She'd been inside the Virtual Sky World for one month, but the situation outside hadn't changed at all.

Ren Yufeng was still practicing his divine dragon secret technique, and Qiu Zhiming was also still alive.

Jiang Shanghang and Tang Fang presumably succeeded in escaping, but no one else ever entered the underground palace. Maybe the Nascent Soul cultivators couldn't do anything to open the underground palace after the entrance was closed, thus Ren Yufeng was able to remain so calm.

Ren Yufeng probably felt bored since he was shut inside the underground palace alone, so not only did he not kill Qiu Zhiming, but he even specifically made him a waterproof enchantment, thus allowing him to keep on living.

Qiu Zhiming, who noticed Ren Yufeng gradually losing his murderous intentions, felt much relieved and he also began cultivating slowly.

From Mo Tiange's point of view as a spectator, Qiu Zhiming most likely wouldn't die for the time being. No one knew how long they would be trapped inside this underground palace; as long as Ren Yufeng wanted someone to keep him company, Qiu Zhiming would remain alive. Perhaps Ren Yufeng might even feel that he needed a servant and at that point, he might even give Qiu Zhiming some benefits.

Of course, these matters didn't really have anything to do with Mo Tiange now. The most important thing for her now was to cultivate and progress as quickly as possible in order to contend with Ren Yufeng to determine whose cultivation speed was ultimately faster.

Mo Tiange knew that for her, having a Closed Door Meditation here now would be more harmful than beneficial. During the short time she wandered around on the outside, both her body and mind experienced growth, so she wouldn't have much trouble advancing to the late stage of the Foundation Building realm. Advancing to the Core Formation realm, on the other hand, was still far too premature at the moment. If she forced herself to make a realm-breakthrough to the Core Formation realm, she would likely have difficulty overcoming the Inner Demon obstacle.

Nevertheless, she couldn't do nothing naturally. Therefore, upon realizing this, she began rummaging through the books inside her Virtual Sky World to look for a way to resolve this problem.

Inside these books, she discovered some medicinal pills that could be helpful during a realm-breakthrough and among them, there were some that had the effects of protecting one's heart and improving one's concentration. The next few days were spent cultivating and concocting those medicinal pills. Doing this couldn't really solve her problem, but in any case, having a semblance of a solution was always better than having none at all.

Just like that, eight months pa.s.sed by in a flash.

Mo Tiange composed her mood, calmed her spiritual aura, and cleared her heart. The Yin five element spiritual aura inside her body was abundant and roamed wildly along her meridians. 

Mo Tiange knew she was advancing to the late stage of the Foundation Building realm.

She didn't feel panicked at all. While regulating her breathing, she slowly led her spiritual aura to flow along her meridians.

In this kind of small realm advancement, one's apt.i.tudes had a great influence. If she still possessed her old five spiritual roots, she would've had to expend a lot of strength in each small realm advancement after she entered the Foundation Building realm. Nevertheless, she changed her cultivation technique and practiced the Sunu Art of the Origin now, so she wouldn't encounter the problem of being trapped in a bottleneck during a small realm advancement. As long as she was somewhat careful, there wouldn't be any problems.

Spiritual Aura was unceasingly acc.u.mulating inside her dantian while the spiritual aura around her body rushed wildly towards her. Mo Tiange calmly absorbed the spiritual aura then stored it into her dantian, thus allowing the process to repeat itself.

Eventually, her dantian was completely filled and couldn't accommodate any more spiritual aura. Mo Tiange immediately stopped absorbing spiritual aura and moved the practically clogged up spiritual aura inside her dantian.

With her meticulous urging, the spiritual aura started to move. It moved from her dantian, along her meridians, then back to her dantian, forming a repeated cycle.

Her spiritual aura movements became increasingly quicker and practically turned into a vortex. It was as if her body had turned into a cosmos in which countless stars were revolving around the center point.

All of a sudden, the movement of those stars finally reached the pinnacle and then "Bam!", they rammed into each other, rus.h.i.+ng to be the first in their attempt to vie over a vaster world. As the stars squeezed into each other and tried to break in, the universe suddenly burst into a bigger one with a loud bang.

...

Mo Tiange opened her eyes. Her whole face was covered with sweat. She didn't bother to wipe the beads of sweat on her face because the first thing she did was inspect herself, feeling delighted.

As she expected, she advanced to the late stage of the Foundation Building realm!

Small realm advancements weren't as difficult as realm-breakthroughs of large realms. The density of the spiritual aura inside one's body wouldn't change; their dantian just expanded slightly.

Mo Tiange moved the spiritual aura inside her body again. It was only after she felt her whole body at ease and realized there weren't any residual problems caused by her advancement that she finally stopped.

She just advanced to the late stage of the Foundation Building realm, but she wasn't too happy about it. The late stage of the Foundation Building didn't count for much; Ren Yufeng had long entered the late stage of the Foundation Building realm, and judging by his behavior, his strength must've already reached the Core Formation realm after he used the so-called divine dragon secret technique— she still wasn't strong enough to do anything to him.

In all honesty, Mo Tiange didn't think Ren Yufeng could become a high level cultivator very quickly upon obtaining the divine dragon secret technique. Aside from the fact that the so-called divine dragon secret technique seemed very odd, his body also didn't possess even a bit of divine dragon's breath; on the contrary, it was full of devil aura instead. As for herself, with the Spiritual Roots of the Origin and the Pure Yin Const.i.tution she had as her natural endowments and accompanied by the Sunu Art of the Origin, she didn't think she would progress much slower than Ren Yufeng if she expended all her efforts in cultivating.

Therefore, this was a race—she wanted to see if Ren Yufeng, who relied on the divine dragon secret technique, would cultivate faster, or if she could advance faster with her Sunu Art of the Origin. As long as her cultivation speed surpa.s.sed Ren Yufeng's, there would definitely be a day when she could come out openly, knock him off his pedestal and kill him.

With a soft sigh, Mo Tiange tore open a crack on the sky of the Virtual Sky World to observe the situation outside.

Ren Yufeng and Qiu Zhiming still spent their time cultivating. In the past several months, she occasionally listened to their conversations. Qiu Zhiming could be considered to have been degraded completely. In order to survive under Ren Yufeng's oppression, he had turned into a servile wretch who adhered to Ren Yufeng.

Coinciding with Mo Tiange's success in advancing to the late stage of the Foundation Building realm, Ren Yufeng also stopped his cultivation outside the Virtual Sky World.

When Ren Yufeng was cultivating, Mo Tiange observed him and discovered that the black aura on his body was becoming more and more concentrated, practically drowning him. However, if his black aura could be considered spiritual aura, then Mo Tiange surmised that Ren Yufeng was still stuck in a realm equivalent to the early stage of the Core Formation realm—he hadn't made any other realm-breakthroughs.

Upon discovering this, Mo Tiange heaved a sigh of relief. This showed that despite obtaining the divine dragon secret technique, Ren Yufeng still couldn't instantly surpa.s.s the cultivation levels of other great cultivators and instead, he had to cultivate slowly step by step. That being the case, Mo Tiange was quite confident that her cultivation speed wouldn't be much slower than Ren Yufeng's.

Ren Yufeng, who had just stopped cultivating, looked a bit perplexed—maybe he had encountered a bottleneck in his cultivation. He pondered the matter but he soon took out something from inside his Qiankun Bag.

Mo Tiange's eyes widened upon seeing his actions.

What Ren Yufeng took out was nothing other than a thick stone tablet!

Qiu Zhiming once said that the first time Ren Yufeng entered the underground palace, he obtained a stone tablet describing the divine dragon secret technique required to obtain the divine dragon's breath. Because of that, Ren Yufeng fabricated some lies to make them think there were a lot of treasures inside this underground palace, and he used them to enter the underground palace again.

After taking out that stone tablet, Ren Yufeng seemed to become a bit emotional; he sighed while caressing the tablet. Soon afterward, he put the stone table down then fixed his attention on it—apparently, he was studying it.

From her current position, Mo Tiange couldn't get a clear look at the contents of the stone tablet. However, this didn't obstruct her from seeing the outline of the content.

Just as Qiu Zhiming said, countless lines similar to drawings had been engraved on its surface. In ancient times, written characters had just been created, so most people still used pictures to record things. The stone tablet came from the ancient sacrificial temple in this underground palace; it wasn't at all strange that the record contained pictures.

The content of the pictures engraved on its surface was very simple. A man stood before dragon bones, seemingly implementing some kind of secret technique. Next to it was many human bodies in several different positions, and on those human bodies, many kinds of lines had been drawn—these seemed to be a method of operating spiritual aura. Presumably, this was Ren Yufeng's so-called divine dragon secret technique. In addition, some of the postures seemed to have simple words engraved next to them, but Mo Tiange didn't have any knowledge about this type of ancient text.

Ancient times were so labeled from the perspective of the birth of mortals. From cultivators' point of view, the ancient times were normally categorized into several phases: the Distant Past era, the Extinction of G.o.ds, and the Middle Ages. The Distant Past era began from the creation of the world and lasted for several million years but cultivators, whose understanding of the Distant Past was relatively deep, generally focused on the several hundred thousand years after the G.o.ds drew up the rule about soaring to the heavens.

Within those several hundred thousand years, there were countless people who possessed great divine power; everyone yearned to soar to the heavens, and there were also many people who succeeded in soaring and becoming immortals. This period left behind many texts and cultivation techniques which were still available to some people who were lucky enough to get their hands on them. Such texts had been studied by many cultivators, and all of them could understand the meanings.

Not to mention other people, but this Virtual Sky World of Mo Tiange's was also a remnant of that period, and the texts and writings inside weren't a hindrance for her.

Nevertheless, nowadays, there was basically no one in the cultivation world who knew about these ancient characters from several million years ago.

Presumably, Ren Yufeng also didn't understand them either because right now, he had a wrinkle etched on his brows as he scanned the pictures and words on the stone tablet, a.n.a.lyzing them bit by bit. He also made some movements from time to time.

An idea flashed inside Mo Tiange's mind. Since Ren Yufeng didn't understand the text, could it be that the so-called divine dragon secret technique he thought he understood was simply wrong? Or maybe it simply wasn't a divine dragon secret technique and was instead a kind of heretical art?

The more she thought about it, the more she felt it was possible. Otherwise, if he really had absorbed the divine dragon's breath, how could his whole body possibly be covered by devil aura? But did Ren Yufeng really not detect that there was something wrong?

Outside the Virtual Sky World, Ren Yufeng's whole face was filled with doubt. No matter how he thought, he still couldn't understand what went wrong.

At that moment, Qiu Zhiming also stopped cultivating. He looked at Ren Yufeng half-fearfully, half-curiously.

He was no longer afraid Ren Yufeng would kill him, but on the contrary, he felt even more scared when faced with Ren Yufeng now. After one year, Ren Yufeng's oppression engraved this kind of fear deep in Qiu Zhiming's heart. Whenever he saw Ren Yufeng, he reflexively yielded.

Right now, Ren Yufeng was sighing and seemingly talking to himself: "The divine dragon's breath... The divine dragon's breath..."

Qiu Zhiming hesitated for a moment but in the end, he cautiously asked, "Senior Martial Brother Ren, is something the matter?"

Ren Yufeng cast him a glance. He then stopped pondering the matter and said faintly, "No problem. I just have a little problem comprehending this cultivation technique."

"... Oh." Qiu Zhiming didn't dare to question him further and just sat quietly on the side.

Apparently needing someone to talk to after spending a lot of time struggling to comprehend the text, Ren Yufeng thought for a moment then said, "The divine dragon's breath... why did things turn out like this after absorbing it...?"

Mo Tiange was shocked. So Ren Yufeng also felt baffled?

Sure enough, Ren Yufeng continued on: "This stone tablet said that upon absorbing the divine dragon's breath, one would turn into a divine dragon's descendant, and their momentum would be overbearing while their breath would be pure and sacred, but..."

Once she heard this, Mo Tiange was almost certain Ren Yufeng must've practiced the technique wrong!

Nevertheless, Ren Yufeng seemed to be completely oblivious to that fact. He was still muttering doubtfully to himself: "Maybe this cultivation technique was supposed to be like this?"

Right after he said that, Qiu Zhiming fearfully said, "Senior Martial Brother Ren, is it possible that... you understood the technique wrong?"

What Qiu Zhiming said made Ren Yufeng's expression change in an instant. He shouted fiercely, "Impossible! I obtained the divine dragon's breath, so how could I have possibly understood it wrong?"

"Yes, yes." Qiu Zhiming naturally didn't dare to refute him, so he just repeatedly said yes.

"It must be because I haven't practiced it to perfection—if I succeed in my cultivation, I'll definitely be able to convert my body into a divine dragon body!" Ren Yufeng said determinedly. He then stored the stone tablet back and once again sat down to continue cultivating.

Mo Tiange, who was inside the Virtual Sky World, shook her head. Ren Yufeng was already trapped in a demonic barrier. Even though Ren Yufeng was able to acc.u.mulate power, that cultivation technique was definitely wrong. How could the pure, sacred divine dragon's breath result in black devil aura?

Nevertheless, it was good that Re Yufeng had problems with his cultivation. Those who practiced the devil art were the most p.r.o.ne to accidents in their cultivation. If he experienced aura deviations in the future, it'd be very easy for her to kill him.

Just right after she closed her eyes and was about to resume cultivating, Mo Tiange suddenly sensed something, so she opened her eyes again.

Inside the Virtual Sky World, everything remained tranquil. The world outside the Virtual Sky World, however, seemed to be quaking.

Ren Yufeng stopped cultivating. Qiu Zhiming also opened his eyes. Both of them looked at their surroundings, feeling both confused and surprised.

Qiu Zhiming called out, "Senior Martial Brother Ren, what... what's happening?"

A wrinkle emerged on Ren Yufeng's brows. He also looked completely puzzled over what happened.

The huge, elevated square inside the room also shook. Despite being inside the Virtual Sky World, Mo Tiange could clearly see that the dragon bones on the square had also started to shake!

Ren Yufeng's expression changed several times. He then closed his eyes and released his divine sense but right afterward, his complexion gradually became paler. "The fifteenth day of the eighth month! It's the fifteenth day of the eighth month!"

Mo Tiange was dumbfounded. A split second later, her expression also changed.

On the fifteenth day of the eighth month, a huge change would occur in the Land of Hiding Dragon. The landscape inside would change completely, changing into one that was completely different from the previous year's. The disciples holed up inside the Land of Hiding Dragon past the fifteenth day of the eighth month would never reappear again!

This was what Jiang Shanghang emphasized to Mo Tiange before they entered the Land of Hiding Dragon.

They had been inside this underground palace for more than eight months. When they first entered, they told her that three months prior, just after the fifteenth day of the eighth month, they came to the Land of Hiding Dragon and discovered the underground palace. Right now, one year had pa.s.sed—the landscape of the Land of Hiding Dragon was going to change!

Mo Tiange was faintly worried about this matter, but she always thought that since she was inside the Virtual Sky World, it wouldn't really affect her. Right now, it seemed like she indeed wouldn't be affected—everything outside was shaking, but the conditions inside the Virtual Sky World were still completely fine. Nevertheless, now that the situation had reached this point, she still felt a bit worried. If this underground palace disappeared, where would the Virtual Sky World appear later? Would it disappear along with this underground palace or would it remain where it was now?

Outside, Ren Yufeng and Qiu Zhiming were already in a complete panic. Although Ren Yufeng was no longer a Foundation Building cultivator, he was still helpless with regards to this kind of unknown matter.

"Senior Martial Brother Ren, what should we do? What should we do?" Qiu Zhiming already sounded like he was about to cry. The underground palace was quaking more and more violently, and that divine dragon's skeleton seemed like it was going to fall apart at any time.

Ren Yufeng was in an extremely bad mood. With a rough voice, he said furiously, "Calm down!"

Qiu Zhiming didn't dare to contradict him, so he stopped talking. However, his whole body seemed to have lost its strength, and he just stared at Ren Yufeng in a daze.

Ren Yufeng took some time to think, but it seemed he was unable to come up with a plan. Obtaining the strength of the divine dragon's breath made him forget about the fact that the Land of Hiding Dragon would change once in every year.

As to why the landscape inside the Land of Hiding Dragon changed once every year, or where the previous year's landscape would end up, no one had been able to answer these questions for several thousand of years. The fate of the disciples, who were holed up inside the Land of Hiding Dragon and couldn't leave, also remained a mystery. After they disappeared, they never returned.

The ground quaked more and more violently. They were already floating in the water because they simply couldn't stand on the ground.

"This won't do; I can't stay like this," Ren Yufeng mumbled to himself. Soon after, he forcefully sat cross-legged and operated his spiritual aura.

Mo Tiange didn't know what he was trying to do, but he obviously had a plan.

As Ren Yufeng moved his spiritual breath and ama.s.sed spiritual aura, the black breath on his body became increasingly denser, and the divine dragon's breath on the dragon bones also started to rush madly towards him!

He was trying to forcefully absorb the divine dragon's breath to increase his cultivation level!

The expression on Mo Tiange's face changed. She had no idea what consequences Ren Yufeng's actions would have, but according to reason, devil art pract.i.tioners were extremely p.r.o.ne to experiencing accidents during their cultivation, especially if they were trying to increase their cultivation level by force. Nonetheless, the so-called divine dragon secret technique was from several million years ago—no one knew whether or not it was subject to the same rules. Moreover, in case Ren Yufeng succeeded and his cultivation level advanced, she would have a hard time escaping, let alone killing him!

Of course, it'd be best if Ren Yufeng failed or maybe got taken by this Land of Hiding Dragon to an unknown destination. That way, at least she could get away easily.

The divine dragon's breath rushed madly towards Ren Yufeng. The black aura on his body began to surge and gradually enshrouded his whole body.

At that moment, the underground palace was shaking even more violently. They didn't know where it started, but a loud "crack" rang out and the dragon bones which had been laid out on the square for several million of years finally fell apart with loud rumbling sounds.

First, the skull tumbled down, then the gigantic backbone. One by one, its ribs were washed away by the current, and the tail bones slowly got separated...

The gigantic, imposing divine dragon's skeleton became a messy pile of white bones in an instant and scattered along with the current.

One of the dragon's bones slammed into Qiu Zhiming, who floated in the water. His mind became hazy, and he soon fell unconscious.

On the other hand, Ren Yufeng was still practicing his art. Right now, he was already completely covered by the black aura, so his body couldn't be seen at all.

Mo Tiange was watching nervously. She hoped Ren Yufeng wouldn't succeed and she hoped she wouldn't be affected by the situation outside since she was inside the Virtual Sky World.

After what felt like an eternity, the underground palace was still shaking, but Ren Yufeng suddenly opened his eyes and screamed out loud, "AH—"

The black aura enveloping his body gradually dissipated, exposing the person inside.

A deathly pale face, a skinny, shriveled body... He was thinned to the bone, just like a skeleton, but there were black lights coming from his eyes.

Mo Tiange was completely taken aback. In these past several months, Ren Yufeng was always surrounded by black aura, so she never saw his real appearance. She never expected that someone, whose appearance could be considered quite pleasing to the eyes several months ago, would actually become like this! Even if she said to others that Ren Yufeng was a dried corpse, some people might easily believe it.

Ren Yufeng once again joined his palms together. Immediately after, black aura was emitted from his palms. One ring of black aura came out after another from his palms and coiled around him just like the silk a silkworm extruded to form its coc.o.o.n. The number of the black threads continued to increase. They started from Ren Yufeng's feet and quickly made their way up his body.

By now, the inside of the underground palace was already a huge mess.

Mo Tiange's gaze remained fixated on Ren Yufeng. The black threads continued to coil around his waist and stomach then made their way up to his head. Eventually, they were coiled tightly on top of his head, thus firmly wrapping him inside them.

Loud noises finally rang out from outside the underground palace. From inside the Virtual Sky World, Mo Tiange saw that the palace was starting to collapse.

This was an ancient construction, so every part of it was constructed bit by bit using huge boulders twice the size of men, each weighing 500 kilograms at most. Now, however, those boulders started to crumble. The walls on all sides, the ceiling... one block after another was swept away by the current and dropped to the seabed. 

The current became more and more violent. The dragon bones floated all around, and the huge boulders were hurled all over the place.

Mo Tiange watched on with regret as those boulders slammed towards Ren Yufeng but were obstructed by the gigantic black coc.o.o.n surrounding his body. As for Qiu Zhiming, he had long been buried under the boulders somewhere.

After a long time, everything eventually started to calm down. The currents were no longer violent, and the movements of the boulders also stopped. In fact, even the water also started to recede...

 Mo Tiange, who was safe and sound inside the Virtual Sky World, suddenly saw a beam of light coming from somewhere.