Chapter 456

Song Qingming, who was forming his core, could not see the heaven and earth phenomena happening outside, but he was clear about it in his heart.

Regardless of whether a cultivator can eventually succeed in forming a core, as long as they reach this step of condensing a Golden Core, it will trigger heaven and earth phenomena. It's just that once a cultivator fails to condense a Golden Core, the heaven and earth phenomena will not last long and will slowly dissipate.

Only when a cultivator succeeds in condensing a Golden Core, like Song Qingming now, will the heaven and earth phenomena continue until Song Qingming successfully breaks through to the Golden Core realm, at which point the heaven and earth phenomena outside will dissipate on their own.

After successfully condensing the Golden Core, Song Qingming only felt that this Golden Core in his body was like a fierce beast that had been hungry for a long time and had been released from a cage, constantly devouring the surrounding heaven and earth spiritual energy in large gulps.

The crazy influx of surrounding spiritual energy into his body also made all the meridians in Song Qingming's entire physical body swell with pain. Seeing this, Song Qingming immediately raised his hand and held the "Red Essence Jade Stone" that had already been placed on the side in his hand.

As a stream of cool earth vein spiritual energy from the "Red Essence Jade Stone" flowed into the Golden Core in Song Qingming's body, the Golden Core in his body obviously became brighter, and the speed at which the surrounding heaven and earth spiritual energy rushed in also slowed down slowly.

Just when condensing the Golden Core, the magic power in Song Qingming's body had already been consumed by more than half. Before he could fully recover, he was scared to death by the heaven and earth spiritual energy rushing into his body crazily. Fortunately, he had also made preparations before this. With the help of the "Red Essence Jade Stone," Song Qingming finally eased up and hurriedly seized the time to adjust his state.

This stream of earth vein spiritual energy in the "Red Essence Jade Stone" can help a cultivator quickly temper the Golden Core in their body during Core Formation. After inhaling this special spiritual energy, the Golden Core in Song Qingming's body became more and more solid.

The newly condensed Golden Core was still very fragile, and facing too much spiritual energy rushing into the body all at once, it could easily be washed away. Song Qingming, who had gotten a breather, hurriedly swallowed another drop of Millennium Spirit Milk to quickly restore the magic power in his body, trying to keep himself in a relatively good state.

This continued for nearly a month. It wasn't until he had absorbed enough heaven and earth spiritual energy that the Golden Core in Song Qingming's body slowly stabilized and stopped devouring the surrounding heaven and earth spiritual energy.

Next, Song Qingming reached the final step of Core Formation: tempering the Golden Core.

This step of tempering the Golden Core is not difficult, nor does it take a long time. It only requires the cultivator to stabilize their mind and move their own Golden Core out of the body to accept the tempering of heaven and earth spiritual energy for a few days, and they can successfully break through to the Golden Core realm.

After a cultivator breaking through to the Golden Core reaches this step, as long as there is no external influence, they basically will not fail. At this moment, Song Qingming already had more than 90% confidence in his breakthrough to the Golden Core realm this time, and a confident smile appeared on his face.

Just as Song Qingming moved the Golden Core in his body out of his body, the spiritual energy in the entire cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool also rapidly gathered toward the location of his Golden Core. Not only that, at this moment, even the white clouds and mist gathered above the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool also surged violently.

On a high mountain dozens of miles away from the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool, Monster King Qingluan, with a displeased face, was also confronting a one-horned giant bull that had just arrived here.

"Stinky water buffalo, this is my territory, don't you hurry up and get out of here!"

Hearing Qingluan's angry scolding, the one-horned bull monster did not retreat. Instead, its eyes turned toward the heaven and earth phenomena happening not far away, seemingly somewhat suspicious that some treasure had appeared there, and wanted to go over to see what was going on.

Ever since Song Qingming reached this step of core condensation, because of the heaven and earth phenomena produced by Core Formation, not only did it attract many low-grade monster beasts near the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool, but it also quickly alarmed the high-grade monster kings nearby.

During this month or so, besides this one-horned bull monster, Qingluan, who was guarding the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool, had already sent away two Tier 3 monster kings who came to make trouble.

The two Tier 3 monster kings who came earlier only had strength at the early stage of Golden Core, and Qingluan defeated them without much effort. Only this one-horned bull monster, because it had already advanced to the mid-stage of Golden Core, had some extraordinary strength, and after a few days of confrontation, it had already made Qingluan suffer quite a bit.

Qingluan's cultivation base was also only at the early stage of Golden Core, but because of following Fire Phoenix, her strength was still a bit stronger than ordinary monster kings of the same rank. But the one-horned bull monster in front of her was not only a monster king who had advanced to the mid-stage of Golden Core for many years, but it was also a water-attribute monster beast, and its divine abilities somewhat restrained the fire-attribute Qingluan. Both its cultivation base and strength were stronger than Qingluan's.

Seeing that this one-horned bull monster still wouldn't give up and changed direction to fly toward the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool, Qingluan had no choice but to flap her wings again to chase it and intercept it.

"You stupid bull, since you are so disobedient, don't blame me for being impolite!" After Qingluan finished speaking, she spat out a red fan from her mouth and used magic power to control the fan to fan toward the one-horned bull monster.

Soon, a violent gust of wind attacked, fanning the one-horned bull monster in mid-air directly out more than a hundred zhang, almost falling to the ground.

The fan used by Qingluan was precisely a treasure bestowed upon her by Fire Phoenix. Usually, in order not to reveal her identity and attract the attention of other high-grade monster kings, Qingluan would not take it out easily. Today, encountering this one-horned bull monster, she truly met a difficult opponent, so she had no choice but to use the last trump card she had.

The one-horned bull monster, caught off guard by this blow, also got angry and soon flew into the air with red eyes to tangle with Qingluan again.

Not far from where Qingluan and the one-horned bull monster were fighting, Fire Phoenix and Long Feng were also watching them quietly.

"Your Highness, I fear Qingluan is no match for that one-horned bull. Why don't I go and drive it away!"

Fire Phoenix, dressed in red, looked ahead and shook her head gently: "No hurry. Qingluan has had too much of a temper over the years, and her nature is becoming wilder and wilder. It's time to let her suffer a bit."

"Don't worry, although Qingluan can't beat it, she won't be defeated for a while. This one-horned bull can just happen to temper her. You stay here and watch, and when the timing is right, you can go over."

After Fire Phoenix finished speaking, she let Long Feng stay behind, while she herself turned and disappeared from where she was. Before long, she appeared again in the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool where Song Qingming was.

After scanning this cave dwelling, Fire Phoenix came to the stone door where Song Qingming was in closed-door cultivation. Standing at the entrance, she closed her eyes to sense the situation inside and revealed a faint smile.

"To think you could actually find such a good place to break through to Core Formation. Sure enough, I really underestimated you." After muttering to herself, Fire Phoenix left the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool quietly again, not knowing where she went.

Three days later, the clouds and mist that were still surging above the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool suddenly started to dissipate slowly. Subsequently, a dazzling rainbow slowly appeared in the sky.

As the heaven and earth phenomena slowly disappeared, the area around the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool, which had been lively for more than a month, gradually began to calm down, and the spiritual energy between heaven and earth also slowly returned to a normal state.

In the cave dwelling of closed-door cultivation, with the successful completion of the step of tempering the Golden Core, after Song Qingming successfully retrieved the Golden Core from the outside back into his body, his entire aura changed accordingly, and he had already successfully stepped into the Golden Core realm.

However, Song Qingming, who had reached this step, although he had successfully broken through to the Golden Core realm, still needed to spend quite a bit of time to stabilize his own cultivation base to prevent his cultivation base from falling back to the Foundation Establishment realm due to a moment of carelessness.

Two years later, as the door of the cave dwelling for closed-door cultivation opened gently, Song Qingming, who had successfully stabilized his cultivation base, finally walked out slowly from inside.

Just after walking out of the cave dwelling, Song Qingming scanned his surroundings and immediately saw a tall figure staring at him. He hurriedly stepped forward, bowed with a smile, and said: "Junior greets Senior Long Feng. Thank you for guarding me during this period, Senior."

Long Feng nodded and smiled softly: "Good kid, you really didn't let Her Highness down, and it wasn't in vain that Qingluan and I guarded you here for so long."

"Senior, where did Senior Qingluan go? Junior wants to go and thank her in person!" When Song Qingming was in closed-door cultivation before, the one he asked Fire Phoenix to guard this cave dwelling was clearly Qingluan. He didn't know when Long Feng had arrived here.

Hearing Song Qingming mention Qingluan, Long Feng replied directly: "Qingluan has long since returned to Her Highness's place. If you want to thank her, just go there directly. She did indeed contribute quite a bit to help guard you this time, and she even had a big battle with other monster kings. You really must thank her well!"

"However, you also know her temper. I advise you to think it over before you go. Don't just go and thank her with your mouth, lest she find you unpleasant again."

"Senior is right. After I go back, I will definitely prepare well before going to find Senior Qingluan." Facing Long Feng's well-intentioned reminder, Song Qingming hurriedly nodded with a smile.

"This item was left here by Her Highness, who instructed me to hand it to you directly after you break through to the Golden Core. Her Highness said that this item was originally deposited with her by you. Feel free to take it!" After Long Feng finished speaking, he took out a cyan jade pendant from his body and threw it directly into Song Qingming's hand.

Seeing the somewhat familiar jade pendant in front of him, Song Qingming immediately recognized it. This item was the space magic tool he had obtained after killing Xiao Huang years ago.

"Alright! Now that you have successfully formed your core, my mission has been completed, and it is time to go back and report to Her Highness." After handing this jade pendant to Song Qingming, Long Feng directly bade farewell and prepared to leave this place.

Seeing this, Song Qingming stepped forward and bowed: "If it weren't for Her Highness's support, I would certainly have had a hard time achieving anything in this Core Formation. After you go back and see Her Highness, please convey my greetings on my behalf."

After seeing Long Feng off, Song Qingming did not rush to leave the cave dwelling at the bottom of the pool. Instead, he hurriedly and joyfully took the cyan jade pendant that Long Feng had just given him into his hand.

The reason this item fell into Fire Phoenix's hands years ago was precisely because Song Qingming's cultivation base was not enough to use this space magic tool at the time. Now that he had broken through to the Golden Core realm, he could naturally use this item as he wished.

As Song Qingming's spiritual sense slowly probed into the jade pendant, his originally excited expression gradually became disappointed.

"Damn! Where are the things inside?"

One million words, the protagonist has finally broken through to the Golden Core realm.

Here, I also wish Fellow Daoist Pan Long Teng Kong a speedy recovery, and thank you all for your company and support along the way.