The Peerless Beauty Stuck With Me

Yan Wei and Zhou Boxiong did not linger any longer and soon left the Ziyuan Villa.

As for Tang Rao, he sat quietly on the bed with his legs crossed.

Now that the Spiritual Energy in his Dantian was completely overflowing, he was ready to step into the Qi Gathering Phase.

One hundred units of Spiritual Energy are needed to begin Qi Gathering, and Tang Rao already has over five thousand units within his abdomen, which is certainly terrifying.

Gathering Qi could be said to be easy, easy to an unsurpassable degree; or it could be said to be difficult, so difficult that Tang Rao had no clue whatsoever.

Gathering Qi with one hundred units of Spiritual Energy was clear to Tang Rao; however, from five thousand units, Tang Rao had absolutely no experience.

Of course, he could still use one hundred units of Spiritual Energy for the initial Qi Gathering and use the remaining energy to directly enter the later stages of Qi Gathering.

But doing so would be incredibly foolish.

Since more than five thousand units of Spiritual Energy had accumulated within the Dantian, naturally, they should all be utilized for Gathering Qi.

It should be understood that this is a transformation of the Dantian.

The extent of the transformation depends on fate and the methods used.

Gathering Qi with one hundred units is the most common method; Gathering Qi with an overflowing Dantian should be considered the most magnificent method.

"It's a pity that when I was in the Seventy-two Domains, I didn't capture a genius who had overflowed their Dantian and asked them for guidance," Tang Rao muttered to himself.

In the Seventy-two Domains, although individuals who gathered Qi with an overflowing Dantian were extremely rare, with Tang Rao's influence, finding one was still possible.

"Forget it, anyway, this is the only way. I refuse to believe that others can succeed, and I, Tang Laohei, cannot!" Tang Rao gritted his teeth. Most of those who had gathered Qi with an overflowing Dantian lacked the experience of their predecessors, yet hadn't they succeeded all the same?

Since others could succeed, so could Tang Rao.

"Spiritual Energy swirls and gathers without dispersal; with the Spirit Root as the origin, the Dantian as the expansion; the mind merges, the spiritual platform unifies," Tang Rao murmured the Qi Gathering mnemonic.

This was the most fundamental mnemonic for entering the Qi Gathering Phase.

There was nothing esoteric or obscure about it; basically, any person could understand these words.

Of course, the depth of one's understanding relies on individual insight.

For Tang Rao, who had previously touched upon the path of immortality in his past life, such rudimentary principles like the Qi Gathering mnemonic were already understood to depths unreachable by regular people.

Those six lines of the mnemonic, seemingly simple and easy to grasp, actually contained profound essences that touched upon the origin and reached the Grand Way.

Under Tang Rao's guidance, the more than five thousand units of Spiritual Energy in his Dantian started to move, circling and converging in a unified direction.

The so-called Gathering Spirit could be simply described as: gathering the scattered Spiritual Energy within the Dantian to form a mutually-generated vortex.

And this vortex is also known as the Spiritual Embryo.

Later on, as the Spiritual Embryo grows stronger and eventually extends to the limbs and bones, connecting all the vital points of the body, one can then establish their Foundation.

Foundation Establishment is known in the Seventy-two Domains as the essential basis of Dao.

And Foundation Establishment is built upon the Spiritual Embryo, which shows the relative importance of the step of Gathering Qi to create the Spiritual Embryo.

After an unknown amount of time passed, and with no idea how many cycles the Spiritual Energy in Tang Rao's abdomen had completed,

The more than five thousand units of Spiritual Energy had turned into Spiritual Liquid, extremely viscous.

However, what troubled Tang Rao was that once he relaxed his focus, the Spiritual Liquid would gradually break down, reverting back to Spiritual Energy.

That is to say, he was encountering problems with the step of "gathering without dispersal."

This was a big issue.

If it were just a hundred units of Spiritual Energy undergoing Qi Gathering, Tang Rao would likely have finished by now.

But with these more than five thousand units of Spiritual Energy, not only was the recycling process already difficult, getting them to adhere together as Spiritual Liquid had become all the more challenging.

It definitely wasn't as simple as one plus one equals two; anyway, Tang Rao truly felt at a loss.

More than five thousand units of Spiritual Energy—fifty times that of one hundred units—to gather these units turned into Spiritual Liquid without allowing them to disperse was something he had no method for.

It was like he was a greenhorn just entering the world of cultivation, clueless.

As time ticked by, Tang Rao's frown deepened.

Although it's possible to gather energy after an epiphany, there's a common saying: strike while the iron is hot, push it twice, and on the third attempt, you will be exhausted.

The first attempt at energy gathering is the best; it becomes increasingly troublesome later on.

"What to do... What to do..." Tang Rao's mind was in chaos.

"A hundred units of Spiritual Energy, five thousand units of Spiritual Energy, this isn't the same pathway for Gathering Spirit at all."

"Dammit, more than fifty times, what the heck is this!"

Tang Rao was getting anxious, with cold sweat starting to form on his forehead.

Suddenly, Tang Rao shuddered.

It was like a moment of enlightenment, his mind now clear.

"More than fifty times, that's right, it's just fifty times more than a hundred units of Spiritual Energy! How did I not think of that! Hahaha! What a pig-brained idiot I am!" Tang Rao laughed aloud, his laughter somewhat spine-chilling.

After his laughter, Tang Rao immediately sprang into action.

One split into two, two split into four, four split into eight...

Finally, Tang Rao divided that massive Spiritual Liquid cycle into fifty-six groups, each group consisting of a hundred units of Spiritual Energy.

In total, that amounted exactly to five thousand six hundred units of Spiritual Energy.

Since it was impossible to combine over five thousand units of Spiritual Energy at once, he would gather them separately.

Divide first, then combine.

At this moment, no one could imagine just how crazy Tang Rao's method was.

Yes, he was preparing to create fifty-six Spiritual Embryos initially, and then have the Embryos devour each other.

Tang Rao knew his method was mad and heretical, but he thought, screw it, at worst he would just start over.

But if he succeeded, Tang Rao didn't dare claim that there would be no one to come after him, but it would definitely be a feat unheard of before, as he had never heard of anyone producing multiple Spiritual Embryos during Gathering Spirit and then having them devour each other to grow.

Moreover, controlling a Spiritual Embryo required Soul Power.

The Soul Power needed for fifty-six Spiritual Embryos was definitely on a terrifying level.

But what Tang Rao had in abundance was Soul Power; although he couldn't use it for combat, it was undeniable that he possessed a soul on the verge of becoming an immortal.

Its strength was self-evident.

"Let's do this!" The next moment, Tang Rao uttered a subtle command, and the cycles of fifty-six hundred-unit Spiritual Liquid began to condense into Spiritual Embryos simultaneously.

Fifty-six cycles, fifty-six Spiritual Embryos, an absolute madman.

Tang Rao did not know how long it took, it might have not been long, or it could have been an eternity.

In any case, the Spiritual Embryos were formed.

Fifty-six cycles produced an astonishing fifty-six Spiritual Embryos.

Each standing alone, interfering with none.

Of course, this wasn't Tang Rao's final step.

The key was to integrate all these Spiritual Embryos together.

That was not an easy task.

A Spiritual Embryo was anchored to the Spirit Root and connected to the soul.

For an ordinary person, if the Spiritual Embryo was destroyed during the energy-gathering phase, it was pretty much equivalent to annihilation.

Because the destruction of the Spiritual Embryo often came with the destruction of the Spirit Root and the soul.

Without the Spirit Root, how can one speak of Cultivation.

"Turn despair into hope; just do it!" Tang Rao didn't think too much.

The more you think about such matters, the more you fear, and the more you fear, the easier it is to fail.

Instead of hesitating and daring not to act, it's better to just bare your ass and slap it twice, charging forward with everything you've got.

Failure is fate; success would be a stroke of divine fortune!