Days passed one after another.
Aside from ripening spirit herbs daily and preparing the required Yellow Dragon Pills and Gold Marrow Pills, Han Li spent the whole day seated in meditation, fully immersed in bitter cultivation.
Of course, he would also follow the Spirit Beast Sect cultivators' insect-taming experience notes and regularly train the White Spiders and other strange insects on schedule — the only entertainment in his cultivation life.
But just as Han Li had estimated, in barely over a year he had entered the ninth layer of the Qi Condensation stage. Compared to before, this was practically flying.
Still, Han Li was somewhat dissatisfied with this speed. After reaching the ninth layer, he steeled his heart and consumed three Foundation Establishment Pills in succession.
Riding on the powerful medicinal potency, Han Li re-entered the Foundation Establishment stage in about another year.
Now he could finally use Innate True Fire.
Accordingly, Han Li immediately stopped refining low-grade pills and began preparing the several pill formulas suited for the Foundation Establishment stage.
By Han Li's calculations, apart from the Qi Refinement Powder — which he had taken too many of for it to have any effect on him anymore — the pills from the other three formulas should be sufficient to advance his cultivation to the late Foundation Establishment stage without issue.
However, according to his original plan, Han Li did not immediately deepen his cultivation. Instead, he merely stockpiled pills and switched to cultivating the "Great Development Technique," preparing to refine an "Avatar."
Back when Han Li had cultivated the first layer of the Great Development Technique, it had gone surprisingly smoothly — he had mastered it in only half a year.
This gave him some confidence, knowing that while his aptitude for comprehending Five Elements techniques was poor, he actually possessed considerable talent for the Great Development Technique. Thus, he still harbored great confidence in mastering the second layer.
According to that half-complete manual, once the second layer was mastered, one's spiritual sense would become several times more powerful, and one could split it into over a hundred portions simultaneously. Only when this technique was combined with puppet arts would the true terrifying power of the Great Development Technique reveal itself.
Although he knew cultivating the second layer would certainly be far more difficult than the first, the sheer amount of time it required still far exceeded Han Li's expectations.
What he had estimated would take two or three years to complete ultimately required six full years of day-and-night dedicated cultivation before Han Li barely managed to master it.
That was nearly half the time longer than expected, leaving Han Li utterly exasperated.
During that period, the torment of forcibly tempering his spiritual sense — those splitting headaches and swollen temples — made Han Li's face go pale with lingering dread whenever he recalled them.
Additionally, in the third year of cultivating the Great Development Technique, a disciple of the middle-aged cultivator from the Ascension Pavilion — the one who had suffered greatly at Han Li's hands over the great island's trading rights — truly came to Small Heaven Island to challenge him again, on his master's orders.
As a result, the disciple first became trapped in Han Li's grand formation for three days and three nights before Han Li happened to emerge from seclusion, discovered him, and released him.
It should be noted that Han Li, weighed down by the difficulty of cultivating the Great Development Technique, had almost completely forgotten about this matter.
Facing Han Li, who concealed his true cultivation with the nameless Qi-hiding technique, this brawny fellow — already somewhat frazzled from being trapped in the formation for days — was naturally defeated with just the right amount of effort, leaving him to believe Han Li merely possessed sharper artifacts. He had no choice but to leave in disgruntled silence.
Three more years passed after this incident. Having mastered the second layer of the Great Development Technique, Han Li prepared to cultivate the secret art of the "Avatar Projection."
He first rested properly for several days, bringing his Primordial Spirit to its strongest state, then called Qu Hun into the secluded cultivation chamber and sat cross-legged facing him.
With a wave of his hand, Han Li lowered the stone door of the chamber, then fixed his gaze on Qu Hun across from him, remaining silent for a long while.
Looking at that ugly yet familiar face, Han Li's heart was overcome with a rush of mixed emotions. Thoughts of many long-forgotten memories surfaced — the Seven Mysteries Sect, Cai Xia Mountain, and all those familiar figures…
However, after meeting Qu Hun's vacant, soulless eyes for a time, Han Li sighed and finally stopped hesitating. His hands moved like windmills as he formed hand seals, and a faint green glow emanated from his body, bathing the chamber in emerald light.
Before long, Han Li's face subtly twisted within the green glow. Tiny beads of sweat condensed on his forehead, and his eyes emitted a piercing, blinding white radiance that no one could bear to look at directly.
"Hah!"
With a sudden shout, Han Li formed a peculiar seal with both hands, and his body went perfectly still. However, from his nostrils emerged a thumb-sized ball of green light, which swiftly flew to Qu Hun's nostrils and entered his body the same way.
By now Han Li's complexion had turned deathly pale, and bean-sized drops of sweat were rolling down his face. But the piercing white light in his eyes grew ever more brilliant, until finally two thin beams of white light shot directly from his eyes into Qu Hun's, and both bodies trembled in unison…
The stone door of the secluded cultivation chamber remained closed for over a month. It was not until the middle of the second month that it finally slowly opened, and out walked a haggard but visibly exhilarated Han Li.
The Avatar refinement had finally succeeded through all the bitter ordeal. Though he didn't yet know how effective it would be, at least there had been no failure or technique backlash, which let Han Li breathe a deep sigh of relief.
But no sooner had Han Li emerged from the chamber than he entered another stone room and began another round of seclusion. This refinement had damaged his vitality considerably, and if he didn't immediately take medicine and cultivate, he risked even falling back out of the Qi Condensation stage.