Forty Millenniums of Cultivation

by <unknown>

  A castle of thoughts was quickly being built in Li Yao's mind.

  "Brain cell activity, 331%!"

  This was the limit.

  Li Yao felt as if he was standing on a higher dimension as he overlooked the just built information castle of [Soul Converging Techniques]. Every single detail had emerged on every single thought and every thread of information of Soul Converging Techniques. He could grasp all the details with a single glance.

  This kind of brainstorming pleasure made him unable to control himself. He was completely immersed in the ocean of [Soul Converging Techniques], where he was happily wandering. He completely forgot the passage of time.

  5 minutes, 10 minutes, 25 minutes, 30 minutes.

  Suddenly—

  Li Yao's pupil fiercely contracted to the size of a needle tip before it once again expanded to the limit.

  His brain cell activity was increasing by the minute, he was getting more and more excited, and his thoughts were flashing quicker and quicker. He felt as if countless flying shuttles, which he was unable to catch no matter what he did, were whizzing out from the depths of his neural field.

  "Boom!"

  The castle of thoughts suddenly collapsed and raised overwhelming frightening billows and terrifying waves, where every wave carried a seemingly inexhaustible amount of memories, while the vast majority of them were useless information. For instance, what he ate on the noon of the third day after his ninth birthday. He started to recall everything that was useless!

  Li Yao let out wheezing sounds, and the corner of his eyes madly twitched as he bit his lips to the point that the blood was flowing out.

  "This is bad! My brain cells are overactive, I am going to have Qigong deviation!"

  "Once I have Qigong deviation, it will take me at least a day to recover, during which my spirit will be weakened, my memory will decline, and I will not be able to concentrate. I will simply be unable to cultivate.

  "I can never let this happen! I must find a way to resolve this!"

  Everything before his eyes had blurred, and countless resplendent scenes collided with each other. Li Yao seemed to be hearing "cracking" sounds of his brain cells bursting open like popcorn. Every time they exploded, an overwhelming amount of useless memories would burst forth.

  "Memories..."

  A thought struck Li Yao's mind; he suddenly seemed to grasp something.

  He gathered a trace of his remaining consciousness, and with all his strength, he rushed into the depths of his brain towards Ou Yezi's tree of memories!

  "Boom!"

  The moment his consciousness was going the collapse, a bright light flashed before Li Yao's eyes and his consciousness appeared inside the Heavenly Refining Tower of Hundred Smelting Clan from forty millenniums ago.

  "Pooh..."

  Li Yao let out a long deep breath. This was the memory world of Ou Yezi. Even if a storm was raging through at the outside world, it would simply be unable to invade this place.

  "My guess was right. Ou Yezi's soul is so huge that it can absolutely withstand the side effects of 300% brain cell activity. This place is going to be my safe haven. I can hide here for 3-5 minutes before going out, and I shouldn’t have any Qigong deviation then."

  Having thought of this, Li Yao crossed his legs and steadily sat at the center of the Heavenly Refining Tower's first level where he studied the [Low-Rank Soul Converging Technique] over and over again for 10 minutes. Only then did he calmly and collectedly leave the memory fragments and made his consciousness resurface as he returned to the real world.

  Sure enough, beside a little headache, he was no longer in an uncontrollable state; he was not going to have Qigong deviation.

  "Fortunately I finally found a way. It seems that the 'Super Perception Cabin' has a great hidden danger, so I can not overuse it."

  Li Yao secretly praised his luck.

  When he swept a glance at the corner of the hologram which was displaying the time, his entire body was suddenly stupefied.

  "What!? Only a minute has elapsed in the real world?"

  "That's not right. I have obviously stayed for a dozen minutes in Ou Yezi's memories."

  "The passage of time of the memory world and the real world is in a ratio of 3:1. Three minutes in the memory world is equivalent to one minute in the real world."

  "Why has it increased by 3.3 times, reaching a ratio of 10:1?"

  Chapter 141: Sleeping Can Also Turn You Into God |

  "Did the passage of time in the memory fragment slow down by three times because my brain’s cell activity was elevated to 331%?"

  Li Yao's heart beat like drums.

  Once this conjecture was verified, then he would have ten times more cultivation time than an ordinary person.

  "In that case, even the abstruse basic theory course will not be difficult for me. Not only will I be able to learn all the basic theory courses in the Grand Desolate War Institution, but I will still be left with quite a bit of time to research the refining records in the Heavenly Refining Tower!"

  Li Yao licked his lip, his eyelids drooped down as he withdrew his mind, and once again, his consciousness sunk into the deep recesses of his neural field to where the Tree of Memories was present.

  "Whoosh!"

  Li Yao, once again, appeared at the bottom most level of the Heavenly Refining Tower. Surrounding him, there was an overwhelming amount of bookshelves that cited innumerable low-level exercises and refining records of the Hundred Smelting Clan.

  The corner of Li Yao’s lips curled up as he took out the [Thirteen Ancient Sword Blueprints] from the bookshelf.

  A sword was the greatest weapon among all, and if one wanted to learn refining, they would first have to learn how to forge swords. Thus, in the ancient cultivation world, refiners were also known as "Sword Forgers".

  This [Thirteen Ancient Sword Blueprints] contained the classical refining process of 13 kinds of flying swords. Every one of the flying swords’ process contained a few dozen crucial refining techniques.

  Once one has completely learned the [Thirteen Ancient Sword Blueprints], even if one was at the basic rudimentary level, that alone would allow him to refine some of the most common flying swords.

  Although the thirteen flying swords were simple, the telepathic thoughts it embodied were as vast as the sea and seemed to be inexhaustible. After Li Yao had acquired this refining record, he had always wanted to study it, but he didn't have the time to painstakingly learn and did not dare to give it a try casually.

  Now that he had such an opportunity, the endless mysteries of the ancient flying sword was a feast for his eyes, allowing him to enjoy it to his heart's content!

  "Whoosh, whoosh..."

  At the bottom most level of the Heavenly Refining Tower, only the sounds of page flipping could be heard.

  At first, Li Yao was planning to just have a look, but not long after, he was completely immersed in this lustrous and dazzling, breathtaking and mysterious world of ancient flying swords, completely forgetting everything else.

  Real world, after three hours, dawn was about to arrive.

  The cultivation gym was still hustling and bustling as countless students who had stayed all night were still ecstatically venting their strength.

  "Bam bam! Bam bam bam!"

  On Zhang Chuang’s body, every strand of muscles was as though crystals were exploding; like a mad gorilla, he continuously bombarded the punching target with explosive power, and the Strength Testing Machine swayed as if it was on the verge of collapsing.

  "Brother Chuang, it's bad! Quickly come and take a look at the Super Perception Cabin!" a fellow student sent the message.

  "What's going on? Did someone have Qigong deviation again? Isn't that pretty normal? Every two or three days, someone will have Qigong deviation in the Super Perception Cabin. It’ll be fine if we just haul him for treatment," Zhang Chuang disapprovingly said.

  Although he was a freshman, he was a citywide College Entrance Examination Cham
pion. Apart from the specially recruited students, he could be regarded as the strongest student, so he served as a small leader in the Iron Fist Club and was responsible for managing the chores in the cultivation gym at night.

  "No, it's Li Yao..." the student wanted to say something but hesitated.

  "Fellow Student Li Yao? Right, when did he leave? Since I was too engrossed in cultivation, I probably didn't notice him leave." Zhang Chuang grabbed a towel to wipe off the sweat.

  "He, he still hasn't left… he is still in the Super Perception Cabin," the student stammered as he replied.

  "What?"

  "Bang!" Zhang Chuang had actually made the towel burst as he forcibly squeezed it.

  He raised his eyebrows and furiously stared as he roared, "What the hell were you doing!? Do you want him to die? An ordinary person can have Qigong deviation after just staying for half an hour in the Super Perception Cabin. He's been staying in there for three hours—three frigging hours! His brain must be fried! You truly are, truly are—"

  Zhang Chuang ruthlessly threw what remained of the towel before he exerted strength in his legs and bolted. On one side, he was running, while on the other, he was showering curses, raining curses down upon the personnel.

  "Brother Chuang, calm down. It's really not like what you are imagining. In short, it is very strange. When you are there, you will know ‘cause even if I told you now, you will absolutely not believe me!"

  "Shut the fuck up! I, Zhang Chuang, am from a family of cultivators. Since I was three years old, I have started to touch the lustrous and dazzling world of cultivation, so what kind strange things I have not seen?"

  Zhang Chuang roared as he increased his speed, and in a little while, arrived at the scene.

  Afterward, he discovered things were truly super strange!

  Three personnel and a dozen students; all stood dumb like wooden chickens before a Super Perception Cabin as they peered inside with a rather fearful look in their eyes. It was as if it was not some human cultivating inside the Super Perception Training but rather some demon god!

  "What's the matter? Why are staring at the Super Perception Cabin? Are you still not going to get the person out?! Do you really want him to die!?"

  Zhang Chuang furiously pushed everyone aside and grabbed the collar of a student.

  "Brother Chuang, first hear me out. Fellow Student Li Yao has indeed been staying inside for three hours; however, aside from the spike in blood pressure and heartbeat just after the first one and half hour, his physiological index remained normal and hasn’t exceeded past the normal value even a bit. Because of this, we didn't pay any attention to it, but when we noticed him, about three hours had already passed!"

  "What!?"

  Zhang Chuang's eyes were so wide-opened that they looked as if they were the eyes of a bull: "Are you joking with me? His brain cell activity has been elevated to 300% for almost 3 hours, and yet you say his physiological index is still very normal? Is he a human or a demon beast? Even if he is a demon beast, it will not be so excessive!"

  The student, who had his entire faced splattered with Zhang Chuang’s saliva, said completely bewildered, "I am not finished. Not only was Fellow Student Li Yao's physiological index extremely normal, but his heartbeat, pulse, and respiratory rate were all 70% of the standard value. We usually call this state... deep sleep!"

  "WHAT!?"

  Zhang Chuang’s roar almost burst opened the roof. He thunderously roared as he ruthlessly shook the pitiful student, "Do you not know why this thing is called 'Super Perception Cabin'? It is precisely because this thing can allow someone to enter a Super! Perception! State!"

  "Now you are telling me that someone who has brain cell activity of 300%, who is in a frigging SUPER PERCEPTIVE STATE, is in DEEP SLEEP!? Is there something wrong with your tongue, or am I hearing things wrongly?"

  The student forcefully smiled: "Brother Chuang, there is nothing wrong with my tongue and there is nothing wrong with your hearing. Even I suspect that there is something really wrong with my eyes!"

  Zhang Chuang spat a mouthful of saliva before he shoved everyone and pasted his nose on the transparent crystal window as he peered inside with wide-opened eyes.

  He kept on staring for a while!

  However, Li Yao, who sat in cross-legged position at the center of the pupa, had a trace of a strange smile on his face. His expression was completely calm, and much to his dismay, there was drool trickling down the corner of his mouth as he made faint snoring sounds.

  All this points to one thing and one thing only, and that was he was in a deep sleep state.

  From the high-speed movement of his eyes, it was quite clear that he was immersed in an incredibly wonderful dream!

  "Brother Chuang, Fellow Student Li Yao has remained in this state for an entire three hours already," the student faintly added this sentence.

  Zhang Chuang was completely stupefied. He dumbfoundedly stared for a long while before he could finally recover to the state of being able to respond.

  After suppressing for a while, he vented out, "Fuck, this brat is really asleep!"

  ...

  From this day onwards, a legend appeared in the Grand Desolate War Institution.

  A legend of a "God of Sleeping"!

  According to the legend, the God of Sleeping was endowed with a unique talent by virtue of which he could sleep at any place. He also had a very eccentric hobby, and he especially liked to sleep in a Super Perception Cabin.

  While others would have their brains fried in the Super Perception Cabin when learning the basic theoretical knowledge in madness, one could always find the God of Sleeping in a nearby pupa with a smile, sound asleep, and he would sleep for the most of the day.

  This kind of self-complacent appearance simply made everyone unsure whether to laugh or cry—if he truly lacked sleep, why didn't he enter the Deep Sleep Chamber instead of making such a huge scene?

  "Maybe he has too much pressure or maybe there is something wrong with his brain, causing all stimulation to his brain cells to be unable to rouse him?"

  "It's possible. After all, he is facing a task which is impossible. He has to gather 40,000 credits in one year and become a registered refiner afterwards. Only then will he be able to protect the Refining Department. Such a task is terrible—it is simply beyond reach!"

  "How many credits does he have anyway?"

  "I checked the Battle Ranking and it's… zero! He still hasn't taken any tests!"

  "What?"

  These kinds of rumors were flying at every corner of the campus.

  But no matter who it was, they dared not to take it out with Li Yao.

  In the end, cultivators were different from ordinary people. Many students were from families of cultivators which have a profound heritage, and they have all learned priceless, wondrous, and mysterious skills

  And some people had fortuitous encounter in their childhood, had beheaded strange beasts, eaten some strange fruit, or inadvertently acquired some peerless ability... In the world of cultivation, this was a pretty common occurrence.

  If they imprudently went and asked, "Hey, fellow student, why can you enter deep sleep in the Super Perception Cabin? What kind of fortuitous encounter did you have? Why don't you open the outlook of everyone?"

  If such words left their mouth, even if Li Yao beat the crap out of him on the spot, no one would sympathize with him.

  As for the faculty, they, even more so, weren't concerned over this matter. A university was completely different from a high school; in high school, teachers might act like stewards and run after students all day, but in university, if a student was willing to learn, then the professors would do their utmost to teach; however, if a student snored all day long, then that was his freedom and no one would interfere.

  After all, everyone was an adult. One must pave their own path step by step.

  And as for Yuan Manqiu, she was pretty much busy reconstructing the Refining Department and was out on a trip
to contact the scattered grassroots refiners. She simply didn't have any time to be concerned with these trivial things—she believed that Li Yao would take at least 2-3 months to learn all the basic theory courses!

  Li Yao was like a weed that spared no effort to grow under the rubble where no one could see.

  One day... two days... three days...

  Every day, he would spend 12 hours in the Super Perception Cabin.

  While everyone thought that he was snoring, he was actually immersed in the depths of the Heavenly Refining Tower where he directed all his attention to learning the 100 basic theory courses.

  In the real world, where ten days had passed, in the Heavenly Refining Tower, three months had passed, during which Li Yao had finally chewed, absorbed, thoroughly memorized, and understood 88 basic theory courses!

  Afterward, he turned his gaze towards the higher-rank theoretical scriptures.

  His target was to use half a month in the real world—5 months in the Heavenly Refining Tower—to thoroughly read over a majority of the scriptures.

  Even if he was unable to understand, he would have engraved them deeply in his brain, which would lay a solid foundation for the next step in cultivation!

  Chapter 142: Fire and Ice |

  First and foremost, Li Yao began reading the jade chips which he had unearthed from the rubble.

  These jade chips were a unique kind of magical equipment which were dedicated to storing telepathic thoughts and could often go through vicissitudes of 1,000 years. Its structure was extremely sturdy and was also engraved with special array glyphs which ensured that the telepathic thoughts stored within could never be extinguished.

  Thus, even after experiencing such a huge explosion, many of the jade chips were perfectly fine.

  A majority of the jade chips had cultivation data and refining processes stored which Li Yao was unable to completely analyze, even with his current strength.