Meridian Connecting Realm, Great Restriction Land
The morning rays of sunlight shone brightly through the wooden windows of the room, landing on the ethereal face of Lin Xuanhao, his eyes closed as he cultivated.
After a few minutes, with another cracking sound spreading throughout his body, he finally entered the Ninth Stage of Body Forging Realm.
Feeling his strength being drastically improved, a small smile appeared on his face as he stood up lazily, stretching a bit before heading outside.
Today, he would leave the Liu Family Village for the Red Dragon City in the afternoon after breaking through to the Meridian Connecting Realm.
As he made his way outside to eat breakfast, he seemed to notice that the weather today wasn't as hot as it was yesterday.
Autumn is just around the corner. It's to be expected.
Soon enough, he got to Village Head Liu's place and sat down to eat.
A Body Forging Realm cultivator could survive without food and remain perfectly fine for a weeks easily, specially those at the peak of Body Forging Realm. While Meridian Connecting Realm cultivators only needed to eat and sleep once or twice a month.
However, Lin Xuanhao just wanted to taste the delicacies of the secular mortal world for once, which was why he decided to stay in the Liu Family Village in the first place.
Otherwise, he might have just found any random cave in the forest he came from and spent some time there to breakthrough to the Meridian Connecting Realm and then go to the cultivation world.
Another reason was that he needed to gather some information, which he gathered in just 3 days, as expected.
As he ate his breakfast, Village Head Liu suddenly came over to his side and asked, "The deity is leaving today. Does the deity have any further instructions for us?"
Hearing his words, Lin Xuanhao just shook his head lightly.
"The cultivation techniques I have imparted will be very useful to you. Perhaps we'll see eachother sometime again in the future."
As he said that, Village Head Liu pondered over his words before nodding in response.
After eating his fill, Lin Xuanhao went back to his room to continue cultivating.
He had to breakthrough to the Meridian Connecting Realm today!
As he sat down on the bed cross-legged, he closed his eyes and felt the Dao Fragment within his conscience.
The surrounding Spirit Qi rushed towards him as he cultivated, forging his body to the peak of Body Forging Realm and then prepare to breakthrough to the Meridian Connecting Realm.
A few hours passed just like that, and the sun was already high above in the sky by the time Lin Xuanhao finally achieved the peak of the Ninth Stage of Body Forging Realm.
Time to breakthrough.
Thinking of this, the Spirit Qi coating his body quickly seeped through his pores and orifices into the internal organs, bones, and most specifically, the first meridian.
The process of breaking through and progressing through the Meridian Connecting Realm was simple.
To enter the Meridian Connecting Realm, one had to infuse their first meridian with a strand of Spirit Qi, and after achieving it, they have successfully entered the Meridian Connecting Realm.
However, this process was extremely delicate, and caused many to fail if they were even a little unstable, causing their cultivation to fall or their meridian to burst in worse cases. They could even die with a simple mistake.
It was not just the Meridian Connecting Realm, but all the steps taken forward into the path of Immortal Cultivation were taken with utmost caution and fraught with dangers.
A small mishap could cause one their life.
However, as a former Immortal Emperor, this was nothing but child's play to Lin Xuanhao.
Immortal Emperors were omniscient beings who possessed all the knowledge in existence, understanding countless things that many of the greatest of Immortals didn't know about.
Even when he was no longer an Immortal Emperor, his past experiences and great knowledge of trillions of Immortal Years was still there.
Within mere moments, he successfully fused a strand of Spirit Qi into his first meridian.
*Whoosh!*
The howling wind swept over him from the open window, as if celebrating the return of an Immortal.
As the Spirit Qi strand completely fused into his meridian, Lin Xuanhao finally broke through to the First Stage of Meridian Connecting Realm!
His strength was dozens of times stronger than before, and he could now use Spirit Qi to fight as well.
Unfortunately, using the pure form of Spirit Qi to fight was quite inefficient as it was not the Spiritual Energy which could be manifested into physical form to attack or defend.
There were 9 meridians in the body of all creatures, and one could progress in the Meridian Connecting Realm by filling up each meridian with Spirit Qi, and then advance to the next stage by infusing another strand of Spirit Qi into the next meridian, repeating the process 9 times till they reached the peak of Meridian Connecting Realm.
Feeling the changes in his body, Lin Xuanhao stood up and stretched, looking outside only to find out that it was already almost past noon. He had to reach the Red Dragon City before night.
It didn't mean he was scared of spending the night in the Red Dragon Mountain Range, it was just that it would be far too troublesome.
Getting out of the house, he was greeted by rows of villagers waiting for him to come out.
It was true that he had saved their village from the bandits and even imparted them cultivation techniques. He was already a true deity before the entirety of the Liu Family Village.
All of them exchanged pleasantries with him and wished him luck, many offering some fresh fruits and other kinds of foods to take on his journey. However, Lin Xuanhao rejected them all as he knew how hard it must have been for them to even accommodate him in the last couple of days.
He couldn't ask for more. And besides, he was already in the Meridian Connecting Realm and could survive without food for weeks and even months.
Not to mention he would be eating in the Red Dragon City after arriving there, so he won't have to starve, either.
At this point, all of them were already standing at the entrance of the village, bidding farewell to Lin Xuanhao, including Village Head Liu and his family.
Lin Xuanhao's eyes caught the sight of Liu Chenfeng standing besides his mother, and he smiled at him warmly.
Liu Chenfeng was slightly stunned before smiling back. He knew that the deity before them had once said he was destined for greatness or something similar, and being a mature child, he naturally knew what that meant.
"I'll be back here after some time. If you can perfectly comprehend the entire cultivation technique I imparted to you, then I'll take you with me to cultivate. I wish you luck."
He said calmly, looking at Liu Chenfeng.
Even though as an Immortal Emperor, he had many subordinates and forces in the Immortal World which he or the people under him had created, he never had an actual disciple.
He was too focused on his own cultivation before becoming an Immortal Emperor and he just created many forces after becoming an Immortal Emperor, then entering a trillion Immortal Year long seclusion. He simply had no time to raise disciples.
But it was different now.
Hearing his words, Liu Chenfeng immediately became excited, but maintained a calm demeanor on the outside and nodded.
"I thank the deity for this great opportunity."
He said as he bowed slightly, cupping his fists.
Lin Xuanhao also nodded at him and then turned to look at Village Head Liu.
"I'll be off now."
He said while Village Head Liu also bowed slightly along with the rest of the villagers as a response.
"May you have a safe journey, deity."
All of them said in unison.
Lin Xuanhao nodded with a smile before starting to walk away towards the Red Dragon Mountain Range, which was around a hundred miles from the Liu Family Village, located beyond the forest where he had first awakened 3 days ago.
After walking a certain distance from the Liu Family Village, Lin Xuanhao's speed gradually increased with each step he took, crossing a distance of more than 15 feet with each step.
Soon, he arrived in the forest he was at before going to the Liu Family Village.
It was a normal forest consisting of normal animals and no Demon Beasts or such.
He ran through the forest without a worry in the world. Not like he would care if there were any Demon Beasts here.
He had learned from Village Head Liu that the only way of going to the Red Dragon Mountain Range was from this forest, called the Great Restriction Land which stretched out to more than 10 miles. It had bears and such animals roaming through it, so it was usually difficult for even the Imperial Army to cross it in some cases.