Kou's eyes snapped open, she had been here for a while now, the days flew by when one cultivated, today after she had prepared for it for a long time she would try to step into the next realm, she had told Shi Shi yesterday and the old woman opted to leave her alone.

"Some steps have to be taken alone, I will be around once you are done" These were her words as she left Kou alone for the time being.

She had spent the last few days bringing both her spiritual and bodily cultivation up to the same level, while she was always somewhat close together her spiritual cultivation was slightly ahead of her body in terms of progress, now she truly felt like she was at the brim, just one step away from forcing her way into the next realm!

She stretched her limbs to afterward go into a light jog around the area, blood, and Qi flow quickened and she felt amazing, she never bothered to ask anyone if they also felt like this but this feeling in her body - the power and control she felt she had over herself and to an extent the outside world, was intoxicating.

She marveled in the feeling for a while - while she consciously worked on spreading her Qi deeper into her body into each toe and finger a firm net of Qi was spreading into every fiber of her being. And then she jumped around a few times! She always loved fooling around when nobody could see her, and this was the perfect opportunity

She played around for a bit - lifting up boulders and jumping up trees - feeling the wind howl in her ears as she ran back and forth and the feeling of the ground crumbling beneath her feet when she stamped down, she acted like a child with super-powers should, there was no restraint or fake maturity in her and she had her fun for a while.

After about 20 minutes of playing around she settled down under her tree again, she was just about to start - but then she stood up again and pulled her clothes off, she did not really want her good clothes to be filled with disgusting grime once she was done and so she quickly put on one of the disposable sect uniforms before settling down once more.

Closing her eyes she took a deep breath, she could feel it, her Dantian was nearly bursting full, she knew from Chi Chi that more advanced cultivators did not see this as a whole new realm but for Kou it was, in this empire it was, and for her it very much felt like a new realm of power for her, and she would not let knowledge of the outside world damper her excitement for it.

She steadied her breath, between her fingers she played with a small spirit stone - Now was the moment, she took in a deep breath, taking in all the energy she could take in one go from the Air - while also absorbing the spirit stone in one go, a torrent of energy rushed into her body, she had to struggle to control it - letting it flow to her dantian - she did not regulate the force it had.

She needed this explosive energy, stepping into the next realm the "Breakthrough" literally involved breaking something, inside her Dantian her energy was bottled up in just a small area, there was still space that was not occupied and empty! Splitting open the walls that kept her energy from filling that space was important, that way she would be able to take in more Qi then she could've before, that meant she would have access to more energy at all times, for her cultivation - for techniques and everything else!

She felt the bubble inside of her extent, as she forced all of the energy into it at once - cracks formed in its walls and energy sipped through - just a little bit more! She picked up another Spiritstone, forcing herself to absorb it in one go while taking another deep breath.

Her face was read and sweet was forming on her forehead, this process was not just painful it was also really exhausting, but she kept at it, determined to make it in one go! She felt how all the channels in her body were in pain as another large flood of energy flowed into her down to her dantian - she had to fight to not cramp up...

"Keep ..relaxing... in one go..." She mumbled to her self and smashed to the new flow of energy against the already cracking walls inside of her, and there it was - the force of energy tore the walls down, her Qi flowed into the new bigger space, and filled it for about 10% of its full capacity.

And with that the feeling of standing on top of the world was gone, she felt almost empty all of a sudden, she would need to cultivate for a long time to fill all this up again... while she was probably stronger than before now, she.. still felt weak again, she understood now why some people took some time staying at the top of one realm - it felt so much better then being at the bottom of another, even if it was a step up...

She let out a sigh, but this was not it... she still had to push her body into the next realm too...

She took about the time it took an incense stick to burn down for resting and adjusting herself to it, a glance upwards showed that this breakthrough had taken her a good part of the morning as the sun was slowly drifting towards its zenith.

Another deep breath and she picked up the next spirit stone, stepping into the next level on a physical level was not quite the same was on the spiritual level, she sat down, a warm breeze flew over Shi Shi's hideout, ruffling her hair slightly, as she tried to focus on her body.

Absorbing to many spirit stones in one day may be dangerous for once channels, the Qi needed to flow - and if one took in too much in one day it may overexert them, making progress difficult and even having a chance for injury.

So this was Kou's only spirit stone she could use for now! She could feel that she was already somewhat worn out but still wanted to try it right now, it was part stubbornness part stupidity, to be honest.

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The energy flew into her body - but this time she actively prevented it from entering her dantian, instead she pulled energy out of it, fusing it with the energy she had just absorbed, she let the wild energy flow through her body, circulating it from head to toe - until it was a constant stream up and down - she needed the energy to fuse with her bones, her flesh, and tendons - her channels and blood, threshold needed to be reached for her to step into the next realm.

Half an hour later.

She was pale, sweat was dripping down from her forehead and she could barely keep her back straight, the control of the Qi inside of her was the hardest thing she had ever done, keeping it rotating and not just flowing into her dantian, while constantly absorbing small bits of it all over her body was exhausting and she could feel how her channels slowly reached a critical point.

She could not continue, there was no way...

Her stiff body relaxed as she let go, the energy dispersed mostly - while some of it went back to her dantian, at least she had not lost too much with this. Her body felt sluggish now, and she was full of sweat - her robes were drenched down to the lower layer - and she quickly threw them off.

Carrying herself over to the pound she carefully lowered herself into it, the Water was clear and while it had no special properties it was comforting to feel the cold water on her heated skin, slowly - she relaxed more - her blood flow returned to normal.

"I'll try again tomorrow..." She was disappointed, she wanted to do both in one go, and awaken her bloodline properly this time, but it did not always work out as you wanted, she had learned that, and while she was exhausted, at least this time while failing she did not hurt herself at all, it was very important to take care of your body while cultivating, to much could be harmful!

Leaning back she just let herself flood in the water while closing her eyes... relaxing time for now...

Hei Tian had fully broken into the second realm a few months ago already, the chubby little boy more and more became a handsome youngling, and the more traditionally inclined females around were already swooning over him - as he was one of the current top 10 in pure cultivation.

Not that Hei Tian would notice any of that, the boy was oblivious to fangirls, he interacted mostly with Li Zhi Xiu Shihong and Yun Kou, and none of those girls would do anything of that sort. Not that Hei Tian would've minded, he had a bit of a crush on Xiu Shihong, and he found Kou quite cute - and Li Zhi's appearance was endearing too, he found he was very blessed with his 3 friends and had little eyes for anyone else.

Much to the dismay of some of the girls around, many had been sent here by their fathers to make good impressions on the higher ranking noble boys and sones of sect officials, as in landing an engagement with these people would get them quite a bit of benefit.

But Hei Tian was numb to all of that, in his mind, there was only justice, his friends and cultivation! He was often found resolving arguments between students, his calm and just manner made him someone to look up to not for the females but also for the boys.

Currently, he found himself in an argument

Two students were standing over a second realm beast corps, both of them claimed to have slain it - it had two wounds - an arrow was in his head, and a spear wound had destroyed its heart - both were deadly to be sure, and it was clearly impossible who of those two had killed the creature.

It was a two-headed deer, those were quite rare and it was hard to kill one even in the second realm as they were very very fast and cautious.

The girl in this argument was a peak first realm cultivator of a small cultivation clan from the desert. She had pretty ebony skin, fiery red eyes and her black hair wavy and unruly, she was rather pretty, to be honest, exotic and proud.

The boy was just like Hei Tian from the middle lands, meant he had fair almost pale skin - dark hair and double-lidded eyes, he was also a bit smaller than the girl, but he was no means thin - he hard large arms and quite the chiseled physique for a boy - he held a spear in his hands while the girl held a bow.

The girl Anyi had stalked the deer of days, carefully observing its habits - attuning her mind to that of the beast to think like it and follow it quickly and efficiently, finally, she had it where she wanted it - her wind art enhanced arrow pierced into its skull destroying its brain.

But at the same time from underneath the ground, a spear shot up and pierced its heart, it turns out the Boy Zhen Cong had followed the creature just like Anyi did, one from the trees while the other did it from underneath the earth.

Both of them had stalked the creature for days without noticing the other and struck in exactly the same moment as the creature thought it was safe - lowering it's heads to nom on some grass!

No both of them were quite agitated with the others, both of them were good hunters and wanted parts of the creature for a project they were working on - as well as selling its meat and fur. None of them wanted to share the kill and kept accusing the other of kill stealing.

To be honest it was quite the ordeal, neither of them was technically wrong while none of them was right - it was not too unbelievable for two good hunters that preferred vastly different elements to not be aware of each other while stalking the same pray, it was also not too farfetched for both of them to strike at the same time as they both would realize that it was unguarded at that moment!

Hei Tian was called as he had the reputation as being a fair person, as such a thing could not be important enough for an Elder or Protector to handle.

Hei Tian stepped forward and touched the Deer, the creature vanished into his Ring, he had a magical treasure! A ring that could store things inside a small pocket dimension, these things were quite rare in this kingdom - and just the scions of the larger families would have things like this - Well this or the filthy rich.

Both of the hunters eyes went red for a moment before Hei Tian spoke "I will keep an eye on this deer, you two will work together to hunt another one, while working together you will only need a fraction of time to corner and slay another one, and then we have two - each one gets a deer - My Ring will preserve the corpse for a while so both of you have plenty of time to go."

The gaffers around applauded, what a great solution to the problem! Their evaluation of Hei Tian rose by another bit!

Anyi and Zhen Cong exchanged glances, while both of them had been angry with the other - they could respect each other as fellow hunters - so working together was not out of the question, they nodded and bowed towards Hei Tian.

"Many thanks for helping us, Sir Hei - we will seek you once we have slain another beast."

This Hei Tian! He brought up a solution and even made the two fighting hunters work together! Wow! The crowd was sure the boy would have a bright future, and once in the future they could say "We were in the same sect as Hei Tian!" ...

Well some people thought that easy to impress people.

Hei Tian bowed slightly and backed off he wanted to cultivate a bit more today - and all these looks on him were bothering, to be honest, he did not dislike helping others with problems but all the stares he got were somewhat uncomfortable!