"Argh! So hot!" Yuan exclaimed as his body grew warmer and warmer until it was smoking.
"A-Are you okay?!" Lan Yingying was startled when she saw this, feeling worried that something might have gone wrong.
"Calm down, Yingying. This means his bloodline is awakening." Grandpa Lan said to her in a calm voice.
And he continued, "Endure it, young man. If you lose consciousness, your bloodline won’t awaken!"
Yuan nodded before making his way outside the cabin since it was much cooler there.
Once outside, he sat on the ground in the lotus position and tried to calm down by cultivating. However, the intense heat burning his body made things extremely difficult for him to stay focused.
"Akk!"
Yuan suddenly puked out a mouthful of blood, startling Lan Yingying.
"Are you sure he will be okay, grandfather? If my blood kills him... I don’t think I can continue living with such guilt..."
Grandpa Lan didn’t say anything and continued to watch Yuan with a serious expression on his face.
*Rumble*
"Hmm?" Grandpa Lan suddenly raised his eyebrows.
"Is it just me or is the ground shaking?"
"I feel it as well." Lan Yingying confirmed.
"It’s been a while since we last had an earthquake." Grandpa Lan mumbled, not thinking too much of it at first.
However, the shaking did not stop like they’d expected it to sooner or later, and it was even gradually getting stronger.
"This isn’t a normal earthquake. What’s happening?" Grandpa Lan frowned upon realizing that this was an abnormal phenomenon.
Meanwhile, outside the Mystic Realm, the spectators realized that the gates to the Mystic Realm were shaking.
"L-Look at the Mystic Realm! It’s shaking!"
"How is that possible? I don’t feel any earthquakes!"
"Something must have happened inside the Mystic Realm!"
Upon closer inspection, they realized that the participants inside the Mystic Realm were experiencing an earthquake.
Senior Nie and the others from the Spirit Heaven frowned at this phenomenon, as they have never heard of the Mystic Realm acting like this before.
"Does anyone know what is happening?" One of the crystal balls asked.
"I have never heard of this before." One of them responded.
"Brother Yuan..." Xiao Hua mumbled his name in a low voice as she looked at the entrance to the Mystic Realm.
Inside the Mystic Realm, as the earthquake grew stronger, the people in that world began to worry that it might be the end of the world and that the Mystic Realm itself was collapsing, causing people to panic.
"What’s going on?!" Grandma Lan stopped her cooking and went outside to see if they knew anything.
"We also have no idea what’s going on right now." Grandpa Lan said.
"Hopefully it’s nothing serious—"
"Ahhh!"
Yuan suddenly began screaming in a painful voice, and as though the world resonated with his pain, the earthquake shook even fiercer.
"T-This is... It can’t be!" Grandpa Lan stared at Yuan with a dazed look on his face.
"Surely, he’s not causing this earthquake from trying to awaken his bloodline, right?!"
"What?! Yuan’s the cause of this earthquake?!" Lan Yingying exclaimed.
"I don’t know yet, but there’s a good chance, especially since it started shortly after he started awakening his bloodline. However, what kind of bloodline could possibly cause such a phenomenon?" Grandpa Lan mumbled.
[Attempting to awaken bloodline]
[...]
[...]
[...]
[Failed]
[Attempting to awaken bloodline]
[...]
[...]
[...]
[Failed]
[Attempting to awaken bloodline]
[...]
[...]
[...]
[Failed]
Yuan had expected the awakening to stop after three attempts like previously, but to his surprise, after his third failure, it continued to try and awaken his bloodline.
[Attempting to awaken bloodline]
[...]
[...]
[...]
[Failed]
Ten failures, twenty failures, fifty failures...
Sixth... seventy... eighty...
Ninety... Ninety-five... Ninety-nine...
After 99 attempts to awaken his bloodline and 99 failure, there was finally some change within the notifications.
[Attempting to awaken bloodline]
[Attempt successful]
[You have awakened your Bloodline!]
Ding!
[Immortal Monarch Bloodline]
[Grade: Royal]
[Description: You will obtain increased stats whenever your cultivation increases. Stats obtained from breakthroughs will also affect Soul Strength.]
"R-Royal-grade? How is that possible?" Yuan stared at his bloodline with disbelief on his face.
The lowest quality of bloodlines was Royal-grade and definitely below Divine-grade, but if that was the case, Feng Yuxiang’s Phoenix blood should’ve been able to awaken it, so why does his bloodline show Royal-grade? Could it be a bug in the system? Or is there something special about this bloodline that he has yet to understand?
Once Yuan awakened his bloodline, the earthquake in the Mystic Realm also came to a halt.
"A-Are you okay, Yuan?!" Lan Yingying approached him with a worried look on her face.
"Yes... I am fine, thank you..." Yuan nodded his head, which was dripping with sweat.
"Thank the lord..." Lan Yingying released a deep sigh of relief to know that her blood didn’t harm him.
"How about it, young man? Did you manage to awaken your bloodline?" Grandpa Lan asked him a moment later.
"Yes, I did. However... It’s Royal-grade."
"What? Royal-grade? How is that possible? I tasted the blood myself! There’s no way such powerful blood could only be Royal-grade!" Grandpa Lan expressed the same disbelief as Yuan after hearing the news.
"Can I taste your blood again just to make sure?" Grandpa Lan asked him.
Yuan nodded and quickly gave him a few drops of his own blood.
After tasting the blood, Grandpa Lan became even more puzzled, "I have tasted Royal-grade Bloodlines before, and this is definitely not Royal-grade."
"I-Is that so..." Yuan mumbled, believing this to be a bug in the game more and more.
Meanwhile, somewhere in this boundless universe, an old man with an ancient and timeless aura sat before a seemingly ordinary but massive jade tablet that had the word ’Destiny’ carved into it, looking like he’d been in the same position for countless years.
The jade tablet that was almost a hundred times the old man’s size suddenly began to glow, and the engraved word ’Destiny’ began glowing golden.
The old man opened his eyes to look at the jade tablet with a sentimental feeling in his gaze.
"Alas... you have finally returned to us..."
The old man stood up a moment later and immediately kneeled onto the ground before the jade tablet, kowtowing to it.
"Welcome back, Master... The Nine Heavens will soon tremble before your might once again... and for the final time..."