His body instantly crystalized. Between his smaller body and the highly concentrated compressed qi, the technique activated faster than ever before. The crystal glistened, nearly translucent, its structure more dense than before.

Ah? Is this because of the compressed qi? It’s condensed down to a more powerful form, so my techniques also get compressed and become more powerful? Excellent!

The blades struck Hui and clattered harmlessly off his body, barely drawing scratches in the crystal surface. They ground shut, closing as tight around the small shape as they could, then retracted again.

Beaming, Hui checked himself over. A few scratches, but that’s not bad! Sure, this body won’t last forever, but it’ll last much longer than my first body did. At this rate, I really can last through all ten thousand rounds of the room!

Between the concentrated qi and my smaller body, I’m already doing well. But… can I do even better? The compressed qi makes my magic more powerful, but what if I also compress my body?

Rather than immediately attempt to put his idea into action, Hui folded his legs and sat in a lotus pose, hovering a few inches over the ashes of his former body. While the rounds ground on and the blades closed in over and over again, he meditated, contemplating his next course of action. My body, but condensed. More muscle fibers per inch. Incredibly dense. In a way, instead of creating a smaller body out of normal-sized components, I’ll be creating a ‘normal’ body out of compressed components, such that my body remains small due to the compression of each individual component, but holds much more power as a result! Ideally, I’ll be able to use my full bodily and magical strength at my small size.

If I can do that, then this technique becomes even more useful than it already is! After all, I’ve used small bodies with my plant form before in order to burrow through the ground and escape. However, due to being clones and plant-based, I didn’t have these same problems… from the start, the lotus clones are more flexible and able to constantly heal, and secondly, back then, I was lower-realm. Even before I compressed my qi, my body was able to handle fourth-realm qi, and with the lotus plants’ pain suppression, flexibility, and healing factor, naturally, I was able to easily handle fifth-realm qi!

However, seventh realm is a big upgrade from fourth or fifth, since I’ve begun to tread my Dao. It’s a completely different equation now! I don’t know if I could have compressed my qi back then. I wasn’t able to manipulate qi as freely or in as much volume as I can now.

But that’s all in the past. The question now is, how do I compress the components of my body?

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After all, my body isn’t gaseous, like qi is. Gas is easy to compress and concentrate, since there’s so much space around the molecules. Solids and liquids can still be compressed, but it’s harder, and you hit a point of diminishing returns much faster. I need a method of concentrating muscle and organ fibers, not to mention blood, brains, and qi organs, that doesn’t lose any power… or at most, loses a minimum of strength.

But how?

Hmm… what if I run my muscle fibers through condensed qi? Could that compress the muscle fibers? Waving his hand, Hui lit the ashes below him with a mote of phoenix fire. A single muscle fiber regrew from the ash. With another wave of his hand, he sent the fiber through the compressed qi.

Nothing.

Hui nodded to himself. He sent a little bit of life qi into the muscle fiber to keep it alive, then carefully inserted his compressed qi into the muscle fiber.

The muscle fiber trembled, then contracted. It nearly vanished before his eyes as the compressed qi diminished its size.

Hui raised his brows. It’s that easy? It can’t be. There has to be a drawback.

Letting the muscle fiber return to ash, he paused for the blades to close around him, then called up the ashes again. This time, he regrew a full-sized finger, with nerves and all. Carefully, he inserted a tiny bit of his divine sense, flexing the finger, feeling it exactly as a normal finger. Alright. Here goes. Maintaining his connection to the finger, Hui inserted a thread of compressed qi into the appendage.

It contracted, the same as the fiber had. At the same time, intense pain washed over Hui. He jerked back, instinctively pulling his divine sense out of the finger, then pressed his hand to his head. Ow, ow, ow, I regret everything, I regret it all!

The tiny finger floated in front of him. Hui squinted at it. Can I trust you?

The finger had nothing to say for itself.

He pressed his lips together, then took a deep breath. The blades are going to come back soon. I need to check it now, before anything happens to it. Gritting his teeth, he sent his divine sense into the finger again.

Throbbing pain. Hui forced himself not to retract his divine sense. Bracing himself, he waited. The pain faded slowly, diminishing bit by bit. Ever so slowly, it faded.

Hui nodded to himself. Ah, okay. It only hurts immediately after the contraction. If I create a new body for myself, wait a minute or two, and then put my soul into it, I should be able to avoid the pain! Or, at least, avoid the worst of it.

He considered for a moment, then nodded. I might as well try to create a compressed body. In the worst case, I feel some pain. In the best case, I can create an even more powerful body for myself!

Ah, it’s too bad I have such little talent with body cultivation. If I had more talent, I would be able to level up from this punishment alone, and I wouldn’t need to go to such lengths to grow stronger. Luckily, I do have some small talent with qi manipulation and figuring out new techniques! Thus, I can create workarounds for my weaknesses.

Drawing his compressed qi out, Hui burned his body away again. This time, he lit all the ashes at once. As the blades drew back, he created a new, full-sized body for himself, then, from the outside, pressed the compressed qi inside.

His new body condensed, instantly dropping down to doll-sized. Hui watched it from outside for a few moments, holding his breath, then jumped into the body. Please don’t hurt please don’t hurt please don’t—