Chapter 45: Rushing the Natal Palace
Within the Metal Suspending PaG.o.da, gold wind whistled as it blew, but Ai Hui was unmoved as if he was sleeping no matter how the gold wind raged. It tossed him in all directions, forcing him to collide with the walls.
His skin"s golden l.u.s.ter grew deeper. It looked like bronze and was actually a sign of formation of 【Bronze Skin】.
Gold Tempered Body has always had stages 【Bronze Skin】【Iron Muscles】【Steel Bones】【Silver Marrow】and【Golden Blood】. If all five stages were completely cultivating, then it would become an extremely rare Gold Tempered Pure Body.
However it was commonly known that elemental energy was easier to cultivate while tempering bodies were much tougher.
Essentially, as long as one"s talent wasn"t too bad, elemental energy would acc.u.mulate little by little and always progress. Tempering the body was truly something that took a lot of time and energy. Not only is it very painful, it takes a long time. Without enough patience and willpower, it is very difficult to succeed.
In regards to Gold Tempered Body, Five Way Heaven had an ongoing debate. Many elemental cultivators believed that no matter how humans tempered their bodies, they would never be able to match savage beasts, so tempering the body was a futile effort. In addition, as one"s strength increased, elemental energy would bring much more battle strength than tempered bodies.
Realistically, this was true. After every opening of a hall, something wonderful would happen and battle strength would increase drastically. However increasing realms in body tempering would not have any direct effect on one"s battle strength.
Of course, mainstream cultivation methods still included some body tempering training. Generally people believed that elemental energy had much more power than one"s body, but tempering the body can allow for greater sensitivity and can increase one"s ability to use elemental energy.
This was also the choice of most metal elementalists.
Even body tempering"s first stage 【Bronze Skin】, was usually acquired or practiced by those who had already opened six halls.
Beginner cultivators usually never choose to temper their bodies. Other than not having much value in power, body tempering was also hard to achieve for beginner cultivators due to their elemental energy"s mild nature.
Ai Hui did not care about this problem.
The gold elemental energy within the golden wind was incomparably sharp. Not only could it temper Ai Hui"s flesh, the remaining scattered would already be much purer than an average beginner cultivator"s elemental energy. That was why Ai Hui may not have had much elemental energy, but it was very pure.
However cultivating this time, Ai Hui had Blood and Bone Invigorating Pastry made by Luolan. Practice was made even more effective and Ai Hui"s cultivation advanced by leaps and bounds, especially in Gold Tempered Body.
Luolan"s Blood and Bone Invigorating Pastry was so effective that Ai Hui wanted to cry. Not only could it recover one"s hidden internal injuries, it helped to temper the body even more. Since Ai Hui did not open his natal palace, elemental energy stimulated his flesh even more.
Ai Hui was very clear on the changes that happened to his body. The increase in strength was most obvious. If he met the guy at the blind compet.i.tion with【Fire Net Sky Spider Transformation】again, he would not be so pathetic in a direct confrontation.
If Ai Hui could fully form 【Bronze Skin】, then he would be able to use force to fight that guy. As for the final result, that would depend on his willpower in comparison to the guy"s reservoir of elemental energy.
The last fight was very short and also very pathetic, but it gave Ai Hui many benefits. It wasn"t an increase in cultivation, but it gave him a boost in confidence and vision.
The absolute art impacted him significantly. He still couldn"t understand how 【Fire Net Sky Spider Transformation】worked. It was really mysterious and miraculous. When Ai Hui had previously met elemental cultivators in the Savage Territories, they were strong, but he still knew where the strength came from. However, absolute arts were incredible, completely outside his shallow realm of knowledge.
If the opponent wasn"t lacking in experience, he would have immediately taken down Ai Hui. Ai Hui and Luolan would not have had any chance in obtaining victory.
At the same time, that battle also gave him confidence. While losing in raw strength and not having even opened his natal palace yet, Ai Hui was still able to last so long by himself then with the help of Luolan, take down his opponent. It was enough to be proud of.
He wasn"t as weak as he thought.
Tempering the body was an unexpected benefit. Ai Hui did not forget his desire to cultivate elemental energy since that was his goal in coming to the Induction Ground.
Time pa.s.sed slowly as Ai Hui"s elemental energy increased little by little, the golden light from his skin sunk deeper and deeper, and the paG.o.da dented more and more. Everyday was completely used and fulfilling.
Cultivation is completely losing oneself. Ai Hui did not know how much time pa.s.sed.
His hair was disheveled. His body was dirty and emitted an unpleasant odor. The Blood and Bone Invigorating Pastry was already finished, but Ai Hui did not return to the city. He had a very strong feeling that his breakthrough was incoming.
Bang bang bang!
【Fish Arching Back】rang out over and over against the paG.o.da walls. The st.u.r.dy walls and muscles collided and created loud noises with traces of sonic boom.
Sweat beads continuously broke free into extremely thin streams of fog, like a plume of weapons, and swirled around Ai Hui, surging from each collision.
When the last sliver of gold elemental energy broke, Ai Hui sat cross-legged like he often did in the past.
With just one rotation of his elemental energy, he already felt that it differed from usual. Usually, the cultivated elemental energy would be extremely smooth when circulated, and was easy to control.
However, when his elemental energy was rotated then, it was explosive as it roared into action. He felt as if he could not control it.
Ai Hui suddenly realized it was time to breakthrough the natal palace.
The elemental energy within his body had already reached maximum capacity that the body could retain. It was like overflowing water, any movement would be hard to control.
Ai Hui"s first goal was to open his natal palace. He had prepared sufficiently long in advance. The Induction Ground was extremely experienced within this field. It had met with every circ.u.mstance and could describe it with specificity and detail.
Ai Hui"s most valuable lesson was sufficient preparation would never result in panic. He thought opening his natal palace was very important, so he combed through all of the possible events innumerable times.
Very little people opening the natal palace would have cultivated elemental energy until it overflowed since the amount of elemental energy that the body could hold was so little compared to the amount that the natal palace could hold. It really was an unnecessary trouble that brought no benefits.
However, a small number still wasn"t zero.
In history, there were still people who accomplished this. Some were due to chance, some others pursued it on purpose. Descriptions of these situations were similarly very clear.
At this moment, he could not panic, and had to be abnormally calm.
He looked into his body and slowly moved the elemental energy within his body. Overflowing elemental energy had to be moved slowly when circulated.
Slow circulation then slowly increasing the speed would prevent the energy from ever losing control.
A circle of pale silvery light emitted from Ai Hui"s body. It was an effect produced by escaping energy and was usually caused by circulating overflowing elemental energy inside the body. It was not an indication of anything good.
As the energy within Ai Hui"s body slowly increased in speed, the light gradually disappeared. Ai Hui became quiet as if he was sleeping.
However, an entirely different scene was playing out within his body.