Heaven, Earth, Me

The power behind the finger flick was so elevated that all the furniture in the room was ruined. The shockwave, while Tatyana controlled her strength, was powerful enough to make all the windows shatter as well. Not to mention, the few maids and other mortals had been blown back and fainted on the spot. 

The Continental Lord’s mind was blank at this moment. The terrifying pain burning through his soul was something he had experienced only once in the past when he faced a World Lord. And yet, to reach that point, the World Lord had to exchange a few blows with him. Meanwhile, the woman in front of him managed to do it with just a finger flick. ‘Who is this woman!? Why is her strength so high!?’ His gaze toward Tatyana carried both resentment and fear. 

Tatyana approached the Continental Lord and looked down at him. The Continental Lord flinched, his heart beating loudly as some blood drained from his face. This person's strength was so high that even the thought of fleeing didn’t cross his mind. Still, he warned. “If you kill me, there will be consequences.” 

The words were spoken through coughs; he was clearly feeling some aftereffects from Tatyana’s attack. Even when he threatened her, Tatyana didn’t feel flustered. Her lips arched faintly as she demanded. “I want your manuals, or however you called them. The thing that helps you reach the so-called enlightenment of yours. If you give me that, I’ll consider sparing you.”

Groaning in pain, the Continental Lord held his stomach and coughed twice before answering. “That is impossible. You can’t offend our entire empire even if you are that powerful!”

Tatyana hummed and asked, curious. “Will taking that manual offend everyone?”

The Continental Lord sneered, struggling to get up. “What do you think? It is one of the most well-kept secrets across the entire Solar System! Only chosen ones earn the right to learn its secrets. Those who take it without permission will become the most wanted criminals in the seven worlds!”

Tatyana looked at his threatening face and smiled with a touch of both amusement and derision. She naturally didn’t fear whatever society took over this solar system. Still, if she wanted to uncover the deepest secrets of this place, she could flip everything around and hope to find it. With that in mind, Tatyana answered him. “I don’t have that intention. If I wanted to, destroying this world is as simple as flipping my hand. Your displays, short temper, and inability to decipher what I was aiming at are slightly disappointing. However, your strength is genuine compared to the rest of the people I’ve seen so far; your arrogance is, therefore, justified.”

The Continental Lord was confused at her words. In his experience, those with power would always disregard everything else and take what they wanted by force. Might make right was the baseline when two powers dealt with each other. Might also didn’t just come in the right of personal strength; influence and connections were also important.@@novelbin@@

Nevertheless, while possessing unfathomable might, the person in front of him actually took a step back when negotiating, even after he attacked with the intention to gravely injure her or outright kill her.

This was somewhat of a slap as well. Her disregard reached such an extent that even an attempt at her life was brushed off as the whines of a child. 

Tatyana waited for him to answer. Staggering, the Lord stood up and looked at her. That pair of red eyes was clearly calculating something, but the only thing he could perceive was a terrifying chill. It felt like he was looking at a still lake made of blood.

After he found his voice, he spoke up. “Since you don’t want to steal the Secret Scriptures, why did you tell me that you wanted them?”

Tatyana raised her eyebrow. “Wanting something means I need to rob it? What kind of logic is that? I have treasures of my own that I can offer in exchange. Moreover, far from wanting to keep it, I aim to borrow it for a few months.”

While he didn’t fully trust her words, he remembered seeing Tatyana returning something to Garel before everything escalated. After thinking about it, he shook his head. “I can’t share it. If it is known that I did, I will lose everything.” Before Tatyana spoke again, he added. “If you want to get one, you need to climb up the ranks and become a Lord of any rank. When you attend the [Nascent Spring] event, you will be able to demand one depending on how you qualify.”

Tatyana sighed and turned around, leaving the place. Tatyana shook her head. “In the end, we need to wait until then. Well, whatever. We have no real haste in moving to the upper heavens for now.”

Meanwhile, Garel was left behind with an injured Continental Lord. Not knowing what to do, he coughed and smiled politely. “D-Do you-”

“Shut up.” The Lord glared at Garel and then sighed. “Just… Forget that I’ve ever arrived at this place in the first place. I’ll go back to my territory to recuperate.” 

Back in the Skeletal Warship, deep inside its hull, Yasenia was meditating and controlling terrifying energies. Her face was pale, and her body was trembling slightly. She had not imagined that after she ate that pill, even her powerful meridians would struggle to carry the ridiculous amount of energy the pill was spreading in her body. 

Her face gained an incredulous grin as she whispered. “I might actually die from overenergy. What kind of ridiculous pill is the [Core Collapsing Pill]!?”

The pill she had swallowed so many years ago was still dissolving in her stomach, leaking out rivers of energies that Yasenia had to hastily move through her meridians, bones, muscles, organs, and Dantian. Inside her Dantian, the planets were all spinning and absorbing energy as fast as they could manage.

Soluna was delighted during the first years, but by now, she was so bloated with energy that she had started complaining. “Ugh… I can’t absorb much more…”

Soluna was basically a furnace that burned energy, and even she was struggling with the remnants of energy being poured into her to share the stress with everyone else. 

Dramel and Draheart were not much better than Soluna. They, as treasures, also had a great ability to absorb energy. And yet, their cores were basically overflowing with energy.

The only reason Yasenia had not exploded was the Celestial Energy star. The star was dealing with nearly two-thirds of all energy being constantly poured into the dragoness all by itself. Even after all of this, Yasenia felt as if she was about to explode.

Her Beast Cultivation had reached the tenth level a few years ago, and even her body cultivation had broken through into the Peak-level Epoch Core realm. However, she remained stuck in the ninth level of the Dantian Spiritualization Realm. 

Of course, unlike before, she remained not because she could not break through. Instead, she was in this realm because she felt that she had not compressed her Energy Core as much as she could. The size of the core had actually not grown during this time. It was around ten times smaller than before.

However, the ridiculous density of the energy Yasenia was concentrating there was terrifying. The Solid Energy Core was constantly vibrating as if begging Yasenia to allow it to expand because she was being too harsh on it.

However, Yasenia ignored it and continued pouring energy into it while using the weight of her existence to squeeze it. The ridiculous pressure she managed to accumulate over the many years would probably shatter the average Solid Energy Core of a genius cultivator.

Yasenia’s would’ve long shattered as well if it wasn’t for one peculiarity she spotted when it first cracked. When that happened the first time, Yasenia almost screamed in pain. The feeling of the Solid Energy core shattering was terrifyingly painful. Yet, when Yasenia was about to stop forcing herself and break through, she saw the material of the Celestial Energy Star seeping into the crack and instantly healing it. 

It was then that the dragoness’s mind flashed with a crazy thought. ‘The crack healed instantly? Then… Can’t I push it beyond the limits?’

She had the [Core Collapsing Pill] helping with the pressure and energy source, and she had the [Celestial Energy Star] as another source of terrifying pressure and healing. This was a perfect environment born from pure chance to refine a Solid Energy Core so dense that no one could compare. 

So, with that chance at the tip of her fingers, the dragoness put on a resolute face and recklessly threw herself into one simple task. “Squeeze the core until you can’t.”

The treasures in Yasenia’s Dantian spun with bright lights around her. The dragoness pushed her core far beyond limits. And the pain of doing so was so much that even Yasenia’s mind had started to waver. 

She had been torturing herself with something that would’ve broken the minds of most cultivators for several years. Even she, with her unbending will, was starting to think of giving up. 

“Isn’t this good enough?”

“There is probably no one that has condensed their core so much in history. You can stop.”

“Will it even be worth it?”

“Will this advantage carry on?”

Yasenia’s clear and pure heart started cracking. However, even when Yasenia understood that she was becoming increasingly vulnerable and had a high chance of contracting Heart Demons, she didn’t stop. “This is not the limit!”

She could feel it; it was far from the limits. Hence, Yasenia pushed. Therefore, Yasenia didn’t surrender. 

A hurricane of energies swirled around her, and she had enough strength to shred cultivators even at the low levels of the Dantian Spiritualization Realm. Just the effects from absorbing the surrounding energy were enough to kill all cultivators below the fifth realm. It was that violent.

Yasenia suddenly felt something strange. After absorbing and condensing the energy for so long, the Celestial Energy Star’s pressure and everything else had started to shrink in size constantly. It was as if a strange barrier had been broken.

Yasenia understood. She had reached a point of no return, leading her straight to unknown lands that she had never read about before. Yet, instead of showing fear, her golden eyes shone with unmatched radiance. “I’ve been waiting. Show me! What’s beyond this point? Where am I heading to!?”

And, at that moment, Yasenia’s Solid Energy Core collapsed and exploded.

BOOM!