A Chaotic World

Chapter 8: Gong Shengjie

The Undulated Currents Breathing Technique regarded the world itself as an ocean, and within this mighty ocean were powerful currents that perpetually swept across the landscape. Through adjusting one's breath to the frequency of these currents, one could be aligned to the world's frequency, allowing for a smooth flow of Spiritual Essence within one's inner world.

When practised to perfection, it was said that a martial artist would be able to see through the flow of all things. By aligning oneself to the world's currents, one could even borrow the speed of the world in his every stride, and the strength of the world in his every strike!

At this moment, Lu Tianzi was far from being able to do so. But he was still relying on the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique to drive his Spiritual Essence, absorbing the wisp of energy from the Essence Stone, and refining it into Spiritual Essence particles.

At the Essence Building realm of humanity's Spiritual Essence system, martial artists absorbed energy from their surroundings and refined it to form Spiritual Essence particles. The accumulated Spiritual Essence particles served as the foundation of martial artists' strength. The more Spiritual Essence particles they managed to refine, the greater the strength they would be able to draw from their inner world.

Essence Building realm martial artists' inner worlds contained a mass of Spiritual Essence particles swirling around a centre. The further they were along the road of cultivation, the greater the number of particles and thus the denser the inner world would be.

When martial artists finally broke through to the Essence Condensation realm, this mass of Spiritual Essence particles would be forcefully condensed into a rotating ball of Spiritual Essence, and it would no longer be possible to see stray bits of Spiritual Essence particles floating around loosely.

Lu Tianzi naturally had not reached that state.

When he had first been named as Holy Guardian, Lu Tianzi only was at the Intermediate Essence Building realm. But now with the help of the Essence Stone in his hands, he was rapidly charging towards the Advanced Essence Building realm!

Absorbing a wisp of energy from the Essence Stone, refining the wisp of energy into Spiritual Essence particles, and then absorbing another wisp of energy from the Essence Stone, refining that wisp of energy into Spiritual Essence particles

The same process repeated for tens of thousands of times in the span of one night.

While it might seem repetitive and mechanical, the process was actually not so simple. For every second that Lu Tianzi maintained his connection with the inner layer of the Essence Stone, he had to expend a great amount of mental strength.

Ordinary martial artists might be able to do so for short periods of time, but Lu Tianzi had gone far beyond the lengths that ordinary martial artists were willing to go to.

Mental strength was vital to a martial artist's cultivation.

If a martial artist's mental strength were to be recklessly pushed beyond the limit, it might result in a mental backlash. If that happened, a light consequence would be losing consciousness, while a serious consequence would be receiving permanent damage to the mind, in which case going insane was not completely impossible!

While the chances were low for such severe consequences to result, low chance did not mean no chance.

Without a resolve as strong as Lu Tianzi's, it was simply unthinkable to opt for such a torturous and dangerous method of cultivation.

As time passed, even Lu Tianzi's incomparably strong resolve inevitably started weakening from the exhaustion. But at this time, he could sense that he was already incomparably close to the next boundary of his cultivation realm.

Just a little more!

Lu Tianzi continued to push himself further, and it was not without reward. With a silent roar, he finally broke through!

Advanced Essence Building Realm of the Spiritual Essence System!

But even breaking through to the next realm was not enough to satisfy his hunger for strength. He knew that only by pushing himself to the limit would he truly be able to maximise his progress!

More!

Lu Tianzi continued to push on, until he was finally too exhausted to continue and had no choice but to rescind the connection to the Essence Stone.

By then, he was already gasping for air, completely out of breath from pushing himself to the limit. Regulating his breath with the Undulated Currents Breathing Technique, he quickly recovered to a state of tranquillity.

As he expected, the Essence Stone was a real cultivation treasure. If he had this from the start, then he would definitely have reached the Essence Condensation realm by now!

But it was still not too late. Now that he had an Essence Stone in hand, he just had to work doubly hard from now on in order to make up for all that lost time.

It was not long before the sun rose again.

Lu Tianzi had already gotten up from bed before first light, and was taking in the cool morning air outside of Uncle Ye's house, but not before practising a little of the Thunderbolt Torrential Fists according to the manual.

Being able to revitalise themselves by driving their Spiritual Essence in meditation, martial artists usually did not require much sleep.

Lu Tianzi was no different, and having just broken through to the Advanced Essence Building realm only made things easier.

Closing his eyes, he took in a deep breath of the morning air of Ivory Rock City.

It had not been long since he last breathed in the morning air of the city. However, the feeling was destined to no longer be the same.

The last time he did so, the air felt clean and fresh, flavoured with the hope of humanity. But now the air was dusty and dry, seasoned by the betrayal of mankind.

Lu Tianzi frowned, and no longer harboured thoughts of savouring the fresh morning air. He understood that everything was just an illusion, and his mental outlook had been the greatest influence on his senses.

As long as he was unable to achieve his goal, he would never be able to appreciate what others refer to as the simple joys of life.

"You there! What are you doing in someone else's yard?" a loud voice broke the silence of dawn, easily drawing Lu Tianzi's attention.

An angry looking teenager was stomping over while pointing straight at Lu Tianzi. He looked to be in his late teens. While he did not wear anything luxurious, the teenager was dressed in a neat manner with his long hair tied up in a ponytail.

"Who are you?" Lu Tianzi raised an eyebrow as he swept his perception over the other party.

The other party had successfully established a foundation to begin Spiritual Essence cultivation, but he had yet to even hit Primary Essence Building realm.

"I am your grandpa! Are you deaf? I just asked you a question! What are you doing in someone else's yard? Get out of there right now!" the young man continued to holler at him.

"I am staying here at the moment. Why should I leave?" Lu Tianzi frowned.

"Staying here at the moment?" the young man snorted in disdain. "What a joke! Who in the Workers District doesn't know that this is where the Ye couple and their beautiful daughter Ye Xiangyuan stays? Are you trying to say that your surname is also Ye?"

Lu Tianzi was starting to feel a little impatient by now. "Even the owners have not said anything. Who are you to tell me what to do? If you have nothing better to do then stop barking here and get lost!"

The houses in the Workers District were built in tight clusters, and most people here woke up early so that they could take full advantage of the daylight to work.

With such a loud commotion, many people had opened their doors to see exactly what was going on, and Uncle Ye was no exception.

"Ah Zhan! What is happening?" Uncle Ye walked up to Lu Tianzi while staring at the young man. "Gong Shengjie? What are you doing here again?"

Seeing how familiar Uncle Ye was calling Lu Tianzi, the young man named Gong Shengjie was startled for a second before he clasped his fists towards Uncle Ye. "Uncle Ye, this youth here mentioned that he is currently staying at your house. Is this true?"

"He is a friend! But what has it got to do with you?" Uncle Ye snapped.

"You must not do that, Uncle Ye! Did you forget that you still have a beautiful daughter in the house? Who knows if this youth would do anything unforgivable in the middle of the night?" Gong Shengjie exclaimed in disbelief.

"What a joke! Do I still need your permission to do what I want? Don't worry, his personality is definitely not as depraved as yours, so such a matter is impossible!"

"His personality is not as depraved as mine?" Gong Shengjie's mouth twitched wildly. "Uncle Ye, I might be giving you face now, but don't push your limits!"

Uncle Ye was slightly intimidated, but still harrumphed and continued. "In any case, I always had an eye for people. Ah Zhan would never do anything as contemptuous as what you mentioned!"

"You can never judge a person by his cover!" Gong Shengjie turned to examine Lu Tianzi from head to toe. "Who are you anyway? Even if Uncle Ye offered, how can you accept the invitation to stay there when there is a young maiden in the house? Do you have no shame? Or are you really intend to take advantage of the situation and make a move on Xiangyuan?"

Hearing their exchange, Lu Tianzi was rendered speechless, his previous irritation turning into disbelief.

Having started on the path of cultivation, the Spiritual Essence particles in his inner world had gradually transformed his body, strengthening him from inside out. As a result, his muscles had become more toned and his facial features had become more mature, so it was easy to be mistaken for someone older.

However, wasn't it too ridiculous to immediately treat him as a degenerate who was just aiming to **** girls just because of that?

Was this guy jealous?

"So what if I do, so what if I don't?" Lu Tianzi smirked haughtily. "As Uncle Ye said, what has it got to do with you?"

"You!" Gong Shengjie pointed to Lu Tianzi in rage before turning back to Uncle Ye. "Uncle Ye! Look at him! Just look at him! Are you still going to say the same things even after hearing what he said?"

Uncle Ye shook his head in helplessness.

Young men these days had such bad temperament. This Gong Shengjie was overbearing, but this Ah Zhan seemed to be a stubborn fellow as well.

Seeing that Uncle Ye kept his silence, Gong Shengjie did not keep pushing in that direction either, instead choosing to turn back to Lu Tianzi.

"You! Is it Ah Zhan? I hereby challenge you to a duel! If you fight and win, I have nothing to say! But if you lose, then I want you to move out of there immediately!"

"A duel?" Lu Tianzi had to consciously rein in his laughter. "On what basis do you have such confidence? Do you think I have too much time to spare or something?"

"Do you not dare?!" Gong Shengjie deliberately raised his voice such that his voice reached all the neighbouring houses.

"Go home and stop wasting my time," Lu Tianzi turned around and gave him a nonchalant wave without looking back.

"You! Good! Very good!" Gong Shengjie clenched his fists in anger. "After a few days, I will come back and visit you again. At that time, I shall see if you would still be able to stay this arrogant!"

Lu Tianzi merely stood there silently with his back facing Gong Shengjie, not turning back even as the latter stomped off in anger.

This was truly a ridiculous affair.

How did he even get involved in such a matter without having done anything?

All he hoped for was that none of the neighbours recognised him through the cloth that was tied around his eye. As for that Gong Shengjie, he was someone who had not even reached Primary Essence Building realm, so what was there to be afraid of?

However, what Lu Tianzi failed to realise was that from the start till the end, all the neighbours had not dared to interfere in the matter, only daring to cast their worried gazes over at him.