You were overwhelmed with joy, never expecting to collect the target Earth Source so quickly.

You didn’t want to wait a moment longer and immediately began to comprehend the Earth Source.

This comprehension brought you even greater surprise.

Because the moment your consciousness touched the Heavenly Mist Blade, it instantly accepted your aura and even trembled continuously, as if it was leaping with excitement.

You grew excited too. To focus fully on comprehending the Earth Source, you stopped flying yourself.

You flipped over and landed on the back of a Fire Emberhawk, guiding its direction with a small amount of Source Power.

The Fire Emberhawk instinctively flapped its wings wildly. Normally obedient and well-behaved, it had never been ridden by outsiders before, so it was a little uncomfortable at first.

Two streams of your Source Power shot out, instantly forming two large lumps on the Fire Emberhawk’s head. It immediately understood you were its new master and quickly calmed down.

You were thus able to focus on comprehending the Earth Source.

Fourteen days later, you returned to the Palace of Ten Thousand Dreams.

You mostly rode the Fire Emberhawk back, so it was much slower than when you went.

In these more than ten days of comprehending the Earth Source, you had gained some harvest.

You figured out that the Heavenly Mist Blade could manifest a blade technique called the Life and Death Slash.

This technique emphasized exerting full strength without reservation, exploding with all the power in your body.

When this slash lands, it decides life or death.

It was very suitable for a reckless player like you who was determined to go all out no matter what.

You landed in the main hall of the Palace of Ten Thousand Dreams and summoned Sang Yi and the other two.

Their gazes toward you had become much more normal, but now carried endless fiery admiration.

You felt something was off and asked, “Did you all somehow train your brains into muscles? What the hell kind of look is that you’re giving me?”

Sang Yi quickly said, “Palace Lord, word has spread in the martial world that you are an unparalleled Ultimate Grandmaster, and you’re at least ranked in the top three!”

“Who spread that?”

“Master Mingjue from Vajra Temple, and this claim was confirmed by Elder Kong Ling from the Beast Taming Sect!”

You reclined in your chair, understanding the situation.

That old bald monk Mingjue was trying to save face by inflating your strength infinitely, making himself look less weak.

As for Kong Ling, he was probably just sweet-talking you, since praising was better than insulting.

Your true combat power would place you around third to sixth among the Ultimate Grandmasters.

Anyway, they were all top-tier players of the same league, so the difference wasn’t huge.

What Mingjue and Kong Ling didn’t know was that after you fully fused with the Heavenly Mist Blade, your strength would far exceed even their wildest imaginations.

Sang Yi and the other two stared fixedly at you: “Palace Lord, is it true? Are you really that strong?”

You waved dismissively, “Don’t listen to the nonsense in the martial world. I’m not that weak.”

“Ah?!” The three were stunned instantly.

“What ‘ah’? You don’t believe me? Want to spar one-on-one with me?!”

“Not at all, Palace Lord, we wouldn’t dare!”

You crossed your legs. Since the old bald monk Mingjue had already blown you up, you might as well brag even bigger and play the role thoroughly.

Besides, combat power had no concrete measurement standard like a running race where seconds mattered.

If someone really challenged you, just say you’ve been sick lately, with palace cold and need to recuperate.

After a few years of recuperation, you’d finish fusing with the Heavenly Mist Blade. When someone dares to challenge you then, one slash would cut their medical insurance bill into arrears.

One brag wasn’t enough for you, so you made up a few more stories about yourself, making Sang Yi and the others gasp repeatedly.

After satisfying your bragging urge, you got down to business.

You instructed Sang Yi to find a blacksmith and forge six iron chains as thick as his waist to tie up three Fire Emberhawks.

You planned to keep the Fire Emberhawks in the Palace of Ten Thousand Dreams, since bringing them back to the Zoo might expose your identity.

You also made Zhao Wunian responsible for taking care of the three Fire Emberhawks from now on, giving him some second- and third-grade nourishing pills enough to feed the hawks for a month.

Since you needed to extract the hawks’ essence blood, you had to supplement them a bit. The Fire Emberhawks were too weak and might be noticed by Kong Ling.

If Kong Ling noticed and wasn’t tactful, you would be forced into killing, and you dreaded killing people. Amitabha.

After giving all instructions, you extracted the essence blood from the Fire Emberhawks, and all three immediately wilted and lost their vigor.

You obtained three drops of Fire Emberhawk essence blood in total.

Although all three drops came from the same species, you wanted to see if this quality of essence blood could have a stacking effect.

You had suspected long ago that the reason the Guarding Gate Body Technique required different types of essence blood was only because ordinary beasts’ essence blood wasn’t strong enough.

You believed that because ordinary essence blood’s strengthening ability on the human body was weak, the second drop of the same type might sense the area was already transformed by the predecessor, and due to its limited ability, it would give up and slack off.

But if very strong essence blood merged into the body, it might think: What? The arm is already fixed? Then I’ll damn well fix your legs too!

Holding this suspicion, you went to the villa atop Flower-Fruit Mountain that same day.

You completed the fusion of the three drops of Fire Emberhawk essence blood.

Sitting cross-legged in the training room, your eyes shone with joy.

All three drops of essence blood took effect and completed a stacked strengthening!

Your extra physical strength rose from late Bone Tempering to early Marrow Washing stage.

You laughed heartily, “Hahaha, awesome!”

Your guess was confirmed: as long as the essence blood itself was strong enough, it could repeatedly strengthen the body.

Moreover, the strength of these three drops of essence blood exceeded your expectations.

“The Beast Taming Sect is impressive; that’s quite something!”

You planned that once you finished fusing with the Heavenly Mist Blade, you would immediately visit the Beast Taming Sect to better understand whether their territorial strength was really that extraordinary.

You stood up and walked outside the villa, intending to return to Youtong County to enter seclusion and continue comprehending the Earth Source.

But the moment you activated your Source Power to take off, you suddenly felt as if something new had appeared inside you, a strange sensation.

Your expression changed instantly, and you landed back on the ground.

You carefully checked your entire body several times but found nothing unusual.

You activated your Source Power again, but the subtle feeling had vanished completely.

Your brows furrowed as you thought of the three Fire Emberhawks: “Are these birds poisonous?”

But then you realized that couldn’t be. If they wanted to harm you this way, they would have had to know your hidden identity in advance, know you wanted to collect Earth Source, know your departure time, know you were playing with animals, know you wanted the Fire Emberhawks, and cultivate poisonous Fire Emberhawks ahead of time. They would even have to mobilize two Ultimate Grandmasters to put on a show for you.

That was too absurd and absolutely impossible. Anyone capable of that would have already crushed you with raw strength.

“So it can only be that there’s something wrong with the Beast Taming Sect. They raised such big birds, maybe someone spiked their well water with steroids?”

You checked your body a few more times but still found nothing unusual.

Your expression darkened and your gaze grew cold.

You went straight to the place in the Palace of Ten Thousand Dreams where the three Fire Emberhawks were kept.

You pulled over one Fire Emberhawk and forcefully probed its body with Source Power, allowing the surging energy to roam and stir recklessly inside.

The massive Fire Emberhawk let out a pained shriek, but wrapped in your overwhelming Source Power, it couldn’t move.

After a long time, you stopped the examination.

Still, you found nothing.

You thought for a moment and decided not to wait any longer. You would go to the Beast Taming Sect now.

If even you, a proud Ultimate Grandmaster, couldn’t find the hidden danger, you had to figure it out.

If you brought this hidden danger back to the real world and it was inherited, everything would be over.

You shot straight into the sky and sped rapidly toward the Beast Taming Sect.