Witnessing Na Xinyi's phenomenally stellar victory lit a raging fire of competition within the hearts of many, fueled by envy, desire, and pride. Be it, man or woman, Chosen or Leader, Saintess or Hero, they were all invigorated by the triumphs of these exceptional women.
Some sought selfish goals in succeeding in their challenge, gaining fame and qualifications to court any Saintess here. Others were filled with a competitive desire to not fall behind in the upcoming era. Most were enthralled by their victories, believing their previous misconceptions about the difficulty of these so-called Entities weren't as high as they believed.
Therefore, as is typical with human nature, the confident and proud stepped forward with a resounding shatter. A dashing young man landed forcefully on stage, his robust aura gushing outwards, and his presence unmistakable!
"Chosen of Lu Golden Palace. Age: 97. Cultivation Realm: Astral Core. Cultivation Stage: Fourth. Entity Level: Mortal, Greater Realmlord."
While his age was underwhelming in comparison to Su Mei, Wu Baozhai, Xue Yifei, and Na Xinyi, his robust and firm aura alluded to his exceptional cultivation foundation; furthermore, the Lu Golden Palace was a Mystic-tier organization in the Twisted Earth Starfield(13th), and was led by three Highlords!
Earthly Saints aside, Highlords were the strongest beings in the public eye, and they drastically exceeded the Earthly Saints in numbers. Earthly Saints ruled entire Starfields while Highlords ruled Domains. Their strength wasn't that far off from the bottom four Noble Clans, so their reputation wasn't small at all!
The discussions surrounding this figure were unquestionably hyped. Some cultivators were even considering if this Chosen would one-shot or use less than ten exchanges to defeat their assigned entity! There were bets! Others cursed at the Chosen taking the tail-end of the spotlight, being very memorable.
"That's Lu Wenhai! I heard he acquired an Ever-Domain Pill from his father, so he should be able to execute World Armor. Without the advantage of World Pressure, this fight will be interesting." An elder of the Twisted Earth Starfield(13th) surmised with bright eyes.
"A Worldly Domain isn't limited to its Worldly Pressure, but you're right; it's up in the air to see how far this Entity will push him." Another chimed in, rubbing his chin excitedly.
"An Ever-Domain Pill? Hmm…"
Lu Wenhai was the picture of confidence. His posture was upright, his eyes glowed with spiritual light, and his aura was surging outwards. This Chosen seemed like a Chosen of the heavens.
"Do you wish to continue?
"Yes!" He accepted the challenge without any hesitation, bringing out his golden greatsword that shone radiantly with light. As the champion of his force, he hefted his blade on his shoulder and waited for the Entity to form.
The Entity gathered together, a male, bulky and short, yet carrying a tremendous physical presence. Unlike the others, it wore heavy armor, only revealing its half-covered face.
Lu Wenhai grinned. "Come!" He shouted as his Ever-Domain constructed Domain Seed was interfaced, pulsating with worldly light.
The Entity didn't respond with any words but directly unfurled its Worldly Domain. Any self-respecting Realmlord's first tactic was establishing dominance! As such, with a Greater Realmlord's foundation, it exerted its strongest World Pressure in the hopes of crushing its opponent!
Lu Wenhai's World Armor held!
The Lu Golden Palace seethed in excitement. Their Chosen was about to take the forefront of this challenge, being the first male to succeed and marking himself as an amazing talent. His mother was shouting in his corner with an energetic smile and cheerful prayers.
Lu Wenhai felt as if he could hear his mother's cheers. 'I'll show the world your son's brilliance.' Was what he thought, and it was his last…
His artificial Domain Seed's world power had lasted merely a second before it slipped out of his control. The World Armor collapsed, fueled by nothing but dreams and prayers. The result was a gushing, crushing, torrentially destructive World Pressure crashed against the Spatial Resonance Phase body of Lu Wenhai, refined in his 90 or so years of cultivation.
In a blink of an eye, he became a splatter of golden bloody mist, carried away by the wind. All his bones, flesh, blood, and fluid had been crushed to the point that they were indistinguishable from each other, simply a scattered flow of bloody liquid.
"...Oh!" A heavy, disgustingly sinking feeling emerged in the stomachs of almost every onlooker.
"..."
While the Saint Cyclic Renewal Summit was ongoing, in a far, far location millions upon millions of miles away, across starfields, one of the main linchpins of its initiation was seated in his artificially constructed Sky Palace with a bemused expression.
Within one of its many rooms, Wei Wuyin was inspecting a vial of cyan-colored liquid with a keen, questioning pair of silver eyes. This was none other than the Neo-Dawn Soul-Sea Elixir, a product with infinite variations.
But it wasn't an ordinary one; this Neo-Dawn Soul-Sea Elixir was transcendent-quality! Its low-quality versions, the products without flaws and impurities, could replenish Soul Light. Shockingly, Wei Wuyin has found a hidden effect in his testing. For non Soul Light-generating Primary Light Sources, it was a heaven-defying product that could temporarily bring out a Spirit of Cultivation's Soul Light.
For a brief period, it could allow cultivators without Soul Light to possess Soul Light. While this was severely limited in effectiveness, and their Primary Light Source of theirs couldn't contain it indefinitely, leading to it flowing out wildly if unused, this could be considered as a temporary power boost. An unintended but exciting effect.
More importantly, its high-quality effect can expand the Primary Light Source. This was a heaven-defying effect according to records in the True Element Sect, the Primary Light Source was set, equal across all cultivators. This was unprecedented. There have been countless alchemists pursuing this effect in their concoction, for all Primary Light Sources of every grade, but they all failed in the end.
Unfortunately, its peak-quality version had no tertiary effect, only greatly increasing its replenishing and expansion effects.
Wei Wuyin had used this elixir to expand all four of his Primary Light Sources. They had increased by three times, reaching their limit in the Gravity Emission Phase. He had tested during this time if reaching the Realm World Phase had increased his capacity for growth during his two months of planning, and it did!
However, it only increased by 150%. This was still a gargantuan expansion, allowing him to store far more Soul Light Energies within them.
But he was curious about the transcendent-quality version. When he was in the Gravity Emission Phase, he decided not to consume it for fear of experiencing a drastic change to his cultivation base. It was not an act of caution, but a gut feeling as an Alchemist.
After concocting so many transcendent products, he felt an inkling of understanding of 'possible' effects whenever he observed them with the Alchemic Stars of Spiritual Transcendence active. It was entirely possible that what prevented him from seeing through the misty veil was his mortal cultivation.
Still, this feeling remained. Even his reckless Astral Souls weren't willing to go against this feeling, especially Eden. Its tone was similar to when he thought of invading the Sea of Consciousness of an Ascended being—grave and warning.
Now, however, there were no feelings of aversion to doing so. Whatever it was, his cultivation base was either fully equipped to handle it or it wouldn't outright kill him. Thinking about the forced Soul-Pulse Manifestation Tribulation multiplied by four, he shuddered a little.
He placed the vial to the side, looking at the empty bottles laid before him in the thousands. His expression was a little odd.
"Cultivation is getting difficult," Wei Wuyin remarked. After reaching the Realm World Phase, his cultivation base had been concentrated into his Domain Seed, his foundation reflecting its size and power. The high-tier, ninth-grade Astral World-Deluge Pill that could expand the size of one's Astral Core was ineffective in increasing the growth of a cultivator's Domain Seed.
There were lesser-tiered variants of the product, such as the low-tier, ninth-grade World Expansion Pill. It was the simplest, most effective pill designed for a single objective, with no secondary or tertiary effects. It replicated the Astral World-Deluge Pill and its lower derivatives effects on Realmlords but only that.
When Wei Wuyin had his Astral Souls refine this pill, he found it horrifically underwhelming. Ori had consumed a thousand peak-quality versions, yet it found itself not growing more than 300 meters in size. It was disgustingly low, considering each Worldly Domain of his was 333 kilometers.
According to various reports, an estimate of a hundred peak-quality pills should be enough to generate a Transcendent Timelord! That was a 1,000-kilometer-sized Worldly Domain! While extremely archaic in estimation, this was extremely powerful! But ten times that number had only increased his Worldly Domain's size by 300 meters, not 1,000 kilometers or even remotely close to that.
Wei Wuyin concluded that the larger the Worldly Domain, the more difficult it was to expand its growth through the Domain Seed. He confirmed through this discovery that his Soul Idol, Spatial Resonance, Soul Light, and Gravitational Central Mass' culmination had considerably increased his Domain Seeds needs compared to an ordinary Domain Seed.
Additionally, he knew that he wasn't remotely close to his limit. As such, he decided to resort to its harder-to-concoct version, a pill that wasn't regarded as peak-tier but labeled everywhere as 'pinnacle' tier. An imaginary tier by Mortal Sovereign Alchemists was conceived solely for it due to its wild effectiveness for Starlords!
It was called the Echoing Stars of the Vastness Pill! Its primary effect was to elevate the innate energies of one's cultivation base—ALL types of energy. Such as the four main types: mental, physical, spiritual, and essence energies. Inadvertently, this effect increased the power of one's Star Core's to a great extent.
Its secondary effect was the refinement of the Spirit of Cultivation, amplifying Spiritual Strength and reinforcing its stability.
Its peak-quality tertiary effect could cleanse the body of impurities, giving one the slightest chance of increasing a cultivator's Astral Physique grade. A heaven-defying effect!
It could do it all!
As for why he hadn't decided to concoct it? It was due to its core material: a Star Core!
A Star Core of a 'natural' Solar Star!
