115: Chapter 115: Waking up to find no one beside him, but discovering his cultivation level has surged again.

After a night of intense battle, the sun was high in the sky the next day before Xu Ruyu was jolted awake by a sharp, aching pain from his waist.

He struggled to open his eyes; in his field of vision were the ceiling beams of the hall, painted with complex cloud patterns. Sunlight slanted through the gaps in the high window lattices, casting several hazy shadows across the timber.

He was lying on the jade bed with brocade covers in the Main Hall.

This wasn't the Disciple's bunk in the Side Hall where he had slept for over a month, but the bed of his Revered Master, Xiao Nianyin.

Realizing this, the memories of last night's indulgent and burning passion surged back into his mind like a tidal wave—bodies intertwined in the darkness, suppressed gasps, scalding skin, and that slightly raspy, melting voice of hers when she called him 'Ruyu' for the first time, along with that question that struck the bottom of his heart: 'Do you not find me repulsive?'...

Xu Ruyu's cheeks instantly turned burning hot, and his heartbeat suddenly lost its rhythm.

He abruptly propped himself up to sit, but the intense soreness in his waist made him let out a muffled groan, nearly causing him to fall back down.

"Hiss..."

He sucked in a cold breath, gritting his teeth as he supported his waist, slowly shifting until he was sitting steadily.

Looking down, he was haphazardly draped in a moon-white gauze inner robe—clearly a woman's style and a size too small. The lapels hung open loosely, revealing several faint red marks on his chest that had yet to fade.

The state of his body beneath the brocade covers was even more...

Xu Ruyu's ears turned bright red, and he didn't dare think about it further.

He looked around.

Inside the vast sleeping quarters, he was the only person; there was no one else.

The entire chamber was permeated with a suffocating sense of loneliness.

"Revered Master?"

Xu Ruyu called out tentatively.

No one responded.

He raised his voice and called several more times, but there was still no response.

Xu Ruyu's heart sank bit by bit.

Had Revered Master left? Or was it because of what happened last night...

Thinking of this, everything that happened last night—the warmth of skin touching skin, those suppressed low moans, her arms actively wrapping around his neck, the scalding heat in the darkness that almost drowned him—all surfaced clearly in his mind one by one.

Could it have been a dream?

No.

The soreness in his body and the lingering, cool fragrance of her scent in the air all proved that last night had truly happened.

So, has Revered Master... restored her cultivation?

Xu Ruyu forced himself to calm down, sat cross-legged, and delved into internal visualization.

Within his Dantian, the Taixu True Qi circulated slowly, more refined and solid than before.

But when he investigated closely, his pupils suddenly constricted—

The Saint Realm Power belonging to Xiao Nianyin, which had been entrenched deep in his Dantian, was gone.

Xu Ruyu froze for a moment, and then a complex sense of relief flooded his heart.

It worked.

Last night he had exhausted his efforts to actively transfer it back; that power had truly been returned to his Revered Master.

This meant Revered Master should have restored her cultivation, or at least a large part of it. Otherwise, that power inside his body couldn't have vanished so cleanly.

Revered Master has finally survived.

She would no longer age, weaken, and eventually face death day by day due to the loss of her vitality.

This discovery made Xu Ruyu let out a long sigh of relief, the heavy stone that had been pressing on his chest for so long finally hitting the ground.

However, just as he was preparing to exit the state of internal visualization, a detail he had overlooked suddenly crashed into his perception.

Wait—

His Qi Sea... something was wrong.

Xu Ruyu focused his attention to examine it closely.

The vortex formed by the Taixu True Qi was still stable, and the silver-white speck at the core was brighter and more solid than ever, emitting a deep, restrained glow.

But at the edge of the Qi Sea...

A nine-layered ring structure had actually emerged clearly!

From the inside out, the colors went from dark to light: silver-white, moon-white, pale green, light gray, grayish-white... progressing layer by layer, with each layer connected by fine spiritual energy channels, forming a precise and complex whole.

And beyond the ninth layer, there were faintly four more illusory and blurred outlines, appearing as if they were there and yet not.

Xu Ruyu was dumbstruck.

Qi Refining... Level 9?!

Nine levels!!!

The Cultivation World recognized only four levels in the Qi Refinement Stage—Initial Qi Perception, True Qi Strands, True Qi Stream, and True Qi Mist. Upon reaching Perfection in the fourth level, one could attempt Foundation Establishment.

But his current Qi Sea actually had nine levels?!

This completely exceeded the existing system of Realms!

After the shock passed, Xu Ruyu forced himself to be calm and carefully sense these nine layers of the Qi Sea.

The first to fourth layers basically matched the records in the scriptures.

But starting from the fifth layer, a strange deviation appeared—the degree of True Qi condensation far exceeded the Perfection of the fourth level, almost reaching the standard of Early Stage Foundation Establishment, yet the Qi Sea did not expand; instead, it contracted and solidified inward.

From the sixth to the ninth layer, this trend of "inward solidification" became increasingly obvious.

Especially the ninth layer; the Qi Sea had contracted to the size of a fist, and the Taixu True Qi within was as condensed as liquid mercury, heavy and carrying a heart-palpitating sense of mass.

Xu Ruyu even had an intuition—if he were to release all the True Qi from this ninth layer, its power would likely be no less than a full-strength strike from a Mid-stage Foundation Establishment Cultivator!

This was completely unlike what the Qi Refinement Stage should be.

Xu Ruyu suddenly remembered those obscure scriptures he had seen in the Hall of Power Transmission—fragmented records about "Ancient Qi Refiners," "Nine Rotations of the Qi Sea," and "Ultimate Foundation Establishment."

Could it be... that he had unintentionally stepped onto that long-lost path of the Ancient Cultivator?

A Heaven-Defying path that tempers True Qi to the extreme during the Qi Refining stage to lay down a supreme foundation for the Dao?

His heartbeat couldn't help but quicken.

If this were truly the case, then this "Qi Refining Level 9" was not a freak occurrence, but... a colossal Opportunity!

Just as his heart was surging with emotion, deep within the Qi Sea, next to that silver-white speck, a wisp of ice-blue aura as thin as a hair caught his attention.