Forty Millenniums of Cultivation
chapter-576

At midnight, deep below the temple of techniques, inside Xiong Wuji's personal training chamber…

Bright silver starry brightness was blinking vaguely on the Black Star Stone floor that was as deep and dark as ink, as if the night sky had been reversed and paved on the ground.

Li Yao was standing right on the 'night sky'. He was wearing a pair of pure white linen pants, and his upper body was naked. His eyes were half close, his breath long and stable. Spiritual gas leaked through the pores all over his body and spread out like ripples. The furthest had reached more than thirty meters away.

The field of spiritual gas around him was now 77 meters in diameter, suggesting that he was in the 77th level of the Refinement Stage!

Li Yao suddenly opened his half-closed eyes and took a deep breath. His chest rose high, almost expanding to double its size.

All the air inside the training chamber seemed to be absorbed by him!

As he took in the air, the spiritual gas around his body also marched at his heart unstoppably under the motivation of his muscles and veins!

Crushing the Black Spider Death Curse with spiritual gas of the 77th level!

The black tattoo on Li Yao's chest was writhing and wriggling like snakes that were burnt by fire. It was fleeing toward the deeper part of his heart with haste!

Li Yao grunted and fell to one knee, smashing a tile of the floor into pieces, before he vomited a mouthful of black blood.

The splashing blood shivered like an evil creature and did not die down for a long time.

Still can't.

But the Black Spider Death Curse has been somewhat moved. I can sense its… fear!

Li Yao grimaced and stopped attacking. He dispersed his spiritual gas evenly around his body to nurture his muscles and veins.

Although the previous trial had not worked out, the reaction of the Black Spider Death Curse had given him new hope. He would definitely be able to break through all the shackles as long as the spiritual gas inside his body was stronger!

Xiong Wuji's surprised voice came over. "One month ago, I never would've believed that anybody could break into the 77th level of the Refinement Stage from the 14th level, nor would I have expected that a qi-trainer in the 77th level could heavily wound Xiong Zhenzhen and almost draw with Shi Meng."

Li Yao lowered his head, watching the tattoo on his chest reappearing, as he replied confidently, "My capability was close to the peak of the Building Foundation Stage in the beginning. Gauged in the metrics of Iron Plateau, it was well above the 90th level of the Refinement Stage. It's just that my heart has been locked by the Black Spider Death Curse, and I cannot liquefy my spiritual energy.

"However, my brain, my limbs, and all my internal organs except for my heart are all in the Building Foundation Stage.

"So, I did not break into the 77th level of the Refinement Stage in the past month; I merely trained myself crazily in the qi-trainers' way and learned to wield the same strength inside my body in a different form!

"It's a shame that one month is still too short. If I had three months, I might have been able to reach strength equivalent to the peak of the Building Foundation Stage while at the Refinement Stage. Chances are that I would have made it into the 95th level of the Refinement Stage or even higher!"

Li Yao was enticed by the idea.

Now that he was in the 77th level of the Refinement Stage, he had sensed clearly that his combat ability was not far from when he was in the high level of the Building Foundation Stage.

Based on the deadly skills and the technique to release his killing intent that he had learned in the Titan Illusionary Land, together with the instantaneous damage when his spiritual gas burst out, his combat ability was even surpassing that of the old days.

He pondered for a long time and concluded that, although he seemed to be at a lower Cultivation level right now, he had in fact only switched to a different combat mode!

Manipulating the spiritual energy in the gas form was one combat mode, and manipulating that in the liquid form was another. There were no rules that the latter was necessarily stronger than the former.

But Li Yao was still desperate to know how strong he would become if when he was able to switch between the two combat modes freely at will or even combine them into one after he resolved the Black Spider Death Curse!

Thinking about that, Li Yao said earnestly, "Thank you very much, Chief Xiong. I don't think every native of Iron Plateau would be so open-minded and unbiased as to provide all their secret training techniques generously for a space resident!"

Xiong Wuji smiled casually. "The apocalypse is coming. The more top warriors we have in our tribe, the more likely we will be able to survive. In the critical times of life and death, prejudice is the least of my concerns.

"Moreover, it was quite a fair deal that we made. The modification plans of sonic swords and Wolf Fangs that you offered left a deep impression on the refiners in the weapon factory. They said that the overall combat ability of the tribe will be significantly increased when the new weapons are manufactured and equipped.

"Your contribution in that regard alone is enough for me to trade any secret techniques with you."

Li Yao shook his head slightly.

They were both well aware that the value of the secret arts was not the most important factor in the exchange of knowledge. The most important factor was that, in the eyes of Iron Plateau natives, the techniques of qi-trainers were supreme and unparalleled. Xiong Wuji had definitely risked a lot of things and held back tremendous pressure when he decided to let an outsider learn their ultimate secrets before he knew enough about him.

Li Yao stared at him in the eyes and said solemnly, "Chief Xiong, thank you for your trust. Tomorrow, you will know that you've made the right call."

Xiong Wuji smiled and said, "Tell me, Li Yao. Are Cultivators in space all like you?"

Li Yao lowered his head. It took him quite a long time to consider the question.

When Li Yao raised his head again, there was delight deep down his eyes, as he observed, "There are countless Cultivators in space. Of course, their personalities are different. Some of them are brave, some craven; some are selfish, some altruistic. I can't tell which personality has the advantage in number.

"However, I have encountered many people who are like me. A great many of them."

Xiong Wuji said, "That will be great."

He raised his head and gazed at the dark ceiling. His eyes seemed to be piercing dozens of floors over his head into the sky and capturing the shining stars. He was apparently deep in thought, but there was no telling what he was thinking of.

Right then, with a 'BAM' sound, the door of the training chamber was bashed open, and a thin young man staggered inside.

It was Wu Mayan!

The hair all over his body was trembling. Even his teeth were clattering. It took him forever before he summoned enough strength and shouted in a voice that was entirely different from usual, "Father Xiong, you said that I would be allowed to join the battle against the apocalypse as long as I completed the training plan that Uncle Sand Scorpion arranged for me. You won't go back on your word, will you?"

Xiong Wuji was dazed. "You've completed it?"

Wu Mayan grinned, his every tooth glittering, "I have! You can ask Master Fu Dong if you want. My movements were as standard as in a textbook, and I took absolutely no shortcuts—"

While he was talking, he suddenly faltered and fell backward to the ground. Snoring sounds came one second later.

Xiong Wuji looked at Li Yao and said, "I thought that the training plan you arranged for him was incompletable."

Li Yao frowned as he stared at the young man who was crouching on the ground and replied, "It is."

…

The next day at noon, the sun was hot, and the sandstorm was raging.

"Haha. The young genius Wu Mayan finally gets to play his part in the battle of the apocalypse now! Father Xiong was the best warrior of the six tribes of Iron Plateau. I'm going to surpass him and become the new best warrior of Iron Plateau in the future!"

Wu Mayan danced excitedly on his single tank and almost fell off. Two flags of the Furious Bears Tribe were fluttering behind the vehicle.

Li Yao was driving a single tank next to him. The tank had been added with the shells of the Emperor Sand Scorpions.

They were the trophies that he had gotten when he saved Wu Mayan.

The curved shells of the Emperor Sand Scorpions could make the surface of the single tank streamlined and reduce the friction of the wind. They could also protect the key parts so that they would not be affected by the sand in the desert.

At first glance, the single tank was an Emperor Sand Scorpion that was lurking in the sand. The rams at the front of the vehicle had been replaced by two giant scorpion claws, which protruded out from the two sides of the tank.

At the rear of the single tank, two scorpion tails were raised high and aimed at the front.

They were two True Qi cannons decorated with shells from the tails of the Emperor Sand Scorpions as if they were real scorpion tails.

The awe-inspiring single tank made Li Yao look intimidating and dominating. Wu Mayan also found it difficult to move his eyes away from it.

Li Yao had promised that he would craft an even better one for him after the battle of the apocalypse.

Single tanks were fastest. A bunch of iron knights were charging in the lead like the sharpest arrowheads.

Behind them, smoke was soaring like a sandstorm. Earsplitting fulminations of spiritual gas made the ground slightly tremble.

Thousands of True Qi tanks, carrying tens of thousands of qi-trainers, turned the desolate land into a simmering ocean.

In the middle of the pack were many enormous True Qi beasts that were almost twenty meters tall. They were like moving fortresses with countless exhaust tubes standing behind them from which dragons of smoke were rushing.

Many other heavy True Qi tanks were carrying large, fully-enclosed iron boxes. Nonstop bashing sounds could be heard from the boxes, as if the most ferocious animals had been locked in them!

The Furious Bears Tribe only had a population of several million, and yet there were tens of thousands of qi-trainers among them, meaning that one person in every hundred people had the opportunity to become a qi-trainer.

Such a ratio was much higher than the odds of ordinary people in the outside world awakening their spiritual roots. It was a result of being eliminated and filtered in the harsh environment for five thousand years.

The qi-trainers marched forward toward northwest like a raging tide. The team made of ordinary fighters was some distance away from them and formed the second defense line.

They were all the adults in the tribe. Although they were not qi-trainers, the tall and strong Iron Plateau natives could still wield simple True Qi weapons with the help of True Qi containers. They were responsible for catching the small fries that luckily escaped the battle formation at the front.

In the unlikely scenario that the qi-trainers failed, they would fight until there were none of them, too.

The apocalypse cloud in the sky of the northwest looked entirely different from several days ago. The colors had dimmed, and the arms formed by the cloud were slithering like the limbs of a giant beast. The size of the cloud was larger, and it looked like it had already consumed a corner of the sky. The black hole in the middle had expanded, too. From the center of the black hole, thousands of dazzling electric arcs were unleashed. They seemed to be piercing into everyone's heart!

"Come on. Let's fight!"

The qi-trainers of the Furious Bears Tribe roared, laughed, and screamed. They accelerated the vehicles below them to the highest speed and almost blew them into pieces as they charged at the apocalypse cloud like a whirlwind!