Time to Settle Scores with the Old Witch

[Shen Yifeng said that, for someone with average comprehension, taking more than a decade—or even several decades—to comprehend their first divine ability was perfectly normal.]

[The difficulty of comprehending divine abilities increased cumulatively with each ability already mastered. The more one comprehended, the harder it became to comprehend a new one.]

[Life was limited. Many people stopped spending their time comprehending divine abilities after mastering just one, and instead focused their efforts on improving their cultivation realm.]

[The more divine abilities one comprehended, the more methods one naturally possessed. However, being able to use a single divine ability to its utmost potential was also a skill. It all depended on how a cultivator chose to allocate their efforts.]

[Most cultivators modified and incorporated divine abilities into their techniques rather than using them directly.]

[Take “Shouldering a Mountain,” for example. One interpretation of this divine ability was that it increased strength.]

[After comprehending “Shouldering a Mountain,” a cultivator would combine it with the cultivation technique they practiced, making its manifestations more varied and powerful.]

[Incorporating divine abilities into cultivation techniques gave rise to a new kind of technique—divine arts.]

[As mentioned before, cultivation techniques in the Real Realm—including spells, ultimate moves, and cultivation methods such as Qi Refinement, Soul Refinement, and Body Refinement—were ranked from ninth grade to first grade, corresponding to the low, middle, high, earth, heaven, and immortal grades of the Illusory Realm.]

[The Illusory Realm had no techniques of the third grade or higher.]

[Because...]

[Divine arts that incorporated Earthly Fiend divine abilities were third-grade techniques.]

[Divine arts that incorporated Heavenly Dipper divine abilities were second-grade techniques.]

[As for the most powerful first-grade techniques, they were not something ordinary cultivators could even learn about.]

[Shen Yifeng told you that first-grade techniques existed only within a single star system, in the hands of its most powerful factions.]

[It was not hard to see that the Divine Armament Apocalypse in your possession, a fourth-grade spell, was already the highest-quality technique among ordinary cultivation methods.]

[Anything above it required one to first master an Earthly Fiend divine ability before it could be cultivated into a divine art.]

[Of course, a cultivator could also choose not to incorporate a divine ability and simply use it in its raw form.]

[But if you did not incorporate it while someone else did, then even if the two of you comprehended the same divine ability, you would inevitably suffer in comparison.]

[You were currently benefiting from the tenfold divine-ability comprehension provided by “Mortal Bones.”]

[While others needed several decades to comprehend their first divine ability, you naturally did not need nearly that long.]

[After trying and failing to make any progress on divine abilities related to spiritual sense, you realized that you should try a different one.]

[You then tried one related to flight, but still made no progress.]

[Finally, you tried “Shouldering a Mountain,” which was related to strength. A trace of enlightenment surged into your heart on the spot.]

[“Could it be that divine abilities more compatible with one’s personal style are easier to comprehend?”]

[Which divine ability one comprehended first was not important. What mattered was having a divine ability at all.]

[Thus, you continued comprehending “Shouldering a Mountain” by following that feeling.]

[Year forty-six. Age seventy.]

[Drawing trait...]

[The effect of “The Older You Get, the Luckier You Become” has been triggered!]

[Draw successful!]

[“Zilong! Zilong!” (Golden Legend):

General, would you be willing to accompany A-Dou into the enemy ranks once more, fighting your way through seven times and back seven times?!

When carrying a young child in your arms and wishing to protect their safety, you gain unlimited stamina, unlimited essence energy, and Bloodbath status!

Bloodbath: Self-healing is disabled. All damage taken is reduced tenfold, and you can additionally nullify seven fatal injuries. Moreover, the more severe your injuries, the greater the destructive power of your techniques, up to a maximum hundredfold increase!

Definition of a young child: A human under six years old.

We really are the golden duo!]

[Adjust traits?]

[Yes/No]

“High-quality traits really do have a higher drop rate now! But this particular trait...”

Golden traits were often ridiculously powerful, but they usually came with some sort of prerequisite.

“Zilong! Zilong!” required Chen Yi to be “holding A-Dou in his arms.”

“Where am I supposed to find a young child?”

Should he just grab some random passerby’s kid and carry them around?

That would be a little too immoral—and the kid would be a huge burden in everyday life.

“Not for now. Let’s see whether anything comes up later.”

[You chose Yes.]

[You replaced “The Older You Get, the Luckier You Become” with “God of Internal Strife.”]

[You replaced “The Martial Artists’ Circle Has Received Terrible News” with “Cross-Dressing Expert.”]

[“Huh? What does ‘I’ mean by giving me ‘Cross-Dressing Expert’?”]

[You flew into a fit of embarrassment and rage.]

[“The Female Heavenly Emperor’s underwear is indeed astonishingly powerful, but I’m a thoroughly straight man. Does it make any sense for me to fight while wearing that thing?

Huh? Answer me!

Even if I were beaten to death by the alien races and died in the Real Realm, I would never wear that underwear again!”]

[You calmed yourself down. You had almost transformed into Super Saiyan One, just saying.]

[“‘God of Internal Strife’ has come up too. Got it.”]

[Now that you had broken through to the Core Transformation Realm, and “Eternal Half-Emperor” had raised your cultivation to the fourth turn of Core Transformation...]

[Along with the assistance of numerous other traits...]

[You felt that it was time to find the Old Hag and reclaim what belonged to you!]

[“Old woman, you’ve ‘borrowed’ the Ten Thousand Souls Banner for all these years. You’ve had your fun, so it’s time to give it back! Chen Two, report!”]

[All these years, Chen Two had been hiding alone near the Old Hag’s lair.]

[He was an old man with a cultivation base only at the Houtian Martial Artist Realm. In the Real Realm, he was as insignificant as an ant.]

[The alien races, on the other hand, were too lazy to pay attention to him.]

[That was how he had managed to complete his surveillance mission for so many years.]

[It was also fortunate that Chen Two’s initial state had been that of a man in his fifties. Otherwise, he would have died of old age while keeping watch.]

[Chen Two told you his current location and informed you that the Old Hag was not at home. She had not returned for a long time and had probably gone somewhere far away.]

[“I’m going to settle accounts with her whether she’s home or not!”]

[You could sense that you were only the tiniest bit away from completely comprehending the divine ability “Shouldering a Mountain.”]

[Therefore, you did not hurry on your way to find the Old Hag.]

[You observed the mountains, gazed at the rivers, and sat watching the winds and clouds rise and change.]

[In your eyes, all things in heaven and earth seemed to come alive, whispering to you of countless years of rise and fall.]

[Their whispers occasionally contained secrets concerning the most powerful force in all of heaven and earth.]

[You captured those hushed words and turned them over repeatedly in your mind, comprehending the wondrous power hidden within.]

[At last, you comprehended your first divine ability—Shouldering a Mountain!]

[Now, as long as you activated the divine ability, even an ordinary punch could unleash enough force to blast straight through a mountain.]

[If conditions allowed, lifting a several-hundred-meter-tall mountain would indeed be well within your capabilities.]

[Under normal circumstances, using a divine ability should consume divine power.]

[However, divine power was a force that only cultivators in the Earth-Severing Realm possessed. It was formed when essence energy advanced to the next stage.]

[Therefore, for you, each use of a divine ability consumed essence energy instead.]

[Essence energy was far inferior to divine power. As a result, using a divine ability even once would consume the vast majority of your essence energy.]

[“Using a divine ability directly is a bit amateurish. Incorporating it into a cultivation technique—that’s what a professional cultivator does.”]

[As long as you successfully incorporated an Earthly Fiend divine ability, regardless of the original quality of the technique, it would immediately rise to the third grade and become a divine art!]

[You did not possess an existing divine art related to “Shouldering a Mountain.” Incorporating the divine ability into one of the techniques you had already mastered was no less difficult than creating a cultivation technique from scratch.]

【This is going to be extremely difficult.】

【So there’s no point rushing. I’ll take care of the important matters first.】

【Year forty-seven, age seventy-one.】

【You arrived at Treasure Granny’s lair.】

【She lived in a Taoist temple nestled in a barren mountain.】

【To your surprise, you found an unmistakably Eastern-style building in the Real World, filled with elements that unmistakably reflected the culture of the Human Realm’s human race.】

【Upturned eaves, lanterns, carved beams, bracket sets…】

【You reunited with Chen Two and took him into your body.】

【“Boss, the Old Hag may not be home, but the temple has her servants and disciples. There aren’t many of them, but they won’t be easy to deal with.”】

【“Are they at a very high cultivation level?”】

【“Probably not higher than yours, but they must all have spirit treasures the Old Hag gave them.”】

【“What do you mean, ‘the spirit treasures she gave them’? Those are ‘my spirit treasures’!”】