Chapter 142: One Step to Nascent Soul

And so, the tyrant of a generation, the master of Penglai, met his end in such a manner.

Everyone stood frozen, as if struck by a paralysis spell, staring blankly at the scene.

Gu Chang’an’s Adam’s apple bobbed with difficulty.

She looked at her junior sister, who was now patting her belly after a burp. Any lingering thought of ‘should I drag her back to the righteous path?’ dissipated like smoke.

Now, she only felt relief that, despicable as she herself had been, she had never considered refining Shen Zhaoqing into a pill. Otherwise, there might be more than just the Radiant Saint lying on the ground.

A sense of post-apocalyptic relief washed over her.

Ling Shuangjue’s reaction was far more direct. Her blood-red eyes no longer held any trace of anger. Instead, they burned with an almost obsessive, scorching possessiveness that threatened to melt everything in their path.

“As expected of her,” Ling Shuangjue thought. The idea of ‘tying her up and bringing her back to the Myriad Blood Flower Palace’ had not vanished; instead, it had become more steadfast than ever.

As for Luan Ge, she looked at Shen Zhaoqing.

She suddenly felt that the rescue mission that had nearly cost her life was totally worth it.

Shen Zhaoqing naturally felt the three gazes that seemed ready to devour her alive. She curled her lip, a sense of speechlessness flooding her heart.

‘Hey, hey, what kind of look is that?’

‘Can’t you tone it down a bit?’

Shen Zhaoqing let out a huge yawn, even squeezing out a tear of physiological fluid from the corner of her eye. Then, under everyone’s watchful eyes, she wobbled over to the potted welcoming pine, which had already turned verdant and lush, brimming with vitality.

She reached out a finger and gently poked its sturdy trunk.

“Hey, Brother Pine,” she asked weakly, “are you… sturdy?”

“It’s not too much to ask to lean on you for a nap, is it?”

The welcoming pine that she poked stiffened suddenly.

In an instant, its emerald needles seemed to bristle, and the entire potted plant exuded an air of terrified ‘Don’t come near me!’.

Unfortunately, Shen Zhaoqing was now so sleepy she was barely conscious, completely missing the micro-expressions of this dramatic pine tree.

She just felt that the aftereffects of the energy that had returned from the Longevity Tripod were too strong.

Now, everything she saw was double, and her mind was buzzing. Her only thought was to find something sturdy to lean on, then shut down and sleep.

But though she wanted to sleep, the meridians in her body disagreed.

That vast, azure-golden torrent, like the Milky Way reversed, did not obediently store itself as she had expected after pouring into her body.

Instead, this energy began a brutal, violent renovation in her nearly dried-up meridians!

Boom!

A dull, heavy explosion erupted in Shen Zhaoqing’s dantian sea of qi.

That layer of paper-thin Qi Condensation barrier didn’t last even a second. It was shattered without resistance by the azure-golden energy torrent.

There was no pain, not even the slightest obstruction.

Effortless, carefree, and utterly unreasonable.

The immense torrent of energy didn’t pause for a moment. It circulated and compressed wildly within her body. The originally gaseous spiritual power completed liquefaction within a millionth of a second, coalescing into a golden ocean.

Then, in the center of this ocean, a rapidly spinning vortex appeared!

Hum—

A perfectly round golden pill, branded with profound Dao patterns on its surface, abruptly took shape!

Golden Core stage!

Done!

“!” Not far away, a surviving Penglai elder’s eyes nearly popped out of their sockets.

He pointed at Shen Zhaoqing, his lips trembling, unable to speak clearly.

“One step to Golden Core?! With… without even a Heart Demon Tribulation? Is… is she human or ghost?!”

His exclamation was exactly what Gu Chang’an, Ling Shuangjue, and Luan Ge were thinking.

They were all favored children of heaven, each having endured countless hardships and teetered on the brink of life and death to barely succeed in forming their cores.

But this scene before them completely overturned their understanding.

It was extremely insulting!

However, this was just the beginning. That azure-golden torrent of energy seemed endless. After forging a perfect, impeccable ‘Great Dao Golden Core,’ it not only failed to weaken but grew even more violent.

“Crack…”

A faint sound came from within Shen Zhaoqing’s dantian.

That perfect golden core, enough to make any Golden Core cultivator envious to the point of cellular breakdown, cracked open.

Yes, less than three seconds after it was born, it cracked.

“Cr… cracked core?!”

Another Penglai disciple screamed, horror written all over his face. “She… she’s going into qi deviation!”

Gu Chang’an’s heart instantly leaped into her throat, and she subconsciously wanted to rush over.

But Ling Shuangjue grabbed her, her voice hoarse as she said, “No… look at her aura!”

Shen Zhaoqing’s aura, instead of becoming chaotic due to the ‘cracked core,’ rose at an even more terrifying rate.

The shattered golden core did not dissipate. Instead, from within the cracks, faint yet extremely pure spiritual light shone through.

Then, under everyone’s stunned gaze, a miniature figure, about three inches tall, exquisitely carved like jade, slowly emerged from the broken golden core.

The little figure’s features were an exact replica of Shen Zhaoqing.

It rubbed its sleepy eyes, let out a huge yawn, and then sat down cross-legged.

Nascent Soul!

Core shattered, Soul birthed!

“…”

The crowd fell into deathly silence once more.

This was cheating!

Ridiculously, this still wasn’t the end. That vast energy torrent, as if finding an outlet, crazily surged into the newly born Nascent Soul.

The infant Nascent Soul’s body visibly solidified, and its aura skyrocketed from early Nascent Soul.

Mid Nascent Soul!

Late Nascent Soul!

Peak Nascent Soul!

Finally, as the last wisp of azure-golden light was absorbed by the Nascent Soul, this earth-shattering energy storm slowly subsided.

Shen Zhaoqing’s cultivation base firmly settled at the peak of the Nascent Soul stage, only a single step away from the legendary Deity Transformation stage.

At the same time, her body, which had become withered and gaunt from depleted vitality, inflated like a balloon filled with air, rapidly becoming full and plump. Her originally pale skin regained a warm, jade-like luster.

Her ashen-gray long hair, starting from the roots, quickly returned to its ink-black, waterfall-like luster, and even more so than before, it held an indescribable nimbleness and shine.

She slowly straightened up from beside the potted pine, which was now too scared to move.

Around her, a faint azure-golden halo that had not yet fully dissipated surrounded her, casting her as a deity walking among mortals.

She did not deliberately release any pressure.

But a majesty, originating from the most primal and ancient source of life, instantly swept across the entire Sacrificial Altar.

Everyone present—whether Gu Chang’an in the Mortal realm, Ling Shuangjue in the Dao Fusion realm, or even Luan Ge with her ancient royal bloodline—felt a palpitation from the very depths of their souls at this moment.

It was an absolute suppression at the level of life itself.

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