77 Harder, Better, Slower, Stronger

As Meng was rapidly aging, several pills appeared in his hand before he threw them into his mouth, gulping them down at one go. The moment he swallowed so many pills at the same time containing a lot of vitality, the veins bulged out on his skin. Meng gritted his teeth as the unrefined vitality within him was rapidly being drained out of him.

He repeated the process a few times but each time he used the pills, the weaker effect they had against the tribulation. As he was quickly thinking about what to do, an idea struck him.

A Sacred Garden inside Meng's consciousness appeared behind him, supplementing him with endless vitality, slowly returning his appearance to that of a young man but the tribulation continued draining the vitality out of him, however this time, it all came from the Sacred Garden that was much more powerful than Meng previously thought. Despite being powerful, the hundreds of good quality herbs were slowly dying inside to supplement him with vitality.

'?! Is that actually Heavenly Profound Treasure? No...There is no record about anything that looks even a bit similar, however, the vitality this garden contains is almost endless.' The residual soul watched Meng with full attention, keeping only a slight of its consciousness on Yufeng who was fusing with its blood.

"UGHH!" Meng was groaning as he felt that a little was remaining to break the mirror formed above him. He felt that the tribulation was getting stronger but at the same time, he could feel that it was due to absorbing an enormous amount of vitality and it was having trouble keeping it, after all, such an enormous amount of vitality can't just disappear despite being drained by the heaven's tribulation itself!

'Oh! I see what you are trying to do! Let me have some fun too~' Su Zhu's childish voice resounded inside Meng's mind before she appeared in her spiritual form of a phoenix behind him and began supplementing him with her remaining divine energy. This greatly surprised Meng as he didn't even dare to think that Su Zhu would waste her recovered energy by helping him, however, that still wasn't enough and only a little bit was remaining to break the mirror that already had a few cracks on the surface.

"HAAA!" Meng once again released a loud roar as the tyrannical pressure from the Hell Suppressing physique started getting stronger. 2 similar gates appeared behind Meng, one abyss-like looking and another radiating with golden light.

"5th move...Heavenly Mandate!" Meng used his 5th move and immediately started absorbing the power straight from the sun at a high rate which would normally be pretty dangerous at his current level but since it was instantly being drained by the crimson demonic light, he didn't care.

*CRACK* Finally, a crack that went from one end to another appeared in the mirror and the mirror suddenly split into 2 parts before completely breaking apart, slowly disappearing along with the strange red clouds.

*huff* *huff* Meng was finally able to take a breath.

'Thanks, Su Zhu. I will make sure to return this favor.' Meng said in his mind.

'Don't thank me...Don't behave like we are strangers, the first time I agreed to go with you, I was resolved to help you on your way, my primary goal was never even to get my body back, after all, if such a thing happened, I would have to start over again.' Su Zhu replied with a voice filled with tenderness.

'...' Meng didn't reply but Su Zhu was capable of feeling his current emotions and knew that he was grateful for her words.

---

[Name: Su Meng]

[Cultivation: 5th stage of Sky Profound Realm (Yin-Yang energy) 54 open Profound Entrances]

[Physique: Hell Suppressing Physique (Half-Completion), Void Imperfection Physique (Minor Completion)

[Personal Skills: Cloud Steps(Lv. Max), River Crossing Slash(Lv. 5, Yin), One with the Shadows (Lv. 7), 7 Moves of Ferocious Sun (Lv. 6 - 6 moves, Yang), The Void Shattering Step (Lv. 6), Sacred Garden (Lv. 3), Death Scripture (Death Soul, Death Seal, Death Record)]

[Skill Points: 37.859]

---

'My Hell Suppressing physique arrived at a new stage, Half-Completion! I can actually feel the enormous weight of my body without even using it yet. All of my Profound Entrances are finally open and I can activate my profound energy much faster, my profound veins were even purified how new energy constantly kept being absorbed into my profound veins while also being drained at the same time. Even my cultivation increased due to this. '

Meng's body weighted completely the same without him using the physique but he was still feeling as if he was moving the entire mountain each step he took. If not for his Void Imperfection Physique that helped him reduce that feeling a bit, he doubted his body would be ready to perform any movement techniques.

Meng's sight turned towards the medium-sized mountain. He stared at its peak for a few seconds before he flew above it and stomped on its peak while using his newly strengthened physique and the entire mountain was flattened to the ground as if there never been any mountain, to begin with.

'Using profound floating technique along with my physique is quite energy graining but that stomp just now contained hundreds of thousands of kilograms without any problem. Right now, only my physical defenses are at the low stages of Sovereign Profound Realm. As for my physical strength...I might be able to directly stomp down high stages of Sovereign Profound Practitioners. Obviously, right now, speed is the problem. I can't compete with Sovereign Profound Practitioners in speed and I would be even hard-pressed against Tyrant Profound Practitioners with my fast movement techniques. Anyway, as Dragon God said...I should avoid using the effects of my physiques too much as there are still holes in my defenses therefore I can still be defeated and captured alive.' Meng thought with his hand on his chin while looking at the ground.

"As I thought...It's been a while" Dragon God's voice resounded as the azure eyes were observing a miniature figure of phoenix in its spiritual form. Its size was comparable to some regular birds and it could easily rest on Meng's shoulder.

Su Zhu didn't reply in words but instead, she just nodded her head.

"Looks like you took a liking to this human, he must truly have good morals for you to be willing to go so low as to reside inside his weapon. I certainly don't doubt his potential." Dragon God said towards the little phoenix while Meng was still busy trying out his new strength some distance away from them.

"...Not really" A little phoenix said while turning its head to the side. Although Su Zhu said so, Dragon God was capable of noticing that her cold tone was filled with hidden gentleness and pride.

"Hahaha, I see." Dragon God started laughing, making Su Zhu slightly flustered but thankfully it was hard to perceive in her phoenix form.

Dragon God's residual soul was quite happy to see another residual soul it could talk to so two of them continued talking for a few days while Meng focused on adapting to his new strength and Yufeng continued fusing with the Dragon God blood.

Su Zhu informed Meng that Dragon God's residual soul actually had a request for him and Yufeng.

'What do you say, Meng?' Su Zhu asked after explaining to him the residual soul's request.

'Sword in mortal's hands capable of annihilating True Gods? I am really skeptical about this, not sure if you are exaggerating or not...' Meng didn't answer what she asked immediately and instead, he said this.

'It's natural for you to be skeptical since you have yet to see any Heavenly Profound Treasure in action, plus it's at the first place, living up to its title of being the number one supreme treasure.' Su Zhu said.

'There is nothing absolute in the world...I can't and don't believe in it, however, I believe that mortal would be capable of killing True God only in the case that True God would underestimate the said mortal. Otherwise, unless it is similar to heavenly tribulation, there should always be ways how to evade it and if it's unavoidable, it is easier to defend against it. There is nothing that can be strong in all points, just like Yin and Yang. Both of them have their own strong points, if combined, their strong points will fuse, making it more balanced and in harmony but overall stronger, however, it is impossible to retain both of their strong points. The heat will decrease, cold will decrease but they will create a new type of temperature that definitely won't be weaker than the previous two but it will be more balanced.' Meng replied but he also compared it to maxing only STR in RPG game or maxing only DEX. Both of those characters would be strong in their own way but maxing both STR and DEX equally would make the character more balanced and adaptable to more situations, obviously, he didn't mention it to Su Zhu as she wouldn't even be able to understand him.

Not to mention, he has read a few novels with cultivation themes so he was aware of how "strongest weapons under heaven" worked. Everyone coveted it for its power but it always has its weak points and he was reluctant to believe that this Heaven Punishing Ancestral Sword was any different.

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