Chapter 331: Li Dao Ye

Gulp!

Like a stone falling into a deep well, Li Yuan swallowed his saliva and gulped down the various pills at once.

Inside the room, blue-black light blazed fiercely; Li Yuan was drenched in sweat, waves of numbness and stinging pain surged over him again and again, each stronger than the last, making his gaze grow hazy.

If reaching the Thirteen Great Dragon Forms was a threshold, then Yi Bai Xing was another threshold of transformation—far surpassing all intermediate form changes.

Li Yuan was Breathing heavily, feeling as if a furnace burned inside him, ready at any moment to melt and vaporize him completely.

"Too painful!"

Li Dao Ye groaned through clenched teeth, his temples throbbing violently, as if his boiling blood would burst forth from every vein in his body any second.

But fortunately, he had prepared beforehand—he swallowed one after another of the Cun Shen Xiao Fa Huan Dan, along with several Zeng Qi and Yu Shen Ling Dan, suppressing the churning, boiling blood and Qi.

"Huh!"

"Hss!"

He forcibly regulated his breathing, forcing himself through the Zhuang Gong to digest the searing heat and numbness throughout his body.

"Ten Thousand Blades Spirit Dragon!"

Li Yuan shifted his mind's focus, visualizing the Spirit Dragon pierced through by ten thousand blades.

His crimson skin membrane was instantly slashed by countless swords and knives, covered in patterns resembling dragon scales.

At this moment, Li Dao Ye's endurance became clear—even under such intense agony, his movements remained steady, perfectly precise and fluid.

He forcibly suppressed the boiling blood and runaway Qi beneath his skin membrane.

Creak—creak—creak~

At this point, Li Yuan did not cling to Hun Tian Zhuang; he unleashed every Zhuang Gong he had learned—Bing Ti Shi, Long Chan Zhuang, and others—his tendons and bones grinding together in a chorus of sounds.

Later, the grinding of his joints sounded like Jin Yu ringing out—ding-ding-dang-dang.

"This level of transformation is far greater than I anticipated!"

Qi surged like a pillar, shooting over thirty meters high, like a waterfall flowing upward, radiating light that spread and enveloped the entire small courtyard.

"This…"

Ba Wan Li, still half-asleep, stood dumbfounded, forcibly dragged out of the courtyard by Fang Fang Bao Luo.

In the night sky, lightning flashed, and now and then came the rumble of thunder.

"This is Thunder Dragon Qi!"

Fang Fang Bao Luo finally recognized it—his eyes filled with disbelief. He knew this scene well; it was unmistakably the sign of Yi Bai Xing reaching Great Perfection.

"This is Qi?!"

Ba Wan Li was stunned—he had thought Li Yuan was fiddling with some rare treasure inside the room!

Watching the light that engulfed the entire courtyard, surging like tides and waves, he simply could not believe this was Li Yuan's Qi.

No matter how extraordinary a genius he was, he had only recently opened his meridians.

"Liiii!"

Suddenly, a monkey's howl exploded.

The two turned toward the sound—a long-armed monkey leapt from within the light, and once it escaped the Qi's embrace, it scattered; when it plunged back into the Qi tide, it had transformed into a giant blue carp!

"Is this Qi transformation into form?"

Fang Fang Bao Luo felt his mouth go dry—he had barely mastered the secret of internal Qi transformation into form while traveling on a boat, and he knew it would take at least ten years of grueling practice to achieve the same fluency as Su Su Wanxiong.

After arriving at Longhu Temple, though he had been awed by Li Yuan's reputation, he never imagined that in just one year, Li Yuan had advanced to this degree.

"Younger brother, you're incredible—this Qi transformation into form is so lifelike?!"

Ba Wan Li's focus was different—he stared fixedly at the giant blue carp, watching it swim, sometimes flicking its tail to become another black fish, sometimes rolling over to become a white-backed old turtle…

In a short time, it had transformed into over ten different forms.

"More than a dozen Great Perfection-level Wu Gong—and with Spirit Forms inside!"

Fang Fang Bao Luo murmured to himself.

After the water's myriad forms shifted, a red-eyed Spirit Fish leapt from the surface, and with a single motion, transformed into a small green snake.

Plop!

The green snake whipped its tail, striking the "water," and when it raised its head again, it had become a python…

Green snake, python, Spirit snake, Bai Yuan, Spirit ape, Azure Eagle, Spirit eagle, Yao eagle, Yan eagle, fierce tiger, wild lion, Spirit wolf…

Under the two men's gaze, within the Qi waterfall surging from the heavens, one form transformed into another, until finally, a Spirit Bear pounded its chest—

then spun, transforming into a long-handle Handle-heavy hammer!

"Bing Dao Dou Sha Chui!"

Ba Wan Li blurted it out—his face had shifted from earlier delight to sheer horror.

He had also opened his meridians—he knew perfectly well what this scene meant.

These dozens of Qi-formed shapes directly corresponded to the Wu Gong Li Yuan cultivated—dozens of them, all at Great Perfection level!

Is this even human?!

The two exchanged glances, each seeing the horror in the other's eyes.

"Roar!"

After the myriad weapon forms crisscrossed and danced in the air, they merged into a Spirit Dragon pierced through by ten thousand weapons; the Spirit Dragon roared and surged upward.

Crack!

The next instant, it was swallowed whole by a furious blue-black Thunder Dragon!

"Aaang!"

The Thunder Dragon roared, soaring through the sky.

Fang Fang Bao Luo instinctively stepped back several paces, only then realizing he had stopped—his shock had numbed him almost to paralysis.

If the form shaped from true Qi earlier could already be called vivid and lifelike, the thunder dragon leaping forth from the true Qi at this moment was already as if it were real.

Scales, claws and fangs, dragon whiskers, dragon eyes, dragon horns…

"Roar—"

Inside Longhu Longhu Dandan, hearing the dragon's cry that came from the light screen, Brother Helian Feng's eyelids twitched wildly; he nearly thought he had miscounted:

"This… has it reached a hundred forms?"

"One hundred and two forms."

Long Long Yingchan suddenly flicked a finger, and at once a layer of dark clouds covered the light screen before his eyes.

Whoo!

Beneath Huntian Peak, the night wind suddenly rose.

Fang Fang Bao Luo started in shock, discovering that he did not know when a gale had sprung up around them; the wind drove the clouds, shrouding an area of several li nearby, like a great dome of cloud Qi.

"Where did this wind come from…"

Ba Ba Wanli rubbed the sand from his eyes, then suddenly started in shock—before him, a venerable monk wearing a kasaya had somehow appeared.

The old monk had his back to the two of them, so his face could not be seen; all that could be seen were his long brows, surely two chi in length, swaying up and down in the wind.

"You…"

Ba Ba Wanli almost reached out to push him, but Fang Fang Bao Luo lunged and pinned him to the ground, his heart nearly stopping:

"Junior, junior Fang Fang Bao Luo, pays respects, pays respects to the Dragon Dao Master!"

The Dragon… Dragon Dao Master?!

Ba Ba Wanli, pinned to the ground, was about to flare up, but at this moment he felt a sudden chill in his heart and hurriedly followed suit in paying respects.

"It is late; the two young friends should go rest sooner rather than later."

Long Long Yingchan did not turn his head. With a casual remark, Fang Fang Bao Luo was already hurriedly dragging Ba Ba Wanli away, not daring to look back.

He felt he had underestimated Li Yuan's standing within Longhu Temple; this Dao Master had very likely been secretly watching Li Yuan all along—otherwise he could not have arrived so quickly.

"He does have some alertness. Hmm, making an inner disciple of him should be fine; that big fellow's talent is also not bad…"

Glancing sideways, Long Long Yingchan no longer paid it any mind. His gaze fell upon the thunder dragon roaming the air, and within his eyes surged a light of surprise and joy.

"Not yet having refined the viscera, yet he has already comprehended the divine soul leaving the body… this boy, perhaps truly can…"

Softly sighing in admiration, Long Long Yingchan pinched his long brows, as if pondering something. After a moment, he seemed to have reached a decision within his heart; without any visible movement, he had already vanished from the spot:

"Clean things up and come to Longhu Longhu Dandan!"

Only the clouds and mist, stirred by the wind, shrouded the small courtyard, sealed tight without a gap.

Inside the room, Li Yuan sat cross-legged with his eyes closed.

Yet he could clearly perceive Zhi Dao Wai Fa Jie—not a vague sensing, but a true 'seeing.'

Using true Qi as a medium, his spirit-self wandered within the tide of true Qi, and with the movement of his thoughts took form, attaching itself to it, thereby observing the outside world.

It was an extremely strange sensation.

As his form changed, he even had the illusion that he had mastered the transformation arts of legends from his past life—from ape to fish, from turtle to snake, and then to flood dragon,

and could even transform into a blade; in the end, he became a thunder dragon soaring through the night sky thirty meters high.

"Divine soul leaving the body, true Qi taking form… this is simply like the 'spirit travel' of legends from my past life? Truly beyond words."

This feeling, as if he had stepped into a myth, left Li Yuan somewhat unable to stop; only after a long while, when his spirit could no longer bear the fatigue of the divine soul leaving the body, did he open his eyes.

He heard only a 'hum' as the true Qi that had scattered outward reversed like a returning tide, pouring back into his body. Accompanied by crackling and popping sounds, Li Yuan slowly rose to his feet.

"Finally gathered a hundred forms, earlier than estimated."

Standing inside the room, Li Yuan's heart surged with an inexpressible joy, a sense of achievement at having finally reached a goal he had set years ago.

When he first learned of the hundred forms from Han Han Chuijun, he had harbored a wild ambition. Relying on the Weapon Master Register, he changed forms again and again—from an initial estimate of twenty years to alter a hundred forms, to seven or eight years later,

and now to the present.

"Old Han reached a hundred forms at ninety-six; I'm only Dong Dong Ershisan now!"

Feeling the explosive power churning within his body, Li Yuan felt a faint sense of satisfaction, and beyond that, anticipation.

With the hundred forms gathered, the ultimate art that Old Han had roughed out, he had already cultivated to Great Completion—even more complete than Old Han back then, and also stronger.

At a thought, the increasingly agile true Qi in the blink of an eye surged forth from Li Yuan's fingertip, and swiftly transformed into a tiny thunder dragon, circling around his little finger.

Thanks to his comprehension of the Rift Sea Mysterious Whale Diagram, his control over true Qi had become extremely fine and subtle, comparable to a veteran marrow-refining expert.

After all, a martial artist's true Qi is limited—how could they possibly squander it in practice as he did within the Mysterious Whale Mi Jing?

"Ten Thousand Blades Spirit Dragon, Long Hu Hun Tian—my thunder dragon has actually incorporated two ultimate arts. Once the Long Chan Diamond Sutra reaches Great Completion, that will be three ultimate arts merged into one body, and there's also Long Xiang Heliu…"

Toying with the little thunder dragon on his fingertip, Li Yuan felt quite a sense of triumph:

"Now, I finally have the right to say I've thoroughly surpassed Old Han… In just two short years, Old Han at most refined his viscera, right?"

"Next time we meet, I have to give Old Han a surprise."

Li Yuan stretched his sinews and bones; once the searing pain had passed, he felt a wonderful sense of clarity throughout his entire body.

He sensed carefully and discovered that after the hundred forms were gathered, the sinews and bones within his body seemed to have undergone a transformation as well—especially his bones, which even showed hints of a jade-like hue.

The thirty-six qi meridians running through his body also seemed to have grown wider.

"The dantian has expanded by half, and the acupoints beneath my feet are also a circle larger… no wonder they all say that form-changing pushes the limits of the human body higher; this is an all-around transformation."

Li Yuan was very satisfied.

With the dantian expanded by half, the true Qi it could hold greatly increased—burst power, endurance, and even the speed of later viscera refining and marrow refining to exchange blood would all greatly increase.

"Feels great!"

Li Yuan stripped off his sweat-soaked clothes, walked into the courtyard, lifted a bucket of water and poured it over his head, then shook his body, scattering the water droplets.

"The old monk really has been secretly spying on me."

Glancing at the empty room next door, Li Yuan's thoughts were subtle. His divine soul had just left his body moments ago; he had seen Long Long Yingchan drive Ba Ba Wanli and the other away, and had also heard the words the man left when departing.

"Hah!"

Li Yuan was not in a hurry to go; he took a bath, heated up the remaining spirit rice from the day, ate and drank his fill, and only then, as the sky began to lighten, walked toward the Dragon-Tiger Tower.

【Dragon List First, Li Yuan, Great Perfection of Unblocking the Meridians】

Beneath the Dragon Stele at the foot of the mountain path, Long Long Yingchan stood with his hands behind his back; although he had expected it somewhat, he was still quite shocked:

"The gap between a peerless talent and an eternal talent might be even greater than I imagined. That Wan Wan Zhuliu..."

Having witnessed Li Yuan's rapid progress with his own eyes over these few months, he suddenly felt that Wan Wan Zhuliu, who had been in seclusion for forty years, was likely even more terrifying than he had anticipated.

"The disparity of the world."

Long Long Yingchan sighed softly, tapped the Dragon Stele with his finger, and Li Yuan's name flashed before dropping back to second place.

"Unblocking the meridians to suppress the blood transformation is too conspicuous."

Muttering to himself, Long Long Yingchan returned to the Dragon-Tiger Tower.

On the sixteenth floor, Brother Helian Feng paced back and forth; above the light screen formed by his life-nourishing true qi, a fierce thunder dragon roamed the night sky.

"Senior brother, I..."

"Stop!"

Long Long Yingchan glared at him, having no desire to deal with him at all; he flicked his finger, and the light screen now reflected the scene of Li Yuan stepping through the door.

"Senior brother, I..."

Swish!

Brother Helian Feng still wanted to say something, but Long Long Yingchan had already swept his sleeve and departed; in the next instant, having avoided Brother Helian Feng, he appeared inside the tower.

"An eternal talent..."

Looking at the arena made of yellow mud before him, Long Long Yingchan thought for a moment, and a wisp of cloud qi flowed from his fingertips, first transforming into a miniature azure dragon.

After a turn, it became a dull little Monk with a slightly dark complexion and a pair of long eyebrows, who was precisely his younger self.

"How great the gap truly is, one must try it personally."

Long Long Yingchan murmured to himself, then, as if sensing something, vanished; the dull little Monk slowly raised his head, his eyes becoming lively as he looked at the tower door slowly opening.

The familiar humming sound rang in his ears.

"Enter once, and one must fight again?"

Thinking this over, Li Yuan did not care much; having gathered the Hundred Forms Thunder Dragon, he also wanted to find someone to test his skills.

The clouds and mist dispersed.

"Eh?"

Li Yuan raised an eyebrow:

"Such long eyebrows; could this be the Daoist Master Long?"