Tianyue City—one of the medium-sized cities on the Star Luo Continent, with a population close to one million. Commerce here was fairly prosperous.
Inside a certain hotel, Yunze, Gu Yuena, and Di Tian sat on a sofa discussing matters.
Di Tian used his spiritual power and concretized his thoughts, projecting what he saw in that small world.
The world shown in the projection was utterly ruined. The ground was cracked due to lack of water, densely webbed with fissures like a spiderweb. As far as the eye could see, there was no grass or trees—only piles of corpses.
Countless bones lay scattered everywhere. Occasionally insects could be seen flying past. The sky was dark; it was unclear if it was originally like this, or if the stench of corpses had gathered to form it.
More than twenty soul beasts surrounded Di Tian. In front of him stood a Five-Element Qilin towering over ten meters tall.
Around its enormous body flowed the radiance of the five elemental attributes—gold, wood, water, fire, and earth—making its majestic presence even more extraordinary.
On the Qilin's left side was a massive Dragon-Tortoise: dragon head, tortoise body, its shell resembling an elliptical mountain—heavy and incredibly tough.
On its right was a Fire-scaled Golden Python—scales pale gold, flames flickering across its surface, forked tongue flicking, its eyes filled with icy bloodlust.
"Human!" the Five-Element Qilin spoke, its voice imposing and full of hatred. Its cold gaze looked as if it wanted to tear Di Tian apart.
After consuming the Human-Transformation Pill, Di Tian's aura was indistinguishable from that of a human. Even a quasi-god wouldn't be able to see that his true form was a soul beast.
Upon first entering, Di Tian had been extremely tense. Only after seeing these soul beasts did he finally let out a breath of relief.
"I'm not human," Di Tian explained, and with a resounding dragon roar, he revealed his true body—the Golden-Eyed Black Dragon King.
Roar!The enormous black dragon spiraled in the sky, releasing a dominating roar, not concealing at all his terrifying cultivation of nearly nine hundred thousand years.
After a round of explanation and proof, the soul beasts finally believed Di Tian's identity.
Both sides exchanged information. Di Tian asked about the situation inside, and led by the Five-Element Qilin, the soul beasts asked about the outside world.
"I want to pay my respects to the Qilin Ancient God."After understanding each other, Di Tian spoke heavily.
"Very well."The Five-Element Qilin did not object and led Di Tian toward the center of this small world.
The other soul beasts remained where they were, greedily absorbing the fresh influx of air and energy, unwilling to leave.
The scenery along the way was extremely tragic. As Di Tian moved, the images of the ground changed—and yet they looked unchanged, every place equally devastated.
Originally, this small world must have housed hundreds of thousands of soul beasts, otherwise there could not be so many remains.
Seeing the endless corpses, Gu Yuena's heart ached with sorrow; her chest tightened, her nose stung, her emotions heavy for their sake.
This scene was even worse than the Dragon Valley—true corpses covering the land. Without even witnessing it firsthand, one could feel the deep grief.
Di Tian skipped the remaining flight images. A massive Qilin stone statue appeared before them—over a hundred meters tall, lifelike, exuding an indescribable dominance.
This stone statue was formed from the corpse of the Qilin Ancient God. Within it lay the Ancient God's inheritance and also the passage out of this small world.
There were six stages in the inheritance trial. After passing the first three, one could earn the qualification to leave.
The projection quickly shifted to Di Tian undergoing the trial—he entered the inner space within the statue: a square space more than two hundred meters per side.
Flames suddenly erupted, engulfing him—blazing fire burning violently against his body.
Besides the crackling of the flames, faint groans could be heard from Di Tian—it was clear that these flames were not easy to endure.
After an hour, the flames turned into a hurricane. Razor-sharp wind blades spun violently, slicing continuously at Di Tian.
Then came raging lightning—bolts as thick as a man's arm crashed down, their power enough to shatter mountains.
"The first stage requires surviving burning flames, hurricane slicing, and thunder strikes—for a total duration of ninety hours."Di Tian explained.
The details appeared only in his consciousness—it was not something that could be visually projected.
"The first stage is already at the level of a Title Douluo?"Gu Yuena whispered, shocked by the demands of the Qilin Ancient God.
At this level, without over 200,000 years of cultivation, a soul beast would never pass. Attempting it was equivalent to suicide.
If the first stage was this difficult, the second and third stages would be unimaginable.
"Fortunately the ninety hours can be accumulated. You can pause in between. Otherwise, even I wouldn't have made it through."Di Tian smiled bitterly.
Each time, as long as he endured five hours, he could choose to rest rather than withstand all ninety hours in one go.
At most, Di Tian could endure over twenty hours in one stretch, but he never pushed himself to the limit—stopping after ten hours each time.
He preferred taking more time to maintain peak condition. If the first stage was this tough, how could he face the next without staying at full strength?
It took nine days to complete the first stage. After resting for one day, Di Tian began the second.
Second Stage
The second stage was to evade attacks. In the same space, but now high-speed stone spikes shot out from all directions—moving several times faster than sound—and lasted half an hour.
To pass, one must avoid being hit for thirty minutes. Getting hit meant failure.
It could be repeated endlessly, retrying until passing—or giving up.
It looked simple, but was actually more difficult than the first stage. Even with Di Tian's reaction speed, he failed hundreds of times before succeeding.
This second stage took him nearly a month. If he hadn't discovered a pattern, it might have taken far longer.
Third Stage
The third trial was to fight the Qilin Ancient God's projection, whose power was equal to about Rank 97 for a soul master.
This was already a weakened form. If it had been the real god-level projection, not even ten Di Tians could defeat it.
Yet even so, the fight was extremely difficult—Di Tian had cultivation advantage, but the Qilin projection had bloodline supremacy.
The Qilin Ancient God's bloodline was only slightly inferior to the Dragon God, stronger than either the Golden Dragon King or Silver Dragon King individually—making it far stronger than Di Tian.
With the bloodline advantage added, Di Tian's cultivation advantage was not only erased, but reversed—he was the weaker side.
Even bringing out his battle armor could not bridge the gap—he fought while being suppressed.
This stage took him more than three months to pass—also relying on discovering weaknesses.
The Qilin projection only possessed combat instincts, no conscious thought, so there were flaws. Once Di Tian learned its habits, he won narrowly.
After passing the third stage, Di Tian earned the qualification to leave and exited the small world.