Chapter 42: Rigged Strength
Chapter 42
MEANWHILE...
Somewhere quite far away from where Li Yuexin and the others were staying, in another distant cave, a figure sat cross-legged in a meditative pose.
His dark wild hair covered half of his face and cascaded down his back. He was wearing a rather eye-catching dark overcoat, his eyes closed in concentration.
Nearby, a figure that closely resembled the sitting figure stood silently. Although this ones wearing green robes and had mid-sized green hair instead, he watched the original continue with the brutal refinement.
The pain that the original was going through, if described in one word, would be monstrous. If it were any other sane person, they would rather choose to live as an ordinary mortal if this was the only way for them to get stronger.
They would rather live their short lives in peace and tranquility than go through the heart-wrenching pain that Li Yu endured due to his refinement method. This was the third refinement session that Li Yu was having after breaking through to the ninth stage of Body Refinement.
And King Rayden had watched him consume numerous beast cores, using their spiritual essence to refine himself. With this latest batch, he would hopefully be able to break into the peak of the Body Refinement Realm.
King Rayden shook his head as he chewed on some roasted meat while watching Li Yu, whose facial expression was contorted in deep pain.
Yet despite the agony he was experiencing right now, Li Yu didn’t cry out or black out. He had gone through this process too many times to be freaked out by it anymore. He had learned to endure it. "He is a freak," King Rayden muttered under his breath.
The original had consumed over two hundred beast cores in his presence. That huge amount of pure energy was enough to kill a normal human, cultivator or not. He was not supposed to survive. But he did.
King Rayden shook his head once more. This original was such an anomaly. Not only was he surviving, but King Rayden could feel it deep within his soul. The original was surely getting stronger, stronger and stronger.
The air around him was becoming increasingly dense with energy as the seconds passed. It seemed that he was finally going to climb into the peak of the Body Refinement Realm soon.
As if waiting for that exact moment, a large wave of energy spread outward in all directions. The cave quaked violently, and a large crater formed directly beneath where he sat.
The overflowing energy made the air dense and heavy. Even the oxygen felt restrained, as if trapped inside an invisible cage. King Rayden’s eyes widened. Not only because of what he was seeing, but because he could feel it as well.
His own cultivation stage had risen from the ninth stage directly to the peak stage of Body Refinement. Not that he was shocked. He was deeply connected to the original after all, and they would grow together.
Still, feeling this much power flowing through his veins... King Rayden clenched his fist. The air seemed to crackle within his grasp as he tightened it. An overwhelming surge of strength flowed through his hands right now.
No, not just his hands. His entire body. The urge to release the overwhelming power he was feeling became so strong that he clenched his fist and, without a second thought, directed his power outward, punching the side of the cave where he was standing.
A loud bang echoed throughout the cavern as several massive cracks spread across the wall. King Rayden was stunned.
Through Li Yu’s memories, he possessed a basic understanding of this world’s cultivation system, which was different from the one in his original world.
So one could say he knew what being at the peak of Body Refinement was supposed to feel like. And it was far, far different from what he was currently experiencing. One could say that any Body Refinement cultivator Li Yu had ever known would die under a casual punch from him right now.
That was just how powerful he had become. This amount of power even surpassed that of Qi Gathering cultivators. If King Rayden were to describe the strength coursing through his body right now, then he would say it was probably comparable to the mid stages of the Qi Refining Realm.
And all of that power while still remaining at the peak of Body Refinement. Just how strong would he become after reaching Qi Gathering? What about Qi Refining? What about Foundation Establishment? The result was nearly unimaginable.
If he was already this monstrously powerful without using his Verdant Lightning, then just how powerful would he become after adding his Verdant Lightning into the equation?
Thinking about it made King Rayden gulp ever so slightly, his calm and composed expression faltering for a brief moment. If he was this powerful without having the Primal Tyrant Physique like the original, then how powerful would the original be?
As if hearing his thoughts, Li Yu stood up. The waves of power emanating from him felt suffocating. Then he opened his eyes, which glowed with a feral, predatory light before a dangerously wide grin formed on his lips.
And then... "Ha ha ha ha ha! Wha ha ha ha ha!" A loud, rumbling madman’s laugh escaped his mouth as he continued laughing wildly in pure joy and savagery. The ground beneath his feet quaked and bent inward from the force he wasn’t even consciously releasing.
Li Yu closed his hand into a fist and then punched outward. BOOM! A loud rumble echoed as an entire section of the cave was destroyed by the force of the punch.
Cold wind rushed into the cave through the massive opening, while Li Yu only smiled even wider. "This is great... really great." At first, when he had seen that it was taking more and more cores to refine his Hardened Primal Muscles, Li Yu had started to think that the system wanted to screw him over again.
After all, one had to know that only one hundred and eighty cores had brought him from the third stage all the way to the seventh stage in just about a week or so. But now he had consumed over two hundred cores just to move from the ninth stage to the peak stage.
Just one stage. It had felt rigged and totally unfair in Li Yu’s opinion. But now that he was feeling the primal surge of strength flowing through his body, he believed that his current power was the thing that felt rigged.
He felt so powerful right now that he felt like he could rip the heavens apart and render hell useless. Of course, that was Li Yu getting cocky.
Still, he was feeling so much power right now that it simply made no sense. He looked at his own hands as if they no longer belonged to him. His body itself seemed to have reached an entirely new realm.
"This much power feels unreal..." Li Yu had grown leaps and bounds stronger after every breakthrough and every stage. But this one was different. Far different. He felt as if he had left behind a weak and frail body and entered a new one that was far more worthy.
"If I face that stupid panther now... I would squash him like a bug." Li Yu was, of course, being snarky, but his pride wasn’t entirely unfounded either.
If he were to fight the Saber Panther with his current power, then his chances of losing were practically less than two percent.
Compared to his nonexistent chances from before, one could only imagine just how much stronger Li Yu had become right now. "This is good... really good. But there is no way to gauge my new power," Li Yu muttered under his breath, speaking to no one in particular.
Then he suddenly froze. A moment later, he realized something he had completely missed before. "Wait... isn’t there one person that could help with that?"
With that thought, Li Yu turned his gaze toward his only clone for now, the calm and composed King Rayden.
King Rayden flinched when he saw Li Yu looking at him. He didn’t know why, but he could already guess what Li Yu wanted to ask. And it wouldn’t be a good question at all. "Care to test your new strength, Rayden One?" Li Yu asked with a small smile.
King Rayden immediately shook his head without wasting even a second. He wasn’t going to agree to that. "Actually, no. I’m good." "Hey, come on, man. We are at the same power level.
And don’t worry, you’re free to use your green lightning as much as you want." After saying that, Li Yu began stretching his body as if preparing for a major battle. King Rayden’s gaze twitched.
Seeing that Li Yu was completely serious about starting this battle one way or another, he immediately felt a headache coming. This was really not good. Not good at all.
Yeah, the two of them were technically at the same cultivation level. But that was only in theory. Li Yu’s physicality became more and more monstrous with every stage he broke through.
If King Rayden had experienced around a threefold boost in physical strength after reaching the peak of Body Refinement, then Li Yu, with his abnormal physique, would have experienced something closer to a sixfold or even eightfold increase.
That was not a small difference at all. So yes, King Rayden was worried about this so-called peaceful spar. Because it would be peaceful by absolutely no means. Instead, it would be very, very destructive.
"I don’t want to fi.." Before he could finish speaking, a punch slammed directly into his face. BOOM! King Rayden was smashed through the cave wall under immense force.
"Sorry, but the spar is already underway." Li Yu said with a grin before exploding forward toward his clone. King Rayden immediately began gathering Verdant Lightning around his body to fight back.
If there was one thing he had learned about the original, it would be this: The original was a madman. Literally speaking. So he had better go all out if he didn’t want to become a punching bag.
