Lu Yin had less than five days remaining in the Timestop Space when he opened his eyes and let out a long breath. The air that he let out warped the void, as its temperature was simply too high.
His skin had been burnt so badly by the high temperature flames that he was no longer able to feel any pain.
The Skyblaze Stone finally began to cool down, and Lu Yin stored it away.
Despite the number of flames that the stone had absorbed, they were only enough to allow Lu Yin to complete three cycles as a Hunter. Thus, he still had six cycles to go before reaching the apex of the Hunter realm. His seventh breakthrough was not too far away.
As for star essence, he had absorbed the star energy of about seven million star essence. This was a ridiculous amount, but fortunately, Lu Yin still had quite a bit more in reserve.
After resting for a long while, Lu Yin raised a hand and brought his die out to roll.
After being tapped, the die spun around and eventually stop on one pip. Useless.
Lu Yin was in no hurry. He checked his time and saw that he still had four days remaining, which was not enough. His first instinct had been to extend that time, but that would not be cost-effective. Whenever ten days were added, the cost would double. Adding even ten more days would be too much for him to bear.
Since he was in no hurry, Lu Yin began to silently recite the full Stonewall Scripture. He had already made it a habit to recite the scriptures anytime he had nothing else to do. This scripture was absolutely amazing.
As the scenery changed before his eyes, Lu Yin returned to a secure room, where he continued to recite the Stonewall Scriptures.
After three days, he was able to roll the die once again.
This time, Lu Yin did not have good luck. He rolled Pilfer three times in a row and only received useless items. When he rolled the die for a fourth time, he rolled one pip yet again. Speechless, he stared at the trash covering the floor of the room.
There was a magazine with Luo Shen on the cover, who was an acquaintance of Lu Yin’s.
After rolling the die five times, it was necessary to wait at least ten days before rolling it again.
These ten days quickly passed by, after which Lu Yin raised his hand to bring out his die. This time, he needed to roll a four. He tapped the die.
He was always afraid of rolling six pips, so he had set his cosmic ring to the side.
His fears were proven true, as he really did roll a six.
If he had not set his cosmic ring aside, then the star essence he had inside would have already been all consumed.
The second time he rolled the die, he finally got what he wanted: four pips.
Lu Yin entered the Timestop Space once again.
It only took a mere 20,000 star essence for him to extend his time in this space to 240 days. If he had not left the space when he had, then he did not even want to know how much it would have cost to extend his time by another 240 days.
While in the Timestop Space, Lu Yin wanted to roll three pips, but his luck was against him, and he did not get it.
Without anything else to do, Lu Yin made the Root of Intelligence into a tea.
The size of each Root of Intelligence varied. The root that Mister Mu had given him was not as big as the withered one that he had obtained from lockbreaking, and this one was only enough for three sips of tea. The previous root had been enough for five.
As the tea brewed, the pleasant fragrance spread out. Lu Yin felt his mind clear up, and no matter if he focused on the present or the past, all of his memories were exceptionally clear. It was similar to watching a movie and being able to examine all of the details.
His mind had improved dramatically all at once.
This was the magic of tea made from a Root of Intelligence.
Lu Yin had already decided to use the tea made from the Root of Intelligence to deduce more of the Overlaying Stacks Path.
Even when considering all of the techniques that he had learned, Lu Yin’s most effective attack was still his Vacuum Palm, which combined his physical strength with the Overlaying Stacks Path to continuously raise the power of an attack. Lu Yin’s physical strength was constantly and passively increasing, and a Vacuum Palm was enough for him to defeat most of his peers. Given his increased strength, his Vacuum Palm should even be enough to threaten the Mavis family’s inheritor now.
The truth of the matter was that Lu Yin had hoped that he would also have enough tea to comprehend more of Daynight Praises and his various sourcebox arrays, but unfortunately, he was limited to only three mouthfuls of the tea.
After the first sip, Lu Yin’s whole body felt like it was floating. He raised a hand and struck out with a palm. The void twisted and rippled in layers like waves. He stared at the waves and saw palm after palm.
When he had been fighting against Nightking Zhenwu, Lu Yin had managed to deduce up to 170 Stacks, but at this time, he quickly deduced 180 Stacks and then 190.
The Overlaying Stacks Path was based off of one’s physical strength, and Lu Yin’s physical strength had spiked after he broke through to the Hunter realm. The increase was truly rather absurd, and it meant that he could deduce up to 220 Stacks before reaching his limit.
If Lu Yin ever faced Lan Si again, then a single Vacuum Palm with 220 Stacks would be enough to instantly defeat Lan Si.
By Lu Yin’s estimation, even if Lan Si became an Enlighter, the number of stacks that he could unleash would be 200 at best, and it was impossible for the Arbiter to exceed that. As for Yuhua Mavis, he judged that her strength was a bit better. She was definitely capable of using more than 200 Stacks, but not much more.
Of course, 200 Stacks was not Lu Yin’s limit. He had just completed his thirteenth cycle, and his strength continued to rise dramatically with every breakthrough.
After taking another sip of the tea made from the Root of Intelligence, Lu Yin continued to deduce the Overlaying Stacks Path.
The void trembled with a vibration that sounded like the beating of drums echoing down across the long river of time.
250 Stacks. He was able to deduce a full 250 Stacks with the second sip of the tea.
Lu Yin took a deep breath and looked down at his palm. Right now, he even felt terrified of himself. He did not know if even Yuhua Mavis could withstand such an attack, but he really hoped to be able to compare strength with that woman once again.
Next time, he intended to find out just how many stacks she could endure.
With the last sip of Root of Intelligence tea, Lu Yin’s eyes locked onto his heart, and he peered past his fatesand to look at the black and white mist.
This mist was the primary reason why Mister Mu had ordered Lu Yin to take first place in ZENITH. Lu Yin had tried to test the black and white mist when he had been on the Royal Frost Continent, but its power had been beyond him at that time. However, even if it was still beyond his current capabilities, he still had to master this power, as he did not want to be expelled from Mister Mu’s tutelage.
With this thought, Lu Yin downed the last of the tea and directed the black and white mist to exit his body.
…
There were less than a hundred days remaining within the Timestop Space when Lu Yin finally returned to himself after drinking the tea made from the Root of Intelligence. His next task was to bring out his die once more, as he needed to roll a three this time!
With this goal in mind, the die slowly came to a stop, revealing five pips. Lu Yin was rendered speechless.
After his luck failed him again, twenty days passed, which meant that he had only eighty days remaining in the Timestop Space. Only then did he finally roll three pips, Enhance.
He heaved a sigh of relief as he stared at the two light screens. It had not been easy to get this roll!
The first thing that Lu Yin intended to upgrade was his formcast model.
His body had consumed the formcast model that he had possessed when entering the Hunter realm. It had been a sixth stage formcast model, which was widely known as the limit for formcast models in the current universe. However, Lu Yin wanted to see if he could upgrade one to a seventh stage formcast model. If such a thing was possible, then just how would it change his body?
Lu Yin placed a formcast model on the top light screen. This was merely a fourth stage formcast model, which made it a very common one. He quickly upgraded it past the fifth stage and to the sixth stage by throwing out numerous star essence.
Once it became a six stage formcast model, Lu Yin observed an amazing number of rune lines from it. Only Envoys were capable of creating such a formcast model, and they could be sold for astronomical prices.
He had once considered selling upgraded formcast models to generate income, but there were too many drawbacks to doing such a thing. For one, he could potentially improve his enemies’ strength, and for another, he would definitely expose himself.
There were certain methods that could be used to generate money, but there were others that would simply burn the one behind them.
After upgrading the formcast model to six stages, Lu Yin grew solemn as he set it back atop the upper screen of light. He desperately hoped that it could be upgraded yet again.
Lu Yin immediately threw out 10,000 star essence.
The formcast model fell down slightly, but only a tiny bit. Despite the fact that the formcast model had barely moved, Lu Yin was pleasantly surprised. This proved that the formcast model could be upgraded to seven stages, which meant that his improvement upon becoming an Enlighter would be absolutely insane.
A key contributor to Lu Yin’s incredible increase in strength after becoming a Hunter was definitely because of his sixth stage formcast model.
He believed that almost no one had a seventh stage formcast model, even when among the Ten Arbiters and the Neoverse’s top talents.
A long time ago, Lu Yin had asked Hai Qiqi about formcast models, and he had been told that sixth stage formcast models could only be made by Envoys whereas seventh stage formcast models could theoretically only be made by a super expert with a power level of at least a million or more. Just how many such monsters were there in the Fifth Mainland? A handful?
Lu Yin’s advantages were growing greater and greater.
This thought prompted Lu Yin to continue trying to upgrade the formcast model to seven stages.
When he looked at the formcast model again, he blinked. Lu Yin had not paid much attention a moment ago, and he had only cared about if the formcast model could be improved again. However, now that he was taking a serious look, his pupils shrank. No way!
He had indeed seen the formcast model drop down a bit, but it seemed as if it had only completed a thousandth or even ten-thousandth of a full upgrade!
Lu Yin was stunned. This was just too much. How could it be so expensive?
Just how much would it cost to upgrade the formcast model from six stages to seven?
He did some quick math and sucked in a sharp breath. 100 million. This upgrade was guaranteed to cost him hundreds of millions of star essence.
Lu Yin’s whole body went cold. It was true that he had hundreds of millions of star essence, but this would essentially bankrupt his entire savings! Why was it so expensive?
He then thought the matter through for a bit. It had cost him 300,000 star essence to upgrade the formcast model from four stages to five, and upgrading it again to six stages had cost him eight million star essence. This was more than a 26-fold increase. If it did indeed cost hundreds of millions of star essence to upgrade it to a seventh stage formcast model, then it simply meant that it was even more than a 26-fold increase in cost, which was not too extreme.
Formcast models were magical things that allowed the younger generation to improve to levels comparable to their seniors. They were a magical discovery that had shortened the potential gap between the current generation and their ancestors. Each breakthrough would allow them to have an amazing increase in strength, and spending hundreds of millions of star essence to obtain something as rare as a seventh stage formcast model was not actually an expensive price to pay.
Lu Yin smiled wryly. Cultivation consumed resources, which was why ordinary people could not cultivate at all. Even if a person had talent, they would be useless without the resources to support them.
Fortunately, Lu Yin still had means to make more money.
He silently put the formcast model away. Since it would take hundreds of millions of star essence to upgrade it, he would not worry about it for the moment. He had already given Ku Wei hundreds of millions of star essence to use to place wagers on ZENITH, so Lu Yin only had 50 million left on his person. It was not enough!
Since he did not have enough star essence to fully upgrade his formcast model, Lu Yin thought for a moment before taking out the froststone. This was what he should upgrade at the moment.
If what the Frost Emperor had said was accurate, then this stone was potentially capable of freezing even time. Naturally, Lu Yin needed to get it to that point.
However, if this froststone had a connection to time, then the amount of star essence needed to upgrade it would definitely be a painful sum.
Lu Yin thought about this as he set the froststone on the upper light screen and threw out a large number of star essence.
At this point in time, anything that Lu Yin wanted to upgrade would be extremely expensive, and each upgrade could easily cost him hundreds of thousands of star essence. This prompted Lu Yin to immediately throw out 100,000 star essence, but the froststone only dropped about ten percent of the way through the screen.
