Preparing for the Breakthrough Tribulation

An hour later.

Before the deepest cultivation chamber deep beneath the Sword God Palace, the heavy severing dragon stone gate rumbled slowly open.

Wu Lingxiao stood outside, her figure looking slight and frail.

She was still wearing that concubine gauze gown that symbolized submission. Her hair had been combed back into place, but her face remained as pale as someone just recovering from a severe illness.

Once the Empress of Great Xia who had looked down on the world and ruled over hundreds of millions of territories, right now she stood before this door, looking no different from a lowly servant waiting for her master's judgment, not even daring to breathe too loudly.

She stepped into the cultivation chamber on slightly wobbly legs.

The chamber was vast and empty, its four walls built from ten thousand year darknet stone that could block divine sense and tribulation lightning, giving off an icy, suffocatingly oppressive air.

Ye Xuan was already sitting cross-legged on the white jade formation platform right in the center of the chamber.

He had changed into a spotless black daoist robe, his eyes slightly closed, his whole body's aura as steady as a deep mountain, unfathomably profound.

Hearing the footsteps, he did not even open his eyes, and only spoke in an extremely plain tone.

"You've come."

Wu Lingxiao's heart trembled. She quickly walked to the foot of the white jade formation platform, her knees going soft as she knelt down naturally, prostrating herself on the ground.

Her forehead pressed against the cold jade floor, her voice soft and respectful. "Husband, I'm here."

Ye Xuan slowly opened his eyes at last.

In those deep black pupils, there was not a hint of warmth, only pure calculation of interests and icy cruelty.

"Since you're here, let's begin."

Ye Xuan looked down at her from above, his expression so calm it was stifling. "Next, I want you to use your own body as the formation eye to set up an Age of Sands time formation for me."

He paused, then parted his thin lips to utter a number that sent chills down one's spine.

"I want a time flow ratio of one to ten thousand."

"One to ten thousand..."

Wu Lingxiao jerked her head up, the last trace of color draining from her already pale face, turning it as ghastly white as a corpse.

What did a ratio of one to ten thousand mean? One day that passed in the outside world would equal nearly thirty long years inside the formation!

This kind of heaven-defying, mad act that twisted the laws of the dao, not even in the lower realms, but even in the fabled Spirit Realm, was a forbidden move enough to rouse the wrath of the Heavenly Dao and bring down apocalyptic tribulation lightning.

Wu Lingxiao's lips trembled violently, her eyes full of panic and despair.

She looked at Ye Xuan, her voice carrying an unmistakable sob. "Husband... my time dao body has not reached even minor completion yet. My origin power simply cannot support such a terrifying drain of years... One to ten thousand, I... I truly cannot do it..."

At those words, the calm in Ye Xuan's eyes shattered instantly, replaced by a bone-chilling coldness.

"You can't?"

Ye Xuan's voice dropped sharply, carrying a heart-palpitating pressure. "Then what ratio can you manage?"

Wu Lingxiao was crushed by that imposing aura to the point she could barely breathe.

She bit down so hard on her lower lip that it drew blood, before she finally forced out the number in a voice full of a guilty sense of inadequacy.

"One to... one hundred and twenty. That is... that is the absolute limit I can maintain right now by burning my dao body origin."

"One hundred and twenty to one?"

Ye Xuan burst out laughing out of pure, exasperated disbelief. He did not even bother hiding the contempt and disgust in his eyes, letting out an icy cold snort through his nose.

"Trash."

The word "trash" was like two heavy sledgehammers, smashing hard against Wu Lingxiao's heart.

If in the old days, anyone had dared call the Empress of Great Xia trash, they would have had their entire clan exterminated, their bones ground to dust. But right now, the one kneeling here was only Ye Xuan's concubine Wu Lingxiao.

Hearing that most insulting insult, what rose in Wu Lingxiao's heart was not anger, but an abyss-deep terror and self-loathing.

Her sickly, obsessive love and her humbled psyche twisted together to the extreme at this moment.

"I'm sorry... I'm so sorry, husband!"

Wu Lingxiao frantically banged her head against the hard jade stone floor, the sound thudding loud and clear. Her forehead instantly turned purple and blue, blood seeping out.

Tears streamed down her face, her tone so humble it sank into the dust. "It's my fault for being useless... It's this trashy constitution of mine that's dragging you down, husband..."

"Please, don't cast me aside. I will work even harder to cultivate my time dao arts, I definitely will be able to achieve one to ten thousand one day..."

Watching her groveling like a dog begging for scraps, a flicker of impatience flashed across Ye Xuan's eyes.

"Enough, stop putting on that pathetic act." Ye Xuan looked irate, waving his sleeve irritably. "Then hurry up and set it up! One to one hundred and twenty it is, don't waste any more of my time!"

"Yes! Yes, I'll start right now!"

Wu Lingxiao felt as if she had been granted a pardon. She did not even bother wiping the blood off her forehead, scrambling hastily to her feet.

Wu Lingxiao took a deep breath, forcing down her internal injuries and the violent roil of her emotions. She walked to the edge of the formation platform, sat down cross-legged, and her hands began to weave seals at blinding speed.

As she moved, a mysterious, ancient and vast aura began to spread through the cultivation chamber.

It was the power of "time".

"Age of Sands, Light and Shadow Barrier, open!"

Wu Lingxiao cried out sharply, spitting a mouthful of scarlet heart blood that exploded into a mist of red. She had burned her dao body origin directly!

In an instant, thousands upon thousands of silvery "time threads" gushed wildly out from inside her body, forming a giant silvery cocoon that wrapped Ye Xuan on the formation platform layer upon layer.

The space inside the cultivation chamber began to twist eerily, the surrounding air turning thick as rippling water, as time was forcibly pulled, folded, and slowed down here.

One breath from the outside world was stretched out infinitely within.

Yet maintaining this heaven-defying formation came at a brutal, painful price.

Wu Lingxiao's face turned ashen at a speed visible to the naked eye, and a single, wispy strand of white hair even appeared at her temple, irrefutable proof that her lifespan and origin power were draining away at a frantic pace.

But she bit down hard on her teeth, her bloodshot eyes gazing adoringly at Ye Xuan in the center of the formation. Even as pain wracked her entire body into spasms, she did not dare slack off even for a moment.

Because she knew, this was the only way she could prove her worth right now.

The formation was complete.

Ye Xuan felt the change in the time flow around him. Though he was still dissatisfied with the one to one hundred and twenty ratio, it was better than nothing.

His eyes hardened, and he spread both hands out sharply.

Along with a deafening roar, the storage ring on Ye Xuan's finger erupted with a blinding light as bright as the scorching sun.

The next second, it was like the Milky Way pouring down from the nine heavens, or a vast ocean bursting through its dams!

Endless, glittering, translucent top-grade spirit stones rippling with terrifying spiritual energy gushed out from the storage space like a raging flood.

A million... ten million... a hundred million... five hundred million!

A full five hundred million top-grade spirit stones!

In just a moment, the massive, spacious cultivation chamber was completely filled. Pure spiritual energy condensed into liquid spiritual springs, flowing across the ground. The spiritual energy in the air was so dense it even coalesced into multicolored spiritual rain, pattering down on this vast ocean of spirit stones.

Such a staggering, unheard-of fortune, not even the Great Xia Immortal Dynasty, nor even a top-tier sacred sect that rules over an entire domain, could lay their hands on all of it at once without suffering severe, foundational damage! Yet Ye Xuan did not so much as bat an eye, piling every last bit of it all around himself. Because the cultivation art he was about to activate next was a true, bottomless pit that would devour resources without end.