Chapter 161: A Heavy Rain Destroyed My Breakthrough Dream

"Invincible~ invincible~"

"Workwork~ workwork~"

"Diligent and brave~ Jia Ji-sama~ He made tremendous contributions~ tremendous sacrifices~ tremendous carry~"

In high spirits, humming a tune, Jia Ji felt he might not need to seek out opponents everywhere—just by cultivating spiritual power, he could achieve ultimate transcendence, make the final leap, and break through his old bottleneck all at once.

In the instant spiritual power emerged, Jia Ji realized qi energy and spiritual power were compatible, like inserting two different DLCs into his body, shifting from a single-core qi-driven system to a dual-core system.

Once connected to spiritual power, Jia Ji's aura surged violently, intensified sharply, skyrocketed…

First, the conclusion: spiritual power is a type of energy with moderate specificity but high versatility, generally classified as a "large cup" within the supernatural system; its greatest advantage over qi energy is its gentleness.

For example: if there were an ocean before him, and Jia Ji had only qi energy, he'd have to forcibly use "Parting the Sea" or "Moxi's Miracle" to split the ocean, or cross it with the Super-High-Speed Water-Walking technique of Liehaiwang; but with spiritual power, he could simply stand atop the water's surface.

Its versatility is indeed broad enough.

Moreover, qi cultivation relies on breathing, while spiritual power has no specific breathing method—it resembles meditation; only by maintaining focus can it be activated… you can't stop breathing during meditation, can you?

In other words, these two martial cultivation methods could be performed simultaneously!

And the more he cultivated, the more Jia Ji noticed… his attribute values, unchanged for a long time, began slowly increasing.

Unlike qi energy, which stimulates cellular potential.

As this gentle energy began circulating within his body, through the "Healing" mode, damaged areas repaired at visibly rapid speeds; new tissue became tougher than before, and he clearly sensed his muscle density rising, bone strength increasing, even his five senses growing sharper.

This "growth-oriented" recovery brought comprehensive enhancement.

Each "explosion" followed by "growth" significantly strengthened his physical attributes—strength, speed, endurance, reaction time, and even his control over spiritual power—all pushing beyond limits in this cycle.

Thanks to his mental attributes and inherent quality, spiritual power grew at an terrifying pace, as if stepping on his own foot to ascend into the sky.

Watching these two overpowered players, Huan Hai muttered, "I saw your effort—so why is sweat on my face?"

Because he was drenched in sweat.

Generally, highly accomplished cultivators, with abundant spiritual energy, essence, and soul, naturally radiate vitality and exude a radiant charm, or at least appear spiritually full and energetic.

For instance, Huan Hai, though elderly, now appeared as a withered old woman: slender and upright, her face lined with wrinkles, high brow bones, deep and sharp eyes like a hawk's, pupils often emitting a cold, piercing glare that radiated the oppressive aura of a martial expert.

She usually wore a pink cultivation robe with a purple sash, her hands thin and calloused, moving with agility incongruous with her age; in battle, her body erupted with pale-blue spiritual energy—clearly a revered elder of the field.

But Jia Ji, a martial artist from outside, was different—he had once been unmistakably a villainous rogue.

His knotted muscles bulged with veins beneath his tight short-sleeve shirt, as if ready to tear the fabric; his face carved as if by axe and chisel, high cheekbones like jagged rocks, often radiating the fierce glare of a scavenging beast.

The key was, his skin grew whiter the more he trained—not the fair white of a woman, but the pallid white of a corpse, looking deeply unsettling.

But after cultivating spiritual power, that eerie aura gradually faded; the murderous aura from countless killings, bearing at least tens of thousands of lives, vanished like snow melting under sunlight.

"Perfect control—I'm amazed! From now on, I won't scare my new group members anymore!"

Already unmatched in the mortal realm, now with spiritual power, he was even more confident: "Who's the strongest in the mortal world? Obviously me, Jia Ji—could it be Huyu Lüdi?"

Yet the very next day after saying that…

"You've hit a bottleneck."

After checking Jia Ji's condition, Huan Hai sighed in relief and announced: she'd feared his spiritual power would rise endlessly, but it had finally stalled at the C-rank limit, unable to advance further.

The earlier explosive growth was merely because his base was strong enough—without deliberate cultivation, his powerful spirit had automatically elevated his spiritual power to this level.

"No way? Are you kidding me?"

Breakthrough: failed.

It felt like hitting the B button during evolution—suddenly stopped.

You're right, but in the Hokuto no Ken, the third brother is like this: the other three Hokuto disciples need only focus entirely on cultivating qi and fist techniques; but Jia Ji has too many things to consider.

Am I… really that useless?

"Gua!"

The preceding is omitted… if you push him too far, once he breaks through, he'll make the world feel pain!

"If you wish to break your limits, you need a battle that forces you into a higher state…"

Coincidentally, Huan Hai uttered words similar to Longquan's, igniting Jia Ji completely.

…………

"Hey!" A two-headed, bouncy little brat, as if leapt out of a children's anime, chewing a pacifier, dressed in a scaled-down version of official robes and hat, the hat bearing strange letters: "JR."

"Put me down right now!"

He shouted angrily.

At this moment, he was kicking and punching the person before him, but his entire body was held aloft by the other's giant hand, floating midair; due to his short limbs, he couldn't even touch a single hair of Jia Ji's.

This brat was actually the interim ruler of the Spirit Realm, the Young Yama; long ago, through Mudan's intel, he learned of Jia Ji's existence, and now that his father had returned to take over, he had some free time—he'd slipped out of the Spirit Realm to find Jia Ji personally, curious what made him so special that even the Yama King had ordered special attention.

Then he discovered: this guy was a total bully!

Upon seeing him, the brat's eyes lit up, as if meeting a long-lost friend, and immediately started ordering him around, completely ignoring that Jia Ji was a major figure in the Spirit Realm.

Setting up barriers, gathering intel, repairing damaged buildings… he was given more tasks than when he was in the Spirit Realm!

If he weren't already a ghost, he'd have died of overwork long ago.

And worse, when the Young Yama realized he couldn't beat Jia Ji, he secretly vowed that after Jia Ji died, he'd make him serve as his slave for a thousand years—and was about to leave, when his father told him to keep working, calling it "training."

"Did you find the person I asked you to find?"

The Young Yama glared at Jia Ji, then reluctantly replied: "The message is out. No info yet on Huyu Lüdi, but the other person has been found."

Jia Ji nodded, praised his work highly, encouraged him to keep going, then tucked the Young Yama under his armpit and ran down the mountain to find the person.

That person—Yao She Cang Ma—Nanyu Xiuyi

(End of Chapter)