Why did you provoke that old man? He's a reincarnation of a deity!

"May I ask if the elderly gentleman is cultivating here?" the thin Taoist priest asked first.

"Just morning exercise," Xiao Nian replied casually.

"Have you been doing morning exercises on the top of Phoenix Mountain these past few days?" The girl in red looked up at Xiao Nian, her tone quite impolite.

Xiao Nian glanced at them impatiently: "Yes. Do you have something to say? Or is this mountain yours? And you want to charge an entrance fee?"

"How dare you!" The burly man with the iron tower stepped forward abruptly and shouted, "Do you know who's standing in front of you?"

"Hmph, I have no interest in knowing who you are," Xiao Nian, who had long held a high position, replied arrogantly, unfazed by any verbal threats.

"You old geezer, you're really tired of living." The burly man with the iron tower took a few steps forward, about to teach Xiao Nian a lesson.

"Xiao Fei, don't be rude. How have I always taught you to respect the elderly and care for the young?" the old man in the Tai Chi uniform said gently.

"Yes." The towering man named Xiaofei retreated timidly.

"Would you mind if we looked at the scenery here?" the man in the tai chi uniform asked, clasping his hands in a fist salute.

"It's alright, do as you please." At this crucial moment of entering the third stage of Qi Refining and the Aperture Opening Realm, Xiao Nian saw that the four people had no ill intentions, so she ignored them and continued to cultivate with her eyes closed.

"Grandpa, he's taking advantage of his age," the woman in the red martial arts uniform said. "Should we teach him a lesson?"

"Zixuan, you must not be rude."

Under the reprimand of the old man in the Tai Chi robe, the four ignored Xiao Nian, who was sitting cross-legged, and followed the thin Taoist priest toward the abandoned Taoist temple.

After the four left, Xiao Nian quickly entered a state of cultivation again. As the "Zhou Tian Xing Dou Refining Immortal Technique" was activated, a rich spiritual energy appeared around him once more.

Xiao Nian took the final step in his attack.

"boom."

Xiao Nian felt a loud bang coming from inside his body, and all the meridians in his body were suddenly connected!

The dantian and dantian suddenly opened! The spiritual energy, like a river that had found its home, surged in from the twelve regular meridians, gathered in the dantian to form a small vortex, and then flowed through the eight extraordinary meridians throughout the body, forming a perfect closed loop.

Enlightenment Realm, complete.

Xiao Nian opened her eyes, a glint of light flashing in them.

Xiao Nian has reached the third stage of the Enlightenment Realm and is at the peak of his skill. His strength is comparable to that of a first-class master in the Martial Arts Meridian Opening Realm.

In the entire Jiangbei Province, there are no more than twenty experts at the Tongmai Realm. And he only took a month.

"Same as expected." Xiao Nian nodded in satisfaction and looked up at the night sky.

The sky was already beginning to lighten, and the morning star was still shining with its cool, clear light.

For the past thirty days, he has been using the Morning Star as his main star, absorbing its stellar power.

The morning star, also known as Venus, possesses a cool and sharp spiritual energy, suitable for both attack and defense. Cultivators of this star revere warfare.

Opening the meridians is just the beginning; the road ahead is long.

After the Qi Refining stage comes the Foundation Establishment stage, and after that comes the Golden Core, Purple Mansion, and so on. In this life, with the [Zhou Tian Xing Dou Refining Immortal Technique] and a thousand years of experience and memories, he can progress faster and more steadily thanks to his talent.

Inside the Taoist temple.

"Grandpa, that old man is so rude, why don't you teach him a lesson?" the woman named Zixuan asked. "If I remember correctly, he was my literature and history teacher a few years ago. He called himself Master Meng, and he was a notorious swindler who often cheated students out of money to buy alcohol."

"Oh? Really? Go on." The old man and the thin Taoist priest stopped in disbelief and looked at Zixuan at the same time.

Zixuan was taken aback. Why would Grandpa and Master Zhang be interested in a swindler today?

"He is the oldest instructor at our Jiangbei Martial Arts Academy. It is said that he was hired because he was cheap and because he used to be a candidate for the Hanlin Academy. However, this man tricked one class after another into buying him wine under various pretexts. The Martial Arts Academy is so difficult to get into. Every naive student who just entered thought that someone his age who was still in the academy must be a reclusive master. In the end, he had no martial arts foundation at all and was fooled by one class after another."

After hearing these vile descriptions, the old man couldn't help but sigh:

"Truth and falsehood intertwine, truth and falsehood are blurred; when truth is taken for falsehood, falsehood for truth—he is truly a master!"

This was the first time such an evaluation had come from an elderly person, and the person in question was an eighty-year-old man who was nearing death.

"Huh?" Zixuan couldn't believe her ears. She had clearly said that the old man was despicable, so how did he become a great man in her grandfather's eyes?

Zixuan glanced at the thin Taoist priest for help, her eyes asking: "Grandpa, have you been getting treatment lately and it's made you senile?"

"Indeed, in all my years of cultivation, I have never seen such a dense gathering of spiritual energy. When I passed by just now, I could sense a flow of spiritual light around him. That's not some kind of cultivation exercise; this is the true drawing of energy into the body!" The lean Taoist nodded and said.

On Blue Star, whether it's magic or immortal cultivation, one must first temper their own body. At the very least, one must reach the Opening Meridian Realm before switching to immortal cultivation or magic, or continuing to cultivate martial arts.

The practice of drawing qi into the body is the most traditional way for cultivators to skip martial arts training and directly cultivate immortality. However, it has been largely lost on Blue Star, where spiritual energy is scarce and cultivation methods are lacking.

"Huh?" The thin Taoist priest suddenly exclaimed in surprise.

"You sensed it too?" the old man said calmly.

The thin Taoist priest nodded.

"What's wrong, Grandpa?" Zixuan asked curiously.

"The spiritual energy here flowed outwards in an instant."

"That old man is definitely no ordinary person. Just now, from a distance, my compass was pointing to the Taoist temple, which means that the Taoist temple is the place with the most spiritual energy. After entering the Taoist temple, I realized that the compass was actually pointing to the old man."

"If I'm not mistaken, he should be a cultivator, and the inheritance he carries is from my ancestor's generation," the thin Taoist said, frowning.

"Cultivators, lineage from their ancestors?" The old man was even more incredulous.

"Cultivators?" Zixuan didn't quite understand and snorted coldly. "Hmph, you always say how powerful cultivators are, I'm going to go and see for myself today."

"Alright, let's go out and pay our respects to the master." Seeing her granddaughter preparing to leave, the old woman lovingly followed. "When you see the master, you must not be rude. This is an important matter that we cannot meet on ordinary days."

"You're the only one who's afraid of him." Hearing the old man say this, Xiao Xuan felt even more indignant. This person was clearly a fraud, yet she was expected to treat him politely.

She was the pride of her family from a young age. His family was one of the most prominent families in the Great Xia Dynasty, having produced the Governor-General of Liangjiang and a famous minister who helped restore the dynasty. Today, his family has students and friends all over the military and political circles.

As the old man's most beloved granddaughter, she was pampered and spoiled since childhood. She had never been ignored like this before.

More importantly, she stepped into the realms of martial arts and magic at the age of eighteen. In martial arts, she had already reached the stage of opening the meridians, making her a standout among her peers; in magic, she was at the apprentice level, able to condense water and fire elements and cast simple spells. Looking across the entire Jiangbei Province, there were very few people like her who had achieved success in dual cultivation at such a young age.

She had never seen a real master of cultivation, nor did she believe in the existence of any so-called "immortals".

To her, those talk of Taoist priests, Buddhist monks, and living Buddhas were nothing but mystification. She only knew that true skill lay in brute force, that powerful magic was the ultimate truth, and that physical exorcism was the most practical method.

When she heard her grandfather and Master Zhang praising that fraudulent instructor so highly, it felt like a thorn was stuck in her heart.

Because this swindler not only cheated others, but also her...

What she hates most is being lied to!