Chapter 1721: Chapter 9: Hundred Feet Void, Three Thousand Dao Seeds, Primordial Daoist Collection!

...

In the twenty-fifth year of studying the Primordial Daoist Collection, Zhao Xing had already cultivated the Stem-Battle Divine Skill to the Sixth-level Divine Power.

The difficulty of this technique wasn’t that high in the early stages; the main issue was that the Secret Technique itself contained an enormous amount of content, with many Life structures that had to be mastered proficiently.

All the way up to the Sixth-level Divine Power, there were no real bottlenecks; only the Seventh-level Divine Power could be considered a threshold.

Because starting from that stage, it already involved Void talent and the birth of certain powerful gifted troop types—a transformation from quantity to quality.

"You really have patience, and you’ve got potential too." The Five Poison Emperor said with appreciation.

The Stem-Battle Divine Skill wasn’t exactly difficult, but it contained far too much content, involving the Life structures of billions of plant-type beings. Even if some were convergent and could be simplified in practice, it was still colossal.

Cultivating it was extremely monotonous, to the point it could even create an illusion of "haven’t I practiced this move already?"

Then, because of this convergence, one might go off in the wrong direction with cultivation, even making fatal mistakes and omissions.

The fact that Zhao Xing could clearly make progress was thanks to his panel, but in the eyes of the Five Poison Emperor that still required tremendous willpower and a strong mind to repeatedly check and correct himself; that was truly remarkable.

"He really is decent." Zuo Qiyu rarely voiced his agreement.

But just as the two finished talking, Zhao Xing stopped.

Having reached a bottleneck, he began to do a thorough review.

At the same time, he flipped through the Star Mirror to learn about the situation outside.

He hadn’t known it if he didn’t look; one look gave him a fright.

There were actually several thousand unread messages in his Star Mirror.

"More than half of them are from Jing Yan, this guy..."

His relatives and friends in Great Zhou all knew that during critical moments he wouldn’t want to be disturbed easily, so they only reported the situation at home once every ten years.

For example, Emperor Wu and Ji Si had already returned to the nation and were planning for war.

For example, Ji Si had already chosen her own Transmission Realm.

Liu Tianning had followed Lord Qianhua of the Divine Splendor Daoist School in completing the first stage of training, becoming Great Zhou’s first Tao Domain Realm expert.

Ji Mengjun, after becoming a disciple of King Luo Hou, had also advanced at an astonishing speed and was not far from the Tao Domain Realm.

"All Jing Yan sends are bits of gossip, this brat..." Zhao Xing couldn’t help but shake his head.

Both Jing Yan and Yu Tianqing had entered the Primordial Realm treasure land, the Little Thousand Array Realm, to cultivate.

Yu Tianqing had only sent three letters, while Jing Yan had sent over a thousand messages.

But they weren’t all gossip.

One of them caught Zhao Xing’s attention.

[Zhao Xing, today I saw seven contestants taken away by an Emperor of the Primordial Realm; they were said to have violated the rules.]

[These make three hundred and eighty-five people taken away in the past fifty years.]

[I heard they’re Reincarnation Realm Reincarnations—people who were heinous criminals in their previous lives and violated the Empire’s taboos. There’s even a Reincarnation Realm Reincarnation from the Wanhe Demon Clan... Heh, after reincarnating they still didn’t rein it in and actually devoured over a million Empire citizens—truly audacious beyond belief!]

"The Red Star Empire’s screening has begun?" Zhao Xing couldn’t help but be taken aback.

There was no doubt this was a cultivation-version "political vetting."

The Red Star Empire wasn’t going to accept someone just because they were in the Reincarnation Realm.

If someone had committed too much slaughter in a past life or had once infringed upon the Empire’s interests, it wouldn’t be written off just because they reincarnated.

Not to mention there were Demon Race powerhouses among them.

Obviously, they wanted to use reincarnation to become "spies."

"Impure earth reincarnation—how could it be that easy? The Empire doesn’t make a move, merely keeps it low-key, and they really think the Empire is easy to bully."

Zhao Xing wasn’t worried about himself. With Qing Yu Zi vouching for him, he had long since passed the Empire’s review; there was no way he would be expelled or punished.

Of course, after passing the Empire’s review, he still had to see if he could pass the Primordial Realm’s review.

Just becoming an Empire citizen wasn’t a big deal; to enter the Primordial Realm, one’s recognition and acceptance of the Empire had to be tested.

[...There are also quite a few people who, upon first entering the treasure land, became so obsessed with cultivation that they broke through their Realm and reached the Tao Domain Realm, and they were eliminated as well.]

[Serves them right. If you can’t even control your own cultivation, you deserve to be eliminated.]

[...]

......

"Take me to the Hundred Feet Void." In the fifty-fifth year, Zhao Xing ended his cultivation in the Primordial Daoist Collection ahead of schedule and began the final stage of his training.

At this time, his Stem-Battle Divine Skill was still at the Sixth-level Divine Power. To break through, it was no longer possible to rely on bitter cultivation alone.

"Come." The Guiding Grassman led Zhao Xing to the next place—the [Hundred Feet Void].

...

"The Myriad Phenomena of the universe, their phenomenon is emptiness." This sentence spoke of the Void being divided into multiple layers; the First Layer was the "Phenomenon Layer," which was the commonly known stable Void.

The Second Layer was the "Dao Display Layer"; Void turbulence, places where the Earth Core collapsed, and the like were considered the Second Layer Void.

The external form of matter underwent drastic changes and could not exist in a complete state.

The Third Layer was the "Dao Ancient Layer," the ancient source of the Grand Dao, concealed within the deep layers of the Void.

From the Third Layer onward, things became rather abstract, and there was another unit of measurement for the Grand Dao: the "ren."

Zhao Xing felt this was the Cultivation World’s unique understanding of the dimensionality of the Space Path.

"Nine ren of the Second Layer is the extreme limit of the Reincarnation Realm."

"The ’Dao Ancient Layer’ is already the domain of the Gods."

Did the Hundred Feet Void really have a hundred ren? Zhao Xing didn’t know; in his previous life he had never set foot in the domain of the Gods.

Coming here to cultivate was solely to comprehend the Void Dao, so that when he cast the Variant Method, he could temporarily transform into a "Void Seed."

"With just the first three ren of the Dao Display Layer, one can travel across star systems. On the path of Spells, the Dojos of Tao Domain Realm experts can delve into this layer to perform long-distance teleportation, greatly increasing their mobility."

"Mechanical Masters’ Arrays also have to take root within it; the Ring Land Array and Star Shifting Array all involve these principles."

For Zhao Xing, if he wanted to master the Variant Method to the Seventh-level Divine Power, his own comprehension of the Void Dao had to reach this level.