals.

The fourth stage was the Nascent Soul stage. Break down the qi core and form the soul using their formless spirit. Each individual employs different ways of breaking down their core and forming the Nascent Soul.

And for the blessed individuals, there were a hundred people chosen this time. They multiplied tenfold. The blessed even started to gather and form their factions.

It also marked the era as the Era of the Blessed.

Then, those who reached the peak of the Nascent Soul stage took hundreds of years more compared to when they were at the core stage.

The fifth batch of blessed was also increased tenfold. Some of them chose to join the factions created by the blessed before them, while some chose to wander alone or with their group.

The fifth stage was the Soul Transformation stage. Nothing more was received other than to transform their soul to a higher state of existence.

For the fifth stage, more than a thousand years passed before one person managed to reach the peak of the Soul Transformation stage.

Heaven had been waiting for someone to reach the peak of this stage so he could finally release a new type of qi along with the knowledge for the next stage and the last batch of blessings.

Heaven had always been watching.

The earlier batch of people he had blessed had performed amazingly well. And now it was time for the next step of cultivation to be released.

Unfortunately, the Endless Plane couldn't contain this new type of qi since the realms there were not strong enough even though it has countless more realms than the Three Thousand Realms.

That said, The Three Thousand Realms were stronger, tougher, and more stable.

Heaven knew this. That's why Heaven only releases this new qi in the Three Thousand Realms. Those from the Endless Plane, Heaven had created something else for them.

The Gate.