*6 days later...*
Near the barrier to enter the core region, a portal was suddenly opened.
“Bastard! Where do you think you're going?! GET HIM!!”
Swoosh!!
A figure leaped out of the portal, followed by mad cackle that sounded like a low-budget movie villain.
“HAHAHA!!!”
“You guys are the bastards! And thanks for that sacred ore, see you guys some other time!!”
After rushing out of the portal, the figure turned and exaggeratedly waved his hand high in the air at the stone golems inside the portals.
Seeing this, the stone golems all felt a burning hatred for this person burst from their life cores.
“You damn fiend Li Shen!! If you ever come back in here you’re dead!!”
The figure who turned out to be Li Shen waved his hand dismissively as the portal shrunk.
"Bah! What can you lot do, and who would come back in that hell hole?”
But after saying that, Li Shen looked at them with a smile before hurriedly saying.
“Hey, Golem 1, tell the tree guardian in the west region I said thanks for everything, would you?”
The golem that was at the front of the group snorted at Li Shen's request, but only responded.
“I told you that’s not my name! It’s *Insert incomprehensible name with a lot of V and R’s* the four hundredth and two.”
“Um, yeah, there’s no way I can say that name without laughing. Don't miss me too much, okay?”
“You-”
The portal finally closed cutting off the golem from responding.
Li Shen then looked around at the forest trees, the ground, and the sun in the sky overhead.
“Am I really back?”
Despite asking himself that, he knew full well that he had returned to the outside world. He just couldn’t believe he was finally out of that place after so long.
As if he was exhausted beyond anything, his body tilted and he slowly fell onto his back.
“Haha...hahaha...Bahahahahaha!!”
A burst of small laughter came from Li Shen that soon turned louder and louder.
It was a peal of belly laughter that came out unrestrained and echoed in the forest for quite some distance.
“For a whole month! I was stuck in there for a whole month!”
Li Shen covered his face with his hand.
A month might not be much to some people, but in that place, a lot had happened to him during that time. And he would need to write a series of books just to tell the bare minimum of what happened.
To say the least, he went on a journey of self-discovery. Not just about himself, but about life as a reincarnator.
How did the saying go? Change usually comes in the most unexpected ways?
Li Shen suddenly let out a sigh and completely relaxed his body. However, all of a sudden, the ground beneath him immediately began to produce fissures.
CrAcK.
cRaCk.
The ground itself couldn’t handle the weight suddenly being produced by Li Shen's physical body, causing earth rocks to start to raise into the air by the second.
Li Shen had absorbed the Chaos Qi contained in the pill furnace, and something ridiculous happen.
He went through a physique tribulation.
It had completely caught him off guard.
He knew Fleshly Body cultivators had a separate system to grade their level of strength and progress.
However, the names of the levels vary from one cultivation method to another. But a universal scale was there for them all and that was the Qi Cultivation System.
The power of a Fleshly Body Cultivator is always converted and measured by the Qi Cultivation System’s standards.
But despite Fleshly Body Cultivation having a somewhat of a soft power system scaling, with no general outline. There were certain requirements one must show to be considered as strong as a Sea Expansion Realm Cultivator, a Foundation Realm cultivator, and the subsequent Qi realms.
So with that said, Li Shen had read about Fleshly Body cultivators going through tribulations while cultivating their external cultivation methods. But like Qi cultivation, that was in the later stages!
And the tribulation was different from anything he read before as he wasn't even cultivating any techniques. It was like a natural barrier his body had stopped at after absorbing more Chaos Qi.
During the tribulation, he felt as if his body and soul were shackled by some inexplicable force that was trying to tear them apart
Neither his Qi cultivation, his Soul Cultivation, nor the power of his Seven Sins Plum Blossom could help him.
Thinking about the dread he felt at that time still gave him shivers.
The only reason he thought he overcome that tribulation was because of his Heavenly Physique. If it was his Spiritual Physique alone his body and soul would have been obliterated.
Though only through struggles does one reap greater benefits!
After that tribulation, his physique changed.
His bones now looked like glistening gold and sparkling black ores, that could be mined from the ground to create a Spirit Artifact. Albeit of the lowest grade.
Another change his body went through was that he could make it a lot heavier or lighter like a switch.
Li Shen attributed that characteristic to the Chaos Qi in his Spiritual Physique, as he already knew his Heavenly Physique mainly helped him with wielding Heavenly Laws.
Slowly rising up, Li Shen swept back his hair that had grown out of control.
He had a calm expression on his face as he sat there.
For some reason not only did his physical body change but so did his overall demeanor.
Li Shen had gone from someone who couldn’t control the highs and lows of his state of mind, to someone self-aware of his and others' emotions, and now to this.
Well, whatever “this” was.
But something had changed with him for sure.
“I wonder how long I’ve been away? It’s not that long is it?”
Thinking this, Li Shen's body became extremely light before he slowly rose into the air until he was above the forest trees.
Then with a swoosh, his figure suddenly shot threw the sky.
Somewhere nearby, the old man who had watched Li Shen enter the core region was observing him.
Seeing the ground beneath Li Shen cracking he frowned. Then seeing him suddenly rising into the air, the old man was completely taken aback.
“This-”
The old man’s eyes followed Li Shen, not understanding what he was seeing.
‘How is he flying? Wasn’t he in the Sea Expansion Realm?’
He then realized something.
“His cultivation, I can’t since his cultivation. This child, what happened to him inside the core region for him to change so drastically? And… why am I getting the feeling that I need to worship him??’
The old man couldn’t comprehend this feeling in his heart and was baffled by it.
Suddenly, in the sky, Li Shen paused before he turned and started heading in his direction.
“...???”
The old man thought that was an absurd notion, there was no way Li Shen could sense him.
But contrary to his belief, Li Shen quickly reached an empty space in the sky before he cupped his fist and bowed.
“Respected Elder, could you please tell this young one how long I was inside the core region?”
Realizing that Li Shen had actually sensed his fragmented space, the old man felt shocked in his heart, and he couldn’t help but ask.
“Child, you can sense my presence?”
Li Shen’s pure golden pupils flickered as a world that was filled with golden silk-like threads presented itself. The golden silk-like threads flowed in a natural pattern but in this area, that pattern was disrupted by an unnatural force.
They were forcibly clustered together, and inside this cluster, the outline of a mountain with a person inside was seen.
Li Shen didn’t lie and answered the old man’s words truthfully.
“Yes Elder, I can.”
After that, Li Shen didn’t hear the old man say anything, but suddenly, massive ripples formed in the empty space before an entire mountain appeared from the void, with Li Shen floating at the peak of it where the old man was in a cave.
“It’s only been six days since you entered the core region.”
Hearing that it was only six days, Li Shen let out a sigh of relief before saying.
“Thank you, Elder!”
He then turned to leave, but the old man suddenly spoke up.
“Wait! Might I ask which entity is in control of this child’s body?”
“Huh?”
Li Shen was dumbfounded by this old man’s question.
“Old man, what are you askin-Uh... I mean, respected Elder what is the meaning of that question, I don’t quite understand.”
Li Shen for split second accidentally dropped his respectful persona, but quickly managed to correct himself.
During that moment, the feeling the old man was getting from Li Shen suddenly dissipated like it was only an illusion.
‘Huh? Was it only my imagination?’
Staring at Li Shen for a moment, the old man then said.
“Forget I ask anything, you can leave.”
Li Shen bowed respectfully before he turned and flew in the direction of the exit.
Wind flapping his robes and hair as he went, Li Shen let out a curse in his heart.
‘Damn, I forgot to hide my Divinity. I knew something like this would happen from reading about it in the God Archives, but I wasn’t expecting it to develop so soon.’
Back in the God Era, the worship and admiration of the mortals to cultivators bless by the heavens, would take on an intangible form. It wasn’t a power that could be utilized but it was more like an aura that surrounded them and give someone of a lesser existence the desire to worship them.
It was called Divinity Aura, and for some reason, Li Shen started developing it while he was inside the core region.
He had no idea who was worshiping him, but they sure as hell were doing it a lot for it to become so noticeable that he had to hide it.
In only a couple of minutes, Li Shen reached the middle region and he passed by the Elders he had spoken to.
Sending out his undisguised Divine Will, Li Shen said his goodbyes to them.
First, the Elders were shocked by the strength of his soul but then were stunned when they realize he was flying. But they soon started sending him farewell goodbyes and suggest he come back again.
As for why Li She was comfortable revealing this to them, it wasn’t because they were part of the Li Clan, but because he didn’t sense anything malicious in their hearts.
He was a good judge of character before his Seven Sins plum blossom, now with it, he could basically tell when others had ill intentions towards him. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have bothered revealing anything even if they were family.
Before passing through the formation to exit the Elder’s cultivation grounds, he landed on the ground and opted to walk the rest of the way.
Li Shen had missed his birthday celebration, but it couldn’t be helped.
He decided not to go back to the hall, and instead head back to his courtyard.
He hadn’t taken a shower for a month as he was too busy running around finding materials to create another jade slip to get out of there. Luckily, he found it while he was sneaking around the Stone Golems' territory, but it just so happens to be a sacred material their species worship.
Li Shen wasn’t even going to think about what he had to go through to get it. Just by looking at their hatred for him one could tell.
He had also run out of practically everything in his storage ring except the Divine Fire Stones. His spoiled attitude of casually using high-grade everything caught up to him. Even his change of clothes had run out, so he was currently wearing nothing but dregs.
Not wanting to be seen like this, Li Shen chose to sneak back to his courtyard as best as he could.
Though, what greeted him as he leaped over the wall was quite unexpected.
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