It has been three days since the tournament where Ren showed his might to everyone in the Void Sect. After the incident surprisingly enough Ren didn't kill Ming Hao or Elder Ming or anyone for that matter instead Ren simply destroyed Ming Hao's dantian, so now he could no longer gather Qi and became a human who could not cultivate the Void Sect's arts. As Ming Hao was falling in despair Ren spoke to him.
"Hmph, this is already a light punishment for what you have done. I hope next time you won't do something so cowardly. If you wish to fight or kill my disciple do it upfront."
When Ming Hao heard Ren's words the fear he felt for the other person was replaced with a fit of intense anger. Upon losing his dantian he became nothing more than a mortal with no power and here in the upper realms were Gods and Ancient beings reside, being a person that could not gather Qi was equivalent to being a dead person or a person forever protected by others.
"Next time? There's no next time for me! Do you call this light punishment? It would've been better if you just killed me! Without my cultivation, I won't be strong enough to be able to protect myself I would be nothing more than livestock."
"Huh, what the f*ck are you saying? Are you confused or something?" Ren responded in a matter-of-fact tone. "Even without Qi or mana or whatever you want to call it, you can still become strong."
Not only was Ming Hao bewildered even the others were confused by what Ren said. To everyone present, the only way to become stronger was by using Qi, even if you try your best there was a limit to what you can do without Qi. Even Ren's disciple Fang Mu was surprised to hear what his master said.
...
If it was the time he was still Demon Lord Kretos even Ren wouldn't believe in what he was saying, but now he knows more than he ever did. After fighting with his past incarnations he learned that some of them had no mana or something similar to it, what they relied on was only their body and technique to fight. Some might think that these incarnations who fully rely on physical skills would be the weakest of the bunch, but the truth was different. The truth is that there is one incarnation that was able to reach the top hundreds in strength without using any form of supernatural ability.
Even the current Ren isn't strong enough to beat that incarnation, but Ren was able to learn the ways of that certain incarnation of the Strongest Mortal Soul. So now even if he had no spiritual power he could still fight.
"You don't believe me, fine then watch this. I won't use even a tiny bit of Qi." After speaking Ren's breath changed and the entire fluctuation of Qi from his body disappeared. "See I stopped the flow of Qi in my body. Now allow me to show you that Qi is not needed to become strong."
Ren raised his right foot upward and smashed it onto the arena. The arena were the Void Sect disciples fought was created to be able to endure most attacks released by people at the Golden Core Realm but it was unable to withstand Ren's attack without even an ounce of Qi.
Not only was the arena destroyed by that attack but the ground shook so much, it was like an earthquake.
"See I did that with nothing but my body and skill."
...
After that incident surprisingly enough Ming Hao actually asked Ren to teach him how to become stronger, what was even more surprising was that Ren actually agreed. Fast forward to three days later, right now Ming Hao was tied to a tree being punched by a disciple at the Qi Gathering Realm.
During these three days, Ming Hao has been stuck to that tree and he has been punched with a rest time of one hour every four hours. During Ming Hao's break time, Ren would feed him with a pill he made that restores Ming Hao's physical health. It doesn't matter if it was daytime or night time there was always a Qi Gathering Realm disciple that was punching Ming Hao. Some people even thought that this wasn't really training and Ren was just punishing Ming Hao. Of course, Ren knew about these rumors but he didn't bother correcting them.
Then there were Ren's two other disciples Mo Feng and Fang Mu, upon meeting each other for the first time the first thing they did was issue a challenge to one another. The two wanted to establish who was the elder disciple between them. As Ren's disciples, seniority wasn't about who was first, but who was stronger.
The two had a sparring match a day after the tournament was over. Some disciples wanted to watch the battle between the two but Mo Feng and Fang Mu warned them that it would be dangerous if they weren't strong enough. Some disciples did not care about the warning and went to watch the battle between the two anyway.
At the end of the battle, several disciples have been seriously injured and two disciples died. The end result of the match was a tie, Mo Feng had higher cultivation but Fang Mu's technique was sharper than Mo Feng's, overall the two were equally matched. In the end, the two decided to have another match in a few days.
...
As his disciples were doing their respective training, Ren entered his soul realm to speak to the original. Ren was now inside the special space within his soul realm that was created exclusively for the original.
Even though he has met the original incarnation several times, Ren could not help but be in awe of the original incarnation's bearing. The aura he was emitting was so much purer than all the other incarnations of the Strongest Mortal Soul. The original incarnation smiled at Ren and asked.
"So what do you want to talk about Ren?"