Ronan took a moment to regain his breath and his balance after the shard had shattered in his grip in the middle of a punch. He turned his focus inwards, wanting to see if he'd managed to at least absorb a portion of the energy.

He was shocked to see that not only had he managed to absorb all of the energy that had remained in the shard, but somehow the energy that was flowing into his body was a greater amount than the shard had contained. Confused, but glad he hadn't lost out on any efficiency, he took out another shard and carefully gripped it in one hand as he restarted his practice moves.

As before, the flow of shard energy into his body began at the usual rate, albeit faster than it had been during his last session due to the many cultivation talent multipliers he'd gained since. It sped up the more he continued his routine, until the sixth set, where it suddenly shattered into sparkling dust.

Exactly as had happened the first time, there had been no loss of energy, but instead the energy absorbed by Ronan's body was greater than the original quantity of energy stored inside the shard. To confirm his suspicion, he opened his status to the cultivation section.

[Partial Status - Ronan Steele]

[Cultivation]

Mind: Quartz ★★★ (0.2%)

Body: Stone ★★ (86.5%) [Diamondback Gorilla (Rare), 3.1%]

Energy: Pulsing ★ (0%) [Nine Mouths Delta (Uncommon), 87.4%]

Soul: Red ★★★★ (1.4%)

Not only had his body cultivation soared all the way from zero to well over eighty percent after consuming just two shards, but his proficiency in the Diamondback Gorilla Tempered Body Art had increased by a fraction. All that in just ten repetitions of some basic combat forms.

Ronan was beginning to like cultivation arts, and made it a mission to invest in luck through his iterations until he had an art for each type of cultivation. He suspected that soul cultivation arts would be the rarest, but he had infinite attempts to get one, so that wasn't a matter of if he would get one, but when.

With confirmation that his method worked, there was nothing for Ronan to do but keep cultivating. Although he first made sure to open the marketplace and buy up all the available shards.

There were just the two, and neither of them were body aspected, but that didn't really matter much now that he had the dao child skills. Any shard could be used to cultivate any of the four paths.

Taking out a third body aspected shard, Ronan continued to run through his movements. This time, before the shard even had an opportunity to explode, he received his first progress notification.

Congratulations! Your hard work and effort have allowed you to reach the third realm of Tempered Body Cultivation!

Tempered Body Cultivation has advanced from [Stone ★★] to [Stone ★★★]!

Physical damage reduction +9%

Efficacy of vitality, strength, agility, and resistance +15%

Despite that, Ronan didn't stop cultivating for even a moment. If he did, there was a risk that the shard might break or he might damage himself. While it wouldn't be permanent, it would cripple his ambitions of defeating the sector boss in this iteration.

For the third shard, Ronan had to complete nine repetitions of his routine before it shattered. He could see a pattern forming, each consecutive shard requiring more effort before its energy would be multiplied.

That tracked with the passage and description of the Diamondback Gorilla Art, which touted repetition and training above all. True mastery of the basics.

In this case, that meant performing many repetitions of the same movements while cultivating in order to see maximum gains. Continuing until he ran out of body aspected shards, Ronan managed to surge through the realms. In just six hours he accomplished more than he'd done in all his previous iterations of cultivation.

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At the end of the six hours, his final shard broke after the eighty-first repetition of his combat stances and movements. It was a huge increase from the mere four that the first shard had required to multiply and absorb its energy. However, the shard that just broke was the boss shard, which meant it increased his cultivation by the largest proportional amount yet.

Unfortunately it wasn't quite enough to push him over the first threshold, into the sixth realm of tempered body cultivation.

[Partial Status - Ronan Steele]

[Cultivation]

Mind: Quartz ★★★ (0.2%)

Body: Stone ★★★★★ (94.8%) [Diamondback Gorilla (Rare), 13.7%]

Energy: Pulsing ★ (0%) [Nine Mouths Delta (Uncommon), 87.4%]

Soul: Red ★★★★ (1.4%)

The rest of his shards were a mixed bag. One of them was energy-aspected while the other three were mind-aspected. He could have used them to cultivate his energy and mind, or simply mind, but given how close he was to the edge of the first threshold, Ronan wanted to make the push.

He felt that the benefits provided by breaking a threshold would be superior to those gained by pushing a realm or two ahead in mind cultivation. With the dao child class skill, he could cultivate his body with any aspected shard at a 60% efficiency rate. That was plenty.

Taking out the energy-aspect shard, Ronan continued his routine. The sensation was muted, as though he was absorbing the energy through some kind of filter. In a way, that was exactly what he was doing.

Nonetheless the actual process of cultivating was identical. He felt as though he'd been performing the same punches, kicks, knee-strikes, and elbow jabs for an eternity, but the payoff was well worth the effort.

After ninety-six repetitions, the shard shattered and was fully absorbed into his body. Ronan held his breath as he waited for the notification to appear. He was let down.

With a sigh he took out the first of the mind-aspected shards and continued the process. He had hoped he might be able to push over the threshold using only the energy-aspected shard, so that he could use the two mind shards to potentially reach the fourth realm in crystalline mind cultivation. Unfortunately the system said no dice.

Continuing, Ronan managed to make it all the way to one-hundred-thirteen repetitions before the shard burst into a thousand motes of glittering dust. The rush of energy that struck him was weaker than he expected, but it still did its job.

All of a sudden every muscle in his body started to cramp. Lactic burns raced through them, and Ronan started shrinking in on himself in twisting agony. That was only the beginning.

His tendons all snapped in sync, causing him to drop to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Following that, the cramping muscle fibres started to pop at the seams, followed by all of his joints dislocating. An outsider watching might think he was a pulsing skinbag filled with twitching rodents.

The top few layers of skin simply peeled off like a series of giant blisters. Or perhaps a snake shedding its skin, though a hundred times more painful.

Having gone through the torture of breaking through the first threshold in mystic energy cultivation, Ronan was able to clench his teeth and bear it, remaining conscious throughout the entire process.

That allowed him to be witness to the miraculous reforging of his body. Every aspect that had been broken and bent was fixed, not simply made whole again, but rejuvenated and raised to a new level of strength, sturdiness, and stability.

All of the pain that had filled him from head to toe just a few moments earlier faded away, as though it had been a bad dream. He heard a faint chime, mustering enough focus to lock his gaze onto the system message that appeared in front of his eyes.

You are attempting to break through the first threshold in Tempered Body Cultivation!

Challenger possesses at least two body-related masteries at tier I or higher!

Congratulations! Your hard work and effort have allowed you to reach the sixth realm of Tempered Body Cultivation!

Tempered Body Cultivation has advanced from [Stone ★★★★★] to [Copper ★]!

Reduces chance of tendon, joint, and muscle damage during movement and combat. Efficiency of bodily functions is increased. Durability, muscle memory, and bodily independence are minutely increased.

Physical damage reduction +25%

Efficacy of vitality, strength, agility, and resistance +45%

Potency of vitality, strength, agility, and resistance +5%

As he'd expected, the benefits of reaching the first threshold in body cultivation far surpassed the potential gains of one or two more realms in mind cultivation. Not only had his efficacy shot through the roof along with his physical damage reduction, but he'd gained some potency in the relevant stats along with a plethora of random bodily improvements.

Seeing what this new realm of cultivation was called, Ronan couldn't stop the intrusive thought from forming. I guess I'm pretty tempting to thieves now, huh?

Doing his cultivation routine once more, the difference was stark. Before he'd been an elderly man attempting to relive his youth, whereas now he was like a prime athlete at the top of his game. Punches split the air, causing thunderclaps. Kicks struck their target like lightning, barely a delay between thought and impact.

Ronan felt his confidence growing. He was going to take down Veloxis this iteration, no matter what.

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