The crimson spark did not remain peaceful.
Before Lucien could even savor the miracle of a living flame burning within his dantian, the microscopic ember expanded violently.
It erupted like a primeval subterranean volcano tearing through tectonic plates, unleashing a torrent of unrestrained cosmic fire directly into his meridians, bone marrow, and blood vessels.
“Aaargh!”
The sound was torn from his throat, choked off as scorching heat flooded his lungs.
The fire did not stay internal; it burst outward through his pores, turning his loose training robes to ash in a heartbeat.
Lucien collapsed forward on the mossy boulder, clawing the wet earth.
The pain surpassed even the ninety-pill explosion—this was the fire of stellar birth, an energy so searing and absolute that mortal flesh was simply never intended to survive it.
His pale skin began to blister, crack, and turn pitch black.
Within minutes, his entire body was charred like coal, smelling of acrid smoke and scorched iron.
Endure!
Lucien’s mind screamed through the fiery haze.
If I cannot survive the heat of a single spark, how will I ever cradle an entire cosmos?!
For ten agonizing minutes, the cosmic flames raged, burning away every trace of mortal impurities, dormant toxins, and fragile tissue.
Only when the dark furnace had thoroughly cleansed his vessel did the crimson core finally settle back into the silent expanse of his core, radiating a steady, warm hum.
The night air blew across the shore of Mirror Lake.
Crack.
A brittle sound echoed over the water.
A thin fissure appeared along Lucien’s scorched forearm, followed by another across his chest.
The dead, charcoal-like outer shell began to peel away, crumbling into fine gray ash that was swept away by the wind.
Beneath that charred husk lay a miracle of metamorphosis.
His new skin was smooth, fair, and faintly translucent, carrying the lustrous sheen of pristine white jade.
His posture had completely transformed; the frail, sickly pallor that had plagued his fifteen years of life was entirely eradicated.
In its place was a lean, lithe physique sculpted with clean, coiled muscles packed with explosive latent power.
His white hair fell across broader shoulders, and his sharp aristocratic features had become breathtakingly ethereal, carrying an otherworldly majesty that seemed disconnected from the mortal realm.
Lucien exhaled a breath of lingering heat, clenching his hand into a fist.
He felt the terrifying, spring-like tension waiting within his sinews.
Yet he knew this was merely the foundation.
His body had been reforged to withstand stellar energy, but he still had not completed the first level of Stellar Body Tempering.
Reaching into the remains of his wooden crate, Lucien pulled out the tenth and final porcelain bottle.
He unsealed the cork, tipped the first pill into his palm, and swallowed it.
The medicinal essence liquefied immediately.
Unlike the void before, the newborn crimson spark flared, converting the medicine into pure celestial heat.
Lucien’s jade-like skin flushed a deep crimson as the first tempering began.
Five minutes of intense warmth coursed through his muscle fibers, tightening them like forged steel wire before his skin returned to its fair hue.
One tempering complete.
He took the second pill.
His body heated up again, the crimson flush spreading across his chest and back, reinforcing the dense muscle fibers.
Three pills…
Four pills…
Seven…
Eight…
By the time he swallowed the ninth pill, his muscles were dense enough to deflect common steel.
Inside his dantian, the crimson stellar core expanded slightly, its surface bubbling with incandescent radiance.
Crack—!
A distinct, crystalline snap echoed within his lower abdomen.
A fragment of condensed cosmic matter broke away from the swelling star core.
Drawn by the star’s newly formed gravitational pull, the tiny, polished sphere took up position in a stable ring, slowly revolving around the central flame.
The first level of the Stellar Body Tempering Realm was officially forged.
Lucien took a deep breath, feeling the colossal weight of physical power coursing through his limbs.
In the Eastern Continent, ordinary cultivators underwent a total of nine temperings to reach the peak of the ninth level of the Body Tempering Realm, while rare geniuses completed ten.
For Lucien, nine temperings were merely his first level.
Without invoking a single martial skill, the sheer physical density, speed, and raw strength packed into his frame was already equal to a peak ninth-level Body Tempering expert.
Before he could fully marvel at the strength humming in his fists, the golden inscription deep in his soul unrolled once more, searing another set of celestial laws into his thoughts:
Inherent Art: Genesis Elemental Control.
A flood of knowledge washed through him.
The technique granted absolute, perfect mastery over elements—allowing him to bypass common chants or hand seals to freely manipulate, boost, and forge any elemental technique he could imagine from scratch, provided he possessed the elemental affinity.
Affinity?
Lucien frowned slightly.
He had never possessed an elemental affinity.
In the testing hall years ago, the spirit stones had remained entirely dark.
Curious, he held up his right hand, pointing his index finger toward the obsidian surface of the lake.
He cleared his mind and visualized a tiny, dancing tongue of flame.
Fwump.
A vivid crimson spark blossomed at his fingertip, dancing obediently to his will.
The heat radiated outward, reflecting in his widening blue eyes.
“It works…” he murmured, astonishment creeping into his voice.
Eagerly, he extinguished the flame and imagined a drop of clear water.
Nothing happened.
He focused on the crackle of lightning.
Dead silence.
He reached for the heavy resilience of earth, then the vibrant growth of wood—not a single reaction stirred in the air.
He lowered his hand, his sharp gaze turning inward to the slowly revolving miniature planet circling his crimson star.
Affinities don’t come from my mortal flesh, the realization struck him like lightning.
They come from the cosmos I am building.
The fiery red planet rotating around his core had granted him fire affinity.
If this hypothesis was correct, every new celestial world he forged within his dantian would bestow an entirely new elemental affinity upon his soul.
And as those planets grew larger and denser through higher cultivation realms, the purity of those elements would evolve from common nature into primordial divine laws.
One elemental affinity made an ordinary cultivator a coveted asset.
Two or three made someone an earth-shattering prodigy across an entire continent.
To command the complete elemental spectrum of a whole solar system was an absurd, reality-defying impossibility.
Yet the rotating crimson sphere inside him proved it was the absolute truth.
The first blush of dawn began to paint the horizon in shades of rose and amber.
Gathering the shattered porcelain shards and hiding his newfound presence beneath a set of spare robes he kept in his pouch, Lucien moved through the mist-covered paths of Aurora City.
His light, silent steps carried him back to the David Clan estate before the compound gates opened for morning drills.
He made his way directly to the inner courtyard, knocking softly on the cedar door of his mother’s pavilion.
“Enter,” Leona’s gentle voice sounded from within.
When Lucien pushed the door open, Leona was seated by the vanity, braiding her dark hair.
She turned to greet him, but the comb slipped from her fingers, clattering onto the polished floor.
Her blue eyes widened in stunned disbelief.
The boy standing before her had completely shed his frail, sickly posture.
His white hair framed a face of breathtaking, chiseled nobility, his posture straight as a spear, carrying a subtle, rhythmic vitality that could only belong to a martial practitioner.
“Lucien…?” Her voice trembled.
She stood up, rushing across the room and placing two warm, trembling hands on his forearms.
“Mother,” Lucien smiled softly, not hiding the faint hum of power circulating beneath his skin.
“I succeeded. I have stepped into the first level of the Body Tempering Realm.”
Tears welled in Leona’s brilliant blue eyes before spilling down her cheeks.
She pulled him into a tight, desperate embrace, her shoulders shaking with silent, cathartic joy.
For five years, she had watched him endure the pity of the clan and the silent mockery of the city.
To feel the steady, resonant heartbeat of an awakened martial foundation beneath his chest was a relief greater than any breakthrough of her own.
“Come,” Leona said, wiping her face with the silk cuff of her sleeve, her eyes sparkling with fierce pride.
“We are going to your grandfather right now.”
Five minutes later, Patriarch Lucas David’s private study doors were thrown open without warning.
Lucas was reviewing merchant manifests alongside Eldest Uncle John when he looked up, surprised by the intrusion.
“Leona? What has happened—”
“Father,” Leona interrupted, stepping aside to reveal Lucien standing quietly in the doorway.
“Look at him.”
Lucas’s sharp, assessing gaze swept over Lucien.
In a split second, the veteran powerhouse’s eyes locked onto the faint, crystalline sheen over Lucien’s skin and the terrifyingly dense foundation of power radiating from him.
Clang!
The jade cup in Lucas’s hand shattered onto the mahogany desk, spilling dark tea across the manifests.
Eldest Uncle John froze, his mouth falling open as he stared at his nephew.
“His foundation…” Lucas’s voice dropped to a stunned, raspy whisper.
He was across the room in a blur of motion, his heavy hand gripping Lucien’s shoulder.
The moment Lucas sent a probe of pure spiritual energy into Lucien’s channels, he felt a solid, unyielding rebound—dense, vibrant, and alive.
“He awakened! He truly awakened!” Lucas roared, his booming laugh shaking the heavy rafters of the study.
Tears of fierce triumph shone in the old patriarch’s dark eyes.
He grabbed the bronze clan bell hanging beside the desk, striking it three times with a deafening, resonant peel that echoed across the entire estate.
“John!” Lucas bellowed, turning to his eldest son with a radiant grin.
“Summon your brothers! Call the elders, call the children! Assemble the entire David Clan in the ancestral hall immediately! My grandson has stepped onto the path!”