Chapter 129: The Golden Body of Virtue

Watching the bucket-thick lightning dragon roar and thrash within the black-and-white Taiji diagram before him, Qingxu still felt as if it were unreal. The entire situation was simply too incredible. The eighth lightning dragon had been so swift and fierce that he had no time to react, meaning he hadn’t even utilized the full power of the Yin-Yang Dao Robe; the current development was entirely the robe’s own doing.

The power of the eighth lightning dragon was terrifying. Even a standard early-stage Celestial Immortal would have been killed or maimed if struck. Yet, the Yin-Yang Dao Robe, despite having few of its primordial restrictions refined, had easily trapped it of its own accord, leaving it unable to break free no matter how it struggled, destined only to be gradually ground into nothingness.

"This is just too insane!" he marveled to himself. Although he had placed great hope in this supreme-grade primordial spirit treasure, he had never imagined it would be this formidable.

Qingxu knew very little about the Yin-Yang Dao Robe; it was entirely unfamiliar, with no mention of it in the myths, legends, or ancient texts from his past life. In his mind, it had never carried the weight of renowned primordial treasures like the Central Wuji Apricot Yellow Flag, the Yuxu Palace Lantern, or the Sea-Calming Divine Pearls. However, today's events had changed his perspective.

"There is truly no such thing as a simple primordial spirit treasure."

The eighth lightning dragon had not caused Qingxu any pressure, but before it could be completely annihilated, the ninth lightning dragon roared down.

*Boom!*

It struck the Taiji diagram. Just like the eighth, it was trapped within. However, trapping two lightning dragons at once caused the Taiji diagram to flicker slightly, its black-and-white Yin-Yang energies rippling with instability.

"This is bad. It won't hold for long at this rate." Startled, Qingxu had no other choice but to desperately force the abundant Yin-Yang energy from within the robe into the diagram to bolster its power.

The nine-nine Chaotic Celestial Immortal Tribulation was relentless, attacking in constant, rapid succession. When two or three dragons descended at once, there was a brief pause, but if they came one by one, there was no interval at all. Qingxu was now in a race against time, struggling to strengthen the Taiji diagram and annihilate the previously trapped dragon before the next one struck.

Just before the tenth lightning dragon crashed down, he successfully disintegrated the eighth. Yet, before he could breathe a sigh of relief, the tenth one had already struck.

"Huh? What is this?" As he trapped the tenth dragon, Qingxu sensed something unusual. He had previously only refined two layers of the robe’s primordial restrictions, but he could now feel that the third and fourth layers had also been refined.

Refining primordial restrictions in a spirit treasure becomes exponentially more difficult with each layer; the third layer alone was more difficult than the first two combined, let alone the fourth. He had spent an immense amount of effort to refine the first two, yet now, the third and fourth had been refined silently. Qingxu was bewildered.

"Could it be because of the eighth lightning dragon?" The thought suddenly occurred to him. Upon reflection, it seemed highly probable. Perhaps it was a case of "one must lose to gain." The annihilation of the eighth dragon had not resulted in a massive boost to his cultivation level as before, but instead, it had fueled the refinement of his treasure.

With four layers of primordial restrictions refined, controlling the Yin-Yang Dao Robe became much easier, and its power increased manifold. The resulting Taiji diagram grew accordingly, and he felt little pressure even while trapping the ninth and tenth dragons.

Under the grinding force of the Yin-Yang energy, the ninth dragon quickly dissipated with several times the efficiency of before.

The eleventh dragon struck!
The twelfth dragon struck!
The thirteenth dragon struck!
...
Lightning dragon after lightning dragon was annihilated within the Taiji diagram, but it was clearly failing to keep up with the tribulation.

Before long, by the time the ninth, tenth, and eleventh dragons were destroyed, the Taiji diagram was already holding four more. The pressure increased, but it remained manageable. As the next three dragons were annihilated, the primordial restrictions within the Yin-Yang Dao Robe increased just as Qingxu had anticipated, leaping from four layers to seven.

This scene reminded Qingxu of the Yuxu Palace Lantern incident. The only difference was that back then, the Grand Supreme Saint had been the one wielding it, and the intricate details were beyond his comprehension; now, he was the one in control.

Eighth layer refined!
Ninth layer refined!
Tenth layer refined!
...
With the help of the lightning dragons, layer after layer of primordial restrictions was refined. The power of the Taiji diagram grew and grew, but the corresponding pressure rose just as sharply, and the number of dragons trapped within continued to climb.

When the eightieth lightning dragon slammed into the Taiji diagram, Qingxu felt as if he had been struck by lightning himself. His internal organs and spirit felt a searing pain; he could not help but spit out several mouthfuls of blood. His face twitched, his expression became listless, his complexion turned as pale as paper, and his breath grew faint.

*Crack, crack, crack...*

The sound of shattering was incessant. Looking up, the Taiji diagram, which spanned over a thousand miles and enveloped the entire Chaotic Rock Mountain, was riddled with thousands of cracks, teetering on the brink of collapse. The dozen or so lightning dragons trapped within seemed to sense the diagram’s precarious state and struggled even more violently.

"Sigh! Just one step away. The Taiji diagram has reached its limit. According to tradition, the final lightning dragon will have the combined power of the previous eighty. There is no chance of surviving this as things stand! Is all my effort to go to waste?" Qingxu was filled with unwillingness. If he had failed earlier, it would be one thing, but he had successfully endured eighty strikes; only the last one remained.

With success in sight, he could not accept failure now.

The pitch-black tribulation clouds began to churn. A golden-black lightning dragon, several yards thick, began to devour the surrounding clouds, gathering its strength. It was not hard to estimate that once it descended, it would strike with the force of a thunderbolt.

"Time to gamble. The bold live, the timid starve." Sitting and waiting for death was not in Qingxu's nature. The Taiji diagram could no longer be relied upon; it had reached its limit and could never withstand the eighty-first strike.

A wild idea formed in his mind. In this life-or-death moment, with the God-Sealing System unpredictable, Qingxu decided to take a gamble. Without hesitation, he executed the "Golden Cicada Sheds Its Shell" technique. He left the Yin-Yang Dao Robe to continue maintaining the Taiji diagram to handle the dozen trapped dragons, while his true body transformed into a streak of azure light, shooting upward and diving headlong into the tribulation clouds.

Once inside, it was pitch black, and he couldn't see his own fingers. Waves of destructive power corroded his Daoist body, while strands of mysterious energy poured into him, surging toward his primordial spirit. Not far away, the terrifying lightning dragon flew toward him, opening its giant maw to swallow him whole.

In the nick of time!

Qingxu roared, channeling the Yuxu lineage’s primary body-refining technique, the *Glazed Daoist Body*. Simultaneously, he utilized the God-Sealing System to fuse his accumulated Yang-Virtue and Yin-Virtue. Strands of moral divine light began to radiate from his entire body, and his physique grew at a leap-and-bound pace.

[Low-grade Primordial Spirit Treasure: Qingxu Tower]

As Qingxu refined his moral body internally and weathered the life-and-death tribulation externally, his natal spirit treasure, the Qingxu Tower, also began to ascend, stepping toward the rank of a mid-grade primordial spirit treasure. Mid-grade primordial spirit treasures differed from low-grade ones not only in power and primordial restrictions, but most importantly in their ability to take human form. The difficulty of achieving this was a hundred times greater, and even a Primordial Saint could not simply bestow it.

*Roar!*

The lightning dragon lunged, its giant mouth snapping shut, instantly swallowing Qingxu whole.

Inside the dragon's belly, Qingxu immediately felt the forces of metal, wood, water, fire, earth, wind, and lightning—dozens of different elemental powers—forming a formation led by the power of lightning, surging and tearing at his body.

Under the terrifying pressure of these dozens of elemental forces, Qingxu’s bare, unprotected Daoist body began to tear open, blood flowing freely, as if he were undergoing the slow, agonizing torture of a thousand cuts.

The pain, intense enough to shatter one's spirit, washed over him in waves. Even with his firm Daoist heart, he could barely endure it. He quickly cut off the connection between his six senses and his physical body, focusing entirely on cultivating the Moral Golden Body.

With the *Glazed Daoist Body*, a supreme orthodox sect technique, combined with the abundant Yang-Virtue and Yin-Virtue, Qingxu’s body moved step by step toward becoming a Moral Golden Body. His store of merits and karmic sins was immense, and with the God-Sealing System, exchanging for Yin and Yang virtue was incredibly easy.

This was a great stroke of fortune for Qingxu. With the internal Moral Glazed technique and the external Yin-Yang good-and-evil gate, the Moral Golden Body he cultivated was tending toward perfection, not inferior to the body of an Ancestral Witch. In the prehistoric world, it was estimated that only the Daoist body of a Primordial Saint could hold a slight advantage.

Time! If only he were granted enough time to refine the Moral Golden Body, he would surely be no less than an Ancestral Witch, for the starting point of a near-perfect Moral Golden Body was on par with that of an Ancestral Witch.

The moral divine light radiating from him grew brighter and more dazzling with every passing moment, and a wisp of moral aura, like floating smoke, drifted above his crown.

Eighty-one days later, the dozen lightning dragons in the Taiji diagram had long since vanished. With their annihilation, the primordial restrictions refined within the Yin-Yang Dao Robe reached the peak of forty-two layers. This supreme-grade primordial spirit treasure, taking advantage of this opportunity, was fully refined in one go, saving Qingxu an eternity of time.

Not only was the Yin-Yang Dao Robe refined, but his cultivation had also broken through from the mid-stage to the late-stage of the Celestial Immortal realm. With a little time to consolidate, reaching the peak would be a natural progression.

Inside the nine-nine Chaotic Celestial Immortal tribulation clouds, after eighty-one days of attrition, the power of the lightning was completely exhausted. Qingxu sat cross-legged, stark naked, within the black clouds. His entire body was a brilliant gold, the moral divine light shining as dazzlingly as the sun, impossible to look at directly.

As the eighty-first lightning dragon was annihilated, the black clouds began to dissipate. When the world returned to a state of calm and the blue sky was washed clean, Qingxu’s moral divine light retracted into his body. At the same time, his tightly shut eyes snapped open, and two beams of divine light shot straight into the firmament, piercing the stellar palace.

"The Moral Golden Body—finally cultivated. My natal spirit treasure has also successfully reached the mid-grade level." A smile tugged at the corner of his lips; Qingxu was satisfied with his gains.

Great risks are often accompanied by great rewards.

Feeling a chill on his body, he realized he was still completely naked. His old face reddened, and he quickly waved his hand, wrapping the Yin-Yang Dao Robe lying amidst the rubble on the ground around himself.

[Thanks to Wang Daye 1234 for the enthusiastic support.]