20: Final Preparations, 5th Realm Breakthrough

I thanked Hasegawa and started to make my way out of the camp, when I saw Jue Zhu heading into it. "Fancy meeting up with you here."

"Hey Zuhui! You selling beast parts too?"

"That's right. Just got done, actually. How's Mount Bing treating you?"

"It's been very interesting. There's some sort of temple at the top—well, a stone building, anyway. I got pretty close before my inventory filled this time. The special reward's gotta be in there, I figure. What about you? You doing alright with Luoxuan Canyon?"

I nodded. "I'm close to the special prize there myself, but I figure I need to advance my cultivation more—whatever's guarding it is tough. I figure I can reach the Core Solidifying Realm with enough of the summer left to take it on."

"You really figure?" Jue Zhu's eyebrows raised. "I checked on how Jong and how Shokoya's group were doing before, and it doesn't look like they'll get there. What stage are you right now?"

 "7th stage, but," I looked around and continued quietly, "I'm saving up cores for the jump to the next realm. I should be able to reach 9th stage just with what the Experiential Physique absorbs at this point. Bloodletter Crows are pretty glass cannon so I'm able to hunt a lot of them in a day."

"Glass...cannon?"

"Oh, it's a gaming term for a mob—an enemy—or build, or character class, whatever—that has extremely strong attacks, but defenses as weak as those attacks are strong. I have to avoid taking on too many at once, but other than that I've been dealing with them pretty easily. The lizard creatures there are the opposite—arrows don't do much and break too easily on their hides so I have to use my sword, but they're not so strong so I end up more with bruises than dangerous cuts, except that their bite can be nasty but it's not hard to avoid."

We continued to talk about our experiences in the summer camp so far. When it was clear that doing so was going to take more than a few minutes, Jue Zhu went ahead and sold his materials, then we headed back to the edge of the Dark Forest together. We parted ways the next morning, and I got back to the grind as quick as I could. I mostly kept going after the Stage 6 enemies until I broke through to Stage 8, when I succumbed to the temptation to go after a group led by a Stage 7. I won out, and even finally gained another Stage 6 core, but I had to spend about a week recovering. I could cultivate of course, but the trickle of Qi flowing into me that way was so slow that I had to question how it was considered average for a cultivator to reach Spirit Rank even after several hundred years.

Even with a week lost, though, I still had time to prepare for the final challenge once I broke through to the 9th Stage. Having done so, I finally brought out my cores. I did my best with the Stage 5 cores first, though I was somewhat chagrined to find out that they weren't any easier to absorb at all with me at the 9th Stage than when I was at the 4th or 5th. With the first one, I finally experienced what it was like for a core absorption to fail before it was complete. I'd gotten about 2/3rds of it. 

It took 30 million additional Qi to break through to the 5th Earth Realm, the Core Solidifying Realm. With this first failure, I had 2 each of Stage 5 and Stage 6 cores left, and I needed just under 25 million. In total, the max I could get from all 4 cores was about 33 million. There were still 2 weeks left, so I decided to take one more trip back to the main camp to buy another Earth Absorbing Pill. I hadn't absorbed the other 2 Stage 5s yet, either. It might not be a huge deal if I messed up with the Stage 5 cores again, but if I did, it'd mean I'd definitely mess up with the Stage 6 cores even with the pills, which would mean I'd fall short of the breakthrough.

So, I camped a short distance away from the main camp, and tried with the remaining two Stage 5s. I got further than before with the first one, but it still got away from me. I took a deep breath, and started the second, determinedly keeping it under control. I succeeded, but I felt strained afterward so I decided to return to my camp at what I was calling the Path to the Center before the big moment.

Since the last two absorptions had been enough to tire me, I made sure I was well rested before attempting with the Stage 6 cores. I'd been warned that using the pills on them would make the absorbing process take longer, and when I'd gone back the second time, the shopkeep had warned me that it wasn't safe to take a second Absorbing Pill in a day. 

I successfully completed the first absorption, but only just. I rested and cultivated for the rest of the day, steeling myself for this attempt at a major breakthrough. Nerves made the second absorption harder than the first, but instead of failing, I felt the absorption stop just a little bit early. In the next moment, I felt the Qi within me change, becoming more concentrated and vibrant than the Qi I could perceive in the air around me.

I also felt quite a bit stronger.

<Personal Status>

Health:

Qi: 90,000,000

Qi Recovery: 500 Qi/second

Physique: Experiential Body

Curses/Ailments: None

<Attributes >

Strength: 1956

Resilience: 1893

Agility: 1968

Comprehension: 5928

Resolve: 2958

Reaction: 1970

Aura: 334

Faith: 1960

Purity: 62/100

<Cultivation >

Realm: Core Solidifying (Earth 5)

Stage: 1

Highest Rate: 1 Qi/sec

Last Rate: 1 Qi/sec

Next: 0/90 million

Spirit Force: 1,114

I steeled myself for a few minutes, and once again approached the center. I still felt spiritual pressure right as the Center became visible near the horizon, but it wasn't as strong as before. The fearful sensation hadn't been enough before to make me turn and run, and now it was down to something like a "I have a bad feeling about this" feeling. I wasn't fully confident considering that, but I had to at least try. The best I could do was take pains to make sure I'd be able to get at the distress totem as close to instantly as possible.

I judged that there wasn't enough time to make another run back to the main camp, either. I'd take a day to rest and eat well, then face what was likely to be a solo boss the next day. That kind of thing had been pretty rare in my Dive Games, and even in special 1v1 challenges, the bosses had been humanoid, and some of the most punishing fights I'd had outside of tournaments. Somehow, I doubted this fight would remotely resemble those.