Chapter 23 Second Level of the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique

Lu Tianzi flicked the blood off his sword before returning it to its scabbard, his eyes never leaving Yan Bingren's corpse while doing so.

It was a pity that he had to take the life of someone as innocent as Yan Bingren, but this was necessary as well.

Even if both Yan Bingren and Lu Tianzi escaped from their fates of being delivered to General Nanbai Zhaoyu at the Shadowfront Fortress, it was still more than likely that Hu Yuanbo would attribute this result to a powerful wild beast's doings.

However, if Yan Bingren were to return to Ivory Rock City and start spreading the truth about the naming of Holy Guardian, that would definitely trigger the suspicions of Hu Yuanbo.

As the Lord of Ivory Rock City, while it might not be possible to keep tabs on every single person in the city, increasing the security level would still greatly restrict Lu Tianzi's freedom!

If that were to happen, then continuing to stay in Ivory Rock City might even become just as risky as staying out in the wilds.

As for inciting the masses to act against Hu Yuanbo?

What a joke!

Even now, Lu Tianzi still could not believe that Yan Bingren actually thought of such an idea.

Currently, Hu Yuanbo's position in the hearts of the people was immovable. Trying to do so would only encourage the masses to reveal their identities and hiding locations to the authorities!

This Yan Bingren had been blinded by his relationship with his sister, such that he believed everyone would trust him wholeheartedly as long as he reciprocated with his genuine sincerity.

But Lu Tianzi was not as naïve.

While he found it a pity, Lu Tianzi would not hesitate to snip any problems in the bud. Especially now that they were out in the wilds, Lu Tianzi would not suffer any repercussions for his actions.

But on the bright side, killing Yan Bingren was not completely without merits either.

Up till now, Lu Tianzi had killed demons at the Intermediate Essence Building realm, the Advanced Essence Building realm, and even Nanhong Wuze who was at the Peak Essence Building realm.

As for humans, he had killed a mortal, as well as one at the Primary Essence Building realm.

With each kill, there was a trace of energy that escaped from their corpses, which Lu Tianzi always promptly absorbed into his body to strengthen the foundation of his Slaughter Essence system.

Earlier, he had thought that the amount of energy emitted was proportional to the dying entity's life force.

But when he killed the human at the Primary Essence Building realm, the trace of energy that escaped from his body was almost equivalent to that of Intermediate Essence Building realm demons.

This had puzzled Lu Tianzi for a bit.

But now that he had just killed Yan Bingren who was at the Intermediate Essence Building realm, he could finally directly compare the energy with that of the Intermediate Essence Building realm demons whom he killed a week ago.

And the result was just as he thought.

The trace of energy that exited from Yan Bingren's corpse was far greater, almost doubling that of the Intermediate Essence Building realm demons!

No matter how strong his foundation was, it was impossible for the life force of a human to exceed that of a demon by such a huge extent. In fact, demons were born with a naturally stronger body, and thus should have the upper hand in terms of life force when they were at the same cultivation realm.

So the only reason would be that demons naturally release less energy when killed.

That explained why the demon martial artists were not just killing each other to gain strength. Lu Tianzi had previously wondered how their societal laws had managed to restrict these demons from doing so, but now he knew that it was simply more worth the time and effort to hunt down other races!

It was almost as though even the heavens were encouraging the demons to continue hunting down humans!

Lu Tianzi sighed helplessly upon realising this fact.

After which, Lu Tianzi searched Yan Bingren's corpse but failed to find anything of value. Without hesitation, he set the corpse aflame as well. Just like the demons, there was no value to keeping his corpse intact.

With his plan to recruit Yan Bingren down the drain, Lu Tianzi could only rely on his own strength from now on. While it would reduce the number of cards that he could play, at the same time it also made things that much simpler.

Now, all he needed to do was to increase his strength.

Only with absolute strength would he no longer need to rely on anyone else's help!

Lu Tianzi reached into his sleeves to retrieve the Essence Stone that he had just obtained from the demons.

The previous Essence Stone was completely depleted after just a few days of cultivation, but Lu Tianzi was not intending to slow down. On the contrary, Lu Tianzi was still thinking of how to increase the speed of his cultivation.

For that, there was only one way that he could think of, and that was by tapping into the energy that had been gathered within the pond in the underground cavern!

Earlier when he had struggled with the assimilation of the demon cells, it was this energy within the pond that permeated into his body, calming the chaotic battle in his inner world. This energy bore the incredible traits of being pristine and primordial, forcing the cells within his body into submission.

That was when Lu Tianzi realised that there was a large amount of energy held within this pond.

While it was not as pure as the energy within the Essence Stone, what would happen if Lu Tianzi were to tap on both sources at the same time?

After taking a deep breath, Lu Tianzi decisively dove into the pond with a loud splash.

Once submerged in water, Lu Tianzi immediately started to probe for the energy within the pond, but things were not as easy as he thought.

For the Essence Stone, all the energy within was trapped right in the centre. On top of that, it was extremely pure, and thus it was relatively straightforward to tap into the energy contained within.

However, it was completely different for the pond.

The energy within the pond was spread thin, and thus far more difficult to tap into it as a whole. Unlike earlier when his body was experiencing a chaotic internal battle, this time the pristine energy did not flow naturally into his body. With his current cultivation, it was impossible for Lu Tianzi to forcefully make that happen either.

Since it was not meant to be, Lu Tianzi would not harp on it further.

Probing into the Essence Stone, Lu Tianzi once again established a connection with it and started drawing out wisps of energy into his body.

The Undulated Currents Breathing Technique was, as its name suggested, a breathing technique.

This meant that in order to cultivate by practising it, the most basic premise would be that one had to be able to breathe. It was by adjusting one's breath to the frequency of the world's currents that a martial artist could align to the world's frequency.

Now that Lu Tianzi was underwater, it was naturally impossible for him to breathe. This meant that he was unable to fulfil the one condition needed for practising the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique, the cultivation method that he had been relying on.

But Lu Tianzi did not surface just because of that.

If given the choice, he would prefer to continue staying underwater with hopes that the cells within his body would once again trigger the entry of the pristine energy within the pond.

The chances were slim, but Lu Tianzi chose not to give up on it.

When the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique was trained to perfection, it was said that a martial artist would be able to see through the flow of all things, aligning oneself to the world's currents.

Lu Tianzi naturally had not reached such a state, and it was impossible for him to see through the flow of the world's currents. However, what he could do was to distinctly feel the currents of the pond water.

As Lu Tianzi felt the chilling sensation of the pond water in contact against his skin, he instinctively drove the Spiritual Essence particles within his inner world accordingly, matching the flow of water.

When he felt that the water direction was flowing down his left arm, he directed the flow of Spiritual Essence particles down his left arm.

When he felt that the water direction was flowing up his right leg, he directed the flow of Spiritual Essence particles up his right leg.

It did not go smoothly initially, as he repeatedly made mistakes with the flow of Spiritual Essence particles, failing to match them with the water that swirled around his body.

But as time passed, the number mistakes quickly reduced. Before long, Lu Tianzi was able to match the flow of energy within his body to the flow of water outside of his body.

Even though it was spread thin, each droplet of water still contained a small amount of pristine energy, aiding Lu Tianzi in perceiving the entire water body both as a whole and as individual tiny units of water.

Albeit it was only to a vastly smaller degree, by matching the flow of energy both within and without, Lu Tianzi was able to simulate the effects of aligning himself to the world's currents!

At this moment, the pond was the world.

The flow of water was the world's currents.

And in the centre of it all was Lu Tianzi, who continued to perceive the energy flowing around him.

Lu Tianzi had completely isolated all external disturbances as he entered into a profound meditative state.

The current Lu Tianzi had just broken through the upper boundary of the basic level of the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique, finally reaching the second level. Now, he no longer needed to truly be breathing in order to practise the cultivation technique.

By hitting the second level of the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique, he was not only able to continue cultivating while being submerged in the cold pond water, but his cultivation speed had also increased by more than 50%!

Bit by bit, the wisps of energy from the Essence Stone entered his body and were quickly refined into Spiritual Essence particles.

After expending the previous Essence Stone, Lu Tianzi had already been extremely close to the upper boundary of the Advanced Essence Building realm.

Armed with a fresh Essence Stone, Lu Tianzi could now charge directly towards this boundary that had separated him from the Peak Essence Building realm!

Refining more and more of the energy from the Essence Stone resulted in Spiritual Essence particles pouring into Lu Tianzi's inner world like floodwaters, causing it to grow denser and denser. The Spiritual Essence particles continued to swirl within a set boundary as though bound by an invisible force, and they slowly firmed up to take the shape of a sphere.

Of course, the countless Spiritual Essence particles were still extremely fluid and moving around in random directions, which in turn meant that holes continued to appear and then mend themselves on the surface of this sphere.

Even so, the appearance of this sphere figure meant that the amount of Spiritual Essence particles was nearing the limit that an Essence Building realm martial artist could bear.

It also meant that Lu Tianzi had now successfully entered the Peak Essence Building realm!

Essence Building was the basis for all martial artists.

At the Essence Building realm, martial artists would refine Spiritual Essence particles that served as the foundation of their strength.The more Spiritual Essence particles they managed to refine, the greater the strength that they would be able to draw from their inner world.

After hitting the Peak Essence Building realm, a martial artist could finally start to prepare for the transition towards the Essence Condensation realm.

In order to enter the Essence Condensation realm, martial artists would have to gain absolute control over the Spiritual Essence particles within their body.

By redirecting the Spiritual Essence particles that had been swirling in random directions, martial artists would move all the particles in one unified direction, forming a true rotating sphere within their inner world.

While it sounded simple, that could not be further from the truth. The fact was that there were countless martial artists who were defeated by the difficulty of this transition, stuck at the Peak Essence Building realm for the rest of their lives.

After all, there were countless Spiritual Essence particles in martial artists' inner world. Controlling every Spiritual Essence particle as individual units was easier said than done!

On top of that, even though martial artists were qualified to enter the Essence Condensation realm upon reaching Peak Essence Building realm, there were also significant differences between each martial artist.

Since there were still gaps in the sphere shaped figure in Peak Essence Building realm martial artists' inner world, it naturally meant that more Spiritual Essence particles could still be refined.

Some martial artists who were more patient or more confident in their talents would delay their breakthrough into the Essence Condensation realm, choosing to refine as many Spiritual Essence particles during their Essence Building realm as possible, so as to strengthen their foundation.

Since the number of Spiritual Essence particles directly affected the strength of martial artists, this difference would only be magnified as they continued advancing to the subsequent cultivation realms.

Still, this was not a path that suited all martial artists.

Martial artists' life force and vitality would be the strongest when they were young. That was also when it was easiest for them to break through the boundaries within different cultivation realms.

By delaying the transition to the Essence Condensation realm, martial artists risked running out of time. If their life force and vitality had deteriorated with age, then it might actually cause them to fail in their future breakthroughs.

While an Essence Building realm martial artist still had a mortal lifespan, an Essence Condensation realm martial artist could actually live hundreds of years!

If a martial artist were to fail in his transition to the Essence Condensation realm simply because he spent too much of his youth on strengthening his foundation at the Essence Building realm, then it was definitely not worth it!

But Lu Tianzi naturally did not face such a problem.

His was born with a high martial talent, was armed with an Essence Stone to tap into, and had comprehended the second level of the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique.

As such, his rate of cultivation at the moment was light years ahead of his peers!

He simply did not have to worry about wasting his life force and vitality due to spending too much of his youth.

Lu Tianzi decided that even if he had to expend the entirety of the Essence Stone, he would still push on towards building a perfect foundation.

This was the only way that he would be able to touch upon the pinnacle of strength in the future!