I died young at the start, but I'm reincarnated with unlimited skill points!

Cloud City is located on the edge of the Central Region.

The city covers a vast area, and its walls are made entirely of hard black iron stone, reaching a height of hundreds of feet.

Today, Cloud City is witnessing a grand spectacle unseen for centuries.

Three hundred enormous warships were anchored in the sky.

These warships were thousands of feet long from bow to stern, and their entire bodies were made of dark gold spirit ore, with intricate defensive array patterns engraved on their hulls.

The huge sails fluttered in the airflow, and in the center of each sail were two large characters embroidered in gold thread.

Taixu.

This is the warship fleet of the Taixu Immortal Palace.

The streets of Cloud City were now completely filled with a dense crowd.

The crowd was dense and jostling.

The inns and restaurants lining both sides of the street were already full, and even the eaves of the roadside houses were crowded with monks sitting on the ground.

Most of these cultivators wore coarse linen clothes and emanated low-level magical energy fluctuations, belonging to the group of rogue cultivators struggling at the bottom of the cultivation world.

They came from all corners of the world, holding children of all ages in their hands and arms.

The children stared wide-eyed at the crowded people around them and the warships floating in the sky.

The faces of the independent cultivators were filled with anticipation.

A middle-aged man in a gray robe held the hand of a seven-year-old boy and greeted a tall, thin monk next to him.

The tall, thin cultivator nodded, his eyes filled with longing.

"Of course we'll come. The Taixu Immortal Palace is the leading sect in the Central Region, and they usually don't accept the descendants of rogue cultivators like us who have no background."

"This time, the Grand Ancestor Tai Lingzi personally issued a decree, opening the mountain gates wide, regardless of background, only looking at spiritual roots and aptitude. Such an extraordinary opportunity is worth the journey, no matter how far."

The middle-aged man in the gray robe repeatedly agreed, his tone respectful.

"Ancestor Tai Lingzi is benevolent. Major sects always value the bloodline of aristocratic families when recruiting disciples, but Ancestor Tai Lingzi is willing to give us, the descendants of lowly rogue cultivators, a chance to defy fate."

"As long as the child is selected and enters the Taixu Immortal Palace, they will obtain high-level cultivation techniques and abundant spirit stones and pills, and from then on, they will rise to great heights."

The surrounding rogue cultivators, hearing the conversation between the two, all chimed in with their own opinions.

"Ancestor Tai Lingzi has a broad mind and is truly a role model for our cultivation world."

"I heard that anyone selected for the Immortal Palace this time, even an outer disciple, will receive ten mid-grade spirit stones every month. That's more than what we rogue cultivators earn in a year of hard work."

"If my son can be chosen by the ancestor, I will die content."

Everyone spoke at once, their words filled with gratitude towards the Taixu Immortal Palace and Tai Lingzi.

Su Yu stood on a street corner not far from the group of rogue cultivators.

He listened quietly to these words of praise.

A cold smile curled up at the corners of his mouth.

He sneered inwardly.

This group of people had no idea about the truth.

Su Yu devoured the soul of the merged old ghost Cang Ming in the Myriad Realms Secret Realm and obtained tens of thousands of years of Cang Ming's memories and information.

He knew the true purpose of the "Grand Ceremony of Immortal Seedlings" held by the Taixu Immortal Palace.

Tai Lingzi had lived for 260,000 years, and his early Mahayana cultivation was no longer able to suppress the fifth Heavenly Tribulation that was about to erupt within him.

Tai Lingzi's lifespan is about to run out, and both his physical body and primordial spirit are decaying.

In order to prolong his life, Tai Lingzi needs a special material to refine the elixir of longevity.

This material refers to children with special physical constitutions and mutated spiritual roots.

Taixu Immortal Palace, under the guise of "opening its gates wide and disregarding background," lured all sorts of rogue cultivators and low-level cultivators from all over the world to this place.

Once a child is found to have the required spiritual root, they will be given the title of "Peerless Immortal Seed" and admitted to the Immortal Palace.

Afterwards, these children will be sent directly to Tai Lingzi's secret alchemy room.

They would be thrown alive into a high-temperature alchemy furnace.

The flesh, bone marrow, spiritual roots, and budding souls of children will be refined in the furnace into blood-stained pills.

It was given to Tai Lingzi to swallow and prolong his life.

The independent cultivators thought this was a path to heaven, and they all sent their own flesh and blood over.

Little did they know, what they delivered was merely a handful of dregs from Tai Lingzi's medicine furnace.

Su Yu looked at the hopeful faces around him.

He did not step forward to expose the scam.

In the cultivation world, the strong prey on the weak. Lower-level cultivators, lacking access to the truth, naturally become prey on the chopping block of higher-ups.

He has his own purpose in coming here today.

He wanted to naturally enter the core of the Taixu Immortal Palace.

Su Yu turned around and walked towards a secluded alleyway.

The alley was piled with miscellaneous items, emitting a damp smell.

Nobody passes by here.

Su Yu stopped and began to prepare for the upcoming test.

His current cultivation level is at the Great Perfection of Foundation Establishment, and he possesses an unconventional Great Dao Immortal Foundation and a Chaotic Flawless Dao Body.

If they were to test him directly, the testing formation of the Taixu Immortal Palace would be unable to read his true state.

He needs to forge an identity that perfectly matches Tai Lingzi's requirements for a "divine seedling".

Su Yu closed his eyes and sank his mind into his sea of ​​consciousness.

Above the sea of ​​consciousness, the purple-gold Primordial Dao Fruit slowly rotated.

A mysterious power coursed through his body along his meridians.

Using the power of the Primordial Dao Fruit, Su Yu began to modify the aura he displayed.

He locked the Great Dao Immortal Foundation and the Chaos True Essence in the deepest part of the inner universe.

He reconstructed a false circulation of magical power and the appearance of spiritual roots on the meridians and dantian of the body.

Lightning and fire elemental energy intertwined in his meridians.

A mutated, top-grade spiritual root with both lightning and fire elements.

Thunder represents the destructive power and rebirth of heavenly tribulations, while flames represent the extreme high temperature that refines all things.

The mutated spiritual root, combining these two attributes, is the perfect catalyst for refining top-tier longevity elixirs.

Tai Lingzi needs to resist the calamity of the decline of heaven and man, and the dual-elemental top-grade spiritual roots of thunder and fire have a fatal attraction for him.

As long as such a spiritual root is demonstrated on the test pillar, the recruitment steward of the Taixu Immortal Palace will definitely list him as a top-level key immortal seedling immediately.

The gas mechanism forgery is complete.

Su Yu opened her eyes and looked down at her attire.

He was wearing a small blue Taoist robe.

The fabric was intact and the color was clean; these were clothes prepared by the Su family of Qianlong.

Such neat attire is not in line with the image of a lonely and helpless orphaned cultivator.

Su Yu reached out and grabbed the hem of the blue Taoist robe.

He tore it open with force.

"Sizzle."

The hem of the Taoist robe was torn open with a long slit, and strips of cloth hung down to the sides of the legs.

He continued to tear at the sleeves and collar, turning the once intact Taoist robe into tattered pieces.

Then, he squatted down.

There was a pool of black water and mud in the corner of the alley.

Su Yu stretched out her fair hands and grabbed a handful of wet mud.

He smeared mud on his face.

The mud and water covered his originally exquisitely sculpted face.

He rubbed the remaining dirt on his hands, neck, and clothes, leaving large stains.

He reached up and scratched his head a few times, turning his neat hair into a messy bird's nest, with a few strands of muddy hair hanging down and covering half of his forehead.

He now looks exactly like a homeless beggar who is starving and cold.

The disguise is complete.

Su Yu walked out of the alley and headed towards the central square of Cloud City.

The central square covers a vast area, with the ground paved with smooth bluestone slabs.

In the center of the square, fifty white jade testing pillars, each ten feet tall, stand in neat rows.

The surface of the test pillar is engraved with array patterns used to sense the attributes and grades of spiritual roots.

Behind each test pillar sat two Foundation Establishment stage deacons dressed in the robes of the Taixu Immortal Palace.

Fifty long queues had already formed in the square.

Hundreds of thousands of independent monks and their children moved slowly through the procession.

Su Yu arrived at the end of the leftmost line.

He lowered his head, crossed his arms, and hunched his shoulders.

He pretended to be timid and fearful of his surroundings.

He stood quietly behind an elderly man dressed in worn-out gray clothes.

Time passed slowly.

The sun was high in the sky.

The team moved forward.

The test column lit up with various colors of light from time to time.

Most of the light was very dim, indicating that the spiritual root was of inferior quality or that there was no spiritual root at all.

The deacon in charge of the test waved his hand expressionlessly, dismissing the children.

Occasionally, a testing pillar would light up brightly, and the deacon would nod in satisfaction, instructing the disciple beside him to lead the child to the designated area at the back.

Su Yu followed the group forward; there were still dozens of people to go before reaching the testing pillar.

A commotion arose from the back of the group.

"Get out of the way, don't block the way."

Several young men from noble families, dressed in magnificent brocade robes, walked over, surrounded by more than a dozen guards.

They shouted at the untrained monks who were queuing up.

These young men from prominent families came from some cultivation families in the Central Region, and they also wanted to join the Taixu Immortal Palace.

The guards walked in front, roughly pushing the rogue cultivators in line to both sides.

The independent cultivators dared not speak out in anger, and all pulled their children away to avoid the danger.

A little girl with pigtails was pushed by a guard, fell on the bluestone slab, and started crying loudly.

Her father quickly knelt down, covered the girl's mouth, and pulled her to the back of the crowd.

The scions of prominent families swaggered into the procession.

The leader was a slightly chubby boy of eleven or twelve, with a jade pendant inlaid with gemstones hanging from his waist.

He glanced at Su Yu standing in front of him.

Su Yu's face was covered in mud, his clothes were tattered, and he smelled of mud.

The slightly chubby boy covered his nose, showing a look of disgust.

"Where did this little beggar come from? He stinks so badly. Guards, take him away."

A burly guard strode forward and reached out to grab Su Yu's shoulder.

Su Yu sensed the guard's movements.

He relaxed his muscles, letting the guard's hands push against him.

He fell to the side, landing hard on his backside, following the guard's momentum.

Su Yu covered his head with his hands, cowered on the ground, let out a cry of surprise, and trembled slightly.

He portrayed a frightened ordinary child flawlessly.

The guard snorted coldly.

The slightly chubby boy, along with a few companions, walked directly in front of Su Yu and cut in line.

"It's true that any kind of trash wants to enter the Taixu Immortal Palace. They don't even know if they're worthy."

The slightly chubby boy patted his brocade robe and mocked without turning his head.

Su Yu slowly got up from the ground.

He dusted off his clothes, rejoined the line, and stood behind the slightly chubby boy.

He lowered his head, his disheveled hair obscuring his eyes.

His expression remained calm and composed.

He ignored the shoving and insults from these scions of wealthy families.

His target was that white jade test column.

The procession continued forward.

Half an hour later, the slightly chubby boy walked to the white jade testing pillar.

He straightened his clothes and confidently placed his palm on the crystal of the testing pillar.

The array pattern on the test column lit up.

A bright yellow light and a green light rose from the base of the pillar and stopped in the middle of the pillar.

The deacon in charge of the test glanced at the light emanating from the pillar.

"Mid-grade dual-elemental spiritual root in earth and wood, qualified. Go stand on the right."

The slightly chubby boy smiled smugly and turned to walk towards the qualified area on the right.

Several other scions of prominent families who were behind him also stepped forward to take the test.

Most of them had mid-grade spiritual roots, but one of them tested positive for a high-grade fire-type spiritual root, which earned him a few words of praise from the steward.

After the tests for the scions of noble families were completed, it was finally Su Yu's turn.

Su Yu walked forward with small, quick steps.

He stood beneath a towering white jade testing pillar, ten feet high.

His body appeared very small in front of the huge pillar.

The steward sitting behind the desk glanced at Su Yu.

Seeing Su Yu's face covered in mud and his clothes in tatters, the deacon frowned slightly.

"Put your hands on it and concentrate."

The deacon gave the instructions in a cold tone.

Su Yu timidly stretched out her dirty right hand and placed it on the cool crystal surface.

His palm had just touched the crystal.

The Primordial Dao Fruit in the sea of ​​consciousness trembled slightly.

Su Yu released the faked lightning and fire dual-element aura from his meridians.

The array patterns inside the white jade testing pillar were instantly activated by this aura.

"boom!"

A deep rumble came from inside the test column.

Immediately afterwards, two beams of light shot straight up from the base of the pillar at an extremely fierce speed.

A blinding purple-gold light, representing the lightning attribute.

One of them was a blazing crimson light, representing the fire element.

The two beams of light intertwined and broke through the markings in the middle and upper sections of the test column.

The light shot forward and crashed violently into the tip of the crystal at the very top of the test column.

A blinding purple-red light burst forth from the top of the testing column, instantly illuminating the entire square.

A violent surge of spiritual energy emanated from the testing pillar and spread outwards.

The deacon sitting behind the desk suddenly stood up, knocking his chair to the ground.

He stared wide-eyed at the radiant test pillar.

"Dual element of lightning and fire...light surges upwards..."

The deacon's voice trembled, and his face flushed red.

"Mutated...mutated top-grade dual-elemental spiritual root of lightning and fire!"

The deacon roared in disbelief.

The loud shout echoed clearly across the silent square.

The other deacons who were maintaining order all turned their heads to look at the test pillar that was emitting a strong light.

The hundreds of thousands of independent cultivators queuing in the square also stopped what they were doing and focused their attention on the thin figure wearing tattered blue clothes.