After the courtroom incident, Han Chen had made every preparation necessary to advance to the next stage of cultivation. The outside world seemed churning with chaos—too much even for his disciplined mind to track—so he retreated once more into the seclusion of his world bead.
But now, with his state of mind steadied and calm after deep meditation, the weight of his past began to resurface. Memories returned like restless ghosts: vast, empty void realms; advanced civilizations flickering out like dying stars; killings... so much killing for revenge, opportunities, and petty annoyances. Journeys through the great nothingness; the primordial void serpents that hunted him across dimensions, quiet years spent among primitive tribes whose names time had long erased. Sect wars that drenched entire worlds in blood. Forbidden lands crawling with demons. Fleeting relationships and connections in distant realms. Accepting disciples who would eventually disappoint or betray. Centuries ruling as an Immortal Emperor—only to fade once more into myth.
So much history. So much violence. So much solitude. So many... memories.
And now... this urban world. Chaotic. Restless. Yet somehow, oddly comforting in its unremarkable simplicity. The noise of ordinary mortal life felt strangely serene after the endless storms of eternity. For the first time in eons, he breathed—and felt the ancient tension in his soul begin to melt away. He recognized it as his spirit's own preparation for enhancement.
The air here was untouched by pollution, thick with spiritual energy. He took a deep breath, savoring it, then reactivated the qi circuits within his Gate of Death, Life, and Vital Blood. Energy surged through him, refining his body at an unprecedented speed. Grey sludge—the waste of his mortal form—coated his skin within minutes. What had once taken days of grueling refinement and rare pills was now effortless. A pulse of energy shook the filth away, followed by a quick cleaning spell.
His body had once again regained the peak of the Unity Body Realm—the absolute limit of mortal flesh.
Elsewhere.
A familiar thread of thought brushed her mind, gentle but firm—his presence.
<"Hye Won...">
She paused mid-step in her office at NovGen, the soft murmur of his name blooming in her awareness. Her response rose with the quiet weight of unresolved thoughts.
<"You finally decided to speak? I've been talking to you for days, Han Chen... you've been ignoring me again. Where were you?">
His voice was calm, yet held a deeper gravity this time.
<"Meditation. I'm preparing for my first major tribulation." A brief silence, then: "I want you to see it.">
There was no need for more explanation. Without hesitation, he opened his spirit sense to her—letting her perceive through his awareness, sharing the solemn clarity of his surroundings.
Through his mind's eye, Hye Won saw what he saw: a remote, mountainous expanse under a dim sky. At its heart stood a wide stone altar, open to the heavens, inscribed with ancient, deliberate symbols that pulsed faintly with power. Something about the place felt... heavy. Old. Sacred. And dangerous.
She exhaled softly, her voice tender but laced with concern.
<"Be careful, Han Chen...">
The transformation to Golden Core was, by its very nature, dangerous. Life essence and the cultivated foundation had to condense into a single, stable globule—spiritual, spherical, and tethered directly to the soul. For those who lacked sufficient body and spirit refinement, the process often resulted in catastrophic failure. And for those daring enough to form higher-fold golden cores, tribulation followed—swift and merciless.
Han Chen sat in stillness, breath slow but steady, his gaze distant. "All that risk... just to compress everything into one fragile little sphere."
His body, however, was not like those of ordinary cultivators. The benefits of body cultivation had long since revealed themselves to him. For ordinary cultivators, their physical bodies acted like bottlenecks—no matter how powerful their cultivation, their mortal frames could only channel so much energy at once. In the outside world's sense, it was like... well, installing a jet engine in a bicycle. The potential was there, but the vessel couldn't properly contain it. If he hadn't reached the Unity Realm before Golden Core, he wouldn't be able to continue on the body cultivation path.
Aside from purifying impurities, strengthening foundation, and testing whether one was worthy to ascend, Golden Core ascension had other purposes—harmony with universal laws and energy transformation. Don't say it out loud, as it would anger the heavens to refer to them as backup energy sources, but... that was the reality for him.
He sat cross-legged on an open platform designed for tribulation-seizing arrays. Just the preparatory channeling caused the sky above to darken. Thunder rolled in the distance, swirling above him in ominous patterns.
As the controller of this small world, Han Chen reached out with his will—and the Heavenly Dao responded.
Thirteen tribulations.
A cold smirk touched his lips. Ten thunder tribulations were enough to forge an Immortal-grade Golden Core. But thirteen? The heavens weren't just testing him—they were trying to erase him entirely. If this were happening outside, the cultivation world would erupt in outrage. But here, in his domain, there were no witnesses. His will was heaven's will.
• • • Trinity Sutra • • •
His consciousness turned inward, to the storm within his dantian.
Thirteen foundation bases stood in parallel, their forms shimmering like half-realized probabilities, edges bleeding into one another in unstable harmony. As he activated the sutra, energy from each layer began condensing at the center, folding in on itself like collapsing stars. Foundation laws intertwined, churning the swirling mass of power into something denser, more profound.
Normally, this process would briefly weaken a cultivator as their stable foundations shattered and rebuilt. But his? His bases were never stable to begin with—that was the point.
A chant left his lips, resonating with the spiritual energy and Daoyun surrounding him:
"The heavens stir, and the semi-spiritual corpus must resonate. Not just tempered by lightning—but by its law, by the spiritual force that binds all things. Align with the cosmos. Fuse flesh with the unseen. Only then can the Golden Core awaken."
The First Tribulation.
The sky swirled, disturbed just above him. Spirit beasts in the surrounding forests bolted in panic, their instincts screaming of impending annihilation. Even the ancient demons and primordial beasts he had sealed beyond the forbidden territories in this small world—creatures that had slumbered for millions of years—stirred uneasily, their malevolent gazes turning toward the disturbance. Something was happening in that area beyond their vision and entry, that place which had remained peaceful since the dawn of this world.
Then—it struck.
A bolt of tribulation lightning, thick as a mountain peak, descended like the fury of heaven-sent execution. This was no ordinary thunder—this was the kind that turned proud Golden Core cultivators into scattered ashes, the kind that made them lose consciousness before they even knew what hit them.
The simple clothing Han Chen wore disintegrated into ash. But even as the fabric vanished, a shimmer spread across his skin—and in the next instant, armor materialized on its own. It enveloped him completely, and in that moment, he looked like an ancient warrior from forgotten legends.
The lightning struck.
And his body devoured it whole.
The lightning surged through his meridians, not seeking to destroy, but somehow managing to feed him instead. His unstable bases drank it in, refining the lethal force into pure, thrumming power that coursed through his entire being.
One down.
"As the thunder rages, the body and soul entwine. Karma must be purified—past sins, unresolved debts, the weight of lifetimes. The soul's essence refines in the crucible of Heaven and Earth, Forging the Golden Core in fire and will."
A flicker of unease touched his spirit—Yue Lan, still unresolved. But he had endured worse, much worse. As an Immortal Emperor, he had weathered karmic tribulations steeped in far heavier burdens. The encroaching mental invasion clawed at his mind, but his will crushed it effortlessly. The lightning scoured his spirit clean, leaving only refined essence behind.
Three tribulations later, his soul was purified and grown.
"Cosmic forces swirl—Yin and Yang must align.
Breath becomes starlight, flesh merges with the unseen.
The Golden Core pulses, unstable yet potent—
Only perfect equilibrium can birth true divinity."
His foundation was already harmonized beyond mortal limits. A single tribulation came—and passed in the blink of an eye, leaving no mark but a deeper resonance.
"The Golden Core takes form—body and mind unite.
Essence condenses, the soul's anchor solidifies.
Threefold tribulations temper its birth,
Layers of law and will becoming one."
Three more tribulations hammered into him, each strike forcing his thirteen unstable swirls in the primitive core to collapse inward, layer by layer, merging into a single, rapidly spinning sphere in his dantian.
But this was no ordinary core.
The thunder carried elemental law energy—the Law of Void and Cosmos, the Law of Thunder's Wrath, the Law of Metallic Qi, more and more rapidly proliferating. These manifested as phantoms—an azure dragon and a blazing phoenix, heavenly beasts that were imprinted into the small world's memory. They lunged at him, only to be seized by his spirit root, torn apart, and refined into the core itself.
The baptism of elements had begun.
"The final clash—transcendence awaits.
The Golden Core is no mere vessel, but a divine conduit.
Flesh, soul, and Dao merge as one.
The mortal shackles shatter—the path beyond begins."
Five tribulations came in rapid succession.
Each brought a new law energy phantom—Qilin of Wood, Vermilion Bird of Fire, Bixie of Earth, White Tiger of Metal, Black Tortoise of Water. Their essence imprinted onto his core, branding it with the heavenly Dao's mark. While simultaneously refining the core.
An Immortal-grade Golden Core had already formed.
The swirling energy mass in his dantian slowed, then expanded, sending tendrils of deeper cosmic laws into the very fabric of his being. His dantian—adorned with twin dragon runes—awakened fully, merging with the core. Life essence, body cultivation's origin energy, and internal cultivation's reserves all fused into it, expanding beyond mortal limits.
He had ascended the realm.
The moment the storm quieted and his presence stabilized, Han Chen felt Hye Won's lingering thoughts through the link—silent, but... well, shaken.
She had seen everything. He exhaled softly. He hadn't meant to frighten her—only to show that cultivation was more than quiet meditation and disciplined training. Sometimes, you know, one must pass heaven's judgment as tribulations or fate.
What she had witnessed didn't call for soft words or distant reassurances. Instead, a calm promise passed through the bond:
<"I'll explain everything.">
Her emotions swirled—fear, awe, disbelief. Gently, he withdrew from the connection, letting her return to herself. It's not that he wanted to leave her hanging, but... he needed to focus on something that demanded his immediate attention. And then he switched his attention to his inner golden core, when he sensed new changes happening.
When his spiritual root first formed, his dantian had been branded with twin dragon runes—a mark of void and time. Now, after enduring tribulation's baptism, those same runes pulsed with new life as they etched themselves deeper into his Golden Core. Strange, intricate patterns spread like veins of cosmic law through his meridians, some legible to his immortal memory yet still... well, beyond his full comprehension. He recognized their meaning, but their true operation eluded him—locked behind layers of higher laws he couldn't yet grasp. Not as he was now, anyway, as a simpler lifeform.
Then, the tribulation's energy that revolved around the golden core took physical form.
Beasts of legend materialized from the runes as circular carvings on the core. A phoenix wreathed in rebirth flames, the Vermilion Bird, sovereign of fire, the Black Tortoise, guardian of the oceanic abyss, the White Tiger, blade of metallic fury, the Azure Dragon, storm given form, a nine-tailed fox spirit, illusion's master, the Qilin, divine omen of wood and mercy, a Gu, the primordial poison, the Taotie, devourer of realms, the Heaven-Swallowing Serpent, void made flesh, the Kun Peng, leviathan of the skies, the Thunder Roc, lightning incarnate.
As the events continued to unfold after his golden core had been formed, his initial joy was... replaced with apprehension. He himself couldn't grasp the formations happening before him.
"Did my past self smoke Starlight Pollen of the Nirvana Lotus before designing this? I must've been higher than a sky-palace when I—"
His thought shattered as the imprints changed. Instead of attacking, they bowed. Suddenly.
Then—his consciousness was pulled inward as if there was a sink in his mindspace. At the center of the runic storm within his golden core, an avatar condensed to form an imprint, seated in meditation. It was as if a floodgate had opened in his mind, linking him directly to the imprint. Control returned—absolute, instinctive.
A new sensation followed: his spiritual root, once anchored at the Shen acupoint, turned ethereal, piercing through his spirit and connecting to the Crown Gate of his physique. His soul's connection to cultivation deepened... um, a thousandfold. Energy flowed like a tidal wave where before it had been a trickle.
His very being drank it in, insatiable, like parched earth meeting the rains after endless drought. His eyes gleamed, reflecting the flood of spiritual power coursing through him. His soul, overwhelmed yet undeterred, stretched outward—expanding rapidly to accommodate the weight of his vast consciousness better. He opened his storage ring and decided to use the essence of nether root orchid to calm down the tearing sensation he was feeling in his soul.
When the growth stabilized, he returned to his senses, and yet the avatar and its bestial guardians remained, shifting again—this time into Sanskrit-like characters that burned with divine authority. A name echoed in his mind:
"Lokakṣara"