The situation was better than expected, but William Clark remained calm and unhurried. As time passed, he had entered the most critical stage. The expression on William Clark’s face grew solemn, motionless, as if he had entered a meditative state.

Pop—a soft sound, as if something had shattered. In his dantian, all the spiritual energy suddenly became unstable. More accurately, it was rapidly transforming. With the aid of his divine sense, he could observe that the color of the spiritual energy had deepened and become thicker. Although the step from the peak of the first layer of the Spirit Movement Stage to the second layer was only a small one, it was a qualitative leap.

After breaking through to the second layer, William Clark immediately felt a difference from before. The quantity and quality of the spiritual energy in his dantian had both greatly improved.

Although William Clark was pleased, his expression remained steady. This was entirely within his expectations. With a large supply of Purification Pills as support, if he still couldn’t break through the bottleneck, that would truly be strange.

This successful breakthrough also proved that pills could indeed compensate for the lack of a spiritual root. William Clark was now full of confidence in cultivating immortality.

After carefully savoring the wonderful feeling of entering the second layer of the Spirit Movement Stage, William Clark began to make plans for the future. The road ahead was still long, and his cultivation was still far behind his fellow disciples. The most urgent task was to catch up as soon as possible.

Not to mention anything else, just the spiritual artifacts he had seized from Emily Carter and Henry Bolton—without reaching the fourth layer of the Spirit Movement Stage, he wouldn’t be able to activate them and could only look on with envy. So, what he needed to do now was still to rapidly improve his strength.

With this in mind, William Clark sat cross-legged, preparing to use introspection to check his physical condition, so that he could arrange his next training plan accordingly.

However, what happened next was an unexpected discovery for William Clark.

The change came from his dantian. In addition to the increase in spiritual power, the size of the star sea had also expanded, with more and brighter points of light.

How could this be?

William Clark rested his head on his hand, lost in thought. Could it be that the star sea would grow in proportion to his cultivation level—the higher his magical power, the stronger the energy of the star sea?

At first glance, this hypothesis seemed a bit unbelievable, but on further thought, it made sense and also solved a deep-seated problem in William Clark’s heart.

First was the speed of purification. Although the points of light in the star sea could recover after being consumed, it still took some time, which was not conducive to purifying large quantities of pills. Previously, the star sea in William Clark’s body could at most support the purification of two waste pills, but now that its size had doubled, purifying four in a row should be no problem.

Secondly, thinking long-term, according to William Clark’s speculation, since the blue points of light could purify Purification Pills, they should also be able to purify other pills.

Purification Pills were the lowest grade of spiritual medicine. Relatively speaking, the materials used to refine them were few, and the impurities were simple. Other, higher-grade spiritual medicines had more complex impurities, so purifying them would consume more points of light. If the size of the star sea didn’t change, it might not be enough to support the purification of even one pill.

William Clark had already tested that the purification process could not be interrupted, or the pill would be ruined. Although this weakness hadn’t yet become apparent, those who fail to plan for the future will soon face immediate worries. William Clark was already making plans for what lay ahead.

If his guess was correct, and the star sea grew in sync with his spiritual power—the higher his magical power, the stronger the energy of the star sea—then this problem would be solved.

Of course, whether this was truly the case still needed time to be confirmed. As his magical power increased, he would see if the star sea continued to grow accordingly.

Chapter 17: Attempting a Mid-Grade Pill

William Clark had already gained a preliminary mastery of using the blue points of light, but whether this was their only secret, or just the tip of the iceberg, William Clark decided to continue exploring.

He poured out a pill from the jade bottle. This was not a waste pill, but a high-quality Purification Pill, obtained from Emily Carter.

If waste pills could be purified, could low-grade Purification Pills also be further purified and upgraded?

William Clark wanted to give it a try!

It was known that, including Purification Pills, every kind of spiritual medicine in the cultivation world was divided into four grades: low, middle, high, and supreme.

The grading of spiritual pills was mainly based on the amount of impurities they contained. The materials themselves were not much different, but the more impurities, the more diluted the essence, and the less effective the pill.

Conversely, the higher the grade of the pill, the fewer the impurities, the more concentrated the essence, and the more obvious the effect after consumption.

Of course, the higher the grade of the pill, the harder it was to refine.

Generally speaking, if the impurity content exceeded seventy percent, it was called a waste pill. Low-grade pills had about fifty percent impurities, middle-grade thirty percent, high-grade ten percent, and supreme-grade pills had very few impurities, only two or three percent.

For tens of thousands of years, the cultivation world had been trying to reduce the impurities in pills, but countless masters and brilliant minds had labored with little result. Nowadays, most spiritual medicines in the cultivation world—Purification Pills, Foundation Establishment Pills, Essence Cultivation Pills, Nine-Turn Pills, and so on—were mostly of the low grade.

Now, William Clark wanted to take it a step further. Since the star sea could purify waste pills into low-grade ones, could it also purify low-grade pills into middle-grade ones?