destiny eternal calamity

In the capital city of Dali, at the mansion of Baron Mingyue, Li Wei, dressed in a black-edged robe, sat in the courtyard, his hands resting on the strings of a zither.

The plants and trees in the capital have all withered and fallen, and a chill permeates the air.

Two and a half months have passed since Li Wei awakened his innate wisdom. Now, he is no longer the so-called martial arts failure.

During this period, Li Wei went to the Eastern City Military Command during the day to perform his duties, and followed Zhao Yuqing to investigate cases and subdue demons.

In the evening, he would return to his residence to learn the zither from Senior Sister Yan, and then open his dantian to cultivate true qi.

Occasionally, he would visit the princess's residence to have a romantic encounter with Long Bilin.

They lived a very fulfilling life.

However, the case of the Changsheng Cult has made absolutely no progress.

He and Zhao Yuqing took the portraits of the three beggars and visited every street in the eastern suburbs and even the eastern part of the city, but they didn't get any useful clues.

In addition, Li Wei went to collect debts from the three properties under his name once more.

Madam Xu still received 71,000 taels, while Juweixuan received 18,000 taels this month.

Wenhai Pavilion still only made a profit of three thousand taels this month because Li Wei had kept the price of the Dali Weekly very low, only three coins per copy.

This "Da Li Weekly" sold millions of copies to generate these profits.

For Li Wei, a sufficiently low price is more important than short-term profits, as it requires sufficient influence.

Moreover, this newspaper doesn't have much of a technical barrier to entry, and other booksellers have already imitated "Da Li Weekly" and started their own newspapers.

However, firstly, they dared not follow the example of Wenhai Pavilion, which was backed by the Princess's Mansion, and secondly, they did not have enough fresh and accurate sources of information about the martial arts world.

Most of them publish supernatural tales and novels, and they can't lower their prices, so they can't compete with Wenhaige and can only scrape by.

After learning about the situation, Li Wei decided to provide the Wenhai Pavilion's newsstands and newspaper delivery system to these booksellers, but he would charge them one hundred taels of silver per month.

In this way, the newsstands can offer a wide variety of publications, allowing newspapers to firmly occupy their position as the mainstream entertainment in this world.

Li Wei temporarily kept the small amount of the 92,000 taels of silver he received and recharged the rest, bringing his recharge points balance to 575960.

At this time, his dantian had been opened five times. With the opening of the dantian and the compression of true qi, the amount of true qi in his body continued to rise.

After the first compression, the amount of true qi reached 30 units, the second time it was 80 units, the third time it was 150 units, and the fourth time it was 240 units.

On the fifth time, after Li Wei felt that he had expanded his dantian to its limit, the amount of true qi in his body reached approximately 290 units.

He then thought that his maximum amount of true qi would be 350 units when he compressed his true qi.

Unexpectedly, after being compressed to 330 units, his true qi liquefied after he took the Sheng Yuan Pill.

No, it wasn't a liquid; it was just a special, more viscous state.

The true energy in this state can be vaporized into ordinary true energy at any time, but it also seems that it can be used directly in this state, but Li Wei has no way to use it.

This dense true qi only occupies one-third of the dantian space of ordinary true qi, so if calculated using the amount of true qi after vaporization, the amount of true qi in Li Wei's body reaches more than 1000 units.

This is more than 30 times that of an ordinary Qi Sea martial artist.

This is due to the combined effects of the Wanfa Guixu Jin and Shengyuan Dan, as well as the seven perfect internal energy techniques within his body.

Li Wei finally felt that he had achieved "perfection".

Zhao Yuqing had already reached this level half a month ago and made a breakthrough on the spot, as if she had no bottlenecks at all.

Xiao Shuying clearly said that in order to step onto the Spirit Bridge, one must obtain an opportunity to embark on the Great Path.

However, considering Zhao Yuqing's status as a savior, it's not surprising at all.

Shaking off distracting thoughts, Li Wei stood up.

After the piece was finished, his mind was clear and tranquil. With a thought, he smoothly reached the state of "perfection".

Then, an idea came to his mind.

His path is... the path of ruthlessness.

The opportunity arose from the death of someone close to him.

The fewer worldly ties he has, the stronger he will be.

Li Wei frowned.

This is practically forcing him to become a ruthless and heartless demon.

He is clearly a person with feelings, so how could his path be the path of heartlessness?

It wasn't the path he liked, so he rejected it outright!

In fact, he had long harbored doubts about the "Heavenly Way" of this world.

As early as when he obtained the "Nine Cauldrons Technique", the system reminded him that the true meaning of this technique had been "obstacleed" by an unknown force.

Even if this "unknown force" is not "Heavenly Dao" itself, it must be some kind of behind-the-scenes manipulator similar to "Heavenly Dao".

He spent a full 80,000 recharge points to get around this obstacle.

If it weren't for the system, he would have already been taken advantage of by his second and third uncles and killed by the Crown Prince and the Prime Minister to silence him.

Compared to the "Heavenly Way" that prompted him to walk the path of ruthlessness, he naturally trusted the system more.

Therefore, he chose to ignore the idea that ruthlessness was the ultimate truth that arose in his mind, looked at the "Nine Cauldrons Technique" on the system panel, focused his mind on the "+" sign next to it, and clicked it hard.

This cultivation technique has already had its unknown 'seal' broken by the system, making it the most likely to help him bypass the so-called 'opportunity' and advance to the Spirit Bridge Realm.

[Learned Technique: Nine Cauldrons Technique + (Tier 3/Perfect)]

[The cultivation technique can be upgraded; should I consume recharge points to upgrade?]

[Upgrading a third-tier cultivation technique to a fourth-tier technique requires 80000 recharge points.]

"System, perform the deduction!"

[Ding! Deduction failed. Detection indicates that upgrading the 'Nine Cauldrons Technique' requires the Nine Cauldrons True Manual. You can spend 200000 recharge points to enter the River of Time and try to obtain the lost Nine Cauldrons True Manual. After entering the River of Time, the host can stay for one year. Enter?]

"Huh? System, what do you mean by this?"

Li Wei was shocked. Was this even possible?

If he were to step into the river of time, would he change the history of this world?

Could this lead to some irreversible consequences?

For example, what if one were not born into this world, thus leading to one's own demise?

Li Wei dared not gamble, so he turned his attention to another third-tier technique that could be upgraded, the "Eternal Spring Finger".

[Learned Techniques: Changchun Finger (False Qi Technique) + (Level 3/Perfect)]

[The cultivation technique can be upgraded; should I consume recharge points to upgrade?]

[Upgrading a third-tier cultivation technique to a fourth-tier technique requires 80000 recharge points.]

"Deduction!"

[Ding! Due to the host's realm being locked, the system is unable to simulate the comprehension of the Spirit Bridge realm, resulting in a failed deduction. It has been detected that the host's advancement requires 'opportunity'. You can spend 10000000 recharge points to bypass the 'opportunity' restriction and forcibly advance. Advance?]

Okay, okay, is this how you play it?

According to the system's prompts, the deduction failed because without the "opportunity," even the system cannot simulate the Spirit Bridge Realm. And without the comprehension of the Spirit Bridge Realm, the fourth-order cultivation technique cannot be successfully deduced or learned.

It seems that even if you directly ask your princess wife for a fourth-tier cultivation technique, you still can't bypass the restrictions.

Li Wei realized that the Nine Cauldrons Technique was indeed the best technique for him to bypass the restrictions of the "Heavenly Dao".

Clearly, there's a reason why this technique was hindered by that unknown force.

Everyone in this world is controlled by the "Way of Heaven" and forced to embark on the so-called "path of destiny" in order to make further progress in martial arts.

However, this technique can bypass this limitation.