Chapter 293

The Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra is a technique with a high entry difficulty because it requires changing the breathing pattern, transforming ordinary breathing into embryonic breathing.

Practitioners often have to continuously fight against their own breathing habits while maintaining the flow of magical power, constructing a new system of embryonic breathing, so there are many cultivators who fail to even get started for half a month.

But for Zhang Yu, these were not a problem.

The Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra involves all the pores of the body and the increasingly complex meridians after Foundation Establishment. After spending over thirty minutes, Zhang Yu managed to circulate his magical power through one full cycle, completing the operational route of the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra.

In that instant, he felt scenes flashing through his mind—visions of himself diligently cultivating the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra time and again until he finally mastered the technique.

At the same time, Zhang Yu's breathing grew weaker and weaker, eventually becoming almost nonexistent.

Meanwhile, a cool sensation spread over his entire body, as spiritual energy from the room continuously poured into his pores and converged into the magical power circulation within his meridians.

Zhang Yu could feel that, having entered the state of embryonic breathing, his pores constantly absorbed the surrounding spiritual energy every moment, as if it had become his new instinct for breathing.

After a brief adjustment, Zhang Yu continued to operate the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra, starting his second cycle of cultivation.

The moment Zhang Yu transformed his breathing into embryonic breathing, Zhang Pianpian, who had been meditating with her eyes closed, suddenly opened them. A glint of divine light seemed to flash in her gaze as she looked at Zhang Yu beside her.

"Embryonic breathing?"

Zhang Pianpian thought to herself: "It seems my little brother has been pondering techniques related to embryonic breathing ever since the semester started."

"That's good—mastering the method of embryonic breathing, absorbing spiritual energy day and night, refining magical power, will greatly benefit the growth of his magical power."

With a brief sweep of her gaze, Zhang Pianpian closed her eyes, and behind her eyelids appeared a vision of the depths of the spiritual world.

Over the following days, Zhang Yu continued to diligently cultivate the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra—passively circulating it during class, actively circulating it after class, never pausing in his hard work.

In just three or four days, he raised the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra to level 10, gaining its level-10 effect: when the sutra circulated passively, it produced the same efficacy as when it was actively circulated at full power.

Then another ten-plus days passed, and Zhang Yu boosted the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra all the way to level 20. At this level, the effect made the magical power flow of the Embryonic Breathing Sutra smooth and effortless, each breath as if divinely assisted.

Where it had originally taken Zhang Yu over thirty minutes to complete one full cycle of the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra, he could now compress it to under twenty minutes, greatly increasing his breathing efficiency.

His magical power also increased during the cultivation process, reaching 286.2, with a quality of 113%.

But just as Zhang Yu was planning to choose his next technique, Zhang Pianpian took advantage of the moment when Yu Xinghan and Le Mulan were absent to find her younger brother.

Back at the end of June, when Zhang Pianpian recognized that Zhang Yu had achieved embryonic breathing, she hadn't thought it was a problem.

But over the following half month, as she reviewed the dormitory's spiritual energy consumption data, she discovered that the consumption kept increasing, growing higher day by day.

After noticing this, she paid closer attention to why the spiritual energy consumption was rising so quickly.

And she soon found that each time the consumption data accelerated, it was when Zhang Yu was in the dormitory.

"Is it because Zhang Yu's breathing efficiency has improved?"

Realizing that her younger brother's breathing efficiency had increased and his magical power refinement had sped up, Zhang Pianpian's first reaction was not joy but suspicion.

"Has he increased this much in such a short time by spending a lot of spirit coins? Or even… borrowing?"

Zhang Pianpian's suspicion was not unfounded—after all, three months into Zhang Yu's first year of high school, he had already owed 700,000.

But Zhang Pianpian wasn't worried about him being in debt; after all, Zhang Yu had already proven his talent in the immortal path, and who in immortal cultivation doesn't borrow money? She was worried that he was spending money recklessly.

"The growth of magical power is accumulated bit by bit over a long time."

"Spending large sums on it every day is only suitable for the truly rich, not for the poor."

So Zhang Pianpian cast a spell and began to investigate Zhang Yu's consumption records, loan records, credit information…

Then she was even more astonished to find that in the month and a half since Zhang Yu had arrived at the Myriad Laws University City, he had been frugal—aside from purchasing many techniques, he had no major expenditures at all.

After ruling out various ways of burning money, only one possibility seemed to remain.

"My little brother hasn't replaced his skeleton, taken any medicine, purchased any Dao technique services, or used any means that costs money…"

Looking at the purchase record of the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra, Zhang Pianpian thought, "In just this half month, his breathing technique has been improving rapidly, which is why the consumption of spiritual energy has been increasing day by day."

And at this moment, only the siblings Zhang Pianpian and Zhang Yu remained in the room.

Zhang Pianpian looked at Zhang Yu and asked, "Little brother, tell me honestly—what level have you reached with the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra?"

Zhang Yu was slightly startled, not expecting his sister to name the technique he was cultivating with just one sentence.

Fu Ji quickly warned, "Zhang Pianpian is one of the gods' people—you must never confess our situation to her. Also, underreport the progress of the Primordial Embryonic Breathing Sutra to avoid attracting unnecessary attention from her."

Zhang Yu thought to himself: "Level 20 in half a month—that really is quite astonishing."

So, after some thought, Zhang Yu slowly said, "Level 10."

"Level 10?" Zhang Pianpian's heart skipped a beat, but she kept her expression perfectly still and said calmly, "Impossible. The Mixed Origin Embryonic Breathing Sutra at Level 10 hasn't truly reached Foundation Establishment level."

"I've been keeping an eye on the spirit energy consumption in your room this past half-month, as well as your spending records. Tell me the truth and don't try to deceive me."

"Just what level is your Mixed Origin Embryonic Breathing Sutra at now?"

Zhang Yu hesitated for a moment, then said, "Level 15."

Zhang Pianpian's heart trembled at this: "Level 15? Practicing to Level 15 in half a month?"

"Cultivating the Mixed Origin Embryonic Breathing Sutra breath technique to Level 15 entirely on your own would normally take a year or two. My little brother actually did it in just half a month."

"If he used spirit coins to achieve this, how much would it cost? Fifty spirit coins? Or a hundred?"

Zhang Pianpian sighed inwardly: "My little brother's talent is even more astonishing than I originally imagined."

She recalled the time she had used a Heaven's Eye Talisman to check Zhang Yu back on the first layer and saw "???".

"Well, that's fine. Otherwise, how would he be able to keep up with me in the future?"

Thinking this, Zhang Pianpian looked at Zhang Yu seriously and said, "Zhang Yu, I've told you before about the importance of information in Kunxu."

"Mastering more information and having a sufficient information gap is often more useful than raw power. It allows you to defeat the strong with the weak, and the rich with the poor."

"We know this, and those righteous gods, Golden Cores, Nascent Souls, and even the higher-ranked immortals know it even better."

"That's why every time you ascend a layer in Kunxu, information monitoring becomes stricter. It's like layers of spiderwebs draped over everyone, desperate to monitor every bit of data on each person."

"The increase in your spirit energy consumption in the dorm this past half-month can easily be discovered."

"If you don't know how to hide it, as your future achievements improve, soon people will start taking an interest in all sorts of your data and information. Before long, many will notice your astonishing talent."

Hearing this, Zhang Yu's heart stirred slightly. The speed of his technique's progress was indeed something he could never explain properly.

If a higher existence became very interested in him, his future fate would be entirely in that person's hands.

So he had deliberately kept this matter hidden, not wanting to appear too extraordinary.

This time, he hadn't expected that through the room's spirit energy consumption data and his own spending records, someone could deduce that his breath technique was advancing rapidly.

Zhang Pianpian continued, "So besides grasping the information gap, creating an information gap is also very important. And for us poor people, the simplest and most effective way to create an information gap is to learn to hide our own information."

"You practice magic power just to sell it and make money, right? But with your talent, if you really improved your magic power massively in a short time and started selling it, you'd immediately have a big problem—an untraceable source of enormous magic power."

Zhang Pianpian sighed and said, "So you need to learn to slow down your rate of improvement a bit."

"For example, with the Mixed Origin Embryonic Breathing Sutra, don't advance it any further for at least half a month. Focus on physical strength or the direction of your Dao Heart instead."

Zhang Yu thought to himself, "But I'm already at level 20, damn it."

Fuki reminded him, "Don't worry, Zhang Yu. With my Anti-Detection Ritual in place, simply hiding your strength isn't that hard."

The Detection Ritual can probe for cameras.

The Anti-Detection Ritual, on the other hand, can hide part of your data when your body's parameters are being scanned.

Both rituals had already been completed by Zhang Yu back when he was on the first layer.

But Zhang Yu still sighed inwardly, "Even if I can hide my magic power's rate of progress, selling too much magic power carries risks too."

"Looks like if I want to earn more spirit coins, I'll still have to rely on the construction site."

"That means my original cultivation plan will need some changes."

Zhang Pianpian continued with another reminder, "Also, pay attention to your ranking. Don't raise it too fast or attract too much attention."

"Many exams in the university are application-based—you apply and then take the test whenever you want. Try to delay until the last possible moment to take them. That way, even if your results improve significantly, you'll attract less notice."

"Oh, and don't do your daily body tempering practice outside the dorm. Go find a place without surveillance."

Zhang Yu asked curiously, "Where is there no surveillance?"

Zhang Pianpian said flatly, "Below the hundredth layer of the university city—the lower you go, the fewer cameras there are. Go practice there."

Zhang Yu asked again, "But what about the spirit energy consumption in the dorm?"

Zhang Pianpian reached out and tapped, and a Lu script appeared at her fingertip.

As runes flashed and vanished one after another, the log recording the dormitory’s spirit mechanism consumption materialized before Zhang Pianpian. With a swipe of her fingertip, it was modified into a different set of data.

“Spirit mechanism consumption is easy enough to conceal—I’ll use a Spirit-Stealing Talisman to hide it for you. But in the end, concealing your own results and strength depends on you.”

Zhang Yu asked curiously, “What’s a Spirit-Stealing Talisman?”

“A talisman that lets you sneakily use a little more spirit mechanism without being caught. It’s just a little something I drew myself—don’t worry about it.” Zhang Pianpian smiled faintly. “After all, the dormitory on floor 125 is rather crude. I’ve already cracked the runes that record spirit mechanism data here.”

Watching this, Fuki was startled inside: “What the hell… that works? Does she think she’s stealing electricity? This Zhang Pianpian… is she human or a god now?”

Meanwhile, Zhang Yu looked at his sister before him and suddenly caught a glimpse of Dao Seed information flashing on her chest.

“Supreme Clarity Talisman and Script?” Zhang Yu thought to himself. “Is this my sister’s Dao Seed?”