"Brother Li... he really ate it!"
Huang Donglai hadn't yet snapped out of his daze, but seeing this scene, he couldn't help leaning back slightly.
"How is it?" Tian Xun asked with an expectant look.
Ying Bing didn't speak, but her hand rubbed at her waist, making the big-headed doll ornament on her belt wail mournfully.
"...Mhm." Li Mo took a deep breath, his face flushed red, and finally nodded.
"Holy crap, Brother Li nodded!"
Huang Donglai's pupils trembled with shock.
"It's really delicious? Then why are you crying?"
The autumn water in Ying Bing's eyes shimmered slightly, rippling with what seemed like joy, but seeing Li Mo's expression, she tilted her head in confusion.
"You may not have heard, but there's a kind of deliciousness so good it makes you cry. Truly."
Li Mo said with a serious face, but as he spoke, his tongue seemed to grow thicker and his speech more slurred.
Huang Donglai's expression changed slightly. Brother Li, those seem like symptoms of poisoning!
It couldn't exactly be called poisoning; it shared a strange similarity with the 'Face-Disfiguring Powder'. After all, those ingredients were all rare treasures, but when mixed together, they triggered a wondrous chain reaction...
Its complexity was so profound even Huang Donglai found it mystifying!
At the same time.
Outside, watching from a distance, Shang Qinqing, Qin Yuzhi, and Tian Miao also couldn't help but suck in a sharp breath, while also barely suppressing their laughter.
The 'Wife-Fortune Little Tyrant', the unparalleled, peerless Young Master Li in the eyes of outsiders, was now speaking with a thick, slurred tongue while looking utterly serious. Those unfamiliar with him probably couldn't imagine him having this side...
"Hey, why are you all standing here?"
Murong Xiao returned from outside, his expression carrying confusion, listlessness, and contemplation about life.
"Hey, wait, don't go in yet. Li Mo is... eating."
Shang Qinqing kindly stopped him, considering he was the junior disciple of the little monk.
"Perfect, this humble monk is also hungry, I'll just..."
"It's Little Bing'er's cooking."
"Hiss..."
Murong Xiao's steps froze. He lowered his head and walked back, muttering:
"The Abbot said Brother Li possesses great courage and great perseverance. Now it seems he was absolutely right."
Murong Xiao was fortunate, called to a halt just before entering the courtyard.
Huang Donglai was already being beckoned by Tian Xun:
"You there... Young Master Li's friend, have some too."
"He's not... not hungry, hehe."
Li Mo said, shooting Huang Donglai a meaningful look.
Are you kidding? With his hundred-calamities-indestructible physique and poison-immune constitution, even his tongue was swollen now. What would happen if someone else ate it?
Strangely enough, under normal circumstances, Old Huang would have long since vanished without a trace.
"I'll eat it!"
A determined little flame burned in Huang Donglai's eyes.
Like a warrior cornered in a desperate situation, burning his boats and staking everything on one final gamble!
Young Li was deeply moved: "Old Huang! My appetite has been big lately, this pot isn't even enough for me alone. I've already prepared other dishes for you, you just need to..."
"That won't be necessary!"
Huang Donglai took the 'hodgepodge stew' Tian Xun handed over: "Fortune favors the bold! No breakthrough without destruction! I can't spend my whole life running away!!"
"Is this... the bond between you guys?"
Tian Xun scratched her head, bewildered. How did eating a meal suddenly become so inexplicably passionate?
Though it was strange, the young girl didn't dwell on it.
"Eat it while it's hot."
She promptly placed the spoon in Huang Donglai's hand.
"..."
He had spoken with passionate fervor, but truly looking at this bowl of brilliantly colorful, more dangerous-than-the-deadliest-poison-he-bought-from-the-Valley-of-Ten-Thousand-Venoms 'hodgepodge stew', he couldn't help but swallow hard.
But the atmosphere had built to this point.
He drank it down in one gulp, swallowing it all in an instant.
Then his eyes rolled back, and he fell straight to the ground, stiff as a board, his head bouncing a few times like a ping-pong ball.
Ying Bing: "?"
Li Mo: "Old Huang, oh Old Huang..."
He hurriedly took out a Five-Aura Purple Spirit Pill for detoxification from his spatial treasure, but then noticed something was off.
A dark cyan light erupted from between Huang Donglai's brows, and a scene of withering spread from around his body—an autumn wind desolate, killing all flowers and living things.
And the images forming within that dark cyan light...
"Those... aren't those the ingredients from just now?" Tian Xun was stunned, seeming to realize what had happened.
Ying Bing was momentarily puzzled: "He... broke through his Inner Realm bottleneck?"
"Sister Bing, could it be that the dish we cooked can help people break through bottlenecks and advance their cultivation in a single leap??!"
Tian Xun was excited but also somewhat uncertain.
This wasn't about being delicious or not anymore; it was practically comparable to miraculous elixirs!
Legend had it that long ago, a Culinary God made his name precisely this way, founding the once-famous Culinary Dao, though his recipes had been lost to time.
Had she accidentally stumbled upon this path?
"..."
Ying Bing narrowed her eyes slightly. It seemed that was indeed the case, but something also felt not quite right.
Just as she too was unsure.
Another intense fluctuation of Inner World energy erupted beside her!
And it was the fourth-layer Inner Realm!
Indeed, fearing this pot of hodgepodge stew might harm the innocent, and considering his grandparents would be back soon, Young Li closed his eyes, picked up the pot, and simply chugged it all down.
As everyone knows, he currently lacked Heaven and Earth spiritual energy. Though this hodgepodge stew was indescribable, its ingredients were all top-notch.
And as everyone also knows, the Eight-Nine Profound Art required tempering through trials and tribulations; calamities would make him stronger...
And so...
Second Layer of the Inner Realm!
"Young Master Li also broke through?" Tian Xun was happy but also somewhat bewildered.
She had been planning to interview him, but now it seemed unnecessary.
Insights on cultivation from a genius √
The Inner Realm phenomena of the two geniuses covered the entire Purple Sun Prefecture, lasting for a full hour. Who knows how many of their peers felt ashamed of their own inferiority, sighed with emotion, and wondered why the 'Wife-Fortune Little Tyrant' was progressing so miraculously fast.
In the suburbs, at the Happy Hotpot restaurant.
The interweaving of fourth-layer Inner Realm phenomena over the prefectural city, along with the spectacle of withering flowers and a chilling, poisonous aura, drew the attention of many.
Two people, however, remained as steady as mountains.
Yuwen Cuojin was eating hotpot. Across from him was a ruddy-faced old man who seemed to wear a perpetual smile, dressed in simple short clothes like a common cart driver, devouring slices of mutton.
This was another Vice-Leader of the Demon-Summoning Cult, Situ Ding.
"This lad Li Mo can no longer be described as just exceptionally talented and brilliant. Walking a path unprecedented in history, yet his progress is so astonishingly fast."
Yuwen Cuojin's words were full of emotion, yet his tone carried a gloomy edge. Although he escaped the battle at the Imperial Capital, he suffered heavy losses, his vitality severely injured, and even the Dao he grasped was scattered.
"Huang Donglai is also impressive. He has forged his own path too, and his temperament suits this old man's taste quite well. What a pity... he cannot be used by us."
Situ Ding was more interested in Huang Donglai.
"And the extraordinary individuals around Li Mo are hardly limited to just Huang Donglai," Yuwen Cuojin said.
Situ Ding nodded: "That's probably how it is—birds of a feather flock together. Geniuses always attract each other."
"Given time, when Li Mo and his band of companions mature and truly stand at our height in the future, I fear no one will be able to restrain them!"
"Indeed. This operation at the Shangqing Abyss Sect must not fail!"
ts me of treason?" "Correct. The host must return to the capital and gradually build up influence." "Wait—I have half a million soldiers, and you want me to go back to the capital to 'build influence'?" "Host, you are currently the Northern Garrison General, loyal to the Great Xia Dynasty." "Of course I am loyal to Great Xia! Absolutely loyal!" "But you keep referring to yourself as 'We'..." "Never mind the details! Summon all the regional commanders and military officers! We suspect treacherous officials are manipulating the court! They shall march with Us to the capital and purge the corrupt!" "......"
ut it can buy an entire year of absolutely perfect training results! Su Yu stared at his empty wallet and decisively opened up various online loan platforms. “Borrow a thousand bucks! Recharge my vitality!” Boom! His vitality broke a hundred points, shattering the limits of the human body! “Borrow ten thousand bucks! Recharge my combat skills!” Boom! A basic punching technique so common it was everywhere instantly maxed out, revealing the ultimate assassination technique of Five Elements Unity—Inner Force! When a rich kid hired assassins for a midnight ambush, aiming to break both of his legs, they instead ran headfirst into a monster—a human-shaped tyrannosaur, brimming with dragon-like vitality. With just two fingers, Su Yu snapped a steel staff reinforced with alloy. Staring at the killer’s stash of stolen cash—a staggering quarter-million dollars—he showed a corporate-sincere smile: “Thanks for the pre-exam gift pack, Mr. Zhao! I’m gonna go re-invest this!” Three days later, at the National Martial Arts College Entrance Exam, while everyone else struggled just to reach the passing line, Su Yu threw a single punch—and more than a thousand vitality points literally detonated the entire arena!
lity and could only live as an ordinary mortal. He only wished to live a peaceful life. Yet he didn't know— The dog he adopted, because it ate his food, became a legendary demon king. The kitchen knife he casually forged became a peerless divine weapon, causing numerous experts to fight desperately for it. The young disciple he took in became an immortal lord that led an era, due to cultivating the techniques Ye Feng taught him. Even the skeletons he looked down on the most were ominous demon kings that suppressed countless worlds. Many years later, looking at the void shattered with a punch, Ye Feng murmured to himself: It turns out the peerless kings were myself all along...
e bizarre and supernatural had descended. The previous emperor was a thoroughgoing tyrant; no longer satisfied with human women, he had set his sights on a stunningly beautiful supernatural entity. He met his end in his bedchamber, drained of all his vital essence. As the legitimate eldest son and crown prince, Wang Hao was thus hastily enthroned, becoming the young emperor of the Great Zhou Dynasty. No sooner had he awakened the "Imperial Sign-In Intelligence System" than he was assassinated by a Son of Destiny—a classic villain's opening. The Great Zhou, ravaged by the former emperor's excesses, was in national decline. The great families within its borders harbored their own treacherous schemes, martial sects began to defy the imperial court's decrees, and border armies, their pay and provisions in arrears, grumbled incessantly against the central government. Fortunately, the central capital was still held secure by the half-million Imperial Guards and fifty thousand Imperial Forest Army who obeyed the court's orders, along with the royal family's hidden reserves of power, barely managing to suppress the realm. As the Great Zhou's finances worsened and supernatural activities grew ever more frequent, the court sat atop a volcano. Ambitious plotters everywhere dreamed of overthrowing the dynasty, and even some reclusive ancient powers emerged, attempting to sway the tides of the world. At the first grand court assembly, the civil and military officials nearly came to blows, fighting tooth and nail over the allocation of fifty million taels of silver from the summer tax revenues. The spectacle opened Wang Hao's eyes—the Great Zhou's bureaucracy was not only corrupt but also martially proficient, a cabinet of all-rounders. Some officials even had the audacity to suggest the emperor release funds from the imperial privy purse to address the emergency. Wang Hao suddenly felt weary. Let it all burn.
