Chapter 173: 172. Vajra Body, Unbreakable Form

"I'm watching."

Based on the information provided by Qin Xiang, Yin Shenli began searching this galaxy for the other's trace.

Even though divine perception is immensely powerful, searching for a single person's trace within this massive celestial body of a hundred‑thousand‑light‑year diameter still takes some time.

But that's already terrifying; to be blunt, a divine perception that strong can cover over a hundred thousand light‑years.

It sounds exaggerated, and indeed it is, but don't forget, this is… uh, never mind.

Nevertheless, even with such exaggeration, Yin Shenli's strength here probably doesn't reach the crushing level.

Because the universe is a very big place.

Since a civilization of galactic‑overlord level can exist in this star system, even though it's extinct, the galaxy is merely a drop in the ocean compared to the entire universe.

Beyond the galaxy they inhabit—though we don't know if it's a galaxy, let's call it that for now—there must be other civilizations beyond this galaxy.

Yin Shenli didn't observe closely, but she did see traces of life and civilization in the neighboring star system.

However, unlike this galaxy, the neighboring system's higher‑level civilization might be the one originating from the "Immortal" that Qin Xiang is tracking.

As for the rest, from Yin Shenli's rough observation so far, no civilization reaches the level of the Heavenly Court.

Not even the Heavenly Court—none even approach the level of the civilization where that "Immortal" resides.

Beyond this star system, the universe also contains countless bizarre celestial bodies.

The demonic calamity seems to spread only within this system; at least Yin Shenli hasn't seen many demonic‑tainted planets elsewhere.

But that doesn't mean those bizarre bodies don't exist beyond this galaxy.

Their numbers are equally vast, and their strangeness is no less than the "Demon Realms" within this galaxy.

The power system possessed by that Immortal is the one currently used by True Dao cultivators on Tianyuan Star.

However, after the techniques from the Extreme Heaven Divine Palace spread, over time the True Dao system cultivated by Tianyuan people will diverge increasingly from the True Dao power system used by that Immortal.

With the aid of a powerful being from another world and the help of the divine race, this universe might halt its continual decay and degeneration.

It will usher in new hope and inaugurate a new era.

Although they are acquaintances and their sects have friendly relations, Yin Shenli helping Qin Xiang find someone isn't free.

She is a killer who always works for money.

Moreover, as the leader of the Asura Blood Demon, the strongest assassin of the Dark Realm, hiring her won't be cheap.

Originally Qin Xiang intended to set the price, but unexpectedly Yin Shenli volunteered that she didn't need it because disciple Wang Wu had already settled the bill for her.

"By the way, Sect Leader Xiao Li, even if our disciple has money, hiring you…"

However, although Qin Xiang normally receives Wang Wu's various courtesies and red envelopes in an instant, at this moment he took the initiative to say to Yin Shenli:

"How about this: you return the money Xiao Wang gave you to him, and I'll pay my side of the bill myself."

"What he paid isn't money," Yin Shenli glanced at Qin Xiang and snorted coldly.

"Huh?" Qin Xiang was startled, about to ask what Wang Wu had paid, but the words never left his mouth.

"Well, okay then." He forced a strange smile onto his face to appear perfectly normal, nodded at Yin Shenli: "Since it's a piece of filial devotion from my disciple, I can't just refuse him."

"Sigh, our disciple is good at everything, just too courteous."

After speaking, he shook his head again, then glanced sideways at the Yin Shenli beside him with a furtive glance.

Yin Shenli is close in age to Wang Wu, and it's evident she quite likes this disciple.

So if something were to happen between them, it wouldn't be surprising at all—in fact, it would be perfectly normal.

After all, Wang Wu is indeed good‑looking; although Yin Shenli isn't particularly a looks‑fan, high looks do add some points.

Moreover, this kid's personality clearly suits Yin Shenli's taste, even though she never says a kind word about her own disciple and is often heated by him.

If she truly disliked him, Wang Wu would have been dead long ago.

But he hasn't, and he even received Yin Shenli's wholehearted instruction, and she even paused her work to help her disciple refine his body, which shows how much she values him.

That's an exceptionally good treatment, even better than what Yin Shenli's other Direct Transmission Disciple has ever enjoyed.

"What are you doing?"

Although Qin Xiang's gaze was very concealed, as the true number‑one assassin in the world, Yin Shenli's perception was naturally razor‑sharp.

Since her divine perception can cover the entire galaxy, it can naturally capture even the subtlest emotional fluctuations on Qin Xiang's face and hidden in his heart.

"Nothing." Qin Xiang smiled and shook his head, "I just thought of something happy."

Yin Shenli narrowed her eyes, exuding a dangerous aura.

But soon, a payment notification on her phone made the dangerous aura vanish instantly.

"Heh." Yin Shenli sneered, "Fine, I won't haggle over this with you."

"Haha, thanks for your magnanimity, Sect Leader Xiao Li." Qin Xiang's face still wore a bright smile.

Only his heart was bleeding inside.

A red envelope worth five thousand yuan, you beast, a beastly thing.

But there's no way around it; this woman isn't as easy to deal with as Wu Yun.

If it were Wu Yun, a hundred‑yuan red envelope would instantly make him grin, but Yin Shenli is different.

Below a thousand yuan, she wouldn't even give you a glance.

"Did you find that guy?"

After a five‑thousand‑yuan red envelope removed the threat, Qin Xiang shifted the conversation back to business.

"Why the hurry?" Yin Shenli turned and glanced at Qin Xiang, "If you're that urgent, why not do it yourself?"

"I'm looking too, but haven't found anything for half a day…" Qin Xiang said, a bit awkwardly.

In terms of strength, he is inferior to Yin Shenli, and by a considerable margin.

Don't think that because this woman and he are only separated by 0.1 times the speed of light, that small gap makes no difference; that 0.1c is a world apart.

Moreover, the techniques of the Extreme Heaven Vajra Sect are not known for pursuit, so this aspect definitely requires a professional.

And Yin Shenli happens to be that professional.

"I've got a lead: that guy erased his own trace, but he's still hiding somewhere in this star system," Yin Shenli replied while using her spiritual perception to search the deeper layers of the universe for his whereabouts.

"The kid can hide well, but his strength is average. If you hope to achieve a breakthrough by battling him, it won't be a simple matter."

"I understand," Qin Xiang nodded, then looked back at Yin Shenli.

Noticing Qin Xiang's gaze, Yin Shenli turned her head toward him.

"What is it?" Qin Xiang's eyes burned with fierce warfire. Yin Shenli smiled lightly, "Did the idea hit me?"

"It's not impossible," Yin Shenli stretched lazily. "If you want me to spar with you, my fee is one million per hour. But I'm not a professional sparring partner; if I can't hold back and kill you, I won't be responsible."

Yin Shenli has always been indifferent toward people she doesn't know well, and even more indifferent to their lives.

For sparring like this, only the most outstanding disciples and members of the Yin Extreme Divine Sect and the Asura Blood Demon are eligible to receive a direct instruction from the sect leader once a year.

Even that Direct Transmission Disciple Mi Yan can be personally instructed by Yin Shenli at most six times a year, roughly once every two months.

As for Wang Wu, although he hasn't known Yin Shenli for many years, the time he has spent with his own master already exceeds that of his senior sister disciple Mi Yan.

"Then let's drop it."

Upon hearing the one‑million‑per‑hour price, Qin Xiang immediately abandoned the idea.

Sparring with top‑tier strongmen is indeed a good idea, but sparring is not a life‑or‑death battle and differs from real combat.

The opponent will hold back, and one's own mindset will not reach that state either; even at the brink of death, because there is no certainty, the Earth‑born potential will not be triggered.

At their level, ordinary sparring yields very little experience.

A life‑or‑death battle is only a life‑or‑death battle.

Even among top‑tier strongmen, the fight may reach a pinnacle of power control, pouring all energy onto the opponent without the after‑effects affecting the surroundings.

But the opponent isn't a punching bag; when strengths are equal, they won't stand there stupidly waiting to be hit.

They will dodge, and the evaded ranged attacks don't vanish; although the energy input stops instantly, the launched attack cannot be recalled.

It still destroys everything in its path, like gathering the power of an entire star into a single beam and hurling it at the target's Dyson lens.

Consequently, life‑or‑death battles between strongmen are strictly prohibited by law.

The universe had already been ravaged by the former Human Empire; the galaxy is empty, and if these deities ravage it again, humanity will truly have nowhere to live.

If a planet is merely shattered into countless specks of cosmic dust, that would be tolerable.

With later techniques, people can re‑manifest those planets in the universe, using the dust that drifts through space.

But the problem is that the Human Empire's civil wars are often annihilation‑force duels, and celestial bodies struck by that energy won't have any "cosmic dust" left.

Only void remains, a void where nothing exists.

But here, although doing so would be irresponsible toward the living beings of this universe, the issue is that Qin Xiang is not a native of this universe.

As for his own disciple, he has no objection anyway.

Moreover, this universe isn't like his home, which has already been devastated once by the Human Empire and can't endure a second round of calamity.

The stars here are abundant, and those extremely bizarre celestial bodies seem to have no good solution other than destruction.

Then perhaps we should just destroy them outright, shattering and eradicating them completely.

Of course, out of environmental concern, Qin Xiang will try to avoid using annihilation force, letting the shattered planetary debris return to dust and the earth to earth.

"Found it."

About three hours later, Qin Xiang, already deep within the Sun's chromosphere, received a reply from Yin Shenli.

Wang Wu was at this spot refining his body at the outer edge of the chromosphere; Qin Xiang had come to check his condition.

Compared with the corona's temperature soaring to a million degrees Celsius, the temperature here is modest, only four to six thousand degrees Celsius, but

nevertheless, the threat here has never been this temperature.

Solar Flare

This is what Wang Wu must face in this layer.

It is one of the Sun's most violent phenomena, a sudden, large‑scale energy release in a localized region of the solar surface.

The process causes instantaneous heating of the local area, emitting various electromagnetic radiation outward, accompanied by a sudden surge of particle radiation, with emitted light spanning the entire electromagnetic spectrum.

"Got it, I'll be out in a moment."

He called back to Yin Shenli, then continued watching Wang Wu before him.

At this moment, no intact part of his body could be seen; his skin was gone, and even his flesh had been burned away.

A few thousand degrees alone wouldn't cause this; he became like this solely because of a solar flare eruption in the chromosphere.

As waves of ultra‑high energy washed over him, Wang Wu's skin and flesh rapidly peeled away from his body.

Not only the outer flesh, but also the organs beneath his skeleton, now baked by the Great Sun True Fire into a golden glow, were stripped away.

Now Wang Wu's body has completely vanished, leaving only a set of bones that still glitter even within this dazzling great sun.

Yet even so, Wang Wu's consciousness remains clear, even though his brain tissue has entirely vanished and his flesh is utterly eroded.

He turned his head toward his master, his jaw opening and closing, shaking the space, and in a place where sound shouldn't exist, he emitted his now hoarse, low voice:

"Master, now, my feeling is so strange."

"I seem… I seem able to see far, far away, and also… see many, many…"

"Yes, my disciple," Qin Xiang nodded, "This is it."

"This is the Diamond Body, this is—"

"Unbreakable Body."

"This kind of… this feeling…" Wang Wu's skull turned, scanning the surroundings.

A faint blue light glowed from his eye sockets—not his eyeballs but his spiritual thought, a 'spiritual thought' at this moment capable of covering tens of millions of kilometers.

He is only a fourth‑rank warrior, still in body refinement, so he could not possibly extend his consciousness over the entire solar system.

Only a first‑rank warrior could achieve that.

"Great, master, this feeling."

"This all‑knowing, all‑powerful feeling…" Wang Wu's jaw opened and closed, his divine thought rippling out wave after wave.

"You idiot, what are you going crazy about here?"

At that moment, Yin Shenli appeared beside Wang Wu and slapped his skull.

The slap made Wang Wu's skull spin around his neck, turning a full 36,000 revolutions before it finally slowed to a halt.

"Master." The skull stopped rotating, and Wang Wu turned his head toward his other master.

In this state, he saw a Yin Shenli completely different from her usual self.

It was like a period before the universe existed, when nothing was.

Cold, lonely, stagnant.

Below absolute zero, even time ceases to flow.

The universe is continuous because of motion, and exists because of motion.

And when everything stops, that is also the moment of the universe's demise.

Wang Wu looked at Yin Shenli and said, "You look very lonely, master."

"Silly dog." Yin Shenli glanced at her disciple.

"But it's okay, master, I will stay with you," Wang Wu continued:

"I will forever be by your side, master, as your disciple, ever serving at your feet."

"Until everything falls into stagnation, until the end of time."

From this perspective, Yin Shenli felt to Wang Wu like a lonely old widower. Wang Wu has always been a person who deeply respects his teachers, so seeing his master in this state naturally pained him greatly.

Thus he decided that he would forever stay by Yin Shenli's side, forever as her disciple.

After all, Yin Shenli is indeed kind to him, even though she constantly berates and scolds him, but there's that saying, right? A strict master produces great disciples.

His innate talent was never great; if she weren't stricter, how could he keep up with others?

Qin Xiang was no longer beside them; the instant Wang Wu spoke, he vanished from the spot and rushed outside the Sun.

He had no interest in interrupting the banter between the master and disciple… Um, the deep master‑disciple bond.

Wang Wu's speech caused no change in Yin Shenli's expression, and she gave no indication in response to his words.

About five hours later, Yin Shenli dragged the skeletal Wang Wu out of the Sun.

"Today's training in the chromosphere ends here; later we'll sleep in the corona," Yin Shenli said, looking at Wang Wu floating in space as his organs and flesh rapidly regenerated on his skeleton.

"Alright, master." Wang Wu replied.

Forging a Vajra body and an unbreakable form requires staying in the Sun for long periods, during which one rarely sees a decent piece of flesh.

That means Wang Wu will not experience any pleasant life for a considerable future stretch.

Undoubtedly, this is extremely painful for a monster like Wang Wu.

As his body continuously breaks down and recovers, Wang Wu can clearly feel that each grind strengthens his body a little more.

His body becomes tougher, his divine consciousness sharper, and the recovery time shortens.

But a single night is certainly insufficient for full recovery; he hasn't reached that level yet.

Even a top expert like Yin Shenli cannot fully heal within one night after such severe injuries.

Oh right, they are inside the Sun now; all twenty‑four hours are daylight. Since the Sun is a star, the concept of day‑night rotation doesn't exist.

In any case, within ten hours neither Wang Wu nor Yin Shenli can recover to their original state.

Nevertheless, he doesn't need to recover; even in this state, Wang Wu still retains combat power, hardly less than when his flesh was intact.

Earthlings are that terrifying; they truly are the perfect beings created by the Old Humans, unlike the Old Humans themselves.

Um, Wang Wu is also an Earthling; his world is the 21st century, so Wang Wu and Qin Xiang and the other Earthlings are the same, no problem.

The timelines of the two Earths differ by only a few years, so this makes sense.

"The 'immortal' you're looking for, is it an immortal?" Yin Shenli asked Wang Wu.

"Um, I don't know," Wang Wu scratched his now somewhat terrifying head, "I've never seen that eye in human form."

"But it should be, right? After all, it's so powerful, and according to the master, that person wore a Daoist robe, albeit tattered."

"Useless," Yin Shenli muttered.

"Speaking of which, if he's an immortal, why is his Daoist robe still tattered?" Wang Wu asked, puzzled.

"Maybe he's poor; all resources went into cultivation," Qin Xiang shrugged from beside them.

At this moment he had already received the coordinates Yin Shenli sent him and was constructing a portal.

The teleportation method of the Extreme Heaven Vajra Sect is rather weak, requiring a long casting time and covering only a short distance.

"Damn it, are you even capable?" Yin Shenli, irritated, said as she watched Qin Xiang huffing while attempting the Leap Technique without progress, "Why don't you just spend more money, and I'll send you over?"

"Um, no need, it's already done," Qin Xiang quickly declined, and a golden portal appeared before him, into which he slammed himself.

"He's also a useless one."

Watching the portal dissolve into countless golden specks that vanished, Yin Shenli sneered.

The moment Qin Xiang left, Yin Shenli changed clothes; unlike the cold, dashing coat she wore before, now she still wore a coat but it was open, and beneath it seemed to be nothing…

"Um, that's irrelevant."

But one must admit, Yin Shenli is truly well‑endowed.

She isn't huge, but her proportions are perfect, curves flawless, muscle‑to‑fat ratio ideal.

"Master, I'm going back to sleep," Wang Wu said contentedly to Yin Shenli after staring at his master's current attire for a while.

"Go then." Yin Shenli, legs crossed, floated in the air, scrolling her phone without looking up, merely raised a hand to gesture at her disciple.

Although satisfied, deep inside Wang Wu was still tormented.

After all, due to his cultivation now, he simply couldn't engage in romantic affairs with his lovers, the legendary cloud‑rain unions, the Mount Wu‑mountain rain, rain…

But there's no other way; to become stronger, this is a price that must be paid.

He found a spot in the corona layer, lay down, turned sideways, and happened to see the Yin Spirit Li right in front of him.

From this angle, Wang Wu could see even more.

(End of chapter)