Chapter 88: Second Layer of Foundation Establishment

Within the Quiet Heart Grotto, Shen Lian was refining the medicinal power of a Spirit-Gathering Pill. Spiritual energy circulated throughout his body in a great orbit, slowly assimilating the pill’s essence into his own strength. In his dantian, the five elemental spiritual powers flowed together, filling the entire sea of his core to the brim.

Such fullness indicated that his spiritual energy had reached its limit—signaling that he could now advance to the next realm, expanding his dantian further. Over the past two years, Shen Lian had refined twenty-three high-quality Spirit-Gathering or True Essence Pills, always placing cultivation above all else.

When the pill’s power was fully absorbed, a faint blue-violet hue lingered in his five-colored spiritual energy—a trace of the remaining medicinal essence. This was another reason cultivators could not rely solely on pills; unless the medicinal force was fully expended, any residue would hinder the flow of their own spiritual power.

Turning his senses inward, Shen Lian felt the swelling energy in his dantian. Yet, instead of pausing to settle the remaining power, he withdrew another Spirit-Gathering Pill and swallowed it. At the same time, he drew the Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman from his storage bangle and sank it into his dantian.

The Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman, with its gilded edges, had been given this name by Shen Lian to distinguish it from another talisman he owned. The ordinary jade talisman was being nurtured with a Thunderfire Sigil he’d previously drawn, now relocated to another grotto for safety—should it explode during cultivation, he would not be caught off guard.

Once the Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman entered his dantian, it radiated with spiritual light. Shen Lian directed the five-element spiritual energy towards it, the fire element being especially drawn into the depths of the talisman. Locking his divine sense onto the talisman, Shen Lian was prepared to cast it aside at the first sign of danger.

Inside the talisman, complex runic patterns formed a multi-layered network, seamlessly absorbing the fire spiritual energy. Sensing the structure’s stability, Shen Lian relaxed. He activated the Five Qi Returning to Origin technique, merging the refined pill power into his dantian, which further swelled under the pressure.

The blend of spiritual energy and medicinal force compressed the sea of his core, which in turn accelerated the talisman’s absorption of fire energy. The talisman itself, without bottlenecks or limitations, simply needed to be infused with more power.

Realizing the effectiveness of this method, Shen Lian abandoned restraint. He treated himself as a converter—swallowing pills, transforming their essence into spiritual power, and letting the dantian serve as a relay station, its pressure driving fire energy rapidly into the talisman.

The Five Qi Returning to Origin technique spun ever faster, making the energy surge through his meridians. Eventually, Shen Lian’s body began to emit visible vapor.

After half a month, he stopped. Any further and his dantian might rupture.

His dantian, never intended as a mere transit station, had become just that. Advancing from the first to the second layer of Foundation Establishment was no major hurdle for most cultivators—once the dantian was full, a focused effort would expand it further.

The Foundation Establishment phase was, after all, a process of continuously broadening the sea of the core.

Shen Lian’s dantian was already saturated. Ordinarily, he would have simply bided his time, allowing the residual medicinal force to convert to spiritual energy before attempting a breakthrough.

But he chose a different path.

Seizing the opportunity while his dantian could hold no more, he used it as a relay, refining pills to fuel the Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman.

No longer did he need to worry about overfilling his dantian during cultivation; any excess spiritual energy could be channeled directly into the talisman, which had no bottleneck and required no gradual process.

The only limiting factor was Shen Lian himself.

In fifteen days, he refined three Spirit-Gathering Pills into energy for the talisman—when his dantian protested, he paused for two days.

Yet while his dantian rested, Shen Lian did not. He busied himself preparing spirit medicines to awaken the bloodline of Dahei and Sanqian.

In the blink of an eye, more than half a year passed.

Within the grotto, a multitude of auras interwove. In the alchemy chamber, spiritual flames danced beneath a cauldron filled with bubbling liquid, in which Sanqian was bathing. Occasionally, Sanqian would paddle to the rim, peering out.

“Master… Master… you’re really, really… not going to eat me, are you?”

Receiving no reply, Sanqian slipped back into the spiritual liquid. At the cauldron’s bottom, several strange fish—shaped like flood dragons or serpents—floated lifelessly, their wide eyes unblinking. Now and then, a thread of golden energy drifted from their forms and merged into Sanqian.

In the adjacent stone chamber, Dahei had become a mass of earth-black mud. Through cracks in the surface, one could see a further split within; two dried shells flaked around him. A savage aura emanated from the mud, punctuated by pained hisses.

“It hurts…”

Dahei’s bloodline was far inferior to Sanqian’s, and awakening it subjected him to far greater agony.

Thus, apart from Sanqian’s periodic inquiries about being eaten, the grotto echoed only with Dahei’s cries of pain.

In the main hall, Shen Lian sat cross-legged on a mat, his aura surging.

He had refined eighty-nine high-quality True Essence and Spirit-Gathering Pills, consuming twenty-three himself to fill his dantian. Later, using the pressure of this saturation, he nurtured the Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman rather than breaking through immediately.

In the past half year, he had channeled the energy of fifty-seven pills into the talisman. Its power aside, the repeated floods of spiritual force through his body had, even without deliberate effort, shattered the minor bottleneck.

Foundation Establishment, Second Layer.

Vast spiritual energy scoured his meridians, washing away the impurities left by the pills, which were expelled through his pores. As his dantian expanded, what had once been a saturated sea now became a gentle, trickling current.

Shen Lian swallowed another True Essence Pill, then crushed over a thousand spirit stones, letting the dense energy swirl around him and form a vortex overhead. The spiritual power entered his body, circulated, and merged into his expanded dantian.

It took two days to stabilize his realm. Now, the spiritual energy in his dantian occupied barely more than a fifth of its new capacity.

A few black-horned demon ants crept cautiously toward him, sensing his aura’s restraint. Each wore a communication talisman, some of which emitted urgent hissing.

This signaled the presence of intruders within the island’s alert perimeter.

“Someone has arrived.”

Shen Lian extended his divine sense, interfacing with the black-horned demon ants to understand the situation.

A new group of fishermen had reached the archipelago.

It was natural for those living by the sea to fish near the islands, though the region’s wild winds and waves had previously kept most away.

He ordered the black-horned demon ants to continue relaying information, then vanished from the grotto, reappearing within another cave.

There, beneath the Five Element Profound Spirit Trap and Kill Formation, thirty-six talismans pulsed with thunderfire power, their energy being drawn into a central jade talisman.

These were the second batch of talismans; their thunderfire force was nearly exhausted. Sensing the destructive power now stored within, Shen Lian noted that the Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman had grown even stronger than before.

He carefully inspected the talisman with his divine sense and estimated that, at most, ten days remained before the thirty-six talismans would be fully depleted.

Ten days later.

Shen Lian returned to the cave and retrieved the suspended jade talisman. The surrounding talismans disintegrated into drifting powder.

“Master… something’s happening.”

Dahei, now shining with a glossy black brilliance and emanating the aura of the ninth layer of Qi Refinement, emerged from the earth.

“The foreign fishermen say there’s war on Thousand Kings Island, and even devil cultivators have appeared.”

After his bloodline transformation, Dahei possessed the intelligence of a twelve- or thirteen-year-old human child. When channeling his spiritual power, an earthen-yellow stripe appeared along his back.

With a wave, Shen Lian dismissed the formation in the grotto and vanished.

On a bay of the island, a cluster of fishing boats huddled together in the storm, each packed with entire families.

From several hundred yards away, Shen Lian’s divine sense enveloped the boats. Listening to the fishermen’s conversations, he pieced together the events on Thousand Kings Island.

Seven months earlier, the most powerful Qian Kingdom and its neighbor, the Ying Kingdom, had erupted into war. Soon, all five nations on the island were drawn into the conflict, with casualties numbering in the millions.

To wage war, the five nations conscripted civilians for military service and forced labor. These fishermen, fleeing danger, had risked the treacherous seas to hide among the islands.

“Mortal war, and devil cultivators appearing as well.”

Shen Lian was speechless. Even in the mortal realm, peace was elusive.

To a Foundation Establishment cultivator like him, mortal warfare was no more significant than battles between black-horned ant colonies.

Yet this was the cultivation world, where secular monarchies were granted power by cultivators. Without their permission, how could the mortal world dare to wage such large-scale war?

Behind the Qian Kingdom stood the Xuanhai Sect, the greatest power of the Myriad Star Sea; the other four kingdoms were backed by forces of at least the Golden Core level.

These sects had their own cultivation pursuits—why meddle with mortals?

And as for devil cultivators appearing, Shen Lian could not help but question: were these devil cultivators truly genuine?

He withdrew his presence from the fishing boats and returned to his grotto.

Let them fight their wars; he would simply find another place to settle.

Afterward, Shen Lian brought out two jade talismans to compare them. After all this time and effort, both talismans were now roughly nurtured to completion.

Immersing his divine sense into the Celestial Evolution Jade Talisman, he was immediately engulfed by dazzling gold thunderfire, its destructive aura making his spiritual power tremble.