Chapter 202 - Sacred Marks
After entering nine-star condensed prime level, Ye Wei was extremely spirited. He briefly consolidated his cultivation and used the third Supernova evolution to see if he could reach the stars.
With the ancient hand seal, Ye Wei’s will-force was able to stretch five thousand miles against the planet’s gravity.
‘Still not enough…’ Ye Wei frowned, deflated. He could now sense the stars’ energy better but his will-force was still not strong enough to draw the energy back to him.
‘Here in Supreme Yu Palace I can absorb primal energy more than a hundred times faster than I do outside, I should just keep my head to it, if I keep up my pace, I will be able to power through to ten-star condensed prime level very soon!’ Ye Wei clenched his fists, rethought his strategies
“Try again when you broke though, no stressing Ye Wei.” He muttered to himself.
Only one minor breakthrough away from having to stand before the returned prime gauntlet, Ye Wei was starting to worry about the major breakthrough he will soon have to overcome if he wanted to go further with his cultivation. Minor breakthroughs can be overcome by hard work but major ones requires cultivators to defend themselves against inner demons, to be able to figure out on their own how they can efficiently and safely route the energy their gain resulted by their dantian and Sentient upgrade.
Ye Wei was focused, put all the frustrations to the side and cultivated.
Two days passed in a flash, the young Runemaster sat still and became one with nature. After twenty more days, he was still in the same position. He did not eat or sleep, lived off the energy he consumed.
Undisturbed by the outside world, the young Runemaster just sat still and cultivated for a whole month, Helian Jieyuan had occasionally been out of the palace to patrol but kept it quiet so Ye Wei could keep focus.
“Crack!”
Ye Wei shivered and the whole palace shook. The silver ball in his dantian was now covered by ten golden cracks.
“You are already a ten-star condensed prime Warrior!” Helian Jieyuan muttered to himself as he sensed the Qi disturbance, shocked by the speed of Ye Wei’s improvement. ‘I have tried cultivating without any disturbance too but even then I was not able to push myself that hard!’
‘I am cultivating fifty times normal speed here, but the Drakehead was a Ye’s flesh and blood, and this kid is using the Ye Yu’s formula…’ The royal look at Ye Wei and thought. ‘This must be why he is getting more out of this palace.’
“Ten!” Ye Wei opened his eyes and shouted excitedly, “if I still can’t channel the stars’ energy I will just try again when I am a returned prime Warrior!”
The young Runemaster was trying his best to remain calm, but behind the calm he was dreading for the major breakthrough.
‘I will get through eventually but how long am I going to be stuck for? A month? A year?’
“Let’s go!” Ye Wei exhaled slowly and filled his lungs with fresh air. He activated the third Supernova evolution, made the ancient hand seal. The texture of his Qi and will-force immediately transformed.
“Zoom!”
His will-force quickly condensed and became thread-shaped, shot upwards to the sky.
“It can go further!” Ye Wei muttered to himself, pointed his bloodshot eyes up at the sky. “I have to hold on to it, I can keep pushing!”
‘One thousand, two thousand…’ Ye Wei grounded his teeth, kept channelling his wiil-force despite the dizziness he felt. ‘Six thousand, eight thousand!’
The thread of will-force stopped stretching at twelve thousand miles above ground level, but Ye Wei still could not channel the stars’ energy.
“No! This can’t be it!”
Ye Wei’s face was pale as a sheet, but his determination kept him going. He ignored his pain and changed hand seal, used his life energy to power his will-force.
Although bleeding out of his mouth and beginning to faint, the strand of will-force still managed to stretch and climbed to a staggering fourteen thousand miles altitude.
‘I am still not strong enough…’ Ye Wei’s will-force was weakening, becoming thinner and struggled to hold up in space.
Just when he was about to faint, a golden glow filled his Sentient.
“Zoom! Zoom!”
The mystic mount’s ancient energy freshened his body, his fading senses and consciousness awakened from fatigue.
“Swoosh!”
Ye Wei’s will force was empowered by the golden energy, the strand shook and rapidly stretched longer through space debris.
‘Sixteen thousand, eighteen thousand, twenty thousand miles…’
Within a breath’s time, Ye Wei’s will-force was twice as far as it was. It kept reaching outwards to the unknown with no signs of slowing down.
“The stars!” Ye Wei feel the constellations’ energy with his Sentient, shouted with joy “I am connected!”
‘I need to be quenched by the starlight…’ The young Runemaster swapped hand seal to draw the immense energy form the among the stars back at himself.
“Bang!” A large, sparkling pillar of amber light connected Ye Wei to the stars.
“This is it!”
Ye Wei stood up in the starlight, smiled in sheer happiness as he pushed himself past the first obstacle of learning the Eternal Star stance.
‘Now I can start using the star’s energy to strengthen my body!’
‘From what I can gather, there should be four steps in the absorption stage, the will-force should be thin as a thread to start with, then a pillar, next level would be thick as a river and in time I should be able to draw energy from the stars as much and as fast and I wish.’ Ye Wei thought to himself, surprised that he was on the second step with the help of the mystic mount presence in his Sentient.
Surrounded by starlight, the first runic pattern in the Ye Wei’s mind began to move, his hands were moving voluntarily, making a new hand seal.
Once the hand seal was made, the cells in his body began to engulf the energy. His skin, bones, muscles and his organs hardened.
“What stance is the kid learning? The energy disturbance he is causing is ridiculous! It’s almost as strong as cosmic energy” Helian Jieyuan stopped cultivating, opened his eyes to see an unfamiliar sight, a pillar of starlight.
Ye Wei’s body shook as the surge of energy entered him, a layer of icy crystals was forming on his surface of his body.
The starlight was quickly absorbed by Ye Wei’s body, the first runic pattern melted into his blood, disappeared as the light faded.
“Crack!”
Ye Wei casually clenched his fist, caused a small Qi explosion under the water, a muffled shrill sound filled the palace as he tensed his muscles.
‘My body strength is comparable to a three-star returned prime Warrior!’ Ye Wei slowly relaxed his grip, satisfied by the immediate result.
“How did you do that!? You have only been here for a month and your body strength tripled! Was the stance you practiced given to you by your family?” Helian Jieyuan, the knowledgeable royal, was surprised and curious.
“Eternal Star!” Ye Wei answered with a smile on his face.
“Are you sure? I thought that stance was lost in time!?” The royal lost his voice. “It’s one of the strongest Sky stance of all time!”
“You have heard that name before?” The youngster was interested, wanted to learn more about the stance.
“Of course, it is a famous stance in a certain group of cultivators who studied the history books,” Helian Jieyuan chuckled and spoke, “about a thousand years ago, mankind was going through a difficult time. The continents were scotched by a horde made up of a few billion demons.”
“Supreme Ye Wei single-handedly fought and defeated six demon emperor's, afterwhich he chased the leading progenitors all the way back to the abyss where they came from.” The royal played with his beard as he told the story.
“Supreme Ye Yu was recognized as the strongest cultivator since the sages after that battle, he gained schools of disciples too. Although he disappeared after failing his Supreme transcendence, his influence lived on.” Helian Jieyuan took a deep breath and continued. “For hundreds of years after his disappearance, demons were actually too scared to cross over to our side of the land.”
“What? Six demon emperors and a progenitor?!” Ye Wei gasped and said. ‘Will I ever be at that level?’
“Haha, you are the inheritor of the Eternal Star stance, you should prepare yourself to fight demons and beast!” The royal Grand Elder patted Ye Wei’s shoulder and said in an encouraging tone.
“Yes sir! I am a Ye and I will live up to my family name!” Ye Wei nodded, said sincerely.
“You can start training soon, there are three-star returned prime level demons and beasts around the area, I can catch one for your when you are ready for it!” Said the Grand Elder in a joking tone.
“My cultivation is nothing comparing to Supreme Ye Yu and yourself, please don’t make fun of me…” Ye Wei blushed and muttered.
“I have cultivating for three hundred years, and Supreme Ye had been doing the same. Don’t you dare compare yourself to us.” The Grand Elder squinted his eyes and said.
The young Runemaster realized he just spoke nonsense and tried to change the subject. “Sir, you have been cultivating here for a while. Have you ever seen the sacred mark?”