The staff were uncertain, but seeing no movement inside the pavilion, they hesitated and ultimately remained silent.
Interrupting someone training in the Blood Pool was a serious offense.
Besides, the pavilion was frequented by Fenshen Stage experts; if anything serious happened, it wouldn’t be their responsibility to handle it.
Inside the Blood Pool, the people soaking in the Qi Refining Stage area faintly sensed something was off.
Why didn’t they feel that unbearable pain that nearly made them lose consciousness just moments ago?
Had their willpower strengthened enough to endure such pain?
But… why did it still hurt so agonizingly deep inside?
That sensation of wanting to faint but not quite passing out was even more mentally exhausting.
In short, when the Qi Refining Stage students were transported out of the Blood Pool and awakened, each of them looked dazed and unfocused.
Originally, when the pain was so intense that someone fainted, the body’s protective mechanism would subconsciously erase the memory of the pain upon waking, minimizing its effect.
This time, however, the demonic energy wasn’t strong enough to cause them to faint, so the phantom pain lingered after waking.
The rest area was filled with crying and wailing.
“What happened?” The pavilion staff looked at the scene, utterly confused.
Upon asking around, they found everyone was crying from the pain, yet upon checking, these individuals’ body tempering was even better than normal.
They just hadn’t fainted after a short time, tempering their bodies a bit longer, which should’ve made things better.
The staff were speechless and promptly dragged all these “sensitive” people out and threw them away.
Apparently, these folks hadn’t been hit enough to toughen up—how could they be so afraid of pain?
Li Yunxian didn’t realize she had unintentionally caused many grievances like Dou E Yuan.
She clenched her consciousness tightly and only after completing a full tempering of her entire body did she tremble as she crawled out of the Blood Pool.
Li Yunxian knew that going beyond the proper limit would do more harm than good.
At her current Qi Refining Stage cultivation, staying in any longer wouldn’t continue tempering her body—it would cause her flesh to collapse.
***
After stepping out, the lingering pain in her body memory made her legs weaken, almost causing her to fall to her knees.
She hastily steadied herself by leaning against the wall.
After calming down, Li Yunxian glanced down at her phone.
Two hours had passed.
Much shorter than she had expected.
She looked at the blood-energized pool water, still boiling with vitality.
There was far more demonic blood energy here than she had imagined.
Two hours of body tempering had only used up half of it.
Such a waste.
Li Yunxian regretted not being able to fully exhaust the power of this small pool.
The pavilion’s interior was designed to guarantee privacy; each pool blocked Divine Sense from entering.
Li Yunxian hadn’t realized that the Blood Pools in the Qi Refining area were interconnected.
Taking a new set of clothes from her Wrist Storage Ring, Li Yunxian changed and felt her energy somewhat restored before pushing open the door of the private chamber.
Newcomers in the corridor saw this and immediately widened their eyes.
Li Yunxian’s hair was still wet, dripping with Blood Pool water…
“You… you actually came out of there?!” someone screamed.
Li Yunxian was startled by the shout: “What, otherwise?”
The other party still looked terrified, seemingly not hearing her, and continued in shock: “Why did you come out of the Blood Pool?”
Li Yunxian showed a shocked expression in return: “Because I couldn’t bear it. Why wouldn’t I come out?”
She had no idea that the normal Blood Pool process was for someone to faint inside, then be detected by a magical tool and directly sent to the rest area.
Even if she knew, it wouldn’t have helped—there was no way she would pass out with her current awareness.
After a long stare-down between the two, Li Yunxian asked, “Where’s the changing room here?”
The dazed other party mumbled an answer: “There isn’t a changing room here.
When people are transported out, both they and the items in the private chamber are sent together.
None of the Blood Pool water comes along.
Therefore, historically, the pavilion never had a need for changing facilities.”
“Alright, thanks.” Li Yunxian sighed.
“Well, I guess I’ll have to go back to the dorm.”
Li Yunxian staggered out of the Qi Refining area, attracting a series of shocked stares along the public corridor.
Li Yunxian: “?”
Something felt off.
She clearly knew what she had done.
A full body tempering that raised her physical quality close to the Foundation Establishment Stage level, absorbing so much energy from the Blood Pool.
She had a good idea of what she had taken in.
There was no way she was still just a normal Qi Refining Third Layer.
Huh?
But…
It was just a small pool, only half the energy had been consumed—everyone’s reaction shouldn’t be this extreme, right?
The lingering pain in Li Yunxian’s body had faded considerably, but she kept up the act of being weak as she headed out of the pavilion.
The staff at the main entrance saw her walk out and stood there, mouth agape.
“How did you get out?!” the staff couldn’t help but ask.
This wasn’t nonsense.
The rest area’s exit was in a different direction.
In all his years guarding the Blood Pool pavilion, this was the first time he’d seen someone come out the way they came in!
Li Yunxian weakly replied, “It was too painful. My body couldn’t take it.”
The staff looked like he wanted to say something but stopped himself.
He had already imagined that Li Yunxian had just been stalling in the pavilion for two hours because she was afraid of the pain.
But now that she was out, it was useless to say anything.
Finally, the staff gave a polite reminder: “Next time, remember not to come out unless you’re about to faint from the pain.”
That made Li Yunxian understand why everyone had been looking at her so strangely.
She thanked him weakly and casually asked, “Teacher, if I want to come again, how many credits do I need?”
That question immediately earned her a pitying look from the staff: “500 credits.”
Li Yunxian understood from that look that 500 credits was quite a lot.
Knowing how hard it was to earn credits, she recalled the Qingteng Class only gave 20 credits a year…
The Selection Trial definitely wasn’t for nothing.
Li Yunxian walked off happily, while the rest area staff, after sending off another wave of wailing students, finally felt something was wrong.
She came to the Qi Refining Stage Blood Pool area, opened an empty private chamber, and stared wide-eyed at the lowered water level in the pool.
“What’s happened to the Qi Refining Blood Pools?!”
“Who did this?!”
By the time Li Yunxian returned to the dorm, the news about the Blood Pool of Tongtian had already spread throughout the academy.
Yu Qiyao fed Li Yunxian while curiously asking, “Yunxian, I heard the entire Qi Refining Blood Pool lost half its energy today!”
“They suspect some Golden Core True Person didn’t have enough credits and disguised themselves as Qi Refining to get in.”
Li Yunxian’s expression remained calm.
Half more or less, she didn’t know.
She was genuinely Qi Refining.
No matter how much she used, it was just to temper a Qi Refining Stage body—not requiring energy comparable to a Golden Core Stage.
This was pure slander!
Li Yunxian, feeling innocent, shrugged: “How would I know? I went in, healed my body, then came out.”
At this, Yu Qiyao and the others chuckled silently.
They remembered passing the arena area during their campus tour and overhearing senior students passionately discussing the newbie at the bottom of the rankings in Qi Refining Second Layer entering the Blood Pool of Tongtian.
Just hearing that…
Anyone who knew a bit would realize they were talking about Li Yunxian!
Newbie, Qi Refining Second Layer, Blood Pool—these three clues pointed clearly at her!
Only, why was she the last in the rankings?
What was her connection to being last?
Thinking this, someone who had given Li Yunxian kill points patted her shoulder.
“Yunxian, you can’t be biased about this, okay?”
“Whether it’s us or the seniors, we’re all classmates.”
“If you beat us up, you better remember to beat them up too!”
Li Yunxian replied, “Actually, I’m a lover of peace.” She said this seriously.
The proposer also looked at her seriously: “You were laughing maniacally when you killed me.”
Li Yunxian was speechless.
Everyone burst into laughter watching her expression.
They chatted and ate until late at night, then packed up and went home.
Li Yunxian waved goodbye and closed the door—but her hand suddenly paused.
In her perception, the moment she shut the door, another presence appeared in the room.
Or rather, another fox demon appeared.
Li Yunxian turned to see Su Wenjing sitting on the sofa in the living room, coldly saying, “Professor Su, coming uninvited at this hour is inappropriate.”
Su Wenjing ignored her words, stood up, and asked directly, “Why didn’t you reshape your body after going into the Blood Pool?”
Li Yunxian: “?”
“Why would I reshape my body?” She had no idea what Su Wenjing meant.
She thought he had come because of today’s Blood Pool incident.
But this question sounded completely unrelated.
Su Wenjing looked at her with a faint smile and made it clear: “You’ve lived for thousands of years, occupying a young girl’s body. Isn’t that improper?”
When they first met at the testing center, Li Yunxian’s soul aura was pure, and considering the circumstances, she could have escaped.
But she stayed for the sake of others and confronted the hunters…
For various reasons, Su Wenjing didn’t think she was a villain, just that there were things beyond her control.
He didn’t want to interfere and left it alone.
But now… Su Wenjing was reconsidering his judgment of her being a good person.
Li Yunxian stared silently at Su Wenjing.
She understood his misunderstanding.
His intentions were good.
But… why did she have to suffer because of this damned pretending fox demon’s misconception?
Crossing her arms and wearing a faintly teasing smile, Li Yunxian stepped in front of Su Wenjing.
“You’re so old, yet you say thousands of years right off the bat.”
“I was born in Daxia,” Su Wenjing said calmly.
Li Yunxian did the math—about four thousand years ago.
She squinted and smiled, reaching out to touch his chin mockingly, “Oh~ call me sister~”
Su Wenjing’s expression instantly darkened.
He grabbed Li Yunxian’s wrist in a flash, then paused.
He looked down at the hand he was holding and couldn’t help but stare at Li Yunxian in surprise.
Li Yunxian sneered and shook off his hand: “Feel that? This is my body.”
“No body snatching, thank you very much!”
Su Wenjing was still puzzled: “Your bone age is only eighteen!”
“A coincidence,” Li Yunxian replied.
Su Wenjing was dumbfounded.
Li Yunxian’s expression turned cold.
“I have no reason to explain to you.”
Seeing Su Wenjing’s reaction, Li Yunxian took a step back, sat comfortably on the sofa, and arrogantly asked the question she cared most about:
“How did you find out?”
Su Wenjing, knowing he was caught, looked at Li Yunxian’s act, and despite himself, smiled wryly as he answered:
“When you needed Soul Fragments in Jincheng, your soul’s aura leaked out; of course I sensed it.”
Li Yunxian raised an eyebrow.
From her perception, Su Wenjing was indeed a Fenshen Stage cultivator.
But…
“You used to be Transcendence Stage?!” Li Yunxian clicked her tongue.
Only someone whose soul strength was Transcendence Stage could determine her cultivation level from the little soul power she leaked.
With the desire to hit a fox in its weak spot, Li Yunxian laughed out loud: “You transcended and then dropped to Fenshen Stage!!”
Su Wenjing’s face immediately darkened and he tried to leave.
But Li Yunxian called out first: “Wait, I have a question. After I ask, we’ll call it even.”
Su Wenjing stopped and glanced at her: “What?”
“Is the path to Ascension in this world… open?” Li Yunxian looked up, through the dense canopy, toward the sky.