Night fell over the Su Residence like a heavy curtain.
The city outside glowed with neon and distant noise, but inside the Su family estate, everything was quiet again—too quiet, as if even sound respected the old foundations hidden beneath the mansion.
Su Chen stood alone in his room.
The door was locked.
No servants. No elders. No eyes.
Only silence.
And him.
He exhaled slowly.
"Ancient Primordial Body…"
His fingers moved slightly as he recalled the sensation from earlier. The faint pulse beneath his flesh was still there—steady, ancient, almost… impatient.
As if it had been waiting for him to stop hesitating.
Su Chen sat cross-legged on the floor.
But instead of using this world's cultivation methods…
He reached into something far older.
Something that didn't belong to this era.
His previous life.
A place where cultivation was not divided into neat mortal stages, but into brutal comprehension of heaven's laws through survival and slaughter.
His hands formed an ancient seal.
One that had once caused entire starfields to tremble.
But now…
It barely caused the air to shift.
"Good," he murmured.
At least this body could carry it.
He closed his eyes.
Body Tempering Realm
Normally, cultivators spent months—sometimes years—refining their bodies at this stage.
Breaking bones.
Rebuilding muscles.
Slowly removing impurities like grinding stone against stone.
But Su Chen didn't do that.
He invited collapse instead.
His Primordial Body reacted instantly.
BOOM.
A violent shock ran through his internal structure.
Bones trembled.
Blood surged backward.
Every muscle in his body felt like it was being torn apart and rebuilt at the same time.
If a normal cultivator experienced this, they would have gone insane or died within seconds.
But Su Chen's expression remained calm.
"Too weak," he muttered.
Then he tightened his seal.
The Primordial Body responded again.
This time, it didn't just react—
It devoured.
The surrounding energy in the room vanished.
Not absorbed.
Consumed.
Like a starving beast finally allowed to eat.
Crack.
A faint sound echoed inside his body.
Not external.
Internal.
A hidden barrier shattered.
His bones hardened.
His muscles restructured.
His blood thickened with something far purer than normal spiritual circulation.
Body Tempering Realm—Peak Stage.
In less than a minute.
Su Chen opened his eyes.
They were calmer now.
But sharper.
"Still too slow."
He stood up.
And the moment his feet touched the ground—
The air shifted again.
Qi Condensation Realm
This was the first true step of cultivation in this world.
Most cultivators would spend years learning how to sense spiritual energy, then slowly guide it into their meridians.
But Su Chen didn't "sense" energy.
He commanded it.
His Primordial Body acted like a sovereign returning to a forgotten domain.
Every trace of spiritual energy within a hundred meters trembled.
Then—
It came.
Not from outside sources.
From the world itself.
From the walls.
From the ground.
From the faint hidden formations in the Su Residence.
Even from the air.
It all moved toward him.
Su Chen frowned slightly.
"This world's energy… is too thin."
Still.
It was enough.
He began circulating it using a cultivation method from his previous life—
A technique designed to refine universal chaos into absolute order.
In his past world, it was considered a forbidden method because it consumed too much energy and left nothing behind.
But here…
It was perfect.
Because everything responded to him.
The Primordial Body didn't filter energy.
It refined it instantly.
HUM—
A low vibration echoed through his body.
Meridians that didn't exist before began forming themselves.
Not artificially.
Naturally.
As if they had always been there.
Qi Condensation—Early Stage.
Then—
Mid Stage.
Then—
Peak Stage.
All within the same night.
Su Chen's breathing remained steady.
But the air around him felt heavier.
More… compressed.
He looked down at his hand.
A faint glow of internal energy pulsed beneath his skin.
"Still incomplete," he said quietly.
But there was no frustration in his voice.
Only analysis.
Only understanding.
The Primordial Body wasn't just strong.
It was incompatible with limits.
That was its true nature.
Suddenly—
The energy inside his body stopped behaving normally.
It didn't circulate in cycles like other cultivators.
It collapsed inward.
Su Chen's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Ah."
He understood.
The Primordial Body was rejecting the concept of Qi Condensation as a "stage."
To it, energy was not something to store.
It was something to merge with existence.
A low pressure spread outward from Su Chen's body.
The wooden floor beneath him cracked slightly.
Not from force—
But from density.
His presence alone was beginning to change the room.
Su Chen let out a slow breath.
"Then let's finish it."
He forced the energy inward.
Not refining it further…
But compressing it.
Violently.
The Qi inside his body screamed silently as it was crushed again and again until it stopped behaving like energy.
And became something else entirely.
A deeper structure.
A core of pure condensed force forming at the center of his dantian.
A fake Golden Core… born inside the Qi Condensation Realm.
Impossible in normal cultivation logic.
But Su Chen didn't care about logic.
He only cared about results.
HUM—
A shockwave spread outward.
The candles in the room flickered violently.
Outside, guards paused suddenly, sensing something strange in the air—but they couldn't locate the source.
Inside the room…
Su Chen opened his eyes.
Now they were different.
Not brighter.
Not darker.
Just deeper.
He exhaled.
"Qi Condensation… Peak."
Then he paused.
And added quietly:
"…and slightly beyond."
A faint smile formed on his lips.
The Primordial Body settled.
As if satisfied.
---
Su Chen stood in silence.
One night.
Two realms crossed.
And something unstable born inside him that didn't belong to any known classification.
He looked at his hand again.
"This world calls Saint Realm the limit."
He lowered his hand slowly.
"But it has no idea what the real starting point looks like."
Outside his window, the city continued to sleep.
Unaware.
Unaware that inside one forgotten room of a declining cultivation family…
Something impossible had just awakened.
And it was only beginning.