"This place is amazing!" Miko couldn't help but exclaim.
John nodded his head in agreement. "Agreed, it's like an entire world is located within here. We've been walking for hours but the mountains are still so far in the distance. I wonder how large this world truly is."
"I heard from my father that this world has no limits, or at least that no one has ever discovered an edge to the world. Not only that, but it changes every time." Ryan added.
"Mhm, either we're being sent to different areas of this world, or it truly changes every time it opens. Either way, whoever made this world must be absolutely incredible." John was truly in awe at whoever made this realm.
While walking in the direction Miko picked, the group had run into some beasts that seemed to live in the world. They were species that they had never seen or heard about before, and several of them attacked the group. But they were all Body Refinement or Mist Creation beasts, and were easily dispatched by the group.
After half a day of walking, the group finally spotted an object appear in the distance.
"Is that...a palace?" Ryan asked as he strained his eyes to see.
"Looks like it. Lets go check it out." John responded as the group started walking towards the palace. Half an hour later, they finally arrived in front of the palace, and all three had their eyes wide open in shock.
The marble white palace was almost a mile tall and several miles wide, and many spires were jutting out high into the sky. It contained a majestic aura, but the dilapidation of time was visible on its exterior. Parts of the palace were either breaking down or broken, and dirt and dust coated its exterior.
"This is the largest palace I've ever seen," Miko muttered, while Ryan nodded his head in agreement. Only John was not all that shocked, as the palace in his special realm dwarfed this one.
"Let's head inside, but be careful." John said to the group and started walking forward.
The group all walked forward, and entered the palace whose gate was wide open. Despite the palace being several miles wide, only the main hallway was open for them to walk down, and it led them directly into the heart of the palace.
All three kept their divine senses pushed to their limits to identify any potential dangers before they fell into them. After several minutes of walking, the group came to a massively grand room.
Their eyes all fell on an object at the center of the room, which was a large tablet, dozens of yards tall, with magnificent markings etched all throughout its surface. The rest of the massive room was empty, signifying that the only thing of importance was the tablet itself.
The three of them cautiously walked forward before they were forcibly stopped by the pressure emanating from the tablet.
"What the hell? We can't move forward?" Miko asked in confusion.
"Seems like it. I wonder what this tablet is about?" John said as he studied the tablet closely. All of a sudden, John found himself appearing in a completely different room, that was empty except for himself.
"What the hell just happened?" John had no idea how he had appeared in the room, but quickly wanted to find a way out.
While searching for an exit, a figure suddenly appeared in John's vision. He took out his scythe in a flash, but laughed at himself once he took a closer look.
'It's just a training dummy. I wonder why it showed up?' While thinking about this question, a monotone voice all of a sudden appeared in John's head.
"Attack the target with all your strength, and you may leave this place."
"What the hell? What was that voice?" John was completely shocked to hear the voice echo inside his own mind. He had never experienced anything like this before, and had no idea who or what said those words.
John waited for more words to appear in his mind, but nothing else happened.
'It said to attack the dummy, at which point I can leave. I don't know why that's the case, but I'll just do as it says.'
Supreme Battle Art!
John powered himself up to his strongest battle state, and steadied his scythe in front of him.
Myriad Annihilation Scythe
John struck out with his melee version of the Myriad Annihilation Scythe, which was also empowered by his Supreme Battle Art.
In the tournament, John's essence dantian was at the middle Mist Creation Realm, and so the power it provided to his attacks was fairly minimal when compared to his Supreme Battle Art. Now however, with his essence dantian and body dantian both in the late Mist Creation Realm, John's most powerful attack was by using the Myriad Annihilation Scythe in conjunction with his Supreme Battle Art.
A regular cultivator would send one hundred percent of their Qi output to their attack, be it essence or body, which would result in an attack at one hundred percent of their peak power.
On the other hand, a dual cultivator would have to send fifty percent of their Qi to their essence attack, and fifty percent of their Qi to their body, which is superimposed to an attack at about seventy five percent of their full power when compared to a single pathway cultivator. This was why no one tread the dual cultivation pathway, as it took longer to cultivate, and resulted in weaker overall attacks.
However, with his two dantians, John was able to send one hundred percent of his essence Qi to his Myriad Annihilation Scythe, while one hundred percent of his body Qi went to his Supreme Battle Art. These two full powered attacks superimposed on each other to reach an attack power far beyond what a normal late Mist Creation cultivator was capable of.
Boom!
John's scythe collided with the stone figure in front of him, and it exploded into a shower of rocks and dust. John breathed in deeply as he stared at the result of his attack, which was the first time he had unleashed this combination attack since his essence dantian advanced to the late Mist Creation Realm.
'This is even more powerful than I expected.'
While thinking about his attack, the voice once more appeared in his head.
"You have no affinity for this inheritance."
"What? No aff-" John asked back to the voice, but cut off his words as he found himself back in the large room where he had been before. Miko appeared just seconds later, and looked around in confusion before spotting John to his side.
"Where did you go? Did you also go to another room?" John asked Miko. Miko confirmed John's suspicions as he detailed what had happened to him, which was exactly what had happened to John himself.
"The voice told me I was not worthy of its inheritance. What the hell is that bullshit?" Miko fumed out in anger. "If a heavenly genius like me isn't worthy, who is?"
John laughed at Miko's comment and nodded his head in agreement. If Miko, with his amazing talent and variant soul type, and John, with his innate variant body and dual cultivation weren't worthy, then who was?
A minute later, Ryan appeared next to the two of them, completely exhausted but with a large smile on his face.
"What happened to you? Did you also have to attack the figure?" Miko asked Ryan. John figured that Ryan was so tired from his channelled Qi attack, but his smile confused John as well.
"Could it be?" John thought of something and asked Ryan for confirmation.