Chapter 9 - Call

As he focused on circulating the technique, Han Zhen felt his entire body vibrate with an unfamiliar but exhilarating frequency. The energies that flowed through him began to surge in an unstoppable torrent, like magma coursing through his veins.

Heat radiated from his body, and he felt his flesh, his bones, even his skin, transforming with every passing moment. The sheer intensity of the transformation was unlike anything he had ever experienced.

As the process continued, a strange sensation washed over him. Deep within his soul, he felt an inexplicable call, a pull from something distant.

His eyes snapped open, and his gaze, almost instinctively, turned towards a certain direction. . It was a subtle but unmistakable feeling, something deep within him was drawn to that place.

"That direction…"

The pull seemed to be coming from... the Demon-Sealing Burial Grounds.

"Yi Lan…"

He could feel her presence, a faint resonance that echoed through his soul, but it was far too weak to offer any clarity.

His strength was not enough to understand the source of it, and that weakness frustrated him.

Why did you die, Lan'er? he thought to himself. What did you leave behind?

But these thoughts, though heavy, were not enough to distract him for long. He shook his head and refocused his mind on the task at hand, his cultivation.

He needed power, and the only way to gain that was through practicing the Primordial Essence Art. He withdrew from his internal contemplation and returned to the technique, determined to push forward.

As he continued the cultivation, something extraordinary began to happen.

A faint white light appeared on his skin, a glowing aura that seemed to hum with an otherworldly energy. He could feel the transformation within him, the opening of the door to a new stage of his life.

For the first time, Han Zhen felt a profound shift within himself. This was true cultivation, power drawn from the depths of his being rather than borrowed from external sources. His body, now full of vitality and energy, had officially entered the Divine Body stage.

From the ancient scroll's teachings, he knew that the Primordial Essence Art was divided into four levels, and he had only taken his first step.

The Divine Body, the initial level, was further broken into four sub-stages: Primary, Intermediate, Advanced, and Peak.

These corresponded to the foundational realms of martial arts in the Holy Firmament: Spirit Awakening, Essence Refinement, Mystic Sea, and Celestial Gathering.

Right now, Han Zhen stood at the Primary level of the Divine Body, equivalent to a martial artist in the Spirit Awakening Realm. But cultivation realms alone did not dictate true strength. In the eyes of ordinary practitioners, he had only just begun, but Han Zhen was far from ordinary.

His soul carried the wisdom of countless lifetimes, and every step he took was built upon a foundation of deep understanding and battle-hardened experience.

Others might struggle for years to reach this stage, yet he advanced effortlessly, as if unlocking doors he had once walked through before.

His rapid progress wasn't just due to his knowledge, it was also fueled by the immense energy he had accumulated from consuming rare elixirs over lifetimes.

Still, he wasn't yet at his peak. As he continued his practice, he felt the energy drain as the residual elixir power in his body slowly faded. It became more difficult to further temper his body using just his blood and qi.

After a while, Han Zhen realized that he couldn't continue without external assistance, at least for now.

He reluctantly opened his eyes and tested his strength.

Circulating a wisp of vitality through his body, he focused on his fingertips, where the energy gathered.

"What a pure energy!" Han Zhen whispered to himself, marveling at the physical force that surged through him.

He flicked his fingers, releasing the energy he had gathered. The energy shot out like an arrow, piercing through the floor with incredible force, leaving behind a deep hole.

The floor, hard as it was, felt as soft as tofu under the impact. Han Zhen was amazed, despite his top-tier cultivation in his past life, the raw power he felt now was beyond anything he had experienced before.

But despite the overwhelming power, a sense of frustration lingered. The Primordial Essence Art was a powerful cultivation method, but it had a significant drawback: it required rare treasures to supplement the process.

Without these treasures, he could only rely on his own blood and qi, which made each practice session limited in duration and effectiveness.