Chapter 1921: Strange Metal

"Liu Qianjue" tossed the violent frog-like creature back into the pond and calmly said, "Immediately put together a list of our most outstanding disciples and deliver it to the Great Eastern Alliance. This war in the Outerverse not only ended with the Great Eastern Alliance stopping the Astral Beast Domain’s invasion, but they also wrested control of the Outerverse’s eastern weaves back from the Sixth Mainland. Dozens of Envoys were mobilized for this war, and nothing can stop Lu Yin’s progress anymore. Given the situation, my Sword Sect cannot fall behind any others.

"Release an announcement to the entire sect that we will henceforth be known as the Great Eastern Alliance’s Sword Sect. The name of the Great Eastern Alliance needs to be added to our own."

Elder Li was truly stunned. "Sect Master, this-"

"Liu Qianjue" turned his head back to stare at Elder Li, and the Envoy’s powerful aura instantly overwhelmed Elder Li. "What? Do you not want to do as you’re told?"

Elder Li dropped to his knees, sweat beading on his forehead. "I don’t dare! This disciple will take care of this immediately."

"Liu Qianjue" nodded with satisfaction. "Also, tell Lianxin that if she insists on not joining the Great Eastern Alliance, then she must remove herself from the Sword Sect. We will not indulge her any longer."

With that, Lu Yin's consciousness separated from the Possession and returned to his own body. He felt quite refreshed by what he had just done.

Elder Li would probably be completely befuddled, and if the elder carried out the orders that Lu Yin had just given, that confusion would be passed on to the entire Sword Sect. No, it would extend to the entire Innerverse. In particular, what Lu Yin had said regarding Elder Lianxin would have serious consequences. The woman was clearly devoted to the Sword Sect, but she would be pushed away from it and forced to become an independent cultivator.

These two Possessions had burned through about 100 million star essence. It was not much for Lu Yin, but both Possessions had been of people within the Innerverse. If Lu Yin had instead Possessed someone from the Perennial World, it would have consumed an astronomical amount of star essence.

Lu Yin was in no rush to roll his die again, and he quietly sat on the riverbed for ten days, resting before he was able to roll his die again.

Timestop was an easy roll to get on Lu Yin’s die, as Pilfer was the only result that came up more often.

When Lu Yin returned to the Timestop Space, he did not rush to resume training Inverse Step, but instead continued rolling his die. He had remembered that there was something that he wanted to Enhance: the pill skin that he had received from Herb Immortal. The Semi-Progenitor had mentioned that the pill skin was already able to defend against attacks with power levels of a million, and Lu Yin had recently lost his bodysuit armor. If he ran into a powerful opponent, he would be in danger, especially since only old freaks with power levels of over a million could pose any real threat given his current strength.

Given the fact that Lu Yin was already in the Timestop Space, there was no chance that he would not be able to roll three pips.

His first roll was Gift Copy, which was useless at the moment.

Next, he rolled Pilfer, which was also useless.

The third roll was Blackhole Disassembly, and while Lu Yin did not initially intend to use it, it reminded him of all the items that First Edition City had sent him to be Disassembled.

Then, Lu Yin remembered something else as well: the metal from the Absolute Beast Cage.

The cage had been made from a strange metal that had once nearly destroyed the entire Fourth Mainland, and Lu Yin wondered if the shards that he had gathered could be Disassembled. So, he quickly pulled out a fragment from his cosmic ring.

He had asked the Sixth Mainland to gather a bunch of fragments of the shattered Absolute Beast Cage for him. Of those fragments, he had stored some away in his cosmic ring, sent some to be stored in Frostwave Weave, and then sent another batch to First Edition City, as the Technocracy was very anxious to acquire this particular metal.

Since the cage had been made of metal, it should be possible to Disassemble it. Lu Yin took the piece that he had pulled out and placed it on the vortex in front of him, but the metal simply fell to the ground. It could not be Disassembled after all.

This was the first time that Lu Yin’s Blackhole Disassembly had failed, and it indicated that the fragment was either not actually metal or was already in its purest state and could not be Disassembled to a more refined state.

Was it actually metal? Lu Yin stared at the shard in his hand. If it could not be Disassembled, then could it be Enhanced?

He spent ten days in the Timestop Space resting before rolling his die again. His luck was good, and the roll was three pips.

Lu Yin pulled the pill skin back out and set it atop the upper light screen while wondering if the odd substance could be Enhanced. He threw out a massive amount of star essence; he had a feeling that, if the pill skin could be improved, it would cost an absurd amount.

10 million. 50 million. 100 million. Star essence was consumed voraciously before the pill skin finally dropped down slightly. Though it had barely moved, the fact that it had moved at all proved that it could be Enhanced.

Lu Yin did some rough estimates, and based on how far the pill skin had fallen, it would cost him at least 4 billion star essence to finish this first upgrade.

How insane!

The further Lu Yin’s strength progressed, the more valuable the items he picked up, and subsequently, the more expensive it became to Enhance those items.

It was not unreasonable for Lu Yin to possess an item that could affect a battle that involved cultivators with power levels of over a million, and paying 4 billion star essence to acquire such an item was not unacceptable. This thought removed Lu Yin’s hesitation. Besides, he still had almost 30 billion star essence, and he could get even more from the Mavis Bank, which meant that he was far from being short on funds for the time being.

4 billion star essence was consumed, and the pill skin finally fell down from the two screens of light. Lu Yin picked it up and squeezed it with a great deal of strength, but he was unable to do anything to it at all.

Before being Enhanced, the pill skin had been able to endure attacks with power levels of a million, but afterwards, it was no longer able to even be damaged by such attacks.

A power level of 1 million was a milestone, and breaking past that point was far more difficult than breaking through to the Envoy realm.

It should be possible to Enhance the pill skin yet again, so Lu Yin threw it back out and started dumping more star essence on the screens. This second upgrade cost him more than 7 billion star essence, for a total of almost 12 billion star essence. The pill skin had become thicker, and while it was still quite ugly: it looked like a poncho.

Lu Yin did not know if the pill skin could be upgraded any further, but he put it away for the time being and instead pulled out a shard from the Absolute Beast Cage and started tossing out star essence to improve it. He watched with both curiosity and high expectations.

The metal of the beast cage could indeed be improved, which made Lu Yin's eyes light up. He started to crazily throw out massive amounts of star essence.

200 million. It took a full 200 million star essence to Enhance a single shard of the metal from the Absolute Beast Cage once. The metal showed no real changes aside from becoming a bit bigger.

Lu Yin actually had no idea what he could gain from this metal, and he was merely curious. He wanted to see for himself what sort of thing had once brought a catastrophe upon the Fourth Mainland, as there was no way that the modern Absolute Beast Cage resembled that ancient terror.

He continued to upgrade the metal.

The second upgrade cost him 400 million star essence.

The third, 800 million.

The fourth, 1.5 billion.

The fifth, 3.2 billion.

The metal grew a bit bigger every time it was improved, and after the fifth upgrade, it twisted upon itself to form a ring before beginning to radiate a dim light.

Lu Yin quietly observed the ring, and at this moment, it seemed more like something alive than a piece of metal.

Suddenly, the metal from the Absolute Beast Cage jolted and shot towards Lu Yin. He raised a hand and grabbed it out of the air, only to feel a bit of pain from his palm. After looking, he saw sharp spines protruding from the ring, clearly trying to pierce through his skin. However, Lu Yin’s physique was too powerful, and the spines could not break through his skin. All that they could do was induce a bit of pain, though the spines were sharp enough to stab through most Envoys.

Lu Yin remembered that this metal was supposedly able to grow and become stronger by consuming flesh and blood.

The massive Absolute Beast Cage had been tough enough that even Empyrean Imprinters had struggled to destroy it, and the legends claimed that the piece of metal that had threatened the Fourth Mainland had been as large as half of the entire Outerverse.

At least, this was what Lu Yin had heard from Ya Mavis, who had obtained the information from the Mavis family’s ancient records. Lu Yin did not actually know how true the information was.

As he stared at the piece of metal, Lu Yin could sense that it only desired to consume his flesh and blood.

This thing was a scourge. His eyes turned hard, and he wanted to destroy the bit of metal, but then he remembered something that caused a smile to slowly spread across his face. This metal had been a disaster for the Fourth Mainland, and it could do the same elsewhere. The key aspect was how this scourge was used.

Besides, Lu Yin had just spent around 6 billion star essence upgrading this piece of metal, so simply destroying it would be a waste of his funds.

After putting the ring away, Lu Yin checked his cosmic ring. What he discovered put an ugly expression on his face. Enhancing just two items had burned through more than half of his funds. Although he still had more than 10 billion star essence left, it was insufficient for his current level.

Also, he realized that it was important to find an even larger cosmic ring so that he could store more resources. The bigger, the better.

𝚏𝕣𝐞𝗲𝐰𝕖𝐛𝐧𝕠𝕧𝚎𝚕.𝐜𝚘𝗺

Despite becoming an Envoy, Lu Yin realized that his need for star essence had not diminished in the slightest. Instead, it had grown even larger than before, which was truly a ridiculous concept.

It was time to train, so Lu Yin returned to practicing Inverse Step.

The feats he had seen Progenitor Chen's clone accomplish with this movement technique had made Lu Yin obsessed with it.

After almost another year of training in the Timestop Space, Lu Yin rolled his die once more and continued training.

Over the next two weeks. Lu Yin rolled his die repeatedly, and he ended up using Timestop five times. He rarely trained this frantically, and all of this time was spent focusing on Inverse Step.

Using Timestop five times meant that Lu Yin had practiced the movement technique for nearly five consecutive years.

After this time, Qian Zou could not compare to Lu Yin’s own mastery of Inverse Step, and Lu Yin had actually reached the level of being able to create a small area of chaotic space. He had actually reached the same level of mastery that Progenitor Chen had accomplished as a peak Enlighter. However, everyone comprehended techniques in their own unique way, so Lu Yin had no idea if there was some difference in his use of Inverse Step and what Progenitor Chen had achieved.

Lu Yin started to carefully review what he had seen when Progenitor Chen's clone had used Inverse Step during the stellular tribulation. Right, Lu Yin had also forgotten that he still had some Roots of Intelligence. Even if they were merely rip-offs, they were still able to calm his mind and help him focus.

Lu Yin drank a cup of tea that he prepared from a Root of Intelligence, and he started to review his battle against Progenitor Chen again.

After training in the movement technique and also facing it in battle, Lu Yin’s understanding of Inverse Step was lightyears apart compared to when he had first observed the technique.

He closed his eyes and focused on his memories of his stellular tribulation. Specifically, he returned to the first time he had seen Progenitor Chen’s clone approach him with Inverse Step. Everything around the clone had grown chaotic and changed, even space itself. Even… time.

Lu Yin’s eyes snapped open. Time? Yes, time had also been influenced.

Truesight was a truly miraculous cultivation art, and it was incredibly difficult to overcome it once a practitioner reached the Knowing realm of mastery. And yet, not only had Progenitor Chen’s use of Inverse Step affected the nearby space, but he had also managed to reverse time, which had disrupted Lu Yin’s use of Truesight, even though it had reached the Knowing realm of mastery.

Time was something that everyone was aware of, but it was also something that no one could influence or even touch. It was a vague and powerful concept. After all, who could control time?

Wendy Yushan's innate gift was Rewind, and it actually rewound time itself.

That was all she did, and yet during ZENITH, Wendy had managed to shatter Zhi Yi’s Vitality Qi despite the Daosourse Three Skies outclassing Wendy Yushan multiple times over.

Time was also connected to divination. Everyone wished to master the power of time, and Inverse Step could allow one to touch time.

Lu Yin started thinking. For Progenitor Chen to reach such a high level of mastery at the peak of the Enlighter realm, just how long had he trained Inverse Step?

Lu Yin needed to keep practicing. If he was not able to match Progenitor Chen’s accomplishment with five years of training, then he would do so with ten years. If that was insufficient, then he would train for twenty years. Lu Yin did not believe that it was impossible for him to achieve the same thing as Progenitor Chen.

Progenitor Chen was extremely talented, but he had also relied on the Nine Clones Secret Technique. One of those nine clones had been completely dedicated to mastering Inverse Step. As such, Lu Yin believed that, without the Nine Clones Secret Technique, Progenitor Chen would not have been able to master Inverse Step so thoroughly as just an Enlighter.

The Nine Clones Secret Technique was almost as much of a cheat tool as Lu Yin’s own Timestop.

Lu Yin wanted to keep rolling his die, but he suddenly received a message from the overseers’ council. However, since Lu Yin was in a pocket dimension, he was not able to access the contents of the message.

After a moment’s thought, Lu Yin left the pocket space and returned to the asteroid field. He accessed his gadget only to find messages and missed calls from many people. Most importantly, Big Sis had met with Nan Yuan.

While Lu Yin had been training in Inverse Step, Lei Qingqing, Big Sis, had arrived at Mt. Microcosms.