"You damned legs, run faster!!"
After leaving Ankang Hospital, Zhang Fusheng was sprinting wildly.
He was terribly afraid that the Twelve Refinements Martial Artist would notice something amiss and chase after him.
When he heard that guy instruct Dean Long to seek out the âChai Gateâ, he immediately understood; this was probably someone from the Western Sect.
His senior brother had mentioned that the Chai Gate was in contact with the Western Sect.
And with that phrase âHeavenly Communicationâ...
He sprinted all the way, until he was about to leave the dark alley, Zhang Fusheng found a deserted spot, leaned against the wall, and took a heavy breath.
"That was close. Luckily, I managed to bluff through. What are Grandmasters and Great Grandmasters?"
He recalled the two terms uttered by the Great Martial Artist when he exclaimed about the Divine Realm.
After pondering for a bit, Zhang Fusheng had a vague speculation:
"Could a Grandmaster be someone who has achieved Minor Perfection in the Contemplation Technique, and a Great Grandmaster someone who has achieved Perfection?"
"No, thatâs not right. The Contemplation Technique should just be a prerequisite."
"This should be a realm beyond that of a Martial Arts Master."
Zhang Fusheng seemed thoughtful; guessing this wasnât difficult. In his past life, heâd read many novels, seeing the phrase âA Grandmaster must not be insultedâ countless times, probably not a thousand times, but at least eight hundred.
Couldnât help it; it was appealing, he loved reading it.
He shook his head vigorously, silently calculating the gains.
"Sixty-three grams of star beast meat left, meaning that in accelerating sixty-two days, Iâve spent thirty-seven grams of star beast meat."
"The effect has weakened, but I donât know if itâs all star beast meatâs effects that have weakened synchronously, or just the âone-horned giant rhinoceros meatâ."
Zhang Fusheng slightly frowned; this matter was hard to verify short-term. Heâd asked his second senior sister, and one-horned giant rhinoceros meat was the mainstream supply of star beast meat,
Other star beasts did exist, but they were not common, at least not within Jiangzhou City.
"Is a hundred and sixty-seven years of contemplation time enough?"
He wondered in his heart; his master was at least a centenarian but still hadnât perfected the White Bone Observation,
It could be certain that his masterâs enlightenment was definitely much better than his own,
But now, having accumulated a hundred and ten years, plus this hundred and sixty-seven years, nearly three hundred years,
Perhaps, he might truly push the White Bone Observation to genuine perfection.
The Contract was dim at this moment, with a cooldown time of over sixty days again, which shouldnât be so long... was it because of the âFlesh Plagueâ?
Within the ancestral acupoint at the center of his brow, aside from the memories of the transaction between two old men in the Contract, there floated two durations of Contemplation time, and two clumps of red material.
Zhang Fusheng dared not extract this thing.
His thoughts separated from the ancestral acupoint at his brow, he removed the veil and quietly walked out of this deserted alley, looking back at the bustling dark alley spanning across the entire Lower Three Districts.
A sense of urgency surged in his heart.
Will leaving the Lower Three Districts allow him to mind his own business?
This thing is called a âplagueâ!
If he leaves Jiangzhou City, could he avoid it?
Zhang Fusheng didnât know.
"Trading for Huang Qiuxianâs past cultivation is difficult," he muttered to himself, "The urgent task is to pull him into the High Heaven Association."
"I need to understand what exactly the Western Sect is up to, what theyâre trying to achieve, and how wide the range of danger will be?"
"Weak! Weak!"
"Iâm still too weak!"
Leaving the dark alley, he casually found a hotel. After tossing a ten thousand yuan bill at the front desk, he directly obtained the hotel registration information.
About a hundred guests were staying, all relatively young... some regret.
After swallowing another thirty-plus grams of star beast meat, Zhang Fusheng picked and chose, settling on a middle-aged man in his fifties.
He didnât knock on the door, nor did he face the man, but instead checked into the room next door, and then.....
The Divine Realm unfolded.
The middle-aged man, lying peacefully on the bed, sat up abruptly, looking around bewilderedly at the boundless wilderness,
Suddenly feeling something, he shivered and looked up, meeting the gaze of a gigantic face covering the entire Celestial Vault.
The face had the left eye as the sun and the right eye as the moon, making the sun and moon share the sky, breathing the clouds and rosy sky for thousands of miles, enveloping everything!
The middle-aged man knelt on the ground, kowtowing endlessly.
For someone unaware of the âSpirit Divine Realmâ, not knowing that all this was an illusion, entering the Divine Realm mistakenly might easily make them believe theyâd encountered a divine miracle, meeting a Divine Spirit.
"How many years have you practiced the Contemplation Technique?"
The one with the sun and moon as their eyes questioned, words spilling out like thunder, transforming into lightning tearing through the dawn and dusk.
"F-forty years!" the middle-aged man asked, trembling with fear.
"By money, how much would your contemplation practice be worth?"
The middle-aged man kowtowed madly:
"As you wish, as you wish!"
"Speak freely." The âgodâ said simply, causing a golden mountain to drop to the ground.
The middle-aged man froze, swallowing nervously, and cautiously said:
"This golden mountain?"
"Your forty years, worth this golden mountain?" The gigantic face queried.
The middle-aged man shuddered, then hesitated to speak:
"One... one million?"
Zhang Fusheng directly drafted a contract but found that the Contract was scorching hot as if on fireâindicating that one million couldnât truly make the middle-aged man willing.
He raised the amount to three million, and only then did the Contract settle.
Then three million it is.
The Divine Realm vanished abruptly, and the middle-aged man glanced around in a daze, soon hearing a knock on the door. He shook his head, merely thinking it to be a dream, and staggered to open the door.
And then.
He saw the aged face from his âdreamâ and saw a parchment, difficult to describe, floating in the old manâs hand.
âThud!â
The middle-aged man knelt again.
"Forty years of contemplation practice, and Iâll add another fifteen minutes of your memory."
"Can the Contract be established?"
......
Throwing the unconscious middle-aged man onto the bed, Zhang Fusheng, who had the appearance of an old man on the verge of dying, returned to his own room.
There was a faint musty smell; after all, it wasnât a good hotel.
He turned off the light and drew the curtains.
"Contract."
The old man sat cross-legged on the bed, palms facing upward.
"Let me see your limits!"
In the year two hundred and seven, there came a crashing sound, like a great tide rushing from the rivers.
[The first year, despite knowing the hope was faint, I still launched an assault on the Realm of Perfection!]
[I failed]
[The second year, I persevered, holding onto a resolute heart for the Dao, continuing to launch an assault!]
[The third year...]
[The forty-seventh year, though I had no intention to refine the Eight Forms of Form and Spirit, through profound spiritual accumulation, I naturally comprehended the âGiantâs Observationâ]
[Under this Form and Spirit, my flesh rotted, swelling into a three-meter tall decaying giant, with all restraints within collapsing, my strength tripling at least]
[The fifty-fifth year, during the cultivation of the White Bone Observation, although I could not break through to Perfection, my control over the Spirit Divine Realm grew increasingly profound]
[The seventy-fourth year, for the first time, I used spiritual thoughts to make a drop of water float in the air]
[Though it was arduous and the effect slight, it meant I could initially interfere with reality through spiritual will, a major step towards Perfection!]
[The ninetieth year, lost in myself, discarding external matters, seeing all beings as white bones, I suddenly had an urge to incorporate all beings into my Spirit Divine Realm]
[Kill kill kill kill kill kill kill!]
Zhang Fusheng briefly awoke from the washing of time, his eyes blood-red, flailing his arms aimlessly, carving seven characters for kill onto the hotel wall.
The contract glowed, forcibly waking him up,
then he re-entered the passage of time again.
[The ninety-first year, I had fallen into a demon]
[In the same year, a powerful force dragged me out of the abyss; I knew it was the Contract, making me absolutely correct, forging ahead unswervingly]
[The ninety-second year, I fell into a demon again, only to be pulled out from the abyss]
[The ninety-third year...]
[The one hundred and forty-first year, I again removed myself from the abyss, each time I fell into a demon, amid the mental chaos, I seemed to touch upon something]
[That year, my Spirit Divine Realm could manifest in realityâalbeit just for a fleeting instant]
[The one hundred and sixtieth year, I was still caught in the cycle of constantly falling into a demon and waking, the White Bone Observation, Grim White Bone Observation, was an evil technique!]
[The one hundred and sixty-eighth year, I called out loud âHeaven created all things to nourish humans, yet humans have nothing to repay heaven,â and fell into a demon again]
[In that same year, upon awakening, I suddenly had a great enlightenment]
[Whether others are white bones, what does it matter to me? I pursue only my path]
[The one hundred and eightieth year, amid decades of continuously falling into a demon and waking, my spirit seemed to become exceedingly resilient, I seemed... to have seen the Great Dao]
[The one hundred and eighty-first year, this year, I didnât fall into a demon, I sat cross-legged on the dust, rotting into white bones in reality]
[Although I hadnât even mastered the Fourth Form of Form and Spirit âBlood Painting Form,â yet through yet another descent into demonhood, I directly comprehended the Seventh Form and SpiritâBone Scattering Form]
[I am a skeleton, I have accomplished it, I have proven the Dao, hahahaha!]
[This year, I went mad]
In the hotel, on the bed, the old man transformed into a youth, Zhong Mountain turned into Zhang Fusheng, and then the skin rotted, the flesh disappeared.
He turned into a skeleton, without flesh, without internal organs, without a brain... yet he was still alive, still sitting cross-legged.
The upper and lower teeth of the skull kept knocking against each other, as if laughing, producing a âka-ka-kaâ sound that echoed in the room.
[The same year, I was forcibly dragged out of madness, waking again, regaining clarity]
[The one hundred and eighty-second year, I fell into a demon once in the first half, and went mad once in the second half]
[The one hundred and eighty-third year, this year, I neither fell into demonhood nor went mad]
[The same year]
[In reality, I transformed into a body of white bones, sitting quietly, with a great enlightenment]
[I pointed one skeletal finger to the sky, the other touched the ground, just like the illustration my master showed me when I first learned the White Bone Observation many years ago]
[I remember, in the illustration was a half-rotten, half-skeleton person, sitting cross-legged in the wilderness, one rotting hand pointing to the celestial vault, the skeletal hand touching the earth]
[It was half decay and half bone, seeming to laugh and cry, both benevolent and hideous]
[I suddenly understood, sighing deeply, so that was it]
[In the beginning of the one hundred and eighty-fourth year, I finally reached Perfection, I stepped into the realm of âHe should see me as suchâ]
[My Spirit Divine Realm manifested in reality]
[Another twenty-three years, I continued to explore upwards, unable to see the path ahead, but in the process, I gradually understood why my master called this Realm of Perfection the Heaven-Reaching Road]
[In the year two hundred and seven, I wanted to continue climbing, to glimpse the road above âHe should see me as suchâ]
[What I saw was a celestial shackle reaching through heaven and earth, I naturally understood that shackle, called âthe Great Limitâ]
[I sighed softly]
The year two hundred and seven came to an end.
A skeleton on the bed sighed lightly:
"Before and after, a total of three hundred years..."
That decaying aura exuding from his body was so thick it almost spilled over, but was quickly swept away by the vibration of the Contract.
"I have become." The skeleton issued a hoarse voice.
The entire small hotel, suddenly fell into an unknown place, below lay seventy-two snow-capped mountains, above was a blazing sun.
Frost and snow howled, the sun blazed brilliantly.
In the blink of an eye, the small hotel and the startled travelers inside, all emerged from that unknown place.
"I have become." The skeleton turned into a delicate and frail youth.
He got off the bed, crouched down, wiped the bloodstains from the corner of his mouth,
then gently, slowly,
picked up a snowflake from the floor.
The snowflake, truly existing, came from those seventy-two great snow mountains.
Half the hotel was buried in snow.