madnovel Chapter 293 - 157: Devouring a Source Crystal Again, Extreme Compression
Chapter 293 - 157: Devouring a Source Crystal Again, Extreme Compression
There were four students, covered in blood, their armor shattered.
Looks of lingering terror were etched on their faces as they gasped for breath, as if they had just crawled out of hell.
Following closely behind them, a familiar figure ambled out.
Yin Liulan.
She glanced at the four miserable figures on the ground, her face filled with unconcealed disgust and impatience.
She couldn’t even be bothered to offer a single word of critique, merely waving her hand in annoyance.
"Scram. Go back and reflect on what you did wrong."
The four of them scrambled away as if they’d been granted a great pardon.
It was only then that Lin Ye finally understood what this chief instructor was truly responsible for.
She was a combat instructor, leading students into the Nirvana Tower—this fragment of the Celestial Abyss—to teach them how to fight and survive against the alien races!
As if sensing his arrival, Yin Liulan looked over in his direction.
When she saw Lin Ye, a flicker of light finally appeared in her listless eyes.
"It seems you’ve finally prepared for the first step of your breakthrough."
Before Lin Ye could reply,
Yin Liulan suddenly took a step closer and let out a soft, "Hm?"
The questioning note in her voice was an unconscious reaction to clearly sensing the vortex within Lin Ye’s Dantian.
Although Yin Liulan’s expression didn’t change, she was inwardly shocked.
’What terrifying quality this vortex has!’
’This level of condensation, this suction force...’
’If he really manages to break through, the Primordial Gang Sha born within him will likely far surpass that of most Martial Artists who have just stepped into the Gang Condensation Realm!’
But she quickly suppressed her surprise.
"Right now, you owe me a total of 2,467 credits."
"You have one more day. If you can’t pay it back before the assessment the day after tomorrow..."
"Sorry, but I mean what I say. I will really kick you out of my training camp."
Lin Ye nodded. "I’ll pay it back. Every last point."
"Good."
Yin Liulan seemed satisfied with his response. She gestured with her chin toward a light screen not far away. "Also, a word of warning."
"Even if you manage to pay back the credits, it’s basically impossible for you to catch up to the progress of those ahead of you."
Lin Ye followed her gaze.
It was a massive kill leaderboard, listing the combat records of all students within the Nirvana Tower.
Unsurprisingly, the name at the very top was extremely familiar.
[First Place: Dongfang Zhen]
[Kills: Regular Stone Ghost Race x546, Elite Stone Ghost Race x94]
[Kills: Regular Eight-armed Race x477, Elite Eight-armed Race x76]
[Kills: Regular Molten Demon Race x12]
[Total Hunt Credits: 8,463!]
Lin Ye’s breath hitched.
’Over eight thousand credits!’
During this time, Dongfang Zhen had actually earned that many credits in the tower.
No wonder Dongfang Zhen had lent him his own credits back then.
He was confident that once he entered the Nirvana Tower, paying off the debt would be no trouble at all.
His gaze shifted down the list. The names of Zhang Daoxuan and the others were also prominently displayed. While not as exaggerated as Dongfang Zhen’s, each of them had a commanding lead in credits.
Lin Ye withdrew his gaze and said nothing more.
He took a step into the twisted, purple rift.
It felt like passing through a cold, viscous membrane.
Lin Ye felt his body being pulled and squeezed by an invisible force. In that instant, all his senses became incredibly dull and distant.
A sense of weightlessness and dizzying vertigo intertwined.
The strange sensation lasted for less than a second.
The next moment, he felt solid ground beneath his feet.
A pungent stench of sulfur, mixed with the smell of scorched earth, rushed violently into his nostrils.
Lin Ye opened his eyes. The scene before him made him feel as if he had arrived in an Otherworld.
The sky was a strange, dark red. There were no clouds, but besides the sun, two enormous celestial bodies hung in the air, occupying half the sky.
In addition, a shattered planetary ring was visible on the horizon.
Lin Ye gazed into the distance and could even see the edge of the world.
It was a pitch-black void.
And dominating the other side of the sky...
...was an active volcano of immeasurable height.
The peak of the volcano continuously spewed pillars of black smoke, and dark-red lava flowed down its slopes toward the ground in a magnificent spectacle.
The ground beneath his feet was a vast, black wasteland, covered in Obsidian formed from cooled lava.
In the distance, he could see large, twisted forests covered in volcanic ash, as well as ravines and hot springs steaming with geothermal heat.
This was the inside of the Nirvana Tower—a real and brutal Alien Race Realm!
Lin Ye immediately understood the three zones the previous instructor had mentioned.
The closer one got to the central volcano, the harsher the environment and the higher the temperature. Naturally, the alien races entrenched there would also be more powerful.
The Molten Demon Race lord he needed to kill for his third-stage mission was probably in the core region of that volcano.
As he was surveying his surroundings, his gaze was drawn to a bubbling, scorching hot spring not far away.
Along the edge of the hot spring and on the surrounding rock faces, clusters of translucent Source Crystals, glowing with an alluring light, were quietly growing!
Lin Ye scanned the area, confirming there were no living creatures moving nearby.
But he didn’t forget that his strength was currently at an all-time low.
He immediately crouched down, using a large boulder for cover, and cautiously approached the hot spring while vigilantly observing his surroundings.
The escape bracelet, which could activate spatial folding at any moment, was clutched tightly in his hand.
’This isn’t a Virtual Illusion Realm. If you die here, you’re really dead!’
Ten or so minutes later, Lin Ye reached his destination without incident.
Thankfully, there seemed to be no trace of any Celestial Abyss Race in this area.
Unable to contain his urgency any longer, he reached out and forcefully broke off a fist-sized Source Crystal.
Without a hint of hesitation, he stuffed it directly into his mouth!
The next moment, a spiciness and Frenzy—far exceeding any Source Crystal he had swallowed before—exploded in his throat and esophagus!
The burning sensation made him feel as if he had returned to that night in the ruined city when he first tried to consume a Source Crystal.
Hiss...
Lin Ye first sucked in a sharp breath from the burning pain.
Then, a tremor of excitement and thrill coursed through his entire body.
’As expected of something straight from the Celestial Abyss!’
’This stuff is potent!’
’So, so, so authentic!’
Immediately after, the Source Crystal transformed into a primal, frenzied torrent of source energy that violently surged into Lin Ye’s nearly-depleted meridians.
In an instant, Lin Ye felt as if his meridians were about to burst from the surging energy!
But before he could react, the dormant vortex within his Dantian erupted with a terrifying suction force!
The torrent of source energy that had been rampaging through his meridians was completely drawn into the vortex, as if it had found an outlet!
And at that very moment, Lin Ye clearly felt the vortex in his Dantian abruptly shrink inward!
In an instant, its size was reduced by nearly half!
Lin Ye’s heart sank. ’This is bad,’ he thought.
’Could it be that the source energy was too frenzied and actually damaged the Innate Qi I worked so hard to refine?’
But when he immediately looked inward, he was stunned to find that the reality was the complete opposite of what he had imagined!
It wasn’t that the source energy had damaged the Innate Qi in his body.
Rather...
This pure source energy from the Celestial Abyss itself was actively helping him perform an even more extreme purification!
Like the sharpest carving knife, it was boldly carving away the most minuscule impurities from his Innate Qi—impurities he himself couldn’t even discern, which he had thought was already pure enough!
The total amount of his already scarce Innate Qi was once again cut in half during this purification!
After a brief moment of shock, an irrepressible ecstasy appeared on Lin Ye’s face!
’This isn’t a bad thing at all!’
’This is an incredible stroke of luck!’
He was certain that before this, absolutely no Martial Artist had ever been able to perform such an extreme, almost perverse, level of refinement on their Qi and Blood before officially breaking through to the Gang Condensation Realm!
At the same time, Lin Ye was delighted to discover something else.
After completing the purification, this pure source energy did not dissipate.
It was following the method of the Tai Xu Two Principles True Understanding, spontaneously compressing the ultra-purified Innate Qi with even greater intensity!
When others took the second step of their breakthrough, they had to painstakingly circulate their Cultivation Technique, drawing in the free-roaming source energy from the world to compress it, strand by strand.
But he could actually complete this step just by swallowing a Source Crystal!
Lin Ye raised his head and looked at the Source Crystals gleaming alluringly in the sulfurous mist. The look in his eyes had completely changed.