Wandering through the urban village, a place deeply familiar from his memories, Qin Fan didn't pause to marvel after running out of his house. Instead, he hurriedly searched for a quiet place.
Having been reborn, he needed to thoroughly assess just how much of his strength remained.
Suddenly, his eyes lit up.
Before him was a pavilion built over the center of a lotus pond, spanning both banks. The area was peaceful and deserted, with a gentle breeze blowing softly. After a quick glance around, Qin Fan walked over without a second thought.
Cross-legged, eyes closed, mind focused, breath steady.
Seated on a stone bench in the small pavilion, Qin Fan quickly entered a state of self-forgetfulness.
Dozens of minutes later, his eyes flew open, but they were accompanied by an utterly helpless and bitter smile.
He murmured to himself, "Just as I thought. The Copper Skin Iron Bone Body Protection Gang from the Fighting Buddha's lineage has vanished. My True Qi Domain, once a vast ocean, is now nothing more than a meandering stream. My cultivation from the Transcendance Tribulation Stage has been knocked all the way back, stuck at the Qi Refinement threshold, the very entry point to cultivation. Have I really returned to square one?"
"Qi Refinement, Foundation Establishment, Golden Core, Nascent Soul, Divinity Transformation, Unification, Crossing Tribulation, Mahayana... Five hundred years of cultivation, wiped out in an instant. So be it. I was destined to perish under the Heavenly Thunder Tribulation anyway. King Yan didn't claim my life, and Father Heaven gave me a chance to return to my past life. This is already the luckiest and best possible outcome! Besides, with a five-hundred-year cultivation foundation, I should be able to avoid many detours this time around."
"For those five hundred years, I was shackled by a Heart Demon born from hatred. This led me to take shortcuts all the way from the Qi Refinement Realm to my tribulation and ascension. Although my Crossing Tribulation-level cultivation was unmatched on the Cangqiong Continent, the foundation for each breakthrough was unstable. It was like a skyscraper with a weak foundation—it looked magnificent and glorious, but it couldn't withstand the destructive force of an earthquake. If I hadn't taken those shortcuts because of my Heart Demon, how could I have fallen during the Heavenly Thunder Tribulation?"
"In this life, I must build a solid foundation, one step at a time! And I should try to see if I can awaken any other latent abilities from the Fighting Buddha's lineage!"
After his soliloquy, Qin Fan closed his eyes tightly once more. The stream-like True Qi began to flow slowly from his Dantian through the meridians of his entire body. At this moment, Qin Fan had again entered a state of self-forgetfulness. If anyone else had been in the pavilion, they would have surely noticed that he had no heartbeat or breath, remaining motionless as if completely bereft of life.
POP!
POP! POP!
POP! POP! POP!
If his meridians during the Transcendance Tribulation Stage had been towering pillars, then now they were like fine steel wires. Moreover, they were fine steel wires that were clogged and jammed. As Qin Fan circulated his True Qi, the slowly moving energy began to accelerate, slamming against the clogged sections. With these impacts, a series of popping sounds erupted from within his body, like jumping beans bouncing erratically just beneath his skin. Beads of sweat emerged with the sounds, only to quickly evaporate into a fine mist.
This cycle continued for over an hour before finally subsiding.
WHOOSH!
The completely still Qin Fan abruptly opened his eyes again. The True Qi had cleared every blockage in his meridians. As his eyes opened, two beams of light, like fire and gold, shot forth.
"What a pleasant surprise! A truly delightful surprise! To think that clearing those clogged meridians would also awaken the Eyes of Golden Flame from the Fighting Buddha's lineage! Although my cultivation is stuck at the Qi Refinement threshold and I can't use the Eyes of Golden Flame to cause any real damage, at least they provide penetrating vision. It's not completely useless! In this city, having a little X-ray vision early on will be more than enough to show off! Haha—"
Qin Fan laughed heartily to himself, thrilled by the unexpected awakening of the Eyes of Golden Flame. His joy was short-lived, however. He soon furrowed his brow and murmured, "But is there any Spiritual Energy on Earth for cultivation?"
After muttering to himself, Qin Fan, who had not yet managed to open his Divine Sense domain, stood up. He took a sharp, deep sniff of the air.
He let out a soft sound of surprise, a hint of joy in his expression as he muttered again, "There's even Spiritual Energy over this lotus pond? It's scattered and faint, just a wisp here and there, but this proves that Spiritual Energy for cultivation truly exists on Earth!"
As his voice trailed off, a roguish and meaningful smile spread across his face. It seemed Father Heaven was looking out for him after all.
He knew that even if Earth had Spiritual Energy, it would be extremely sparse, nothing like the boundless, majestic reserves of the Cangqiong Continent.
But what did it matter if it was sparse? Qin Fan never expected to cultivate to the Mahayana Realm and face a tribulation on Earth. Forget about intermediate realms like Nascent Soul or Divinity Transformation; as long as he could break through to the Golden Core Realm, or even reach the peak of Foundation Establishment at the Great Perfection level, wouldn't he be able to dominate everyone on this planet?
At this thought, a sinister smirk appeared on his face. "All you scum who left your humiliating scars on me... Du Zicong, the Du Family, Second Uncle, and my own Qin Family... just you wait. Wait for the surprise I have in store for you! You will repay every single debt you owe!"
Retracting the piercing light of his Eyes of Golden Flame, he returned to his normal state. Qin Fan dusted off his clothes and strode out of the pavilion.
He began to follow the faint wisps of Spiritual Energy from the lotus pond, his sensitive nose guiding him on an aimless search, like looking for a needle in a haystack.
The sun began to set, and the curtain of night was about to rise. Lost in his single-minded search, Qin Fan completely lost track of time. Moving like the wind, by the time night fell, he had already traveled several dozen kilometers.
BZZZT!
The phone in his pocket suddenly vibrated. Qin Fan halted his steps. He looked up at the dark sky and the scattered, brilliant city lights, only then realizing he had been gone from home for several hours.
Sheepishly, he pulled out his phone. Unsurprisingly, it was a call from his mother, Wei Shuying.
"Xiao Fan, where are you? Look at the time! Hurry home for dinner! Your dad and I are waiting for you!"
"Okay, I was with some friends and lost track of time. I'll head back now. Why don't you and Dad go ahead and eat?" Qin Fan said, making up an excuse.
"We're waiting. You'd better hurry back," his mother said before hanging up.
Qin Fan, who had planned to search a while longer, could only shake his head with a wry smile at his mother's ultimatum. But just as he pocketed his phone and was about to turn back, a familiar scent drifted to his nose.
His eyes widened in shock.
This... This Spiritual Energy was so rich and dense!
Unable to remain calm any longer, he followed the aura, dashing forward at full speed. Finally, he came to a stop on the shore of a lake.
"Damn! To think there's a lake with such abundant and dense Spiritual Energy! If I can absorb all the Spiritual Energy from this lake, I can definitely break through the Qi Refinement threshold!"
Suppressing his ecstatic excitement, Qin Fan walked over to a relatively clean stone slab. Just as he was about to sit down cross-legged and begin cultivating, he suddenly remembered his mother's call.
Forget it. There's no rush. I'll come back tomorrow.
Without any reluctance or hesitation, Qin Fan memorized the location and hurried away.