Chapter 131: Breaking the Realm, Acquired Perfection

Chen Mo cautiously guided his own Inner Qi, allowing it to arrive at the Mysterious Aperture simultaneously with his divine sense.

The Mysterious Aperture is where a person's essence and Qi reside; for the human body, the three treasures of essence, Qi, and spirit are all indispensable.

Lacking any one of them, a person's life is like a candle in the Wind, flickering and liable to be extinguished.

With divine sense and Inner Qi returned to one place, Chen Mo guided the two to combine with his essence and Qi.

Essence and Qi can also be called a person's physical Blood Qi; Chen Mo's physical strength, manifested within the Mysterious Aperture, is an extremely vigorous and flourishing essence and Qi.

The three treasures of essence, Qi, and spirit unite here, and using this place as a point to drive the whole body, the breakthrough is considered finished.

Chen Mo is currently performing this step, scattering the thousands of thoughts that originally resided in his Shenhai, and merging his essence and Qi with his Inner Qi into one.

This is an extremely dangerous matter, no less than walking a tightrope at a great height; one wrong step and he will fall.

Chen Mo's cultivation foundation is solid enough that it would not matter if he fell a few times; he could recover well after resting for a period.

But for a Martial Artist whose foundation is not strong enough, a single failed breakthrough would require at least half a year or a year of rest, and failing a few more times would fundamentally damage their essence, Qi, and spirit.

At that point, unless one has heaven and earth spiritual objects with special effects to nourish the essence, Qi, and spirit, it would be extremely difficult to break through for the rest of their life.

Chen Mo does not worry about these things; he has already realized the fetal breathing state in advance.

One must reach the Acquired Perfection realm to have a chance to comprehend the fetal breathing state.

Even among Martial Artists at Acquired Perfection, this state is not something everyone can reach.

Chen Mo's physical body is formidable and produces wonders on its own, which is why he was able to reach this step early; for other Martial Artists, this is absolutely impossible.

The divine sense spread out within the Mysterious Aperture, and that wisp of Inner Qi likewise spread out, beginning to merge with the Mysterious Aperture.

Essence merges with Qi, Qi merges with spirit, and spirit merges with intent.

The three treasures of essence, Qi, and spirit, under the guidance of Chen Mo's intent, began to gradually merge into one.

This is an extremely dangerous and slow process; if even one step is taken incorrectly in the middle, this breakthrough will fail.

Chen Mo was not overly tense; he considered defeat before considering victory.

Long before the breakthrough, he had considered the result of failure and was fully able to accept it, so he was very relaxed now.

However, he was not careless because of this, still keeping his mind focused and carefully completing this step.

I do not know how much time passed, but Chen Mo's divine sense and Inner Qi finally completely merged into the Mysterious Aperture, and his Inner Qi and physical essence and Qi became one.

The path of breakthrough could finally be considered to have taken its first step.

Driven by his physical essence and Qi, the Inner Qi in Chen Mo's dantian and meridians was undergoing a new round of Mortal Transformation.

With the three treasures of essence, Qi, and spirit united, a Martial Artist's Inner Qi at this realm is no longer pure Inner Qi, but is evolving toward the True Qi of an Innate Martial Artist.

Once the Inner Qi completely transforms into True Qi, the Martial Artist is considered to have arrived at the Innate realm from the Postnatal realm.

What is called True Qi? Remove the dross and keep the essence, refine the false into the true, and one can obtain True Qi.

For a Martial Artist to return from Postnatal to Innate, it can be said that they must undergo a great transformation from the inside out for their Inner Qi to sublimate into True Qi.

This is no longer a process of condensation, but a process of sublimation.

If the power of an Acquired Martial Artist's Inner Qi is one, then after sublimation, the power should be five.

Therefore, the more condensed a Martial Artist's Inner Qi is in the Postnatal realm, the more their strength will relatively increase upon entering the Innate realm.

Of course, this increase does not lack an upper limit, but the vast majority of people cannot reach this limit; only those top-tier geniuses have a chance to do so.

But for Chen Mo, reaching this limit should not be a difficult task.

With the three treasures of essence, Qi, and spirit in harmony, Chen Mo's Inner Qi began to show signs of sublimating toward True Qi.

His Inner Qi, which was originally condensed to the extreme and flowed with cyan radiance, now showed faint dragon-shaped patterns appearing amidst the cyan radiance when circulated, and it even seemed to emit the sound of a dragon's roar.

Chen Mo's current Inner Qi is as condensed as eastern green wood and moves like a swimming dragon.

Although it is only an initial sublimation, its quality has further condensed, becoming increasingly thick and solid, and its quantity is far greater than before.

Most importantly, its power has increased; Chen Mo can perceive that, while still releasing Inner Qi to injure enemies, the Inner Qi he releases now is far more formidable than before.

Even if it is only initially sublimated Inner Qi, it holds a great advantage when facing other Acquired Martial Artists.

The condensation Chen Mo performed before was, in the final analysis, all about increasing quality, not changing the foundation.

Only the sublimation of Inner Qi is a change in its essence in the true sense.

It is just that his current Inner Qi is only initially sublimated, and there is still a very long way to go before truly breaking through to the Innate realm.

Chen Mo does not feel that he can make a breakthrough immediately; compared to his physical body, his Inner Qi strength is still slightly inferior.

It is just that he does not know if his physical Blood Qi combined with this initially sublimated Inner Qi can fight an Innate Martial Artist.

As for Golden Core cultivators?

That is a bit too hard to estimate; their methods are strange, and the various Secret Techniques and Talismans they can use are endless.

A fully armed Golden Core cultivator from a top force is slightly stronger than a Martial Artist of the same realm.

Because they have more Talismans and magical treasures, and even Arrays that can be used to fight enemies and protect themselves.

But it is hard to say who would win in a real fight; Innate Martial Artists are better at close-quarters combat, and once they have a chance to get close to a Golden Core cultivator, life and death can be decided in an instant.

And if they are those Golden Core cultivators who do not come from top forces and lack many Secret Techniques, appearing somewhat impoverished, then their true strength is not much different from an Innate Martial Artist of the same realm, and may even be slightly inferior.

Because Golden Core cultivators have a difficult-to-solve drawback, which is that they cannot move freely in the outside world.

Short-term fighting is fine, but if the battle lasts too long, the Golden Core cultivator must first consider how to leave afterward.

Especially those Golden Core cultivators who must use Secret Techniques to move outside are at an even greater disadvantage when fighting in the outside world.

Once they cannot maintain their own Secret Technique, they do not need anyone to attack them; they will be swallowed by the Mirage Sea first.

But if they make preparations in advance and use the power of mountains, rivers, terrain, and Arrays, the role a Golden Core cultivator can play can be said to be quite large, and one could even say that one man can hold the pass against ten thousand.

In general, Golden Core cultivators are good at defense, while Innate Martial Artists are good at offense.

With Chen Mo's current strength, if he is given a chance to get close, then he also has a chance to kill a Golden Core cultivator.

He did not dwell too much on these problems; before entering the Innate realm, Chen Mo would not easily fight an Innate Martial Artist, as that carries a certain risk.

If it truly cannot be avoided, then he can only try and see whether the Innate Martial Artist is stronger or he himself is stronger.

However, even if someone at the Innate Realm wanted to intercept and kill him, they would never dare to make a move in the Capital City.

The Capital City's Array and the Dragon Qi of the national destiny would suppress the opponent, not to mention that there are many experts guarding the interior of the Capital City.

Making a move here has a low success rate and carries extreme risk.

If they really wanted to make a move, they would definitely wait until he was far away from the Capital City for it to be possible.

He slowly exhaled a breath of stale air, ending this period of closed-door cultivation.

Chen Mo took out the Blood Essence Stone from his Storage Bag, and along with it, he also took out a Bright Silver Long Spear.

Under his control, the long spear turned back into a mass of flowing silver-white liquid, beginning to devour the Blood Essence Stone to strengthen itself.

Devouring one Blood Essence Stone could increase the weight of this weapon by about a hundred catties.

Chen Mo controlled it throughout the process, letting it devour four Blood Essence Stones in succession, and the weight of the weapon reached over seven hundred and fifty catties.

With his current strength, it was handy to use; of course, this was without using Inner Qi for reinforcement. Once Inner Qi was used for reinforcement, it might feel slightly light, but it was still sufficient.

However, after this devouring was finished, Chen Mo could vaguely perceive the limit of this weapon, which was at most around a thousand catties.

After experiencing one more Mortal Transformation, he would have to consider the matter of replacing the weapon.

In addition, Chen Mo had once heard Ma Jianxin say that some weapons could conduct Inner Qi or True Qi, but such weapons were extremely precious and not easily seen.

With his current status, it was indeed difficult to obtain one. Once he performed a great service and the Imperial Court bestowed rewards, he might have a chance to acquire one.

After upgrading the weapon, Chen Mo pondered for a moment and still shaped it into a long spear.

The main reason was that there was only one such weapon, so it could not be turned into a pair of Giant Hammers.

If he only used one, it would not be as handy as using a long spear.

It was just that this way, he would have to find a way to find a pair of hammers with sufficient weight later.

Otherwise, just using the ones on hand would be fine for dealing with ordinary Post-Heaven Martial Artists, but for fighting against Acquired Perfection Martial Artists, they would be a bit too light and not sturdy enough.

Putting the weapon away, Chen Mo stood up and pushed open the door of the training room; this closed-door cultivation was finally completely over.

The training room he practiced in was the back wing of the small courtyard, a specially cleared-out area.

Pushing open the training room led directly to the martial arts arena, where various weapons were placed; the iron hammers Chen Mo had previously ordered to be forged were now also placed in a corner of the courtyard.

Walking out to the backyard, one could see many maids and servants busy moving about.

These people were all hired with the help of Sun Ji and were not worth trusting too much, but there was no problem with them attending to daily food and lodging.

"Master." The servants and maids passing by, upon seeing Chen Mo, hurriedly stopped their work and bowed in salute.

"Help me prepare water to wash up, and also, where is the Madam?" Chen Mo said in a deep voice.

"Replying to Master, the Madam is in the side room of the front courtyard," a head maid said.

Chen Mo immediately walked toward the front courtyard, but upon arriving in the side room, he did not see Zhao Yu's figure.

He was not surprised by this at all, because on the offering table to the side, the Mysterious Ice Bead was placed, and three sticks of incense had been lit.

Without needing to think much, one could guess that Zhao Yu was definitely inside the Wei Xia Ghost Domain right now.

Chen Mo had no intention of entering the Wei Xia Ghost Domain now; it was not appropriate for him to rashly listen to the private talk of a lady's boudoir.

He turned and walked into his study, where several military books and Policy Essays were already laid out on the desk.

The Metropolitan Examination, unlike the previous Martial Cultivated Talent examination, had Policy Essay topics that remained undecided until now.

At that time, many examiners would set questions simultaneously, and then they would be drawn randomly, so before the examination began, no one knew exactly what would be tested.

Therefore, Chen Mo still needed to study strategies more; as long as the answers he wrote were not too poor, it would be enough.

"You've finished your seclusion!" After reading the military books for about a quarter of an hour, a voice with a hint of joy suddenly rang out.

Chen Mo smiled and put down the military book; Zhao Yu had already arrived at the door.

"How long did my seclusion take this time?" he asked with a laugh.

"Five days; today is already the twenty-third of the fourth month." Zhao Yu remembered this very clearly because she knew Chen Mo was going to participate in the Imperial Court Metropolitan Examination on the eighth of the fifth month.

Chen Mo nodded slightly; looking at it this way, there were not many days left, but he was not nervous about it.

Unless an Innate Expert came to participate in this Imperial Court Metropolitan Examination, with his strength, he was only likely to win first place.

…………

Half a month passed in the blink of an eye.

The Metropolitan Examination was divided into five days, and the subjects tested were not much different from the Prefecture Examination; Chen Mo took the top spot and earned the title of Metropolitan Graduate.

Two days later, he entered the Palace Examination together with other scholars who had also passed the Metropolitan Examination to be tested again.

(End of this chapter)