Within the demon god barrier, an obscure and unfathomable aura was slowly brewing. The Wind of Annihilation was gone, the Annihilation Wraiths had vanished, and even the yaos had hidden themselves away. The entire demon god barrier had fallen into a rare silence. With everything suddenly so quiet, Lin Zheyu found it strangely difficult to adjust. He raised his head and looked toward the colossal Buddha towering in the distance, noticing an invisible pressure radiating from it, while profound Dao resonance laws swirled around its phantom form, condensing into clusters of seven-colored mist like auspicious clouds.

A trace of understanding arose in Lin Zheyu's heart. The opportunity presented by the rule fragments could only be considered as side dishes. The real prize lay in the Dao resonance insights gained from that enormous Buddha phantom. That, most likely, was the real reason this space-time node had appeared.

"An unspoken understanding among the strong..." Lin Zheyu murmured softly.

This space-time node belonged to the Buddhist sect, the next would belong to the ancient yaos, and the one after that to some other power. Perhaps the appearance of these space-time nodes had long since been arranged. Lin Zheyu could not help thinking of martial cultivation sects in the mortal world.

"The space-time nodes that ultimately failed were probably just meant as training grounds, weren't they?" Lin Zheyu guessed.

An inexplicable emotion rose in his heart, leaving him unsettled. Even martial artists as powerful as Huang Baizhong and Elder Yang were like ants in the eyes of these mighty immortal cultivators. Only martial artists like Bai Lin, who had broken through to the Martial Innate realm, could be treated by them as their peers.

Seeing Lin Zheyu staring at the distant Buddha phantom in a daze, Ji Zitong asked curiously, "What are you thinking about, Fellow Daoist Xiao? You seem completely absorbed."

This battle fought side by side had brought Lin Zheyu much closer to them, and the strength he had displayed had earned Ji Zitong's respect.

Lin Zheyu came back to himself and smiled. "That Buddha phantom is not the true body, is it? Yet it can suppress a space-time node. I was wondering just how terrifying the strength of its true owner must be."

"I know a little about that. It is said this Buddha phantom is the dharma body of an Arhat Venerable of the Buddhist sect. Its strength is immense, equivalent to the Deity Transformation realm of the Immortal Dao," Ji Zitong said.

"Oh? Then what stage of the Immortal Dao would a Buddhist sect's Bodhisattva correspond to?" Lin Zheyu asked at once, intrigued.

"A Bodhisattva is equivalent to the Void Cavern realm of the Immortal Dao. As for the level of a Buddha, that corresponds to the Dao Converging realm," Ji Zitong said.

"The Dao Converging realm... That sounds absolutely terrifying!" Lin Zheyu said with a hint of awe. Just hearing the name alone conveyed how extraordinary that stage was.

"The Dao Converging realm is far too distant for people like us. Existences in that realm are beyond anything we can imagine." Ji Zitong sounded equally reflective. Since childhood, her pursuit in cultivation had been to step into the Void Cavern realm and ascend to the Dao Converging realm.

The two fell silent as the strange aura swirling through the void grew denser and denser. Ji Ziyang and Shi Mulan were drenched in sweat as they controlled the formation. It was not over yet. The final sacrificial step still remained. Fortunately, the formation had suffered almost no damage this time, and with no one interfering, the sacrificial process went very smoothly.

"Everyone, prepare yourselves. The sacrifice is about to begin!" Ji Ziyang called out loudly.

He did not need to remind them. The others had already seated themselves cross-legged at their designated positions, calming their minds and focusing their spirits, ready to receive the descent of the rule fragments.

"Fellow Daoist Mulan, begin," Ji Ziyang said in a low voice, looking at Shi Mulan.

"Alright!" Shi Mulan responded. The spirit power within her body poured through her right hand into the formation.

In an instant, the formation erupted with dense ghostly light. At the center of the formation, the light collapsed inward, condensing into a small energy vortex. The yao blood aura, thick to the extreme, was swept up by the ghostly light and drawn into the vortex. As the sacrifice progressed, Lin Zheyu felt a mysterious and ineffable aura descend, and a strange insight suddenly arose within his spirit and spiritual soul.

It was not just him. The others were the same. Everyone had their eyes closed, immersed in that inexplicable enlightenment. The ghostly light on the formation flared brilliantly. While using the yao blood aura and the Annihilation Wraiths as sacrificial offerings, it also condensed a massive energy barrier that enveloped them all.

Time passed slowly. After comprehending with closed eyes for a while, Lin Zheyu opened them again.

"The spatial power drifting through the void is gone. No, it has weakened until it is almost imperceptible." Lin Zheyu frowned slightly.

Now that the space-time node had fully stabilized and the Buddha phantom had appeared to suppress it, the spatial rule fluctuations emanating from the space-time rift had become faint to the extreme. They were even weaker than the spatial rule power released when a teleportation formation operated.

Lin Zheyu murmured softly, "The rule fragments are still forming. This state is far too rare to waste. If the spatial rule fluctuations are gone, then I'll comprehend something else."

With a flip of his right hand, a barbarian-style storage pouch appeared in his grasp. Lin Zheyu gave it a shake, and out dropped a headless barbarian corpse. Dense spikes covered its body, and its pair of claws were incomparably sharp. This was the corpse of the barbarian warrior who had grasped a trace of spatial rule power.

Lin Zheyu had originally planned to wait until he returned before finding a chance to carefully study the totem on this barbarian expert and see if he could integrate it into his own totem. But now, under the blessing of this mysterious aura, his spirit and spiritual soul were clearer than ever before. Sparks of inspiration flashed from time to time. Countless strands of knowledge collided in his mind, stirring up one novel insight after another. In this state, it was the perfect time to comprehend the profundities of the barbarian expert's totem.

Lin Zheyu extended his right hand and pressed it against the corpse's chest. His spiritual sense flowed along his arm and entered the barbarian corpse as he carefully studied the profundities of its totem. His understanding of barbarian totems mostly came from the Saha Scripture. This was the first time he had used a barbarian corpse's totem for direct study. To research the mysteries of barbarian totems through a corpse alone was unimaginably difficult. Even in this special state, he still found it extremely arduous.

More than an hour went by. Just as Lin Zheyu was immersed in the wonders of the barbarian corpse's totem, the chaotic rule aura in the sky finally reached its peak. The dense yao blood aura and Annihilation Wraiths within the formation were completely absorbed by the energy vortex at its center.

The energy vortex rapidly collapsed and transformed into a perfect sphere of energy. The sphere quickly contracted into a single point, then suddenly expanded at incredible speed before bursting like a bubble. In an instant, a dense Dao resonance aura of rules enveloped the entire formation. Lin Zheyu felt his spirit and soul tremble as immense rule power pierced his sea of consciousness and condensed a tiny, flawless rhombus-shaped crystal at its center.

Feeling the terrifying Dao resonance radiating from the rhombus crystal, a thought flashed through Lin Zheyu's mind at once.

Rule fragment!

Lin Zheyu examined it carefully. As he had expected, this rule fragment was a spatial rule fragment. His soul drifted toward the fragment. He reached out with the hand of his spiritual form and tried to grasp the floating rhombus crystal, but his hand passed right through it.

Seeing he could not grasp the rule fragment, Lin Zheyu stopped trying. His figure shifted. Though he could not seize it, he still wrapped the rhombus crystal within his spirit and spiritual soul.

Right!

A thought stirred in Lin Zheyu's mind, and the vast golden energy accumulated in his sea of consciousness surged continuously toward the rhombus crystal.

"The level of the rule fragment is too high. It seems the golden energy cannot affect it."

Lin Zheyu tried for a while, then shook his head helplessly and, honestly, began to comprehend the projection of the rule fragment. Dense Dao resonance radiated from the rhombus crystal, and Lin Zheyu absorbed that Dao resonance with ravenous hunger, trying to make it his own.

Within the formation, everyone had their eyes closed, immersed in their comprehension of the rule fragments. A hazy, earthen-yellow radiance emanated from Tu Yuan, and even the thin air had become incomparably viscous. Not far away, Lei Yongtao was bathed in the light of lightning, with violent arcs crackling over his body.

Everyone had their own destined opportunity. Lin Zheyu's was the spatial rule power. Around him, tiny cracks appeared one after another, like blinking closed eyes. They were incredibly faint and unstable. At the slightest stir, they burst like bubbles and vanished into the air.

Immersed in comprehension, Lin Zheyu suddenly opened his eyes. "No, that's not right!"

A sharp light flashed in Lin Zheyu's eyes as he thought, The rule fragment is in my sea of consciousness. Perhaps it can be counted as something that belongs to me. If I create a technique that requires rule fragments and then use Origin Force to raise it, it might actually work!

Using the rudimentary spatial rule power he had comprehended as a foundation, he fused it with his martial cultivation knowledge to form the basis for a new technique.

[Heaven Rewards the Diligent]

[Name: Lin Zheyu]

[Origin Force: 14]

[Skills: Earth Shrinking Technique (Dormancy), Primordial Concealment Technique (Perfection), Primordial Golden Body (Second Stage: 100%)]

Lin Zheyu named it the Earth Shrinking Technique, drawing inspiration from the barbarians' unique lightness and movement techniques. The technique was somewhat crude and could not be compared to the true divine ability of the Earth Shrinking Technique at all. It was merely a framework Lin Zheyu had created, using martial cultivation and Immortal Dao knowledge as a foundation, to reproduce the Earth Shrinking Technique's ability. The most important part of this framework was the application of spatial rule power.

Lin Zheyu had only grasped the barest surface of spatial rule power, so the rule power involved in the technique was extremely shallow. If cultivated step by step, it could still succeed, but the resulting technique would be almost useless, because the spatial rule power within it was too weak. But that did not matter. The technique itself was secondary.

What Lin Zheyu wanted was to use the process of raising this technique with Origin Force to simultaneously comprehend the rule fragments. That was what truly mattered.

Joy surged in Lin Zheyu's heart. "It works!"

The first step had succeeded. Next came seeing whether, when using Origin Force to raise it, he could comprehend the rule fragment within that mysterious consciousness space. For some reason, Lin Zheyu felt a trace of nervousness. He let out a breath, flipped his right hand, and five low-grade spirit stones appeared in his palm. Then he sent out a thought.

Use 1 unit of Origin Force to cultivate the Earth Shrinking Technique.

The rule fragment could last for a full day. Using a few breaths to test this would not have much impact. In an instant, vast mysterious energy surged forth, sweeping up the energy within the spirit stones and pouring into Lin Zheyu's body. His injuries recovered in a flash, and his blood qi, true origin, and physique all rapidly returned to their peak.

At the same time, the mysterious energy poured into his sea of consciousness and wrapped around the rhombus crystal. When Lin Zheyu entered the consciousness space, the same rhombus-shaped rule fragment appeared there as well, constantly radiating profound spatial rule power.

A few breaths later, Lin Zheyu suddenly opened his eyes, endless delight filling them.

"It really works!" Lin Zheyu was overjoyed.

The rule fragment contained a Dao resonance of rules that was profound, vast, and complex, yet it existed for only a single day. No matter how gifted a cultivator was, it was impossible to comprehend it all. But Lin Zheyu could use the mysterious Origin Force to cheat, effectively extending the time he had to comprehend the rule fragment.

I need to continue!

But before that, Lin Zheyu thought to himself, I need to improve the technique again. My grasp of spatial rules was too shallow before. The technique feels too crude.

As his thoughts shifted, the data in his awareness blurred for an instant, then became clear again.

[Heaven Rewards the Diligent]

[Name: Lin Zheyu] 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎

[Origin Force: 13]

[Skills: Earth Shrinking Technique 1.0 (Dormancy), Primordial Concealment Technique (Perfection), Primordial Golden Body (Second Stage: 100%)]

After making his preparations, Lin Zheyu sent out a thought.

Use 1 unit of Origin Force to cultivate Earth Shrinking Technique 1.0.

The familiar sensation returned. His spirit blurred, and he entered the consciousness space, beginning endless cultivation, comprehension, and improvement.