When they returned to the Xuantian Dao Sect, the Dragonblood warriors entered seclusion to consolidate their cultivation bases.

Having just advanced to the Jade Core realm, their power had grown explosively. Compared to when they had been at the Foundation Forging realm, their spiritual yuan had grown by over ten times in terms of both quantity and quality. They needed to get used to their new power.

Everyone in the Dragonblood Legion had advanced to the Jade Core realm, and it was a perfect advancement. Even Li Tianxuan felt emotional to see this.

These Dragonblood warriors were all elites amongst elites. Not only were they brave warriors who would fight one against a hundred, but they were even monsters who could fight across realms.

With such a terrifying group of disciples, there was no point in worrying over whether the Xuantian Dao Sect could return to its former glory. It would probably surpass any point in its history to reach an unprecedented level.

However, the Dragonblood Legion was too conspicuous now. Countless people were envious of them, and most likely, the Xuantian Dao Sect had become a huge target for many people.

But the only thing that didn’t draw envy was mediocrity. As long as you stood at a high level, there would definitely be people envious of you that hoped for your downfall. Dirty tricks, scheming, trying to crowd you out, these things were unavoidable.

This was the cultivation world. The struggle was endless. If you weren’t prepared for such a thing, then you should simply never think of rising.

Whether it was a single genius or a whole sect, if they wanted to rise, they would have to face countless enemies.

The history of a powerful sect’s rising had to be bloody. They rose by climbing the mountain of bones of their enemies.

Geniuses were the same. One of the laws of the Heavenly Daos was that everyone was in competition. Life was a survival of the fittest. To not climb over other people’s corpses was to allow others to climb over your corpse. The path of cultivation was one with no turning back.

After returning to the Xuantian Dao Sect and making sure everyone was set, the only one with nothing to do was Long Chen. He was unable to use his spiritual yuan to cultivate. As soon as he tried, the curse would reactivate.

Although the curse wasn’t able to threaten his life, it stuck to him like cancer. It was incredibly irritating, and there was no way for him to fight.

However, he did find that while he couldn’t do anything else, he would be able to circulate his flame energy. The curse wouldn’t reactivate as long as he only used his flame energy.

His guess was that it was due to the Nirvana Scripture. His flame energy wasn’t affected by the curse. Otherwise, there would have been no way for him to refine pills for everyone.

After everyone went through the tribulation, Long Chen noticed that there was something strange with Wilde. Wilde was constantly yawning, and his focus was gone. Sometimes Long Chen would be talking to him and he would just start napping.

When Long Chen asked Li Tianxuan what was going on, Li Tianxuan said that Wilde was very likely undergoing some kind of metamorphosis.

That made Long Chen jump. Wilde wasn’t a Magical Beast. How could he go through a metamorphosis?

Li Tianxuan said that the true Barbarian race only existed in legends. Perhaps they had existed, but they had disappeared from this world.

The Barbarian race of legends used to eat anything with flesh. Even dragons were eaten by them.

Their bodies were similar to Magical Beasts. They cultivated neither spiritual yuan, true qi, nor the Dao. They were an oddity of the entire world.

When their physical strength reached a certain level, their bodies would undergo a metamorphosis. But when undergoing this metamorphosis, they would be like hibernating Magical Beasts. They would enter a long slumber. Once their metamorphosis was complete, they would automatically wake, and their combat power would have increased massively.

However, Li Tianxuan didn’t know what kind of changes would happen. All of this was from the scanty sentences about the Barbarian race he had read in ancient texts. No one could say whether it was true or not.

But as expected, in just two days, Wilde completely collapsed and entered a deep sleep. He couldn’t be woken no matter what.

At the same time, the pores on his face and hands began to have slim threads grow out of them. More and more of them appeared until they completely enveloped him in a large cocoon.

“It seems the legends are true. The Barbarian race was exceptionally domineering back in the immortal era. But how could someone from the Barbarian race appear now? Didn’t they go extinct a long time ago?” wondered Li Tianxuan.

Long Chen had told him about how he had found Wilde on the streets in the Phoenix Cry Empire. Feeling him to be pitiable but an honest and sincere person, he had kept him by his side.

But now that he looked back on that, Wilde’s origins were too mysterious. The Barbarian race was clearly extinct, so where had Wilde come from? Who were his parents?

Wilde didn’t recall his parents. He had been raised in a little rural village by villagers. Then an epidemic had struck the village and they had all died. Only he had survived.

It was like a portion of Wilde’s memories were missing. His memories started at the age of four or five, and he didn’t remember anything before that.

“Once Wilde comes out of his cocoon, he’ll probably be very terrifying,” sighed Li Tianxuan. It seemed a great era had truly descended. Even the legendary Barbarian race had appeared. This was an era of all the powers of the world.

Li Tianxuan felt like he had suddenly grown older. Perhaps the future of this era would become the land of these monsters.

Long Chen carried the cocoon that was Wilde into a private room of the Xuantian Tower. There was a stone bed in this room, and Yue Zifeng was lying on it, his hands holding his sword.

“Xuan Master, Zifeng…” Long Chen worriedly looked at the lifeless Yue Zifeng.

The current Yue Zifeng was essentially an empty husk. He didn’t have the slightest sign of life.

“He is a genius of the Sword Dao. He placed his whole heart, mind, and soul into his sword during that battle. However, he hasn’t reached that level of power yet. He was able to use that move, but he’s not able to do the opposite. Now, his essence is locked within his sword. As for whether he will be able to bring his soul back into his body, it’s completely up to him,” said Li Tianxuan.

Back then, Li Tianxuan had been completely stunned by Yue Zifeng’s powerful sword arts. Yue Zifeng’s killing power had already surpassed the control of heaven and earth. That meant his comprehension of the Sword Dao had reached an extremely high realm.

But although his realm had reached the level that he was able to use such a terrifying move, his actual power had not reached that level. After placing his soul within his sword, he had managed to bring his power to his peak, and with a single attack, he had killed over ten Soul Transformation experts. But being unable to retrieve his soul from his sword, his body had become empty. No one could help him. The only one who could help him was himself.

Long Chen placed Wilde on another bed. Through Li Tianxuan’s explanation, he no longer felt so much worry for Yue Zifeng.

He understood Yue Zifeng well. Although he rarely spoke, his willpower was definitely at the apex of the Dragonblood Legion. Otherwise, there was no way for him to be so outstanding amongst all sword cultivators.

The only thing he felt regretful over was that Yue Zifeng hadn’t undergone tribulation with everyone. He didn’t know if this would leave behind any flaws.

But thinking about all this had no meaning now. After making sure the two of them would be safe here, Long Chen was called over by Li Tianxuan to his personal room. The two of them sat facing each other.

Li Tianxuan asked, “For you to raise everyone’s power so openly, I presume you have some trump card to shut their mouths?”

Li Tianxuan felt like Long Chen wasn’t so impetuous. According to reason, he should have raised everyone's power in secret. Although it would be noticed sooner or later, stalling for just one day was a good thing.

But he had done it so openly and brazenly. Furthermore, the Dragonblood Legion hadn’t hidden the marks of their tribulation. All of the Xuantian Dao Sect knew that the Dragonblood Legion’s Celestial ranks had increased once more.

With Li Tianxuan’s understanding of Long Chen, he was sure Long Chen had done that intentionally. So he wanted to know the whole story so he could prepare as well.

“Yes. Paper isn’t able to cover up a fire. Pill Valley has had its gaze on me for a long time now. No matter how carefully I act, they’ll still find ways to find trouble for me. Compared to the Corrupt path, Pill Valley is far more shameless. They’ll just make a random excuse and start making things hard for me. They’re the most hateful. So this time, I also want you to spread the news openly. Let’s blow this matter up as big as possible and slap Pill Valley in the face,” said Long Chen.

Pill Valley’s people had truly been too shameless. They were despicable and felt no guilt with harming the innocent. He was fed up with them.

“Long Chen, you should think through this. The second volume of the Nirvana Scripture is in Pill Valley’s hands,” reminded Li Tianxuan.

“That’s fine. Once I slap them in the face, I’ll go learn it. They’re two separate matters. Otherwise, if I learned their Nirvana Scripture and then slapped them, I’d feel bad. So it’s best to first slap them,” said Long Chen indifferently.

Li Tianxuan was speechless. What kind of logic was this? Was this supposed to mean that Long Chen wouldn’t feel bad learning their art after slapping them?

“From your tone, you already have a way to handle this?” asked Li Tianxuan.

“Yes, it shouldn’t be a problem. After all, I’ve had past dealings with Pill Valley. I’m very familiar with their patterns,” said Long Chen. He took out a badge from Pill Valley.

This was the first place reward he had obtained in the Pill Tower’s competition back in the Eastern Wasteland. Now it was finally time to use it.

Li Tianxuan nodded. Long Chen’s intelligence wasn’t inferior to his. As long as his temper didn’t get the better of him, he wouldn’t lose out.

“Then since you’re so confident, I’ll leave it to you. I guess the Xuantian Dao Sect is about to become very lively. You’ll be in charge of slapping their faces, and I’ll be in charge of cowing them with power. We’ll split the work!” Li Tianxuan smiled.

“Xuan Master, can I ask how much power the Xuantian Dao Sect has?”

“Hahaha, little fellow, you don’t need to worry about that. You can go as far as you want. The foundation of the Xuantian Dao Sect is far greater than you imagine. Although the Pill Tower is strong, my Xuantian Dao Sect isn’t so easy to bully. When it comes to such a situation, whoever has more misgivings will suffer more. So since I’m fine with leaving this matter to you, you should know how much confidence I have. It just so happens I can use this chance to properly give a display to those fellows. It can count as my oath to the Central Plains that the Xuantian Dao Sect is rising. Anyone who’s not afraid of dying can come and try to stop us!” laughed Li Tianxuan grandly.

“Hahaha, good. If that’s the case, then I’m at ease. I’ll properly slap those idiots’ faces this time.” Long Chen was delighted.

With what Li Tianxuan said, Long Chen’s confidence rose. He just happened to be an expert in slapping faces.