Book 4, Chapter 159: Fusing Yin And Yang With The Mind, Entering The Heavenly Gate For A Profound Truth

Between the two methods to reach the Fourth Limit, in Settling the Mind, martial artists were already impressive enough to be able to mobilize 70% of their strength to tear down the limits of the human body. When it came to One with the Mind, the martial artist would be able to mobilize more than 90% of their strength.

This was where the danger lay, because this method left no room for retreat. It would keep pushing the martial artist upward and wouldn’t stop until they succeeded.

Even with Chen Chuan’s foundation, as his life force was continuously converted to fuel for the growth of his mind, he became thinner. His originally radiant skin became completely dull.

But he got an incredibly stable mind out of it.

With his willpower and the Observance of the Gold Planet guiding him, he expanded his mind and felt the corruption coming at him from everywhere. Strange shadows that were a cross between real and illusion surged over and started tempting him to stop him from transcending. Higher up were multiple existences watching him hungrily and waiting for him to fall into their clutches.

Even if he did this in the physical world, he wouldn’t have been able to avoid this. Now, since he was in the other world, he had to face even more threats. He didn’t have his second self protecting him either, so he had to face all of it on his own.

The corruption might have come from hostile forces attacking him, but at the same time, it was food for his advancement. Each wave of corruption was a problem he had to think over, and his mind transformed after he passed each wave. As long as his life force wasn’t depleted during this process, he would be able to complete his metamorphosis.

It wasn’t like he didn’t have any shields, though. First, he had the light from the artifact protecting him, and second, the eggshell artifact was supporting him by replenishing all the energy he depleted. This allowed him to continuously expand his mind.

His current task was to break the wall separating him from the Fourth Limit. If he couldn’t do it or if his foundation wasn’t strong enough, he would have to give up something or embrace something to continue expanding his mind.

He had no intention of doing that.

After all the fights he went through and the nutrients he absorbed, Chen Chuan was among the top thirty or top ten in the world. Such people had a certain chance of reaching the Fourth Limit without giving up on anything or embracing something they hated. Chen Chuan’s strength had doubled, so he could rely on his own power to tear down the wall.

His mind was headed to the wall, but he did not feel any sign of his energy running out. His momentum did not falter. Soon, he reached the wall and tore it down with his firm mental energy.

Chen Chuan’s mind trembled. The existences who were watching him hungrily were cast far behind him, where they vanished, while he entered a brand new world. His mind merged with everything around him, as if they had become one. It was like he had cast aside the burden that was his physical body. It felt refreshing and freeing.

But his body was still around, and he needed to send his mind back to transcend it as well. However, the thought of casting everything aside to enjoy his newfound freedom rose in him.

This was an instinctive urge that would always appear once the metamorphosis of the mind was completed. The mind would no longer want anything dragging it back and would wish to cast aside its physical restraints. This was an Inner Haunting.

Humans might have all sorts of desires and changes of the heart, but no matter what, they always prioritized their own survival. Right now, once Chen Chuan’s mind metamorphosized, it became an external self and naturally had the selfish desire to prioritize itself. This was unavoidable.

But the mind came from the body. If he cast aside his base, he might be able to exist in this space for a while, but he would face a torrent of corruption. The continuous attacks would drain him and prevent him from replenishing his energy, then he would scatter into nothingness.

Perhaps he could choose to depend on some existence to survive, but casting aside his body to rely on something else was the worst plan possible. In the end, he would just end up as food for the existence and lose his intelligence.

Once he understood this, as well as the pros and cons of his Inner Haunting, his mind could return to his body. Hence, the second stage was destroying the Inner Haunting and returning to the body. One had to guard the heart and refine the soul.

Chen Chuan didn’t let his mind do whatever it wanted and told himself the cons of casting away the body, which allowed him to dispel the thought right away. He soon focused and returned to his body.

This was the last stage: Guide the life force back to the body and attain true transformation, then cultivate your life.

Once he completed this stage, his yin and yang forces would transform. Light would come from his heart to illuminate both his mind and body. This would merge his mind and body into one.

As his mind started injecting nourishment back into the body, Chen Chuan felt his body tremble. White smoke shot out and formed a cloud above him. Then, light in the form of rain fell down.

His mutated tissue cheered and greedily absorbed the nutrients from his mind. It also used all that it got to help the body complete its metamorphosis.

In just a while, the shriveled body regained its vitality. However, cracks formed on his skin, and his skin started falling in flakes that danced in the air.

Once his old skin fell off, what was revealed underneath was new, smooth, radiant skin that was glowing.

His hair also seemed to have grown longer, and it looked like it was shiny black ink. He remained a human, but he looked to have been reborn.

When the cloud above him faded away and all the energy it brought with it became one with him, Chen Chuan opened his eyes. They shone brightly, just as his body.

He had passed the third stage and become a martial arts master.

There was a saying in the Observance of the Gold Planet: “Fusing yin and yang with the mind, then entering the heavenly gate to obtain a profound truth.”

Hence, the Fourth Limit was also known as Acquiring Arcane Truth.

Chen Chuan checked the light in his palm. In the past, he needed to use his mind to borrow this power from the other world, but after becoming a martial arts master, his mind and body went through a metamorphosis. He had become an entirely different being, so he could generate this power on his own.

The amount of spirit sense a martial arts master could generate depended entirely on their foundation as well as their training. Even without anyone telling him, Chen Chuan knew that its strength determined the martial arts master’s fighting prowess.

The spirit sense each martial arts master possessed was different. The one he borrowed was average and identical to what everyone else borrowed, but the one he created within himself had his own brand, just like how everyone’s Heartborn Force was unique to them. He would even say that after reaching the Fourth Limit, his spirit sense was no longer separable from his Heartborn Force.

Well then, what has become of my refined force—

While thinking about it, he heard a loud bang. When he looked up, he saw that the cracks in space were getting larger. Some of them were already the width of a finger.

In the little time that passed, Wei Guochan had almost reopened the gap.

Chen Chuan stood up and calmly kept his eyes trained ahead. As the tremors grew, he heard cracking sounds. The space couldn’t stay shut anymore. With a loud crack, a jagged tear appeared.

Through it, Chen Chuan saw Wei Guochan’s large body.

Wei Guochan also saw Chen Chuan, even though he was standing in the light. He didn’t move at first, then, with a loud rip, he pushed open the narrow tear and tried to grab Chen Chuan.

Halfway through, he froze. There was a fist pushing against his hand.

Surprise flickered in Wei Guochan’s eyes before they turned fearsome. He curled his fingers to crush the fist and the arm attached to it.

Yet the moment he grabbed the hand, Wei Guochan trembled. Black smoke flickered about him while he fell back and slowly left the gap. A fist flowing with golden light pushed his palm out.

The wisps of golden light flowed like water up the fist’s arm, then went over the rest of Chen Chuan’s body. In the end, as if something was set on fire, golden flames rose into the air with a loud bang and a violent tremor.

Chen Chuan stepped forward while pushing the large palm back. The ground shattered and sank beneath his feet, and the air vibrated nonstop. The golden flames seeped into the cracks before turning into thick, white smoke that rose up.

The power of the attack in the gap shattered the thin wall separating the two worlds, and bright light gushed out. At the same time, the light from the artifact showed up again, though much dimmer. The moment it returned to the physical world, it rose into the sky again.

Yao Zhiyi, Xiao Wan, and Zhao Zhenye noticed the commotion in the forest and looked over. Amid the colorful light staining the sky in every color was a golden glow like molten lava. A person with white smoke rising from him was walking out while pushing against Wei Guochan’s palm.

As they stared at the thick white smoke and golden light forming a large cloud of smoke and light behind him, their gazes sharpened. Was this... another martial arts master?

Once Chen Chuan was outside, he pushed forward, and the black flames as well as the golden glow exploded. Wei Guochan stumbled more than a dozen steps backward before falling on one knee. It was then that he finally stopped. The black smoke behind him flickered violently.

Wei Guochan stayed still for a moment before whipping his head up and charging forward. His huge body caused the ground to tremble. Before he reached Chen Chuan, their biofields collided. Cracks formed around the place where their lights intersected, as if there was lightning spreading outward. The black flames were the first to collapse and shatter.

The next second, Wei Guochan was sent flying. Then, like a cannonball, he bounced on the ground a few times and crashed into the ground, where he created a large crater.

Chen Chuan stayed still with his arm outstretched. While looking at Wei Guochan buried in dirt and smoke, he said, “You’re too weak.”

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