“Origin crystals have grades?” Qianye had never heard of this.

“Of course. Do you think all divine champions have the same combat strength?” Ji Tianqing replied with a question.

There was really no need for a reply. Divine champions could differ drastically in their fighting powers, with some of them gaining tremendous power that would transform them entirely. Some geniuses would awaken rare powers and pull far ahead of their peers.

For instance, Zhao Jundu’s True Shot was a power that could be used up until the heavenly monarch realm, growing more powerful toward the end.

Meanwhile, the weakest divine champions were inherently no better than Zhao Jundu, except perhaps a slightly superior speed and strength. Even Qianye could fight such divine champions if he were to go all out.

The extremely weak and the extremely strong were both rare. Most of the experts were in the middle, each possessing their own advantages.

For instance, people like Zhao Jundu, Zhang Boqian, and Lin Xitang who possessed matching talents, secret arts, and power were few and far between.

“Origin crystals would be differentiated according to the divine champion’s ability. It can be roughly divided into ordinary, medium, high-quality, and top-quality,” Ji Tianqing explained. The Empire’s classification might not cover all situations, but it made for a way to measure things.

The so-called ordinary-grade origin crystal could only elevate a certain attribute of the body and only to a certain extent. Meanwhile, medium-grade ones would be able to raise two or more attributes such as strength, endurance, defense, speed, alacrity, etc. or they would bring about some unrelated minor abilities. A high-grade origin crystal would upgrade multiple facets of one’s physical body to a considerable degree; either that or they would contain a powerful ability or multiple practical ones. A top-grade one, on the other hand, would contain an extremely powerful ability or extremely useful characteristics.

Ji Tianqing pointed at Li Kuanglan who was focused on transforming the crystal. “For instance, if her crystal can grant someone an origin power attribute similar to hers, it would border on top-grade. Of course, a true top-grade origin power would need to convert all of a person’s origin power into the ice attribute.”

Li Kuanglan’s icy origin power was a secret cultivation art specific to the Li family. Not only could it work well with weapons like the Cold Moon’s Embrace and a series of outstanding sword arts, but it was also fairly pure. From this, one could say that her chances of stepping into the divine champion realm were fairly high. If an origin crystal really could convert one’s attribute to icy origin power, it would surely be ranked among the top.

Qianye’s own crystal back then could raise his vitality exponentially, and natural origin crystals were one grade superior to the ones from the Constellation Well. So, it should be ranked among the top-grade crystals according to this classification.

At this moment, the Storm Pearl in front of Li Kuanglan had shattered, and the resultant misty smoke was rolling about in a fist-sized area. One could vaguely see a small blue crystal at its center.

An origin crystal foundation had formed, but Li Kuanglan was sweating and her body was trembling somewhat. Dozens of stars at the bottom of the well had reacted, sending specks of starlight into the mist and accelerating the formation of the origin crystal. However, Li Kuanglan was clearly unable to hold out because she would need to save some origin power to return from the well.

Judging from this process, it would seem that this origin crystal was about to be ruined.

Despite that, her competitive nature had gotten the best of her at this point. She was determined to see it through and refused to come back up no matter what. Ji Tianqing looked worried, but she didn’t dare cry out for fear of disturbing Li Kuanglan.

Countless crystalline fragments had come together in the smoke, forming an early framework of the origin crystal. Li Kuanglan was drenched in sweat, pale and trembling, but she clenched her teeth and refused to give up.

The origin crystal took form—Li Kuanglan heaved a sigh of relief as she grabbed the crystal and flew upward. It was just that she had used up all her origin power and had no more strength left as she was a couple dozen meters from the entrance.

𝒻𝘳ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝒷𝘯ℴ𝓋ℯ𝘭.𝑐ℴ𝑚

Her heart sank, along with the gradual fall of her body. This distance could normally be covered in a single jump, but now, it felt extremely far.

It was at this time that a firm arm grabbed her waist and flew up with great strength. This feeling was extremely familiar since she had often relied on this arm to survive during the frigid nights.

Li Kuanglan relaxed wholeheartedly as she leaned into Qianye’s arms.

The latter, however, wasn’t so relaxed at this moment. When he flew into the Constellation Well, it felt like several chains had latched onto his body and were dragging him toward the void at the bottom of the well. This type of spatial draw seemed weak, but Qianye had no support around him and was relying solely on his origin power to fly. Add to that the fact that he had to carry Li Kuanglan, the strain wasn’t just a simple doubling of weight.

Fortunately, Qianye possessed an almost endless pool of origin power that allowed him to drag Li Kuanglan out by force.

The moment they landed, Ji Tianqing charged over and hugged the two of them in silence. Although she didn’t say anything, her actions spoke louder than a thousand words. It was clear that she was completely terrified.

Having gone into the well personally, Qianye understood that Ji Tianqing had no power to save Li Kuanglan. Not to mention the fact that she was in a weakened state, she wouldn’t be able to pull Li Kuanglan up even if she were at her peak. Forcing a rescue would only end in one way: both of them would fall into the bottom of the Constellation Well.

The space within the Constellation Well was peculiar in that origin power would dissipate very quickly. It wasn’t possible to use origin power to operate long weapons like whips. So, Qianye had no choice but to jump into the well and drag Li Kuanglan back.

The girl was somewhat pale. Just now, she had thought she was destined to fall into the void. Ji Tianqing said not a single word and merely hugged the two tighter.

Qianye was the only one who was relatively normal. He patted Ji Tianqing in consolation, saying, “Okay, everything’s fine now. She’s back, see? It was quite easy, really.”

Ji Tianqing realized that she had lost her composure just now. She looked up and glared at Qianye before running away to the side with Li Kuanglan in tow.

The two girls were whispering, so Qianye didn’t want to eavesdrop. He merely gazed at the Constellation Well, thinking back to the process of origin crystal condensation and his experience entering the well personally.

The girls returned moments later. Li Kuanglan stretched out her hand to reveal a light blue origin crystal, shrouded by a cloud of faint mist. Qianye could feel a faint chill coming off of the beautiful crystal as it approached him.

However, he could see that the crystal was far from being perfect. That misty cloud looked good, but it was a sign that the power of the stars was leaking out from inside the crystal. This outflow went to show that the origin crystal was of insufficient quality to hold that much origin power.

The crystal sported an icy attribute. Although there wouldn’t be a huge upgrade for the user, it could still be considered a medium-grade origin crystal. The Jingtan Li family produced the Storm Pearl in order to increase the chances of forming an origin crystal, so naturally, they had some original comprehensions in this field. It really wasn’t a bad outcome for Li Kuanglan to have successfully produced a medium-grade origin crystal.

“Next, it’s my turn,” Ji Tianqing said.

Qianye was startled. “No, your body is still weak, you’ll be in danger after going down. It won’t be too late to go down after you’ve fully recovered.”

“I’ve recovered a fair bit. Besides, I swiped a lot of good medicines from Elder Lu. A random handful of them is enough to last me an entire day. You should observe carefully instead of worrying about me. My method is completely different from Kuanglan, so learn it well. We’ll need to depend on you to produce a high-grade origin crystal and get rich.”

With that, Ji Tianqing placed a Storm Pearl in her mouth and jumped into the Constellation Well.

Qianye shook his head but didn’t stop her. Ji Tianqing normally looked lively and naive, much like a spritely girl, but she had her own views regarding important matters. She was certainly more decisive than Li Kuanglan was, and likely wouldn’t change her mind on something she had decided.

Ji Tianqing’s earlier phase was the same as Li Kuanglan. She fell straight down until she was near where Li Kuanglan was earlier. At that point, countless golden bubbles appeared around her body, forming layers of soft mattresses to slow her fall. In the blink of an eye, Ji Tianqing had stopped at the center of the well. Her eyes were half-closed as the golden bubbles around her popped in and out of existence.

Her method was different from Li Kuanglan’s in that she was holding the Storm Pearl in her mouth, drawing upon the power of the stars with every breath.

In just moments, several of the stars had lit up and specks of gold light were converging into Ji Tianqing’s mouth.

“She’s using her respiration to condense the power of the stars. The advantage of that is that the process is more natural and contains no artificial aspects. Compared to our Li family’s method, theirs is more likely to condense a high-grade origin crystal. The bad thing about their technique is that the process is too slow and it imposes significant requirements in one’s cultivation. It's not as easy as our Li family’s method.”

After a pause, she said, “At our level, the Li family’s technique is naturally superior, but her secret art would catch up near the divine champion threshold. After becoming a divine champion, however, the Ji family arts would have the complete advantage.”

Currently, Qianye also knew that Ji Tianqing was the Pointer Monarch’s descendant. It wasn’t odd for an art taught by the Pointer Monarch to be stronger than the Jingtan Li family’s, and this also made clear the special characteristics of the two. The Jingtan Li family had been working to become a major clan, so they were more focused on the overall strength of the Li family as a whole. The inherited secret art was geared toward people with mid or high talent levels. The core objective was also to pass through the divine champion threshold.

Meanwhile, the Pointer Monarch was from the Imperial clan. He had no intention of forming his own branch and was entirely concentrated on how to get further in the heavenly monarch realm. As he saw it, so-called geniuses had to reach the divine champion realm or they weren’t worth raising. Hence, it was only natural that the arts before that rank weren’t quite valued.

As for the Zhang and Zhao clans, their clans attended simultaneously to people before and at the divine champion realm. They also had an abundance of heavenly-monarch-level cultivation arts. The only thing they were missing compared to the Imperial clan were the resources required for cultivation at the heavenly monarch realm. This was also the two clans’ foundation for over a thousand years.

At this point, Li Kuanglan’s voice became distant. Apparently, she found the outcome quite regretful.