197: Broken Mirror Yuanying

Just as the words fell, Li Dong didn't even have time to glance at the Female Shaman again before his body reacted on its own.

It wasn't that he wanted to achieve a Breakthrough.

It was that call from the end of the Void Realm, like an invisible hand, roughly gripping the Golden Core in his Dantian, and then... giving it a gentle squeeze.

"Crack."

A crisp sound, so faint that only he could hear it, emanated from the deepest part of his body.

The Female Shaman and the nomads behind her only saw Li Dong's expression suddenly freeze, as if he had been choked by something. Immediately after, an indescribably terrifying Aura exploded from within him!

It was not Spiritual Qi, nor was it divinity, but a pure "emptiness" that threatened to swallow everything around it.

The wind and snow that had just ceased in the glacial rift seemed to have been hit with a rewind button at this moment, surging back in an even more violent manner, yet strangely stalling three feet outside his body, forming a rotating, silent wall of wind.

"Ugh..."

A muffled grunt escaped Li Dong's throat.

It shattered.

That Golden Core, which he had painstakingly polished, repaired, and even used like a power bank, shattered into billions of specks of dust without any warning.

However, the anticipated loss of all his cultivation did not come. Instead, it was replaced by an unprecedented feeling of relief. It was as if a thousand-pound burden had been lifted, and his entire Soul felt light.

Those fragments of the Golden Core did not dissipate; instead, under the guidance of that power of "emptiness," they began to re-condense in a profound trajectory.

No longer a solid pill, but a... little person?

A miniature version of "him," identical to Li Dong's features, translucent, and carved like black crystal, sat cross-legged in the center of his Dantian.

Nascent Soul.

It was done.

The moment the Nascent Soul took form, the world before Li Dong's eyes changed completely.

He could "see" the Spiritual Qi flowing in the air, could "hear" the joyful song of the cold marrow deep within the earth veins recovering its vitality, and could even "smell" the "scent" of longing belonging to the "core" in the distant Void Realm.

It was no longer a flat map, but a real Universe, three-dimensional and filled with dangerous Void Realm turbulence and countless stars. There was an unimaginable distance between him and that "core," yet that call was as clear as a whisper in his ear.

What surprised him even more was that as the Nascent Soul condensed, his [Perfect Dao Body] also began to undergo mutations.

Layers of extremely faint runes, seemingly composed of pure darkness, emerged from beneath his skin, slowly flowing like living creatures. They did not emit any light, yet they were actively pulling in the imperceptible stray energy of the Void Realm from the surrounding space, incorporating it into his body.

Automatic Cultivation? And the twenty-four-hour uninterrupted kind?

This was a good deal.

Just as Li Dong was experiencing this natural promotion, deep within his Sea of Consciousness, the long-quiet "black crystal stone" and "ancient stone slab" suddenly began to vibrate violently as if they had gone mad.

"Hum—!"

A burst of Void Realm energy, purer and more solid than any time before, erupted from between the two, directly forming a blurry humanoid projection in the center of Li Dong's Sea of Consciousness.

The projection had no facial features, no details, just a mass of distorted light and shadow, yet it exuded a magnificent, suffocating will that was of the same origin as that "Void Realm core."

It did not attack; it just quietly "watched" Li Dong's newly born Nascent Soul.

Immediately after, a torrent of consciousness, clearer and more complex than before, washed over Li Dong's mind.

"Fusion... Unity..."

Accompanied by this thought was a vast scene—that "Void Realm core," like a giant eye, rotating slowly in the endless darkness; with every rotation, it seemed as if a Universe was born and destroyed.

"Get out! Get away!"

A shrill screech, not sounding like a human voice, suddenly exploded from between Li Dong's eyebrows.

The mark branded by the God Lord, the moment it touched the Aura of the Void Realm projection, acted as if it had seen a ghost, twisting and struggling violently, even trying to peel itself off Li Dong's skin to run away.

It was afraid.

It was that absolute fear originating from the level of life itself.

"Want to run?" With a thought from Li Dong, the new Void Realm runes on his [Perfect Dao Body] lit up slightly, and an invisible force of suppression pressed that mark back down firmly.

"Stay put."

He now looked at this mark as if he were looking at a shivering little insect stuck in a spider web.

Interesting.

The Void Realm projection seemed to have no interest in this little interlude; it lingered in Li Dong's Sea of Consciousness for a moment, as if confirming something. Immediately after, it turned into a stream of light and merged into Li Dong's Nascent Soul.

A stream of information appeared abruptly in Li Dong's mind.

It was not a complete Cultivation Technique, but more like a... manual? A vague guide on how to perform "Void Realm Fusion" more efficiently.

It was like a navigation map gifted by the System for a beginner.

"There's such a good thing?"

Before Li Dong could savor this "big gift package," the "divinity core" at his waist, which had fused with the three-colored divine light, also joined in the excitement.

It emitted a strong resonance, and the earth-yellow, sea-blue, and ice-white Law runes inside flashed frantically, like a computer with overclocked computing power, trying desperately to analyze the slight energy that had escaped from the Void Realm projection just now.

But obviously, the "data" this time was too high-end; it was struggling immensely to analyze it.

Li Dong slowly opened his eyes and let out a long breath of turbid air.

This breath was pitch black like ink; it made no sound when it hit the ground, but it corroded a bottomless small hole into the ground.

He looked down at his hands; the profound runes on his skin had faded, but the feeling of being integrated with the entire Void Realm was clearer than ever before.

He understood.

From the capital to Qingzhou, and then to the South Sea and Northern Territory, what he had faced were merely forces contaminated and downgraded by the "God Lord." Those agents were, at best, administrators of local servers.

And now, the appearance of that Void Realm projection, that guy calling itself the "core," was equivalent to directly connecting him, this "cleaner," to the head office's intranet.

What he would face would no longer be these diluted divinity forces, but the higher-dimensional, purest Void Realm power.

The power System needed an upgrade.

Everything before was just a trial in the beginner village.

The real game was just beginning now.

Li Dong stood up and looked up at the sky, his gaze seeming to pierce through the clouds and see that boundless dark Universe.

"Let's go." He waved his hand at the Female Shaman, who was already dumbfounded behind him, as if saying goodbye, or perhaps as if speaking to himself.

"It's time to go meet... our real boss."