Chapter 201 - Eternal Star
Most cultivators that failed their Supreme transcendence were not able to deal with the pressure of their impending death. Even the kindest Supremes had been recorded to go on illogical sprees, killing anyone they see.
As for Ye Yu, he did not become violent under the pressure after his failed attempt, instead he disappeared from the public and later even from his family. He left the mansion with all his belongings leaving them to deal with everything. This indirectly caused the decline of the Ye’s.
Nobody knew where Supreme Ye Yu went and, sadly, nobody had a chance to record the stance he created for his ascendance.
The Eternal Star had been hidden in plain view throughout the centuries without anyone figuring out its structure or function. Although the stance was inevitably mentioned in the family’s history books, the passages were brief and undescriptive.
The Sky stance had been relentlessly refined by the Supreme before his ascendance, it wasn’t yet a Heaven stance but it was only a few compressions away.
If the Supreme had the time and will to develop the Eternal Star, it would certainly have became a Heaven stance.
“This is astoundingly close to being absolutely flawless!” Ye Wei’s chest was pounding as his breathing quickened becoming irregular.
Ye Wei widened his eyes in surprise as the runes in his Sentient rearranged themselves and composed a message.
‘The stages are as follows: return star, divine star, supreme star and last sage star.’ The young Runemaster was amused but focused as he analyzed the complex sequence. ‘He even thought it this far through!?’
‘If I learned this, I would be able to beat anyone on my level.’ After digesting the large amount of information, Ye Wei could better appreciate the intricacy of the stance. ‘No, actually not even a ten-star returned prime Warrior would be unable to do anything to me when I master this technique.’
‘The Eternal Star stance is about energy transformations, dissipating the opponent’s strikes, and converting this energy to power my body. The harder I get hit, the faster my Qi will flow, and the more my body will be strengthened by this stance.’
‘These twelve complex patterns make up the first stage. If I can interpret them and use them in as a stance…’ Ye Wei thought to himself as he tried to categorize the sea of images in his head. He decided to just memorize a small portion; he was in no hurry as the entire stance was stored in his blood.
‘This should keep me occupied for a while!’ Ye Wei opened his eyes with a smile on his face, energized and motivated. ‘My body has already been strengthened to a one-star returned prime Warrior’s level by my Supreme blood… Just how strong will I be when I figure out the moves on these twelve patterns.’
‘It is quite strange having stronger defense on my exterior than interior.’ Ye Wei thought while he opened and closed his hand looking at the muscles in his forearm contract. ‘I feel like a savage demon, or a dumb wild beast, haha!’
‘Enough pointless thoughts!’ Ye Wei changed his attention and dived right back in his mind, carefully studying each of the runes in the twelve patterns.
After going through all of them once, the young Runemaster frowned in frustration and muttered to himself. Ye Wei had identified four key difficulties in the return star stage.
“I guess it wouldn’t be a good stance if it were easy to learn.”
The first difficulty involved being able to sense and channel the energy of the stars. Supreme Ye Yu had learned to harvest the energy of a specific constellation above the Zenith continent while creating the stance.
Without the stars’ energy, the patterns in his head was redundant as there were no other means of power to activate the special runes.
Unlike primal energy that fills the sky and earth, the energy of the stars was light years away through space, gravitational fields, and planets. Even powerful cultivators had no way of sensing the stars’ energy without the blood of a Supreme.
“I should be able to make this work.” Ye Wei checked the runic patterns in his head a few more times. After studying them for a while he had memorized the tiniest details.
The young Runemaster closed his eyes and made a simple hand seal in front of his chest. It was ancient and interpreted from the rune patterns in his head. His will-force became a thin thread reaching up into the dark and empty space.
With his cultivation, Ye Wei’s will-force could currently reach over thirty miles, but it was miniscule compared to the distance between him and the stars.
The ancient hand seal created a protective layer around the energy he emitted thus strengthening it. Thirty miles, fifty miles, one hundred miles, one hundred and fifty miles…
Ye Wei’s will-force reach had expanded multiplied time over his limit within seconds. He swapped hand seal as the thread reached its maximum length. His energy oscillated in space and began to detect the stars.
Ten hours passed without a trace of starlight. Ye Wei opened his eyes in the middle of the underwater palace and his depression was obvious on his bitter face.
‘I felt nothing at all!’ He thought to himself frustrated as half a day of struggling turned out to be pointless.
‘I am pretty sure my will-force reached space. How was three hundred miles not far enough!?’
Ye Wei held his frown as he kept wondering what went wrong. Even with the hand seal, Ye Wei’s will-force did not reach more than two hundred miles.
In the history of the Ye’s, Supreme Ye Yu was the last person in the family recorded to be able to sense the power of the stars.
Although will-force that could reach a hundred and fifty miles was quite a feat, it was not sufficient for the purpose of harvesting the power hidden in the stars.
‘I can’t believe this!’ Ye Wei’s determination was hard as steel; he clenched his fist hard enough that his knuckles cracked. ‘I can do better, much better!’
‘I will have strength as great as any returned prime cultivator if I somehow figure this out!’
Ye Wei tried again to extend his will-force but with no success. He became even more tired and frustrated.
‘Maybe I am just too weak…’ His face was slightly pale when he decided to take a short break, to review what could have caused his failures. ‘But my will-force is much stronger than what is it suppose to be compared to my eighth-star level.’
“Wait! The quickest way to empower my will-force is my Supernova stance! It’s so obvious... Why am I so stupid?” ” Ye Wei mumbled to himself. “If only I thought about this earlier then I wouldn’t have been stuck for so many hours.”
The basics of Falling Star form was the only thing the Supreme left the family, Ye Wei had no way of knowing any how the Eternal Star stance worked.
‘I just have to try! Third Supernova evolution!’
Ye Wei’s cultivation was amplified in just moments, reaching returned prime level. The strand of his will-force kept extending, travelling deeper into the darkness.
Over a thousand miles away from the ground, Ye Wei’s will-force was could now pick a faint, mystical energy.
‘That is underwhelming…’
Although Ye Wei could now feel the energy, he was yet to be capable of absorbing and using the stars’ power due to his low cultivation level.
‘Cultivating it is, and I am at the best place for it!’ Ye Wei thought to himself, realized how lucky he was. ‘I should be able to breakthrough soon.’
The young Runemaster sat down and started using the Falling Star form, getting the advantage of the Supernova stance while it was still active.
“Bang!”
The under palace shook as surges of primal energy rushed towards Ye Wei from the water, the sky and the earth, he was absorbing them almost a hundred times quicker than usual.
Like a giant magnet, the palace was continuously attracting energy, no matter how quick Ye Wei drained, the palace kept up, saturating the area with nature’s power.
Just a few days later, Ye Wei’s dantain developed the ninth crack.