Chapter 655: Hiss! This Density... It's Absolutely Reckless!

He turned his head to look in the direction of Qingyou Residence and took a deep breath of the vitality-rich air.

"The opportunity has arrived. Today is the day of breakthrough."

He returned to the tree hollow of Qingyou Residence.

Su Ming wasted no time. With a backhand, he bolted the heavy wooden door shut, and casually slapped a soundproofing formation rune onto the back of the door.

"Shadow, go keep watch on the windowsill. If any living thing comes within ten zhang, warn me immediately." Su Ming gave the order in a low voice.

The Profound Shadow Crow gave a soft "cheep," flapped its wings, and flew up to the windowsill. Its black feathers instantly merged into the shadows of the wood grain, pushing the "Concealment" rune to its absolute limit. Even its breathing nearly came to a stop.

Deep within the meditation room, Su Ming summoned his lifebound formation plate and fished out from his storage pouch eight Void Stone fragments with slightly worn edges, along with a small pinch of dark red Soul Stabilizing Sand.

"Eight pieces? Kid, you're really going all in this time?" Lin Yu's Soul Body drifted out from the ring. Looking at the materials on the lifebound formation plate, he couldn't help but click his tongue in amazement. "Before, when you set up the Minor Void Spirit Attraction Formation, you used four at most."

"Breaking through to the mid-stage of the Golden Core requires a terrifying magnitude of spiritual energy. Relying solely on the slow conversion of Primal Spirit Fruit in this spirit realm, even ten years might not be enough." Su Ming's expression was as still as an ancient well. A drop of bright red essence blood had already been forced out from his fingertip. "I can't wait ten years. Once the Dark Current Sect's encirclement closes, without strength, I'll be at their mercy."

Lin Yu put away his playful attitude. His Soul Body instantly expanded, hovering in midair, dark golden patterns flickering faintly across his transparent form. "Since that's the case, focus on your breakthrough. I'll guard your Consciousness Sea and Spiritual Platform for you. I won't let a single residual whisper of a Void Nightmare interfere with you."

"Thank you, Master."

Su Ming took a deep breath. The Like Water Art roared into motion within his body. Deep blue spiritual energy wrapped around that drop of essence blood and slammed onto the center of the ironwood platform.

"Bzzzz!"

All eight Void Stones shattered simultaneously. The Soul Stabilizing Sand transformed into a dark red halo, sealing the entire meditation room with absolute finality.

With a sharp, ear-piercing ripping sound, a pitch-black rift half a chi long was forcibly torn open in the void!

This time, it was no longer just faint wisps of mist.

Void spiritual energy, pure to the extreme with not a single attribute impurity, poured directly into this narrow meditation room like a galactic waterfall cascading from the highest heavens!

Even within that vast white waterfall of spiritual energy, visible specks of golden Source Substance were mixed in!

"Hiss! This density... it's absolutely reckless!" Lin Yu exclaimed. But he knew now was not the time for his own gluttonous feast. He forcibly restrained his devouring instinct and transformed all his soul power into an invisible net, tightly covering Su Ming's head to filter out the spatial turbulence that could tear apart his Consciousness Sea.

Su Ming sat cross-legged directly beneath the waterfall of spiritual energy.

His body was instantly swallowed whole by the white spiritual mist.

Deep within his Dantian, the Golden Core that was originally only the size of a dragon's eye now spun madly like a sponge meeting sweet rain after a long drought!

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

Ruo Shui spiritual energy roared through his meridians like a Yangtze River bursting its banks. Those wide meridians, forcibly infused with Void spiritual energy, were stretched until nearly transparent. Threads of blood seeped from Su Ming's pores, staining his azure robe with a layer of dark red.

Su Ming endured the agonizing pain of his meridians tearing apart and began to change the circulation route of the Like Water Art. He no longer let the spiritual energy crash against the sturdy barriers, but instead let it flow like water, following the gaps between meridians, along the grain of his bones, seeping toward every limb and bone with a soft yet endlessly continuous posture.

The Golden Core spun faster and faster. The kintsugi cracks on its surface, nourished by the vast spiritual energy, began to gradually melt and perfectly merge with the Golden Core's main body, transforming into natural, seamless deep blue formation lines.

Just as the Golden Core was about to complete its transformation and cross the threshold of the mid-stage!

"Bzzzz!!!"

A sudden, violent vibration, as if from the deepest part of his soul, exploded within Su Ming's body!

It was not the Golden Core.

It was the Border Defense True Seal, that item which had lain dormant deep within his Consciousness Sea, completely silent ever since he arrived in the spirit realm!

This ancient seal, carrying the fortune of the human realm's Northern Frontier's seventy-nine great passes, now burst forth with a blinding blood-red light!

This blood light instantly pierced through the shroud of Void spiritual energy, even penetrated the life-force seal of Greenwood Court's ten-thousand-year-old luminous banyan, and shot directly toward the deepest depths of the Void Rift.

"Cross-realm resonance?!" Lin Yu's Soul Body jolted violently, his illusory eyes filled with disbelief. "How is this possible! The law barriers between the two realms are as thick as mountains. How could this seal resonate without a World Gate?!"

But the facts left no room for doubt.

Within that blinding blood-red light, Su Ming's consciousness suddenly blurred. His vision seemed pulled by an irresistible force, piercing through endless spatial barriers.

He "saw" a scene.

It was a wasteland dyed red with blood, the sky so gloomy it seemed about to collapse.

Above the wasteland, the shattered walls and broken ramparts of seventy-nine great passes stood in the cold wind.

In the vision, there was even an old Formation Master with his left arm severed, roaring at the heavens, fiercely slamming a formation plate carved with intricate runes into the ground, trying to block the black demonic energy surging up from below.

The vision vanished in an instant, like a stone thrown into calm water, rippling outward before completely disappearing.

But Su Ming shuddered violently, his eyes snapping open, a look of unprecedented shock flashing through their depths.

He was certain that it was absolutely not a hallucination from cultivation deviation! That visceral sense of bloodline connection and intertwined fortune was genuinely imprinted into the very origin of the Border Defense True Seal!

"Master! Did you see that?" Su Ming shouted in his Consciousness Sea.

"I saw it... I saw it..." Lin Yu's voice was unprecedentedly grave. "The Border Defense True Seal resonating across realms! Disciple, when you tore open this Void Rift just now, you actually captured the residual formation ripples from the human realm!"

Lin Yu's Soul Body trembled violently in midair. "What does this mean? It means the spatial barrier between the two realms has already become weak! So weak that even the fluctuations of a formation can briefly penetrate it!"

"Dark Current Sect..." Su Ming gritted his teeth, squeezing these three words out from between them.

"Yes! Those madmen extracting life force from belowground really are frantically weakening the Abandoned Lands' seal!" Lin Yu sucked in a sharp breath. "Once the seal loosens, the barrier between the two realms thins. If the seal completely collapses, the two realms will be thoroughly connected!"

"Break!"

Su Ming let out a low roar suppressed in his throat. The spiritual energy within his body, accumulated to its absolute peak, finally broke through that invisible barrier at this moment, as naturally as water flowing into a channel!

"Boom!"

A powerful pressure far exceeding anything before erupted from his body.

The Void spiritual energy within the tree hollow, as if drawn by some force, transformed into a massive vortex and was completely absorbed into his body within three breaths.

Mid-stage Golden Core, achieved!