Chapter 771: The Power of a Flick

In cultivation, a day passed quickly.

The next day, Su Mu returned to Li Yi's residence, but before she even drew near, her expression subtly changed.

For within the entire sky villa, five-colored qi surged upward, and golden and silver divine light radiated boundless brilliance like sun and moon, concentrating cosmic energy here to an unimaginable degree.

The entire building emitted concentric rings of light.

"Is Li Yi cultivating? What method is he practicing simultaneously to produce such an anomaly?" Su Mu was astonished.

Currently, most evolvers in the survival base practice both evolution techniques and xian cultivation, and although xian cultivators from the Xuanxian Continent are enemies, it cannot be denied that among all the worlds encountered, xian cultivation is the most suitable method to promote.

Because xian cultivation has too many advantages, its only drawback is slow progress—each meditation session often lasts several years—but combining it with evolution techniques can partially compensate for this weakness.

Therefore, practicing both evolution and xian cultivation is currently the mainstream approach.

Naturally, gene serums are also injected into the body to trigger autonomous evolution and offset the weakness of xian cultivators' frail physical constitutions.

But Li Yi, Su Mu is certain, is definitely not practicing xian cultivation; rather, he is practicing a method that rivals xian cultivation, and even beyond it, there are traces of other cultivation systems.

"Moreover, being completely at ease within such intense energy suggests Li Yi's physical condition must be extraordinary."

Su Mu moved closer again, and even with her own strength, she felt a faint burning sensation on her skin from the energy ahead.

This is a sign that the energy is too powerful, exceeding the body's tolerance threshold.

It's like the energy field emitted by a complete artifact—any cultivator with insufficient strength would be instantly destroyed upon approach, reduced to ashes.

She immediately halted, dared not approach further, nor disturb him, yet still stared curiously toward the center of the condensed energy.

Her eyes even felt a slight burning pain.

Yet Su Mu faintly perceived a divine figure seated atop a crimson lotus, clad in five-colored auroras, holding a sacred seal, with a serene and dignified countenance; besides, the sun and moon flanked the divine figure on either side.

Perhaps her presence had drawn the attention of that divine figure.

A calm yet authoritative gaze turned toward her.

At that moment, Su Mu's soul was seized by inexplicable terror—a terror that made her soul feel as if it wanted to flee her body immediately.

"How is this possible?" she exclaimed in shock.

As an evolver, she understood perfectly what this feeling signified.

It meant the opponent's soul power vastly surpassed hers—just as a weaker being instinctively fears a higher life form when standing beside it.

"Could that divine figure be Li Yi's soul? No, it must be his spiritual deity—but I've already passed the Soul Tribulation; my soul power is certainly not weak. How could there be such a vast gap?"

Su Mu was stunned, yet found it hard to believe what she was seeing.

Even if Li Yi could slay great demons, their difference in power couldn't possibly be this extreme.

Fortunately, the divine figure immediately retracted its aura upon noticing Su Mu; the surrounding auroras began to dissipate, and the powerful energy field rapidly weakened as the strange phenomena inside the room subsided.

After the divine figure vanished completely, only Li Yi remained standing in place.

"So, this was indeed Li Yi's spiritual deity."

Su Mu now felt the pressure lift, and slowly walked into the room, greeting him: "Li Yi, it's me, Su Mu. We agreed yesterday that today I'd take you to tour the survival base—I hope I didn't interrupt your cultivation."

"No, I was just resting casually today. Let's go, let's tour the survival base."

Li Yi said this, and he would never casually discuss his own cultivation matters.

"No problem," Su Mu replied.

Soon after,

the two left the building and descended from the high-rise, quickly reaching the ground.

Due to the dense, towering buildings nearby, the streets here were narrow and dark; since survival was the only priority, not a single vehicle could be seen—only survivors passed by.

Every survivor possessed some cultivation, nearly all practicing multiple methods; though their strength was insignificant to Li Yi, their future potential was far from negligible.

"Survival of the fittest—this saying is indeed true. After the catastrophe, only those with cultivation have survived; elderly people from the old era are extremely rare."

Li Yi sighed.

Su Mu said: "Correct. Though cruel, it's reality. The elderly from the old era received cosmic energy too late—they're now beyond the reach of cultivation and inevitably discarded by the times. Only the young or children of this new era can smoothly enter cultivation."

"Of course, not everyone was abandoned by the times. With the opening of interdimensional gates, many were safely evacuated."

Li Yi asked again: "How many people roughly live in one survival base?"

Su Mu replied: "About two million. Sizes and conditions vary by location, but on average, it's roughly the same."

"Ten survival bases combined only total twenty million people," Li Yi fell silent—this number was minuscule compared to the peak population of China.

But viewed as cultivators, this number was terrifying.

Twenty million cultivators—if they aren't annihilated—could unleash unimaginable potential in the future; no world in existence could withstand such a vast, overwhelming army of cultivators.

No wonder Earth is being targeted.

On the Xuanxian Continent, seeing twenty million people cultivating xian techniques daily, as enemies, how could they sleep peacefully? Invading Earth was inevitable, since the two worlds have already merged.

Once Earth's people rise, those xian cultivators will surely be purged.

"No wonder the Xuanxian Continent tacitly allowed xian cultivation to spread on Earth," Li Yi suddenly realized.

Su Mu paused, struggling to follow Li Yi's train of thought: "What do you mean?"

"Earth's population is too large, and everyone is on the cultivation path. Evolution techniques are miracle-inducing methods; once the potential of multi-method cultivators explodes, it will be a devastating blow to any cultivation world. Under such a tide, the spread of xian cultivation actually slows our evolvers' rise—after all, everyone knows xian cultivation is extremely time-consuming," Li Yi explained.

Su Mu smiled: "But what can we do? At first, we lacked any top-tier cultivation method, and xian cultivation happened to fill that gap, didn't it? Besides, it's universally accepted that the more powerful a method is, the slower its cultivation speed."

"That's why martial arts techniques, once very popular, gradually disappeared," Li Yi shook his head slightly.

After all, martial arts have one trait: the older one gets, the stronger they become; as long as they survive, explosive potential and breakthroughs in desperate situations are common.

Su Mu said: "Let's stop discussing cultivation methods. We can't decide these things anyway. Just surviving the Heavenly Collapse is already hard enough."

"You're right," Li Yi didn't pursue the topic further and continued strolling through the survival base.

In reality, only those with high clearance could move about freely; those with insufficient clearance were mostly confined to their homes with severely limited outdoor time.

This rule was enforced to force them to cultivate diligently at home and not waste time.

Thus, despite the two million population, few people were seen outdoors, and the streets were never crowded.

At that moment, a group hurried past them; Li Yi glanced and said: "That must be the patrol team."

"Yes,"

Su Mu said: "The survival base still needs security. By the way, Ye Jingtian has investigated the incident from yesterday—the patrol team led by Zhang Yiming was fake, but the AI system showed everything as normal. Someone with S-level clearance altered the AI data, and there are very few people in the entire survival base with S-level clearance."

"The mole will likely be uncovered within two days. When it's time to act, I'll notify you—since you're more likely to succeed in eliminating the mole."

"No problem."

Li Yi's expression showed surprise—he hadn't expected Ye Jingtian to act so swiftly; within three days, he truly intended to uncover and eliminate the mole.

But then again,

this matter was crucial. Without decisive action to remove this hidden threat, who knew how much damage it might cause later.

The two continued strolling through the survival base.

Under Su Mu's explanations, Li Yi gained a fairly clear understanding of the base's situation.

But when they reached another district of the survival base,

suddenly,

a brilliant yet dangerous light descended from the sky, striking directly at Li Yi.

"Hmm?"

Li Yi remained unmoved, merely looking up.

The dangerous light halted abruptly before him; as the energy dissipated, it revealed a specially crafted flying dagger—exceptionally sharp and infused with xian cultivation arrays.

"Su Mu, you can take Li Yi around all you want, but don't bring him to me—I don't welcome him here."

A voice echoed, and a man stood mid-air, idly playing with another crystal-clear flying dagger.

The dagger radiated terrifying demonic energy.

It appeared to have been forged from the remains of a great demon, combined with xian cultivation metallurgy techniques, granting it extraordinary power, though its exact rank was hard to determine.

"This man is Li Yugang, an S-level clearance holder."

Su Mu whispered: "He once teamed up with others to kill a great demon—he's extremely strong, having reached the Soul Tribulation in evolution and surpassed the Tribulation Stage in xian cultivation, having endured two thunder tribulations. I can't fathom how he cultivated so fast."

Li Yi remained silent, merely staring at the dagger hovering before him, then flicked his finger—Dragon-Tiger power erupted.

The dagger instantly shattered under the overwhelming force.

"Your dagger's quality is terrible. You should forge a new one. Besides, in this survival base, with my strength, there's nowhere I can't go—it's simply a matter of whether I want to or not," Li Yi said calmly.

Li Yugang's expression turned grim. He had merely been annoyed by Li Yi's previous behavior and intended only to intimidate him—he never expected that a casual flick from Li Yi would shatter his dagger.

This was a weapon forged from the remains of a great demon!

"Could this guy really be this terrifying?" Li Yugang felt deep fear.

If a casual flick could destroy his dagger, it could destroy him too.

(End of Chapter)