Kang Kingdom, Ying Ding tribe.
In Hujie Immortal City, within Cloud Lark Residence.
"Golden Core peak realm at last." Sitting cross-legged on the meditation mat, Wei Tu glanced at the perfectly round golden core inside his dantian and the nearly full sea of spiritual power, then slowly opened his eyes and exhaled a heavy breath.
As planned, after over 40 years of secluded cultivation, his cultivation had finally reached the peak of the Golden Core realm, the stage right before forming a Nascent Soul.
"But before I form the Nascent Soul, I need to deal with this thing first."
While speaking, Wei Tu's right palm lit up with green light and gently pressed on his left abdomen.
With a sweep of the green light, a blood-red dot appeared on his skin. It slowly opened, and a slender white jade pill bottle was squeezed out from within.
No need to say it—this was the One Qi Illusion Pouch secret technique he'd obtained from Sun Chixin.
After learning this secret art, Wei Tu had quickly followed the example of the Qingzhu Mountain cultivators and applied the technique to his own body to hide items.
The item he had stored in the One Qi Illusion Pouch, naturally, was the Nascent Transformation Pill he had obtained from the Mingwang Sect.
At this point, not only had his cultivation reached the Golden Core peak as expected, but the Righteous Clarity Divine Qi he cultivated had also reached the stage of major accomplishment.
"With Righteous Clarity Divine Qi at major accomplishment, I should be able to purge the poisonous energy from this pill."
Wei Tu poured the Nascent Transformation Pill out from the bottle. A flash of golden light passed through his eyes as he carefully examined the traces of evil poison lingering in the pill.
The pill was about the size of a thumb, entirely crystal yellow, surrounded by wisps of violet spiritual mist—clearly a top-grade spiritual pill.
But unfortunately, its surface was marred by several small black specks.
Some of those specks had even seeped into the pill's interior, like ink stains bleeding through.
These black specks were the strange poison that had tainted the pill while it was in the possession of the Red Snake Ancestor.
"Cleanse!"
Wei Tu activated his secret art. Rainbow-colored radiance flowed from his palm and enveloped the Nascent Transformation Pill.
A moment later, under the aura of this Righteous Clarity Divine Qi, the surface poison on the pill began to dissolve, gradually returning to its original crystal yellow appearance.
However, Wei Tu had only removed the superficial layer of poison. The deeper poison remained stubborn and refused to clear so easily.
"I'll just have to grind through it slowly."
Wei Tu stayed calm and patient. After cultivating for over 300 years, how could he lack the willpower to deal with this?
Time passed.
Another spring and autumn came and went.
The Nascent Transformation Pill in Wei Tu's hand had fully regained its bright yellow color. No trace of the black poison remained.
However, its mass had shrunk by nearly one-quarter.
"For me, the remaining potency is already enough."
Wei Tu placed the pill back into the One Qi Illusion Pouch inside his body and thought quietly to himself.
The two key items for forming a Nascent Soul were the Nascent Transformation Pill and a Spirit-Awakened Item.
Either one alone could significantly increase the success rate of breaking through to the Nascent Soul realm.
Now, he had both.
Even though the pill had lost some of its potency, the impact on him would be negligible.
"But… for forming a Nascent Soul, I still need a fourth-rank spiritual land…" Wei Tu's eyes narrowed as he rubbed his chin.
As the chief alchemist of Ying Ding tribe, he certainly had the qualification to borrow a fourth-rank spiritual land.
But doing so would inevitably expose his current cultivation level.
And once that happened, there was no guarantee Ying Ding tribe would still treat him the same way.
In fact, they might even interfere with or sabotage his Nascent Soul breakthrough.
After all these years in Ying Ding tribe, Wei Tu was already familiar with its internal politics. The lower levels were open and welcoming to foreign cultivators, but the higher levels remained conservative.
The change in Yuan Jie's attitude was proof of that.
Or rather, it wasn't a change—it was a consistent execution of the fundamental policy of the three Divine Masters:
—"Power must stay with Kang people."
Now, if he succeeded in forming a Nascent Soul, the disruption to the political balance of Ying Ding tribe would be enormous.
There would be very few within the division who truly hoped to see him succeed.
Sure, it was possible they might welcome a new Nascent Soul cultivator…
But Wei Tu didn't dare take that gamble.
If he guessed wrong, he wouldn't be the only one to suffer. The entire Wei Clan could be dragged down with him.
There was another concern.
His methods for facing the Nascent Soul tribulation—once exposed—could bring serious trouble.
Take, for example, Yuan Ying's Azure Flood-Dragon Banner, the Yellow Cloud Pouch, or Yuwen Cheng's Jade Parasol...
All those were dangerous items.
And he obviously had no intention of discarding them.
"Fourth-rank spiritual land…"
Wei Tu's mind spun rapidly as he tried to think of a suitable place.
"Fellow Daoist Wei, have you forgotten about that fourth-rank spiritual land inside the Great Void Realm?"
Just then, Bai Zhi—who was still refining Shen Yunqiu's essence—spoke up and reminded him.
Great Void Realm?
Wei Tu's eyes lit up immediately. He recalled the hidden domain he'd entered while capturing the Spirit-Awakened Item inside the Great Void Realm.
That secret domain was indeed a fourth-rank spiritual land.
In terms of spiritual energy, it was second only to the Falling Sun Spring among places he had visited.
As for safety...
That wasn't a concern.
The treasures within the Great Void Realm had already been swept clean by him, the Demon Lord Gui Luo, and the others. Now it was a treasureless land, unlikely to attract anyone's interest.
Moreover, the interior of the Great Void Realm was filled with the poison of the Seven-Star Begonia. Even Nascent Soul old monsters wouldn't linger there, lest they drain their vitality.
With the Great Void Stone in his possession, even if danger appeared, he could instantly teleport to safety.
In other words, heading to the Great Void Realm for seclusion and forming a Nascent Soul had almost no downside—except the distance.
"Then I'll go to the inner region of the Great Void Realm to undergo seclusion and form my Nascent Soul."
Wei Tu made his decision.
Without hesitation, he activated all the restrictions and formations in his cave residence, then took out the Instant Transmission Array and teleported out of Hujie Immortal City. He then flew straight toward Tonghu Mountain in the Zheng Kingdom.
With several past experiences of crossing the border, Wei Tu didn't fear the treacherous Black Blood Marsh that separated the Zheng and Kang Kingdoms. In less than half a month, he had already crossed it.
"Qingfeng Prefecture, Qingmu County…"
On the way, he passed by his homeland.
Hovering in the air, Wei Tu scanned the familiar land with his divine sense.
Whether it was the single courtyard in Sanyuan Township or the Yue family estate in Qingdu, he sensed the presence of cultivators.
In fact, the latter even seemed to house a Foundation Establishment cultivator.
"Looks like the Yue family really did rise to fortune. They seized the opportunity."
Wei Tu's tone carried a hint of surprise.
Back when he left his old residence in Qingmu County, he'd given Yue Changzhong and his son two Foundation Establishment Pills as payment for providing the Chisong Heart Technique.
However, because Yue Changzhong was too greedy, Wei Tu had held back and didn't give them the matching demon-refining talisman needed to safely use the pill.
Now, nearly 100 years later, the Yue family had somehow turned just those two pills into a Foundation Establishment cultivator clan… That was honestly a bit beyond what Wei Tu had expected.
But thinking back on the Yue family's history, it didn't seem too far-fetched.
After all, a century ago, the Yue family's position under the fourth generation of the new dynasty's rule wasn't something they inherited from their ancestor, Yue Jing.
That lowly bailiff who had once served under him only rose to a fourth-rank general in the end.
What truly made the difference was the Yue family's strict household discipline, which had nurtured talents generation after generation and preserved their status. In fact, they had even taken it a step further.
In other words, if they could evolve from a common family into a top-tier secular clan, then becoming a Foundation Establishment cultivator family was also within reason.
"The only question is… how long can the Yue family's prosperity last? The cultivation world isn't like the mundane one—conflicts are constant. And Zheng Kingdom is a land of frequent wars."
Wei Tu shook his head.
He didn't have much faith in the Yue family's long-term future.
Sometimes, a clan's rise or fall had little to do with its internal efforts and more to do with changes in the external world.
And compared to Zheng Kingdom's shifting political landscape, the Yue family's strength as a mere Foundation Establishment clan was far too fragile. One wrong move, and the entire clan could be wiped out—just like the Huang family of Heshan back then.
Of course, if the Yue family's ancestral tomb suddenly produced a once-in-a-lifetime cultivation prodigy, that would be another story.
But such things almost never happened. The odds were nearly nonexistent.
After checking in on the Yue family, Wei Tu had no other acquaintances left in Qingfeng Prefecture. He retracted his divine sense, flicked his sleeve, and continued flying toward Tonghu Mountain.
...
Half a day later.
Wei Tu landed on Tonghu Mountain.
"This ancient teleportation array… it's been destroyed?" As he stepped into the mountain's interior and saw the shattered remains of the array scattered across the floor, a trace of surprise appeared on his face.
After all, with all the treasures in the Great Void Realm already looted, there was no real reason to destroy the array anymore.
"Could it be that the old demon Jiuchuan thought… I or some other cultivators were still in the Great Void Realm, and wanted to trap us?"
After a moment of thought, Wei Tu reached a conclusion.
The last time he left the Great Void Realm, he had relied on the power of the Great Void Stone, not the teleportation array in the underground palace.
And outside that palace, the Dao companion of Madam Lan—Master Jiu Li—had been stationed there the whole time.
In other words, the departure of Che Gongwei and the others could be traced. But his own exit had left no clues.
So, in a fit of frustration, the old demon Jiuchuan might've destroyed the teleportation array on Tonghu Mountain out of spite.
Based on his reasoning, Jiuchuan probably assumed he had escaped through the array.
—After all, teleportation arrays do leave traces of recent use.
What Jiuchuan didn't know was...
The Great Void Realm didn't have an exit teleportation array. All exit mechanisms relied entirely on the power of the Great Void Stone.
Which explained why, nearly 100 years later, Wei Tu was now seeing the array in ruins.
"Fellow Daoist Bai, do you think you can repair this teleportation array?"
Wei Tu flicked his sleeve, releasing Bai Zhi's ghostly body, and asked.
Bai Zhi didn't reply right away. Her ghost form circled the broken ancient array, carefully inspecting it for a while.
"It'll take about three months to repair. That's only because you collected some spatial materials back on Little Cold Mountain. Without those, rebuilding the array properly would've taken years…"
Half a day later, Bai Zhi showed a hint of relief and smiled as she spoke.
The materials available on the market were only crude stock. They needed to be refined before they could be used in array construction.
Fortunately, Wei Tu currently had a batch of teleportation materials that Bai Zhi had already refined.
That was the only reason she could confidently promise the repairs would be finished within three months.
"Then we'll wait three months."
Wei Tu nodded. With a wave of his sleeve, he cleared away the surrounding dust, then sat down nearby and closed his eyes to meditate.
Although the array's destruction had delayed him, it also proved something important—there were no longer any Nascent Soul old monsters interested in the Great Void Realm.
Otherwise, wouldn't Jiuchuan have just stationed someone here to wait and ambush him?
The reason he didn't was simple—waiting wasn't worth the cost, and the gains weren't enough to justify the effort.
Or maybe Jiuchuan had already lost interest in what Wei Tu had gotten from the realm.
Wei Tu hadn't forgotten—the old demon Jiuchuan had entered the Great Void Realm to retrieve the Divine Transformation Technique left behind by the Stone Demon Sect in their Technique Pavilion.
Three months passed in a flash.
During that time, because of how remote Tonghu Mountain was, neither Wei Tu nor Bai Zhi encountered any trouble while repairing the array, nor did they see any demonic cultivators.
Nothing happened at all.
"Fellow Daoist Wei, it's ready to use!"
At that moment, as Bai Zhi finished channeling several incantations into the array, the restored ancient teleportation array suddenly lit up with a soft yellow glow, projecting a hazy portal image to the other side.
"Thanks, Fellow Daoist Bai." Wei Tu gave a small nod and thanked Bai Zhi, then stepped straight into the array gate.
Moments later, as the teleportation array activated, Wei Tu vanished without a trace.
Strangely though—
This time, Bai Zhi didn't follow him. Instead, about half a day after Wei Tu left, she suddenly swept her jade sleeve and smashed the ancient teleportation array hidden deep in Tonghu Mountain.
"Let's see if Fellow Daoist Wei... can actually succeed in forming a Nascent Soul." Bai Zhi gathered the shattered array fragments and silently looked toward the direction of the Southern Desolate Plains. Her face showed a mix of unwillingness and envy.
The Great Void Realm had been her place of failure.
Now, unless something unexpected happened, it would likely become Wei Tu's place of success.
To say her feelings weren't complicated would be a lie.
"Come, Wind Cleaving Eagle."
"Hopefully you won't repeat my mistakes in the future."
After a brief moment of gazing, Bai Zhi sighed, picked up the spirit beast pouch Wei Tu had left on the ground, summoned the Wind Cleaving Eagle, and rode off from the cave chamber.
...
Elsewhere—
Wei Tu, who had teleported into the outer region of the Great Void Realm, steadied himself midair and released his divine sense to scan the surroundings.
When he saw the crystalline ice platform in the distance, a flicker of surprise appeared on his face. 'That's... the seventh trial of the Great Void Realm, the Cold Crystal Platform?'
He had thought that, like Gui Luo Demon Lord's subordinates—those people named Wei Tai and the others—he would be sent to the first trial of the Great Void Realm's outer region.
But instead, he was directly sent to the seventh trial—Cold Crystal Platform.
'Must be because I passed through the Cold Crystal Platform last time and entered the inner region. The Great Void Realm must've remembered my aura, so this time it sent me straight to the end...'
Wei Tu thought for a moment and came to a rough conclusion.
However, the current state of the Great Void Realm wasn't quite what he'd expected.
The realm wasn't empty.
At least on the Cold Crystal Platform, he could already see several Golden Core cultivators sitting in meditation.
Among them was someone he recognized from a past encounter—the Heavenly Maiden Sect prodigy, Ni Shihuang.
'Of course. The inner and outer regions are different. The inner region is full of Seven Star Begonia poison and has no remaining treasures. Naturally, no one would stay long.'
'But the outer region is different. The seven demonic trials of the Great Void Realm are ideal training grounds for body cultivators. It'd be weird if no one was here.'
Wei Tu thought to himself.
Luckily, he had already disguised himself and changed clothes out of habit before coming here, so even after arriving at Cold Crystal Platform, he wasn't worried about being identified.
He flew low to the platform and pretended to be one of the many ascetic cultivators, using only physical strength to begin ascending the treacherous path toward the inner region of the Great Void Realm.
He kept a low profile and quietly avoided all other cultivators he passed, never disturbing them.
But when he reached the final stretch of the Cold Crystal Platform, some people started to notice him.
After all, climbing this last section without using any magic tools was something only late-stage Golden Core cultivators could do.
And Wei Tu's face was unfamiliar.
That said, only a handful of people took note of him, and most of the gazes directed at him carried a hint of caution or respect.
After all, in the demonic path, strength was everything. And Wei Tu's power clearly marked him as a top-tier Golden Core cultivator.
"This fellow Daoist, may I ask your name?"
Standing at the peak of Cold Crystal Platform, Ni Shihuang also looked over at Wei Tu. But her gaze carried more admiration than the others.
"My name?" Wei Tu paused slightly, feeling amused.
He still remembered how this woman had once mobilized nearly ten Golden Core True Lords from the Ni and Xue clans to chase him across a thousand miles to the border of Zheng Kingdom.
And now, she wanted to befriend him?
"I'm called Fu Dalu, from a small and obscure sect," Wei Tu replied vaguely.
He had no qualms about using Fu Dalu's name at this point.
Besides, the Xiao Kingdom and Zheng Kingdom were separated by more than 10,000 miles. Even if the real Fu Dalu found out, there was nothing he could do about it. There was no way to investigate.
"So your surname is Fu, Fellow Daoist Fu?"
Ni Shihuang paused, clearly unfamiliar with any renowned Golden Core cultivator named Fu Dalu in the demonic path. Nor had she ever heard of a powerful Fu clan.
But she kept her expression composed, feigning understanding as if she recognized the name.
"My name is Ni Shihuang, from the Heavenly Maiden Sect. My family resides on Yunhe Mountain in Zheng Kingdom..."
She introduced herself.
"If you ever have time, Fellow Daoist Fu, feel free to visit my clan. We would be honored to host you."
Ni Shihuang smiled as she added this offer.
Forming ties with top talents from the demonic path not only expanded her network and boosted her status in the sect but also benefited her family.
If this so-called Fellow Daoist Fu came to visit and happened to take a liking to one of her younger sisters, perhaps even taking one as a concubine, then he'd be tightly bound to the Ni family of He Mountain.
"Of course, of course."
Wei Tu cupped his fists and gave a perfunctory reply.
After exchanging a few more polite words, he excused himself and walked toward the inner region of the Great Void Realm.
"What? He's going into the inner region?"
Watching from the side, Ni Shihuang's expression turned surprised. After all, the poison in the inner region was deadly even to Nascent Soul ancestors.
What kind of backing did this guy have that gave him the confidence to directly enter the inner region and face the Seven Star Begonia poison head-on?
'He really must be from some tiny sect and doesn't know that all the treasures in the Great Void inner region were taken long ago. Now there's only toxic spiritual energy left.'
Suddenly, that thought struck Ni Shihuang, and a glint of satisfaction crossed her eyes.
After all, cultivators from small sects lacked knowledge and were easier to manipulate later.