Chapter 776 - Celestial Qi

Long Chen would be enveloped by celestial Qi when he started cultivating the Seven Star Body. Since celestial Qi was a terrifying energy, no one would be able to get close to him.

While the celestial Qi could harm regular cultivators, Long Chen had the Seven Star Manual, which would allow him to channel a minuscule amount of celestial Qi into his body.

More importantly, Long Chen had obtained the strange, blue rock that resembled a heart. He took it out of the Primordial Realm to inspect it.

“This is the core of a massive meteor. The core is the most instrumental part of a star. Without the core, I would never be able to cultivate the Seven Star Body. This core is the key to cultivate it. First, I must merge the core with my heart.”

Long Chen looked at the core floating in his palm. It was akin to the heart of a star. He needed to merge it with his heart and transform his body into a small star to accept the power of the stars! He could then use celestial Qi to temper his body. Long Chen was using the core as a catalyst to cultivate the Seven Star Body and control the celestial Qi.

The other important aspect of cultivating the Seven Star Essence lay in his ability to precisely control the celestial Qi.

Rays of Seven Star Essence surged out of his palm just like water to envelop the blue core. The blue rays of light lit it up and revealed the runes carved into it.

As the runes shone, Long Chen’s face also reflected the deep, blue color.

“This should be fine.” Since the Seven Star Essence belonged to him, he could absorb it back at any time. The blue core was slowly melted, leaving only the blue runes imprinted on Long Chen’s Seven Star Essence. They were floating around the surface of his essence like boats on water.

“It’s time.” Long Chen immersed himself and slowly moved the Seven Star Essence from his palm to his heart. When it touched his heart, the Seven Star Essence would turn into liquid and slowly merge with it.

Long Chen felt a burning energy entering his body as the blue energy surged towards his heart. Soon, the blue energy enveloped his heart completely.

Is the core going to merge with my heart now?

Long Chen then saw the runes on the core slowly etch themselves onto his heart. They merged with his beating heart and slowly turned it blue just like the original core was.

Long Chen started to feel a strong energy entering his body. The burning energy was similar to the energy of the stars.

Thanks to the Ancient Bloodsoul Dragon’s Inherited Blood Essence, everything inside of Long Chen’s body, including his bones, had long turned blood-red. Now only his heart was blue, as if it was the brightest star in the sky.

The core and Long Chen’s heart fused together, giving him the new sensation of being able to control the power of the stars. The billions of stars above his head were inexplicably clear in his heart, as if he was one of them.

The core had turned him into a human-shaped star.

Now I need to use this power to channel the celestial Qi and use it little by little to temper my body.

Merging the core wasn’t dangerous, and the process had gone well. The blue runes were now etched onto his heart and provided him with the power of the stars.

It granted Long Chen slight control over the power of the stars from above.

He was about to channel some of the celestial Qi, but something changed. As his heart beat, his blood circulated through his body endlessly, and blood-red dragon illusions appeared in his veins. There were an infinite number of them, and they all flowed towards his heart!

It was as if his blood was alive!

The Inherited Blood Essence of the Ancient Bloodsoul Dragon was too strong. The inheritance of a mere mortal like the Seven Star Lord and the minuscule core could never take the place of the heart, the most important organ for blood.

As such, the Ancient Bloodsoul Dragon’s Inherited Blood Essence was angry. The infinite blood-red dragon illusions surged towards his heart, making Long Chen feel like his blood was boiling.

He couldn’t react before they reached his heart. They enveloped his blue heart and soon turned it blood-red too.

The runes of the core were still present, but they were completely dyed blood-red.

Long Chen could feel that the power of the core was still present, and it had become stronger thanks to the reinforcement of the blood-red dragon illusions. However, outsiders could not detect the power of the stars radiating off Long Chen this way.

This reminded him of when he infused the Golden Crow Flames into his body. The golden flames turned blood-red as well and were dominated by the blood of the Ancient Bloodsoul Dragon. As long as the Inherited Blood Essence was present, only one color would be allowed in Long Chen’s body: blood-red. Both the Golden Crow Flames and the star core had been enveloped by that color.

But this was just a minor incident. The change didn’t affect Long Chen’s ability to channel the celestial Qi. He didn’t mind it and started channeling celestial Qi using his Seven Star Essence.

Having full control over the core allowed Long Chen to feel the celestial Qi high up in the skies. It was a deep purple gas that enveloped some of the stars. It was incredibly corrosive, just like the Metal Devouring Wind. It felt like it was made out of countless tiny, metal blades. A regular cultivator would die just from touching it, just like how they would from touching the Metal Devouring Wind.

It would take some time for Long Chen to learn how to channel the celestial Qi. As expected, he didn’t succeed on his first try. There were a lot of stars in the sky, and Long Chen could only try again and again.

As the Seven Star Manual had described, it would take a few days to successfully channel the celestial Qi from the stars. But Long Chen was different. His Martial Soul was shaped like a dragon, not a human. His comprehension ability was also off the charts. All of this meant that Long Chen could channel the celestial Qi better than others.

Four hours later, Long Chen finally managed to channel some of it towards him. It was very little, but it was a good start. He had progressed significantly faster than what the Seven Star Manual had described. There wasn’t enough celestial Qi to envelope him, but he still carefully channeled it down towards him from the sky. He opened his eyes and inspected the wisp of celestial Qi.

It was a purple gas that could shift its shape freely, like an intelligent being. It was changing constantly, forming shapes depicting various beasts, fish, shrimps, and even humans. Each of its transformations also sported a snarling expression as it glared at Long Chen, as if it hated him for taking control of it.

“What a strange world we live in. To think that the celestial Qi has a mind of its own...”

Cultivating the Seven Star Body only required two special conditions. Long Chen had successfully found a suitably high place and merged the core with his heart. He only needed to complete the next two steps to successfully cultivate the Seven Star Body.

First was control. He needed to control the celestial Qi so precisely that it wouldn’t injure him when he used it to temper his body and organs. The second thing was endurance. Only those with astonishing willpower were capable of cultivating the Seven Star Body. They had to endure the pain of being mutilated by the celestial Qi to temper their body. Only by enduring the pain could they succeed.

Many people throughout history had been given the method to cultivate the Seven Star Body. The Seven Star Lord was not the one who had invented it. However, many of them had failed in cultivating it because the pain was too much for them to endure. Even if they did, it would take them a very long time.

Long Chen wasn’t certain he would succeed.

But he knew he was much more stubborn than others. He wasn’t afraid of cultivating it as long as it only needed him to control and endure it.