After a tumultuous year, this unremarkable corner of the Heavenly Succession's first round's event venue finally saw relative peace. Even the Imperial Han Family members in the states which had been assigned to Theodore could again sleep without keeping one eye open all night long.
Contrary to Eleanora's half, which still experienced their kind getting slaughtered every so often, the Hans of his worlds never once met the one who would cleanse them all eventually, for one sole reason: Theodore had already collected enough veins to complete his Energy Vein Incorporation, therefore he saw no use in dragging it out longer. When the time came, he could simply set aside a few weeks to deal with all of the remaining states.
Every day during this semi-seclusion, he spent ten hours on replacing the walls of his meridians, another ten on cultivating, and the last four on eating, drinking and resting. It was a very comfortable life, one that flew by extremely quickly–especially because nothing all too noteworthy ever really happened.
Some of his Subordinates occasionally had a breakthrough, but no further enemies appeared to stir up any waves. Eleanora was busy with growing stronger herself, too, so he could devote nearly all of his efforts and time to doing the same.
112 days after this period had begun, his Energy Vein Incorporation was finally complete. For now, the sole direct change that he saw as a result was that his cultivation speed at the Body Refinement Stage had soared to a staggering one million realms per hour! But although he did feel profoundly different from before, he couldn't truly tell anything else at the moment.
Choosing to not let it bother him and waste any more time on such a non-pressing issue, he altered his daily routine to now include 20 hours of cultivation and continued on as before.
The seasons came and went, and soon, another 320 days had passed. On that morning, finally, a huge change occurred: Theodore had reached his absolute limit. And this time, there was really no way for him to circumvent it, or to continue on somehow regardless of the restrictions.
[ Cultivation]
[ Stage: Body Refinement ]
[ Realm: 10,000,000,000th Realm ]
[ Technique: Theodore Winter's Unique Technique (Unnamed) ]
[ Energy Vein Incorporation: • Meridian Wall Replacement: 100% ]
'I don't know why, but every cell of my body is screaming at me to stop. Considering that this happened at exactly ten billion, it's highly suspicious. According to my calculations, this should have been very far from what my Endurance should have been capable of withstanding. But alas, I'm at my wit's end.'
Heaving a helpless sigh, he chose not to be reckless. Perhaps, what had reached its limit was not his own physical vessel, but rather the Body Refinement Stage itself. Whether or not this truly was the case, he chose to believe it anyway, even if solely to feel a bit better about himself.
Staring at his Standard Attributes on his Status Panel, he frowned slightly. 559,993,613,939 really wasn't a good-looking number. Using up a few more million Attribute Points, he turned it into a rather pleasing 600 billion without hesitation.
'Much better. If I want to keep all of them nice and tidy, I'll have to do this every now and then–but that's fine.'
By now, he wouldn't be too heartbroken at 'wasting' some of his gains in this manner. After all, upgrading a singular rather high-grade Talent would cost many orders of magnitude more than his act of making his Status Panel appear a bit more presentable.
Shaking his head, he dispersed all of these distracting thoughts, his mind ultimately focusing on what was most important: He had finally reached the starting line! From here on out, he could also tread on the proper path of cultivation.
Suppressing his excitement and holding back from beginning immediately, he instead forced himself to calm down and analyse the steps to come.
'Overall, the Energy Refinement Stage could be considered to be quite rudimentary and simple–and most of its realms can indeed pass one by in a blink. But there are a few which I'll need to pay proper attention to, as they'll lay the groundwork for everything from here on out. Also, come to think of it, I wonder what my initial Dantian size will be...'
Before officially stepping into the next stage, it wouldn't be displayed on the Status Panel, therefore he could only rely on roughly calculating what it should be himself, based upon all the information that he was aware of. Still, the end result would usually vary a tiny bit, so he couldn't proclaim it to be a specific number.
'Enough stalling, it's time to begin.'
Contrary to Xie Mei back when she had started off, Theodore had plenty of experience when it came to cultivation. But even he had never once had the privilege of having replaced all of his meridians' walls with Energy Veins this early–that was why he proceeded rather carefully.
Finding his Middle Dantian wasn't a challenge, as he was perfectly aware of its exact location. Taking a deep breath, he finally allowed the Energy surging within his meridians, which had been knocking on its doors constantly for far too many months, to slip inside.
The next moment, it was as if all hell had broken loose and the floodgates had been opened. Ridiculous amounts of Energy endlessly surged into his Dantian, leaving him not too much time to check out its initial size before it would be filled up completely. Then, he would automatically break through from the Gathering Realm into the Accumulation Realm.
[ Dantian Size: • Middle: 100,001,500,000 km³ ]
'... those 100 billion are the anticipated result of my 10 billion realms of the Body Refinement Stage. That means that the other 1.5 million represent its original size. Yet, seeing a number like this is... I don't even know what to say. I expected it, for sure, but it still feels unreal. Is there no true limit to a Dantian's size?'
To put it into perspective, currently, his Middle Dantian was about a tenth as large as the planet on which John had lived. And he would still have the opportunity to enlarge it once again later!
'I truly didn't incorporate those Energy Veins for nothing. It's only been less than a minute, but the Accumulation Realm is already right around the corner. Let me check my Standard Attributes once more, just to see the exact improvement that the Gathering Realm has brought me.'
With a thought, another part of his Status Panel appeared.
[ Attributes ]
[ Strength: 600,000,000,000 → 718,761,789,576 ]
[ Dexterity: 600,000,000,000 → 718,761,789,575 ]
[ Vitality: 600,000,000,000 → 718,761,789,577 ]
[ Endurance: 600,000,000,000 → 718,761,789,577 ]
[ Agility: 600,000,000,000 → 718,761,789,576 ]
[ Energy: 85,089,761,012 ]
[ Intelligence: 177 ]
[ Wisdom: 1,911 ]
[ Mind: 2,042 ]
[ Luck: 103 ]
When breaking through, most people would usually see their various Standard Attributes double–but very few of them had the ability to directly add Attribute Points to them. Now, he saw that the ones which he had obtained in this manner didn't get included in this improvement, and another rather 'ugly' number had appeared.
'Still, that's more than sufficient. An approximately 118.7 billion point increase from breaking through into the Gathering Realm... it's absurd, so exactly what I was aiming for! Still, I'll need to deal with these ballooning numbers sooner or later...'
Previously, his Status Panel had shown him his Attribute Points from the perspective of a regular mortal. If he wanted to, he could ask it to change it to higher cultivation stages. The vast majority of experts eventually did this, as the sheer length of the numbers would grow to appear very annoying in everyone's eyes at some point.
As he was still contemplating when the best time would be for him to make such a change, he had already automatically broken through into the Accumulation Realm, seeing his Standard Attributes rise by roughly 337.4 billion again.
'... I'll just deal with it another day. It'll soon be important for me to focus.'
Eight minutes later, he had arrived at the peak of the Condensation Realm. Concentrating as hard as he could, he forced the Energy within his Middle Dantian to gather together even more closely, slowly transforming it from its liquid state into an almost entirely solid one. Still, he couldn't allow it to fully do so, as that would prevent it from rebounding.
Once his limit in this regard was reached, he suddenly relinquished control over his Energy, allowing it to shoot outwards in all directions with reckless abandon, rapidly expanding his Dantian. This was when–for the second time today–something inexplicable occurred.
The moment that it reached a size of one trillion cubic kilometres, despite there still being a lot of momentum remaining, all of the Energy halted in its tracks, not advancing even a single nanometre further.
'... I guess that answers my prior question. Unless some higher power is sabotaging me for their own amusement, this should be the true limit in size that a Dantian can have. It's approximately that of an average planet. Is it a coincidence...?'
Contemplating this matter for a while, he eventually shook his head and put it aside for the time being, as there was no way for him to figure it out at present. Fortunately, he was quite confident in not currently having been messed with, as both the Heavenly Empress and the Heavenly Dao should be making certain that the competition was running smoothly.
Another ten minutes later, his Dantian had been completely filled with liquefied Energy once again. At this point, it was time for him to begin laying down his Foundation in its very centre.
By complete instinct, a part of the Energy nearby slowly transformed into a massive, extremely detailed and beautiful snowflake, representing his Winter Family Member Talent. Most of it was pristinely white, but three tiny spots of it were a little different.
One of them was a bit red, exuded a gentle warmth and glowed with a powerful light. The second one was dark to the point of appearing black, almost fading from sight. Yet the last one was even more extreme: It seemed as if the snowflake was simply incomplete, as if a part of it was missing–yet, that wasn't the case, for this spot was merely 'empty'. In order, these reflected three other Talents of his: Sacred Phoenix Physique, Darkness Incarnate and Void Walker.
If he acquired additional considerably impressive Cultivation Technique-related Talents, then it would turn into some sort of patchwork eventually–not that he particularly minded that, of course. After all, there was no downside to it.
Once the Foundation had been successfully formed, the Energy in his Middle Dantian continued to consolidate for another twenty minutes, but then he reached his limit. Stopping the Energy rampaging in his meridians from entering it for now, he quickly moved on to his Upper and Lower Dantians, spending around 80 minutes to repeat the exact process which he had only just gone through two more times.
Unsurprisingly, all three of them were forced to stop expanding at the same point. But other than that, nothing else of note occurred.
Feeling the resonance between his Dantians, a satisfied smile spread across his lips. Compared to a mere two hours ago, he was now capable of beating the vast majority of peak Dawning Numen Stage Supreme Pillar descendants in a head-on brawl.
'By the time I reach the same heights as them, I'll likely be many, many cultivation stages beyond them in terms of Standard Attributes. I almost feel sorry for them.'
His amused smirk suddenly froze, then he displayed a more serious expression. When thinking about who he was likely to face–not only monstrous geniuses capable of similar feats as him, but even threats from beyond the Heavenly Dao–his joy became much more subdued.
Yet, the familiar sensation of being capable of utilizing Energy properly once more made a smile blossom on his lips. His physical body had never been his strongest weapon. Eternal Ice, that was what he usually relied on.
'But enough about that. It's time to get the Core Formation Stage out of the way as well.'