Chapter 261: Mechanical Ascension, Man-Beast Unity, True Dragon Descends (I)

Chapter 261: Mechanical Ascension, Man-Beast Unity, True Dragon Descends (I)

After leaving the office, Chen Chu didn’t return to his dormitory.

The base was organized very differently from the school; there was no reading room or library. The only way to access information from the outside world was through the Celestial Think Tank or East Xia’s core intelligence database, and the only place to connect to those was the control room.

Soon, after passing through several security doors, Chen Chu arrived at a room that resembled a large computer room. He politely greeted the supervising teacher, who was idly drinking some tea, before sitting down in front of a light-screen computer.

After identity and access verification, the screen quickly refreshed with dozens of options.

Chen Chu could now access more information than before. When he clicked on the "arts" category, a dense directory of thousands of arts appeared, among which were top-level secret scriptures.

Of course, these secret scriptures only had their names and brief summaries. To learn and cultivate them, one needed to apply for them, and the process of obtaining these teachings was even more cumbersome than for high-level arts.

Skipping the arts category, Chen Chu clicked on "runes.” The page immediately switched, displaying images of over a hundred complete runes and thousands of incomplete runes, each representing a type of power.

When he hovered the mouse over a “mountain” rune, the image instantly magnified, revealing a dense, intricate internal structure. It appeared to be composed of hundreds to thousands of twisted strokes, extremely profound and complex.

"Sure enough, they’re all the same," Chen Chu muttered, his eyes flickering as he looked at the rune images.

Having condensed both incomplete and complete runes before, Chen Chu could feel a certain profound aura emanating from these rune images even through the screen. However, compared to the Divine Might Dragon Elephant rune he had condensed within his body, these runes seemed much simpler, even the over one hundred complete runes.

All of the officially available runes were basic ones, which varied in their effects: some had considerable power, some merely stirred a gentle breeze, and some, when condensed, could prevent nightmares. The powers they contained were diverse and peculiar.

Even the incomplete ones held special powers. Many of the basic and incomplete runes seemed weak individually, but according to the data, sometimes combining the weakest runes could result in explosive power.

It was similar to basic computer code: a single line would be useless, but once compiled, it could become a powerful, fully functional software.

After enthusiastically browsing through the rune information for a while, Chen Chu exited the page and opened the information section, clicking on the introduction to the West Meng Empire.

He had always been curious about the cultivation environments and conditions in the two nations that were on par with East Xia, especially now that Luo Fei was transferring to West Meng.

However, as he read through the cultivation information for the West Meng Empire, Chen Chu's face showed a look of surprise. He quickly scrolled through the information and then opened the details about the North Lin Empire.

Soon, a complete picture of the Federation's cultivation structure unfolded before Chen Chu. The three major empires, or rather the entire Human Federation, were dominated by three distinct paths: the true martial arts path, the gene path, and the mechanical fusion path.

Unlike East Xia and its affiliated nations, which adhered strictly to martial arts cultivation, North Lin followed the gene path, integrating the genes of mutated or colossal beasts. Practitioners there started by cultivating special arts to fuse with beast genes, continually enhancing this fusion through their training.

Or, instead of maximum enhancement of the Tyrant Body and condensing runes, he could have directly deduced the seventh stage of the Dragon Elephant Art and already condensed the True Martial Phantom.

During this period, Chen Chu had almost figured out the special traits of attribute points. Cultivating arts was about enhancing physical objects, such as battle armor, weapons, the Sumeru Bracelet, and even the body, so he could use points to enhance and break through each stage of the arts, all the way up to maximum enhancement.

When it came to the intangible, however, like the power of will, the points didn't work. The power of will, honed from spiritual force during art breakthroughs, could provide some momentum but couldn't be directly enhanced. Each breakthrough in willpower resulted from Chen Chu's consciousness merging with the Dragon Elephant Phantom and honing his insights.

After condensing the Hellblood Battle Will, the option to enhance it never appeared, since attribute points had almost no effect on those kinds of will. The same applied to the Insightful Eye Realm, which had stalled after losing the known arts for further deduction and couldn't enhance the Blade of Void into a complete rune on its own.

Can I create a top-level secret scripture on my own?

Chen Chu had doubts about this, though it wasn't impossible. He already had a complete Divine Might Dragon Elephant rune. The next step was to reference a secret scripture that could be cultivated to the Ninth Heavenly Realm.

Combining his own true martial art attributes, physical body, and will, he could create a Dao that perfectly suited him. Other cultivators had paved their paths to become kings step by step; he could also create a top-level secret scripture as his foundation to ascend the throne.

Especially since this era was different from the past. Each high-level art essentially represented a microcosm of a rune structure in its core principles, and there were thousands of them to reference when creating a secret scripture.

Given that he was currently in the late stage of the Fifth Heavenly Realm, with a major realm to go before reaching the peak of the Sixth, he had enough time to perfect and create his own secret scripture.

Of course, one shouldn't be blindly arrogant. So, as Chen Qi suggested, Chen Chu decided to prepare two options: if he hadn't developed his secret scripture by the late stage of the Sixth Heavenly Realm, he would choose another secret scripture as his foundation.

After making this decision, Chen Chu took a deep breath and opened the secret scripture directory.

"Confirm application for the top-level secret scripture, Divine Might Dragon Elephant?"

"Yes." Chen Chu clicked confirm.

"Secret scripture application has been submitted. Please wait for notification from the Federation headquarters. The printed version of the secret scripture will be delivered within half a month."

Phewww!

Exhaling a long breath, Chen Chu stood up and strode out of the control room.

He still had many things to accomplish next. For instance, he needed to refine his transcendent armor and weapon a second time, enhance the Eight Desolations Purgatory Halberd to its limit, and condense a combat skill rune.

After breaking through to the Sixth Heavenly Realm and obtaining the top-level secret scripture, he would have to consider his next steps. At this point, the southern battlefield no longer significantly contributed to his power progression.