I proved immortality with thunder magic.

Lei Hefeng, a bamboo house by the stream.

In the dimly lit room, two beams of bright white light suddenly shone, sweeping across the walls like two searchlights.

"Finally, I've broken through to the fourth level of Qi Refining!"

Zhou Tai's words, filled with emotion, rang out from the quiet room, and the light in his eyes quickly faded.

The strange phenomenon just now was caused by the overflow of his magical power after his breakthrough in cultivation.

All told, this is now his eighth year at Spirit Beast Mountain, and he just celebrated his forty-fifth birthday a few days ago.

Eight years of arduous cultivation, from an ordinary mortal to the fourth level of Qi Refining stage, this cultivation speed is undeniably fast.

Many of the disciples who went up the mountain at the same time as him are probably not even at the third level of Qi Refining now.

However, Zhou Tai dared not be complacent about this, because his age was an indelible disadvantage.

Others, even after eight years of training, are only sixteen or seventeen years old, and have another thirty or forty years to catch up.

However, the best time left for him to cultivate is only a little over ten years.

If he had been allowed to meditate and cultivate normally for the past ten years, he would have only reached the seventh level of the Qi Refining stage at most. He would still need at least ten more years of arduous cultivation to reach the ninth level of the Qi Refining stage.

Therefore, he absolutely cannot continue down the normal path; he must take a shortcut.

Of course, what Zhou Tai cared about most at this moment was the changes after he broke through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining.

For cultivators in the Qi Refining stage, the breakthrough from the early to the middle stage of Qi Refining brings about significant changes.

Besides the significant increase in total magical power, the biggest change will be in the spiritual consciousness.

Early-stage Qi Refining cultivators have weak magical power and are unable to cultivate divine sense. Therefore, even when taking something out of a storage bag, they have to empty the entire bag each time, making it impossible to accurately retrieve a specific item.

However, after breaking through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining, one will develop divine sense, which is like turning on a detection radar. Internally, one can clearly see one's own body, understand the internal organs and meridians, and externally, one can see all things and even sense and touch the spiritual energy of heaven and earth.

No matter how many items are inside the storage bag, a quick scan with divine sense will instantly reveal them all, and then, combined with magical power, a specific item can be accurately extracted.

But the wondrous uses of divine consciousness go far beyond this.

With divine sense, Zhou Tai could more easily discover hidden flaws on the talisman paper and impurities in the talisman ink when drawing talismans, and he could better control the transmission of his own magical power.

At the same time, if he has other magical artifacts, after imprinting them with his divine consciousness, others will not be able to easily take them away, and it will be easier for him to control them.

Even learning new spells would be easier for him with the aid of his divine sense.

Zhou Tai closed his eyes and tried to use his divine sense to perceive everything in the room.

Suddenly, the visually dim room became colorful and vibrant.

The images that his divine sense could observe were clearer and brighter than those that his eyes could see, and the sounds he could capture were more acute than those that his ears could hear—something he had never imagined before.

Moreover, under the state of divine perception, many things that are invisible to the naked eye will be clearly revealed.

For example, small insects hiding in blind spots, dust accumulation on the top of cabinets, etc.

Zhou Tai also discovered that objects imbued with spiritual power would appear brighter and more clearly display their spiritual power attributes under divine observation.

Furthermore, divine sense also has the power to penetrate physical media, such as "seeing through" clothing and penetrating the water in a cup to see the limescale at the bottom. However, this penetration will increase the consumption of divine sense, and it will be ineffective once it encounters solid hard objects such as wood, stone, or soil.

He also quickly discovered that using his divine sense to observe the outside world was very mentally taxing, and he felt tired after only a short while.

So he stopped observing and quickly withdrew his consciousness, restoring his normal five senses.

After returning to normal, Zhou Tai carefully recalled his experience. Suddenly, something occurred to him, and he muttered to himself, "My divine sense seems to be even stronger than described in the ancient texts. It can actually extend two zhang (approximately 6.6 meters) outwards right after breaking through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining!"

Upon hearing this, a thought struck him, and he pondered to himself, "Could it be because I have lived two lives, and my soul is naturally stronger than that of ordinary people?"

He felt that this might be the truth.

After all, according to the records, apart from a very few people with special talents in spiritual sense, most cultivators can only project their spiritual sense to a little over 10 feet when they break through to the middle stage of Qi Refining. It is quite rare for someone to be able to project more than 13 feet.

Zhou Tai's divine sense had just extended to a range of over 22 feet, far exceeding that of other newly advanced Qi Refining mid-stage cultivators.

"This is indeed a great thing. If my spiritual sense is superior, I will have a greater advantage over others in the future, whether I am fighting with others or drawing talismans and learning magic."

He was secretly delighted, happy that in addition to his lightning spiritual root aptitude, he finally had another talent that surpassed ordinary people.

Of course, the benefits that Zhou Tai received from breaking through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining went far beyond what he had just gained.

The simplest and most intuitive point is that after he breaks through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining, he can learn other lightning-attribute spells.

Lightning-attribute cultivation techniques and spells are rare in the library of Spirit Beast Mountain.

Among the first-tier low-grade lightning attribute spells, only "Lightning Arc Finger" is worth learning.

However, once you reach the mid-stage of Qi Refining and can cast a mid-grade first-tier spell, you can learn several mid-grade first-tier lightning attribute spells.

The number of Thunder-Patterned Frogs in the mountain stream frog pond has increased dramatically, now exceeding one hundred. Zhou Tai's "Thunder Arc Finger" spell is no longer effective, and he urgently needs to learn more practical spells to consolidate his position.

So after resting for a short while, he immediately went to see Qi Yuntao.

Qi Yuntao looked much younger than Zhou Tai, only thirty-eight years old this year, but his cultivation level was already at the seventh level of Qi Refining.

Based on his age, he should be able to reach the ninth level of Qi Refining before the age of sixty, and may even be able to establish his foundation.

So when Zhou Tai came to him, he discovered that Zhou Tai had broken through to the fourth level of the Qi Refining stage.

Therefore, without Zhou Tai needing to speak, he preemptively offered his congratulations, his eyes filled with surprise: "Congratulations, Junior Brother Zhou, on breaking through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining! It seems your lightning spirit root aptitude is even stronger than I imagined in terms of cultivation speed!"

There was a hint of envy in his voice when he said this.

Although he was an outer disciple, he only had the aptitude of three spiritual roots. Normally, he would envy someone with two spiritual roots, let alone a rare spiritual root like the lightning spiritual root.

However, this feeling of envy only surfaced in his heart for a moment before he suppressed it.

Because he knew very well that even if Zhou Tai had the talent of a lightning spiritual root, his future prospects were far inferior to his. At least he would definitely have a chance to try to establish his foundation, while Zhou Tai would have virtually no chance.

If that's the case, why should he envy Zhou Tai?

Zhou Tai dared not show any arrogance in front of him. Upon hearing this, he immediately gave a wry smile and said, "Senior Brother Qi, you flatter me. I was able to break through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining so quickly thanks to the help of elixirs. I'm afraid such an opportunity will be hard to come by again!"

Hearing Zhou Tai's words, Qi Yuntao nodded slightly and said, "Pills are good things, but given your situation, Junior Brother Zhou, it will indeed be quite difficult to obtain pills that can improve your cultivation in the future."

He often helped Zhou Tai buy supplies, so he was well aware of how bad Zhou Tai's financial situation was and didn't think Zhou Tai would be able to afford the elixir in the future.

However, since Zhou Tai has just broken through to a higher level of cultivation today, there's no need to bring up those unpleasant things.

Therefore, after looking at Zhou Tai for a moment and thinking about it, he roughly understood Zhou Tai's purpose.

He immediately smiled slightly and said, "Junior Brother Zhou, I'm afraid you have other purposes for coming here today besides bringing good news."

"Haha, I knew nothing could be hidden from Senior Brother Qi."

Zhou Tai laughed heartily without the slightest embarrassment and immediately replied, "To be honest, Senior Brother Qi, I've now broken through to the mid-stage of Qi Refining, which qualifies me to cultivate mid-grade first-tier lightning attribute spells. However, the number of lightning-patterned frogs in the mountain stream frog pond is increasing, and their strength is growing stronger. If I don't provide them with even stronger lightning power, they'll probably eat me sooner or later!"

Qi Yuntao knew, of course, that his last words were a joke, but he also understood that he was indeed under a lot of pressure. So he quickly nodded and replied, "Junior Brother Zhou, I understand what you mean. I will report this to Uncle Yang immediately. Go back and wait for my news."

"In that case, I thank Senior Brother Qi in advance."

Zhou Tai quickly bowed to express his gratitude and went back to wait for news, satisfied.

Sure enough, just one day later, Qi Yuntao personally delivered a spellbook to Zhou Tai.

The writing on this spellbook is still very fresh, obviously it was recently copied. It records three first-tier mid-grade lightning attribute spell cultivation methods.

These three lightning-attribute spells are named "Lightning Strike," "Lightning Serpent Dance," and "Lightning Bolt."

Without a doubt, all three spells are offensive spells with maximum output.

This is also a characteristic of lightning-attribute spells; among the spells available during the Qi Refining stage, it's difficult to find a single lightning-attribute defensive spell.

After reading through the information on the three spells, Zhou Tai understood which one he should learn first.

From the perspective of feeding Thunderfrogs and from the perspective of the difficulty of spell training, "Thunder Serpent Dance" is the most suitable.

If he could learn this spell, he could satisfy the needs of multiple Thunderfrogs with a single cast, and it wouldn't be easy to harm them.

It's important to know that the Thunderfrog's talent for absorbing lightning also has an upper limit. Powerful spells like "Lightning Bolt" are not suitable for directly feeding the Thunderfrog.

After acquiring the new spell, Zhou Tai spent most of his free time learning it, and even the number of times he drew talismans was greatly reduced.

The main reason is that he doesn't have many talismans left, so he doesn't dare to use them easily.