The Prodigies War

Toady was startled, “A’lu, you were so crazy that you even stole the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor’s coffin?”

A’lu instantly felt an urge to strangle Toady. He angrily said, “Coffin?! Stop with your toad fart! This is the Ancient Tablet of All that he left behind! It contains the Body Refinement Battle Diagrams of All that records his insights on how to temper the physical body!”

Hearing this, Toady was delighted. His eyes lit up, and he said with a smile, “Why didn’t you say so earlier? Come, come tell me about it and enlighten me!”

His words still echoed as he pounced at the stone slab with a fervent look.

The big black bird also circled around the slab as it marveled, “Goodness, the insights of an Emperor! It’s the first time I’ve encountered one!”

A’lu laughed coldly. “You two have no chances with it. To those who don’t strive to become a Saint by purely following the path of refining the physical body, the Ancient Tablet of All is no different from a coffin.”

Toady and the big black bird refused to accept this. They kept on researching the stone slab with infatuated expressions.

After all, any Emperor was a horrifying, legendary existence that had been closer to immortality than anyone else. They stood above the world, and could tear open the sky with a thought and dominate all Saints and Kings!

In the ancient era, the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor had been an elite Emperor among Emperors. It was rumored that his cultivation had been capable of splitting up the horizon, traveling among the stars, and suppressing all the Saints to the point they had not dared to lift their heads!

Now that a stone slab recording his painstakingly developed inheritance was in front of them, who wouldn’t be tempted?

The expressions of the big black bird and Toady could be described as fanatical.

Meanwhile, Lin Xun finally understood why so many powerful cultivators had come to the Ancient Land of All to compete for the emperor’s mound fortune. Even Saints wouldn’t be able to sit still in the face of such a treasure.

“Only body refiners can study this tablet?” asked Lin Xun.

His heart stirred when he suddenly remembered that he had an art called the Nine Pure Sacred Light Art in his possession. This meant he would have to refine his body sooner or later.

A’lu nodded. “Boss, I won’t hide it from you. Any cultivator who takes the path of becoming a Saint with their flesh won’t have to worry about not stepping onto the supreme path at all if they have this tablet!”

He continued to explain that the Ancient Tablet of All contained sixty-four diagrams. Each diagram contained its own profound mystery that made it a precious treasure for body refiners. As the whole collection, the tablet allowed one to comprehend the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor’s lifelong insights and experience!

In the years being trapped in the emperor’s mound, A’lu had relied on this inheritance to step on the supreme path of body refinement and acquired the battle prowess he had today.

But for other cultivators, this tablet was simply useless.

Learning about all this, Lin Xun was helpless.

The three paths to the absolute apex were spirit cultivation, qi refinement, and physical refinement.

From the start of his cultivation until now, Lin Xun had been balancing his spirit cultivation and qi refinement, and had achieved extraordinary results on these two paths.

In cultivating the spirit, he had divided his primordial spirit into three that studied the laws of the past, the present, and the future respectively. This allowed his spirit to surpass anyone among his generation.

In refining the qi, he had stepped into the sixth longevity stage. His fighting prowess was enough for him to kill any supreme figure of the same stage like slaughtering chickens!

Only physical refinement was the path that he had never touched upon.

One reason was due to having limited energy and time. Secondly, he had not come across any texts on body refinement, and the fortunes that he had acquiried almost had nothing to do with it.

The only thing he got on this was the Nine Pure Sacred Light Art, which was a supreme inheritance of the Saint path. He hadn’t been able to cultivate it because he didn’t understand the theory.

Therefore, Lin Xun felt a kind of indescribable helplessness when facing the Ancient Tablet of All.

He did want to temper his body, but he simply had never had the chance to!

Of course, if he had truly desired to, he could probably find some body refining arts here and there, but they would all be ordinary techniques that couldn’t catch his eye.

“But Boss, I still suggest that you try it,” A’lu suddenly said.

“The physical body is the carrier of the great dao and can bear the weight of heaven and earth. It’s both a precious house for nurturing the spirit and refining the qi. As they say: a healthy body results in a healthy spirit. The body is like a boat that sails through the sea of cultivation full of ordeals. If you become a Saint through your flesh, then you can never be killed easily!

“Spirit cultivators can only be immortal as long as their spirit doesn't perish, and this is also the case for qi refiners. Only body refiners can be reborn from a drop of their blood!

“Moreover, I discovered a secret from the emperor’s mound.” A’lu suddenly became extremely serious. “Back then, the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor was not just a body refiner, his spirit and qi techniques were also terrifyingly superb. I speculate that if one wishes to achieve the stage of Emperor on the Saint path, then they must be a body refiner, qi refiner, and spirit cultivator at the same time!”

Lin Xun’s gaze flickered. He had never previously researched deep into these untold knowledges.

Balancing the three dao paths was actually essential to reaching the Emperor stage!

“It’s shown to be challenging to become a Saint, let alone an Emperor. But we are lucky to be born into a time that witnesses an unprecedented great age and are able to step onto the supreme path. As long as we don’t get killed, we will sooner or later reach high levels.” A’lu revealed a yearning expression and declared emotionally, “My goal is to surpass the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor, reaching a stage that he had never stepped into!”

“Hmph, stop tempting Boss. Since the ancient era, countless powerful figures have tried developing all three paths, but what was the result? Most of them have become half-baked and could only dream of the Saint stage!” Toady suddenly turned around and intervened. “And we all know why. One path is enough for anyone to spend their entire life researching, let alone three.”

The big black bird also sighed. “A’lu has a point though. Reaching the Emperor stage indeed requires balancing all three paths, but one should only start doing so after becoming a Saint.

“If they were to to juggle all three paths before reaching the Saint stage, no matter how heaven-defying their talent and aptitude are, they would encounter something horrifying during their Saint tribulation.” The big black bird wore a grave expression.

Toady’s expression also changed as he seemed to remember something.

“Which is?” Lin Xun frowned.

“The Taboo Dao Tribulation!” uttered the big black bird.

The short four words carried a palpitating power that the big black bird and Toady seemed very apprehensive of.

“Over the years, numerous heaven prides and outstanding geniuses have refused to accept reality and tried to progress on all three paths, wanting to pave out a never-before-achieved Saint path. But in the end, they all died tragically under the Taboo Dao Tribulation, which destroyed their primordial spirits and left no chance to ever be reborn again.

“That path is like a taboo that cuts off all possibilities, like a supreme iron law that no one in the Ancient Wasteland Domain has been able to break.”

As the big black bird elaborated on the matter, it seemed to fall into a trance.

“I still remember what Saint Monk Duji once said: ‘The Taboo Dao Tribulation is a type of the Dao Slashing Power that originates from the heavenly laws. It was a chain that tied down anyone who tried to seek it, and it’s still present to this day. Touching it means death!’

“Otherwise, why do you think that no one has ever succeeded? Before one becomes a Saint, it’s simply a road to death!”

Learning all this, Lin Xun’s tempted heart also calmed down. He hadn’t expected that taking into account the cultivation of all three paths would actually be so fatal. Not only would one lose all hopes of becoming a Saint, but they would also have to face a bizarre Taboo Dao Tribulation.

Right at this moment, A’lu retorted, “There are no absolutes. In the body refining tips left by the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor, it says he traveled the Ancient Nebula Road and met a horrifying character who had become Saint by combining the cultivation of the three paths!”

Both the big black bird and Toady were stunned, almost thinking that they had misheard. Then, they blurted out in unison, “There’s such a thing?”

A’lu replied solemnly, “Since this concerns the path of dao, I wouldn’t dare to speak presumptuously. That’s right, and the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor even emphasized in his records that it’s not impossible to pass the Taboo Dao Tribulation, and one will become a Saint if they have a way to survive it!”

The Divine Elephant Martial Emperor had been a legendary giant in the ancient era. His insights and wisdom were naturally extraordinary. If the records were true, then it was indeed very shocking.

After all, the Ancient Wasteland Domain had never seen a powerful cultivator enough to survive the Taboo Dao Tribulation.

The big black bird frowned. “The Ancient Nebula road is beyond the Ancient Wasteland Domain. That character he mentioned is definitely not from the Ancient Wasteland Domain.”

Toady also nodded. “Indeed. Anyone in the Ancient Wasteland Domain is restrained by the shackle of its heavenly law. Unless we can transcend the Ancient Wasteland Domain, we’ll be subjected to it!”

The two reached the same conclusion.

While the Divine Elephant Martial Emperor’s records might be true, such a thing was simply unsuitable for cultivators of the Ancient Wasteland Domain, as the heaven and earth they lived under were totally different!

Not to mention that the Ancient Nebula Road was a mysterious place that even Saints could hardly touch. Its situation was bound to be different from the Ancient Wasteland Domain.

“I think you forgot that we are not in the Ancient Wasteland Domain!” A’lu hit the nail on the head. “Most importantly, after the descent of the great age, the Ancient Wasteland Domain is no longer what it was before. In this extremely splendid great age, everything is possible!”

The big black bird and Toady were speechless as they could not refute this.

A’lu was right!

This great age had changed not only the power structure of the Ancient Wasteland Domain but also the very nature of the domain itself! That was why it had been labeled an ‘unprecedented great age!’

In the past, the supreme path had been a taboo that no one had been able to step into, and that was why many heavenly prides since the ancient era had stopped advancing and died with regrets.

But now, in the Upper Nine Realms, Supreme Kings were simply commonplace and could be seen everywhere.

In that case, why couldn’t the forbidden Taboo Dao Tribulation be conquered as well?

Just think about it, if one could reach the supreme peak of all three dao paths then pass the Taboo Dao Tribulation and become a Saint, then how horrifying would their cultivation be?

Entering the Saint stage with a complete supreme spirit, qi, and physical body… It was definitely a path that had never been seen before, and it was destined to be spectacular!

Even the big black bird and Toady felt their hearts tremble. Their eyes lost focus as they envisioned the wonderful possibility of this.

Eventually, all gazes settled on Lin Xun.

“What do you think, Boss?” asked A’lu.

Lin Xun rubbed his brows and pondered for a long time.

Finally, he uttered, “I need some alone time.”