‘Arghhh!’

The dark energy was ignited and shrunk against the golden light. The sound of screaming echoed in Ye Wei’s head.

Under the effect of the golden energy, Ye Wei’s mind cleared as he regained his consciousness and the pain faded. He then sat up in a lotus position to calm his Qi feeling the sacred presence of the Mystic Mount.

‘Who are you? How is there the Mystic Mount’s presence in your Sentient!?’ The Black Scale Progenitor was forced to flee back into the scale on the ground, but his voice remained in Ye Wei’s head.

‘It seems like your fancy title is just for show!’ Ye Wei became angry and started to feel threatened by how he nearly lost control of his own consciousness.

‘Pfft, don’t be so proud of yourself just yet! If any of us find out what’s inside your Sentient, then the clan will definitely send hordes after you, and this place will be flattened even if the whole of Ning City decides to fight us!’ The Progenitor’s voice echoed in Ye Wei’s head.

Ye Wei’s eyes lit up. He thought about how this golden presence was buried deep inside his Sentient. He honestly doubted anyone was able to find it, and also that if he just managed to destroy the scale, nobody except his best friend would know what happened tonight.

‘Naive! I shed that scale when I was transforming into a demon Sage, you don’t stand a chance breaking it unless you have the help of a Prime! Just deliver it back and save the hassle before you lose your life trying something stupid!’ the Progenitor seem to have read Ye Wei’s mind.

Ye Wei frowned, bothered by the hot potato that was now in his hands, afraid that if he kept it, it would bring him trouble.On the other hand he didn’t know how to get rid of it. However, the curious side of him was interested in keeping the scale, just in case he could somehow find use for it, even though it would be next to impossible to get any information regarding the scale out of the angry Progenitor who was trying to kill him just seconds ago.

‘Kid, I’ve marked you with my presence. Even the Mystic Mount’s golden light won’t be able to purge it! If you meet a demon Emperor one day, they will be able to detect it right away!’

Ye Wei frowned, angry that the Progenitor kept troubling him.

‘Pfft! That’s a lot of assumptions. How many demon Emperors are there anyway? I will either be strong enough to face them or will get rid of you and the scale before I ever meet one!’ Ye Wei replied bitterly.

‘Ha! Are you worried now? You are too young to play dare with me!’

Ye Wei grunted and stopped answering to the Progenitor. He placed the scale into his interspatial ring as an extra security measure, then he placed the ring into his bag, in case the demon had acquaintances here in Ning City who could might be able to sense the scale’s presence.

The Progenitor’s hoarse voice sounded in Ye Wei’s head again, ‘Do you really think that will save you? Hahaha!’

‘You old, annoying monster! Can you just stop bothering?’ frustrated, Ye Wei scratched his head. He could feel the Progenitor’s presence in his Sentient but couldn’t locate exactly where it was and how it was left there. ‘I don’t care what saves me or not! if I do meet a demon Emperor, I will either kill it or die fighting it!’

“Whoosh!”

Five minutes had passed, the black mist slowly disappeared in the night breeze and the array’s effect faded, Ye Wei once again bathed in the moonlight.

“Cao Ning, are you okay?”

Ye Wei sat in the lotus position. After regaining strength, he stood up and walked to his best friend.

“I’m fine!” Cao Ning shook his head, still feeling startled by Ye Wei’s powerful display, wondering if what he saw was real.

“Nobody can know about what happened tonight!” Ye Wei patted Cao Ning’s shoulder and said solemnly. It was not that he couldn’t trust Cao Ning, he just needed to make sure that they were on the same page.

“Yes, I understand.” Cao Ning was glad and relieved to see Ye Wei was fine and trusted him to have it under control. He understood that if people learned what happened tonight it would cause chaos.

“You need the rest. I’m sorry, but I can’t help you any more with refining tonight,” Ye Wei looked at the dark sky and said to his frightened friend.

“Yea, I’m sure you need resting more than I do,” after bidding farewell, Cao Ning headed off.

“I wonder if the demon came specifically after me or if he was attracted by the talented youngsters in general...” Ye Wei frowned and mumbled to himself, concerned. “That is not important though. I have to be careful anyway, in case more than one demon infiltrates the tournament.”

‘Of course there is more than one! And they will kill you!’ the Progenitor’s voice sounded in Ye Wei’s head.

‘Can’t you shut your stupid mouth?’

‘Kid you are the first person who dares to insult me!’

‘So what? What are you going to do? Bite my Sentient?’

The Progenitor quieted down, angered.

“I’m finally at condensed prime level!” Ye Wei mumbled to himself, feeling the power of the condensed silver energy ball in his dantian and smiled.

‘Pfft! Back in the days, even before I became a demon Sage, I could wipe out millions of condensed prime Warriors with a sneeze and flood the whole nation with a single pool of piss!’ the Progenitor did not waste the chance to mock his host.

“You old monster, I will take a piss on that precious scale of yours if you don’t shut up.” Ye Wei mumbled.

‘You... disrespectful brat! You will regret your arrogance!’ Being one of the strongest demons who ever lived, the Progenitor was furious. Demon or human, anyone who ever insulted him had always been killed.

“Old guy, you said you were scaled. What’s your real form? A pig demon? A manis?” Ye Wei stood up and said in a mocking voice.

‘I will tear you apart sooner or later! I was a three-headed scaled jackal and had the power of ten dragons and ten elephants! I was born with the wisdom to understand the force behind the universe! How dare you!’

“Oh wow! That’s amazing!” Ye Wei opened in mouth wide, pretended he was impressed.

‘Yes, so shut up!’

“You are pretty impressive for a dog indeed, I apologise for my foolish words,” Ye Wei chuckled.

‘Did you just call me a dog!? I am a three-headed scaled jackal!’

“Erm, excuse my ignorance but I thought jackals and dogs were the same thing.”

‘As I told you before, I promise you I’ll tear you apart and you will suffer a painful death!’ the Progenitor maddened, roared in anger.

“Yes, you have said it many times. I wonder when you will actually do it?” Ye Wei ignored the threats and kept cultivating, “Why are you so obsessed? Dogs are related to jackals anyways you will make many dogs feel bad if they knew you look down on your own kind.”

‘One last time, I am a jackal, not a dog!’

“Wolves are related to jackals too right? You do have great connections!” Ye Wei shrugged, he didn’t know much about demons but he surely enjoyed enraging one.

On the other side, the Progenitor was furious, wishing he was in his real form. He didn’t feel like he wanted to talk to Ye Wei anymore.

That meant Ye Wei could finally have a moment of peace to get used to his newfound powers.

Historically, the gap between Warriors and condensed prime Warrior was immense. A lot of peak ten-star Warriors were not able to overcome themselves and push their limits high enough to force the transformation and ended their lives as the former.

Becoming a condensed prime Warrior was more than just a cultivational achievement, in terms of status, condensed prime Warrior marked the state when cultivators were strong enough to start their own martial families or branch out to other cities, if the cultivator already belonged to an established force.

Condensed prime Warriors’ title was named that way because of how their Qi behaved. In rest, their Qi clumped into a silver ball in their dantian, which ultimately allowed more energy to be stored and increased the density of it.

For each breakthrough, after a cultivator reached condensed prime level, a golden fissure would appear in the silver ball. The single crack on Ye Wei’s silver ball represented that he was a one-star condensed prime Warrior.

“I can start learning the sixth of the Selenic Seven Stances – Selenic Triple-Primal Sword!” Ye Wei mumbled to himself joyfully under the moonlight, as he could finally look to learn all seven stances of Glacial Emperor’s set. The first four were high-level Spirit stances while the fifth was a low-level Myst stance, and the sixth was at mid-level.

Ye Wei sat down and crossed his legs, under the dark sky he began to learn the sixth Selenic stance while he consolidated his cultivation.