The Strongest Dao Fruit

Deep within the Sword God Palace lay an extremely secret Spirit Spring Mystical Realm.

The spring water was a faint milky white, filled with dense spiritual mist so rich it seemed almost impossible to disperse. It had gathered from the purest spiritual leyline beneath the earth.

Ye Xuan stepped into the hot spring, and the warm water instantly enveloped him.

Ying’er had been waiting there for some time.

She wore a thin gauze robe and carried a jade basin filled with various precious spiritual liquids. The moment she saw Ye Xuan enter, she immediately greeted him obediently.

“Master.”

Without asking a single question, Ying’er walked behind Ye Xuan and placed a pair of delicate, boneless hands upon his shoulders.

She personally activated water-element magic, directing the spring water as she carefully and meticulously cleansed Ye Xuan’s body, as though she were washing away some filthy substance.

As he felt the aura belonging to another woman gradually being stripped from his body, the tension in Ye Xuan’s face finally eased somewhat. Yet the gloom in his eyes remained.

“That Wu Lingxiao…” Ye Xuan snorted, his voice filled with undisguised irritation and disgust. “She’s truly revolting.”

Whenever he thought of the way that woman had clung to him like a mad dog, he felt uncomfortable all over.

If it had not been for his grand ambitions, he would not even have wanted to look at her a second time.

Ying’er’s hands never stopped moving. She controlled her strength perfectly as she softly consoled him, “Husband, for the sake of the greater plan, you’ll have to endure it for now.”

“Yes. What else can I do if I refuse to endure it?”

Ye Xuan drew a deep breath. His expression was still irritated, but his gaze quickly turned cold, transforming into absolute rationality and icy composure.

“She possesses a Time Dao Body. That thing is simply too useful to me. If I keep her, she can use time acceleration in the cultivation chamber to give me ten or even a hundred times the cultivation time available in the outside world…”

Ye Xuan narrowed his eyes slightly, ruthless calculations shifting within them.

“More importantly, through dual cultivation, I can secretly absorb her temporal origin! This will provide an irreplaceable boost when I lay the foundation for my Dao Fruit in the future.”

“Wu Lingxiao is nothing more than essential nourishment for me to reach the summit and forge the supreme Dao Fruit of all.”

At the mention of the words “Dao Fruit,” Ying’er’s hands paused slightly.

She moved around to Ye Xuan’s side. As she wiped his arm with spiritual liquid, she raised her head and asked, “Husband, are you planning to seize her temporal origin and condense one of the strongest Dao Fruits in the cultivation world—the Time Dao Fruit?”

The Laws of Time were among the highest-level existences in the myriad heavens and countless realms. Anyone capable of condensing a Time Dao Fruit would surely become a supreme magnate in the future.

Yet Ye Xuan shook his head disdainfully.

“The Time Dao Fruit is indeed one of the strongest Dao Fruits.” He watched the spiritual mist curling around his fingertips, his voice calm yet filled with an ambition that seemed capable of swallowing the heavens and earth. “But in the end, it is only one of them.”

“What I want has never been merely one of the strongest.”

“What I want is the only supreme Dao Fruit throughout all of history and across the myriad heavens and countless realms—the strongest Dao Fruit of them all!”

The moment these words left his mouth, the temperature within the entire hot spring realm dropped several degrees.

Ying’er stopped what she was doing. As if she had recalled some terrifying ancient secret, her eyes suddenly widened, and she drew in a sharp breath.

“Could it be… could it be that legendary one…?”

Ye Xuan did not answer directly. Instead, he let out a long sigh.

“This is a plan I have been plotting for ten thousand lifetimes.”

Ying’er’s eyes filled with astonishment, which then turned into deep melancholy.

She shook her head, her tone carrying a hint of awe and regret. “But, Husband… under the suppression of the laws of the lower realm, it is fundamentally impossible to condense a Dao Fruit like that. This world’s capacity is simply too limited.”

“That’s right. The pond is too small to raise a true dragon.”

Ye Xuan tilted his head slightly and allowed the water droplets to slide down his chiseled jaw.

“Therefore, I must go to the Spirit Realm. Only the complete Great Dao laws of the upper realm can support me in accomplishing this.”

Ying’er still seemed puzzled. She resumed kneading Ye Xuan’s shoulders and asked curiously, “Why are you so obsessed with this? With Master’s astonishing talent, even if you condensed merely one of the strongest Dao Fruits—the Time Dao Fruit—you would certainly be an invincible existence among your peers after ascending to the Spirit Realm. You could then steadily improve your cultivation. Wouldn’t that be enough?”

Ye Xuan turned his head and looked at Ying’er, patiently explaining, “You don’t understand. Condensing a Dao Fruit is the first step in a cultivator’s transformation and ascension to immortality. It is also the most fundamental factor determining the limit of one’s future achievements.”

He gave a cold laugh and used the woman he had just treated as a tool as an example.

“Take Wu Lingxiao, for instance. Since she possesses a Time Dao Body, there is a high chance that she will condense one of the strongest Dao Fruits—the Time Dao Fruit. But once she condenses it, her path will be completely fixed!”

“Because of the exclusivity of the Time Dao Fruit and the interference between its laws, her progress in cultivating other Great Daos will become extraordinarily slow. She would instead waste vast amounts of time. That is what is known as the shackles of the Great Dao.”

Ye Xuan’s expression became utterly indifferent as he stated an unshakable truth.

“A Dao Fruit is the foundation of a cultivator’s towering edifice. Once the foundation takes a particular shape, the building can only be constructed in accordance with it. This is the most crucial step. Therefore, my Dao Fruit must possess no weaknesses. It must embody the strongest form possible—one capable of embracing all things.”

Ying’er nodded in sudden understanding. Given her insight and status, she could naturally keep up with Ye Xuan’s perspective.

Looking at this far-sighted man before her, she sincerely praised him. “Then the Dao Fruit you intend to condense probably won’t be one of a single attribute, but rather the legendary… multi-attribute Dao Fruit that defies the laws of heaven?”

“That is inevitable.”

A brilliant light erupted from Ye Xuan’s eyes, and even the water around him rippled faintly beneath his aura.

“For example, Ye Jiuhuang. She condensed the Sword Emperor Dao Fruit. Although that Dao Fruit makes her unparalleled in slaughter along the path of the sword and greatly enhances her sword techniques, it provides no enhancement whatsoever when she uses other spells. It may even reject them to some extent.”

Ye Xuan let out a cold laugh.

“But what if Ye Jiuhuang had condensed not the Sword Emperor Dao Fruit, but the Flame Emperor Sword Fruit?”

“Then that Dao Fruit would allow her to wield fire-element spells capable of burning the heavens and boiling the seas, while also perfectly complementing and enhancing her supreme swordsmanship. With the two laws intertwined, her combat power would increase explosively!”

By this point, Ying’er had completely understood the scope of Ye Xuan’s ambition, but deep concern also appeared in her eyes.

“But, Master…”

Ying’er lowered her voice. “Throughout the myriad heavens and countless realms, who knows how many peerless prodigies have tried to walk this path? Yet to condense a multi-attribute Dao Fruit, one must balance entirely different Great Dao laws within the body. At the slightest mistake, the body will explode, the soul will be annihilated, and death will be absolute. This is a feat more difficult than reaching the heavens…”

“More difficult than reaching the heavens?”

Ye Xuan rose from the hot spring, his flawless body faintly visible amid the spiritual mist.

With a casual wave of his hand, a dry black robe appeared and draped itself over him.

He turned back, his eyes carrying a cold arrogance that regarded all things as mere straw dogs.

“Precisely because it’s as difficult as ascending to the heavens, it’s worthy of the ambition of Ye Xuan.”

“An hour is almost up. To the cultivation room—it’s time to break through to the Tribulation Transcendence Realm.”