Ascension of the immortal Asura

John reappeared a moment later, finding himself standing where this training had started; in the graveyard of the demon titans. The sun beat shone brightly from above, baking the arid, cracked land beneath his feet.

"Before we start the next part, do you have any more information regarding my companion?" John asked curiously. He was hoping the Prime Shadow would provide him with some good news this time.

"Ah, yes, I do," the Prime Shadow said, a complicated expression forming on his face. "Your companion has been acquired by the Sword-Saint."

"The Sword-Saint? Impressive sounding name," John said.

"That's because the Sword-Saint is an impressive man," the Prime Shadow said. "The Sword-Saint is the second highest ranking member of the Sword Dao Sect, just below the Sword Sovereign. His cultivation is in the Early Holy Manifestation Realm, making him one of the true powerhouses of this world."

John frowned at this news, which was not good. The more powerful the person who had Lilian was, the more trouble it would be to free her from their clutches.

"Do not worry too much," the Prime Shadow said, noticing John's expression.

"Why is that?" John asked. How could he not worry about Lilian's situation.

"Because, my spies have heard rumors of the reason the Sword-Saint obtained your companion, and her current situation as well. Let's just say, you shouldn't worry about her too much right now."

"What's her current situation?" John asked, anxious to hear the answer. It was good news that the Prime Shadow seemed to be unconcerned, but he still wanted to hear about her situation himself.

The Prime Shadow smirked lightly, then patted John on the shoulder.

"I'll tell you when you complete you manage to successfully unleash the assassination art a single time," the Prime Shadow said, smiling as if he was oblivious to the serious frown John was giving him. "Use it as motivation for completing this training as fast as possible. I don't want too many distractions in your head at the moment. All you need to think about right now is successfully unleashing this assassination art. Just know this, her situation is…quite amusing, and is one that you'll be involved with before long," the elderly man added.

Still frowning with displeasure, John took a deep breath, then sighed deeply. He had plenty of dealings with these powerful, elderly cultivators, and they were all frustratingly stingy with their information at times. No amount of pestering would change the man's mind either, so John decided to focus on the task at hand; mastering the Shadow of Death: Form Two assassination art.

"So what's next? More concealment training?" John asked.

"No," the Prime Shadow shook his head. "You've completed all the aura and presence concealment training. Now we move on to the fun stuff. That is, mastering the final part of the art, then putting all the pieces together."

…

Two months later, John stood calmly in the graveyard of titans, eyes closed, mind focused on one task; successfully unleashing the assassination art he had trained in for the last half year. It was the longest any art had ever taken him to successfully grasp, a testament to its profundity.

After standing there for some time, John breathed out, stilling his mind, body, and soul. In mere moments, it was as if he had become a lifeless rock. As he did so, the laws of the universe around him, the heavenly Dao's, began to twist and turn, changing into the Dao of Nothingness.

The Dao of Nothingness permeated outwards, wrapping all around him like a blanket. The Prime Shadow stood nearby, watching intently as John started the process. He nodded his head in approval, as although he could still peer through the shroud of nothingness and see John within, those around John's level, and even slightly higher, would have a hard time doing so.

Wrapped in the layer of nothingness, John's eyes suddenly snapped open, flickering with powerful intensity. His essence dantian exploded with power, sending powerful essence Qi surging through his body. The powerful Qi tried to pierce through his acupoints and flare into the air around him. His Qi slammed into the acupoints but was unable to pierce through, causing his body to tremble slightly from the growing pressure. While some of the Qi returned to his meridians, much of it remained within his muscles, flesh, and bones, growing every second, making it feel like he was going to pop like a balloon at any moment.

Ignoring the sensation, John focused his mind on the thing he had been training for the last two months; the meridian circulation pathways of the Shadow of Death: Form Two assassination art.

When he had first started training them, he had been shocked and awed that some would not only be crazy enough to come up with such a dangerous art, but also figure out how to make it work in the first place.

The meridian pathways for this art was the most complicated he had ever encountered, rivaled only by the Divine Reaping Scythe. However, as his Divine Reaping Scythe only went up to the Heaven Tribulation grade, it had fallen behind this art in profundity.

The meridian pathways of the assassination art were so intricate and complicated that it had taken days just to memorize the pathways needed for the art. Successfully navigating his Qi through the correct pathways without error was even harder, taking him over a full month before he finally managed to do it successfully.

He had made errors along the way, sometimes with disastrous consequences. The assassination art was akin to a channeled art, only that it used the body's meridians to store the growing levels of Qi, instead of the dantian itself. When it came to meridians, a single mistake could lead one becoming crippled, and the level of Qi within his meridians quickly reached a level that even he would be harmed if he made too great a mistake.

It was truly an insane assassination art, one that had the user on the edge of catastrophic failure the entire time. However, that danger was not without reward, as the power it unleashed was incredible.

'Circulate the Qi through my meridian pathways, recirculate, recirculate, recirculate. Then explode!'

The Qi within his meridians pulsed with a rhythmic beat. The thousands of meridian pathway loops linked up perfectly each pulse, the timing exact, reinforcing one another, growing in strength. The pulsing, circulating Qi quickly grew to a level that made his meridians strain, nearing the brink of collapse, finally reaching the point of unleashing.

'Now!'

Part of his Qi surged within, forming a thin but sturdy wall of defensive Qi within him just below the skin, stretching from his feet up towards his neck, covering the front of his body. The pulsating Qi that flowed through his meridians exploded towards this wall of Qi, like a thousand tiny battle arts being unleashed within him. The front of his body, his chest, legs, arms, and shoulders felt like that had been slammed into by a mountain, one coming from within. His body groaned from the ruinous power blasting within him. His muscles neared tearing, bones neared fracturing, and skin neared tearing as his own power slammed into himself.

Ignoring the pain as best he could, John gritted his teeth and focused on keeping the exploding power contained entirely within his body, allowing none of it to leak out as aura. This only added to the pressure and pain within, causing muscles to finally start to tear and his skin to crack.

Boom!

He pressed off the ground with his full physical power, which exploded behind him like a battle art had struck it. At the exact same time, the blast of Qi circulating within slammed into his front half, propelling him forward like a beam of light, his speed instantly reaching a level that would take him several seconds to reach when moving normally. He reached his target several miles away in the blink of an eye, the land racing past him like a blur. Using no Qi externally to shield himself to minimize his aura and presence, the air blasted into him with its full strength, ripping at his skin with a surprising power.

Che!

His arm pierced into the target dummy, carving through it easily with the momentum and power he had. A blink later, he was already miles away, the speed of the assassination art carrying him forward like an unstoppable meteor.

Boom!

The air behind him exploded into a small explosion of fire from the heat of compression his unshielded body had created, radiating outwards in all directions. The explosion washed over the Prime Shadow, who batted it aside with a flick of his wrist. A large, pleased smile appeared on his face as he vanished, reappearing a short distance away.

He stared down at John, who was splayed out on the ground. His skin was cracked, looking like bloody spiderwebs, while blood leaked from his mouth. His long hair was frazzled in all directions, making him look like a beggar. John groaned from the pain as he sat up, then looked towards the target that was now cut in half. He shifted his gaze to the Prime Shadow, who reached out to lend a helping hand.

"I now know why your master wished he was a body cultivator when he came up with this crazy assassination art," John grumbled.

"Well done, child," the Prime Shadow said, smiling widely. "You have successfully completed your training. From now on, any cultivator at or below the World Expansion Realm will come to fear you, with many dying before they even know what hit them. You are now without a doubt the most dangerous youth on this world, a world which will soon learn to fear the power of the new Shadow of Death."