Ye Yun's eyes widened, feeling an immense terror being forced into his mouth. His entire body was stiff, yet his small limbs couldn't resist.
And so, Ye Yun grew day by day within an infant's body, yet with an adult's mind, until he was eight years old.
"Sun Xiaoshan! Hurry up, you scoundrel! The Qingyue Sect only recruits disciples once every three years. Do you still want to become one of those immortals who can fly and burrow?" Ye Yun was groggily pulled out of his warm bed by Sun Dashan early in the morning.
In eight years, Ye Yun had diligently cultivated the Great Nirvana Art daily. Although his talent was vastly different from before, compared to the prodigies of other beings in this universe, he was more than ten thousand times stronger. Moreover, having retained every single memory before his transmigration, Ye Yun didn't need to waste any time comprehending his cultivation techniques.
However, to avoid attracting the attention of the powerful beings in this world, Ye Yun had spent these eight years using the Great Nirvana Art to absorb vast amounts of spiritual energy. Once the Primordial Heaven-Burning Art had transformed into True Essence, it was all used to cleanse the impurities within his physical body.
Therefore, in these eight years, Ye Yun's cultivation realm had barely advanced, but his physique had been honed to its utmost. His physical body was even far more powerful than that of many martial arts magnates.
In the parlance of this world, Sun Xiaoshan was exceptionally gifted from birth, possessing innate divine strength.
"I say, old man, if you dare wake me up this early again, do you believe I'll let Mom beat you?" Ye Yun looked up at his cheap father.
His mother, Luo Meiyun, had reached the Martial Master level. While not comparable to Sun Dashan's Martial General cultivation, Luo Meiyun's fierce personality had him completely subdued.
Though Ye Yun now possessed his previous memories, his divine sense was largely dormant, requiring him to break through to a certain realm before it would be correspondingly unsealed.
The cultivators of this universe had not yet broken free from the shackles of their star systems. Only a handful of the most powerful beings had managed to break the planet's limitations.
"Hey, kid, you're mistaken. Waking you up on time was the only command your mother gave your father before she left. Hurry up, damn it, your old man's backing now is your mother."
Sun Dashan proudly raised his head and, without even eating breakfast, dragged Sun Xiaoshan out, heading straight for the county yamen.
"Old man, where did Mom go today?"
Since Sun Xiaoshan's birth, Luo Meiyun, though still fierce and fiery in front of Sun Dashan, had changed. Perhaps it was the maternal role, but she no longer ate with a knife in one hand and chopsticks in the other.
"Today is the day the Qingyue Sect's outer sect stewards come to assess disciples. Your mother naturally has to be there as an assessor," Sun Dashan said with an unnatural tone.
"Assessor? Wasn't it usually you who went in previous years?"
With his Martial General cultivation, Sun Dashan was one of the top experts in this Dragon Hang County yamen, and also a registered second-tier reserve Martial General of the Tianyu Empire. Therefore, he was almost always the one conducting these assessments.
"Well, recently your mother confiscated all your old man's authority, so..."
Sun Dashan was depressed. As a Martial General, in this small territory of Dragon Hang, only Luo Meiyun dared to treat him this way.
By the time Ye Yun arrived, the entire plaza in front of the county yamen was already filled with hundreds of children around eight years old. In the center of the plaza stood ten massive stone millstones, each weighing 300 kilograms.
The requirement for passing the assessment was simple: be eight years old and lift the stone millstone. Those who succeeded would pass the Qingyue Sect's first round of assessment and become an outer disciple of the Qingyue Sect.
This kind of selection process was rather crude, as cultivators were supposed to test a person's spiritual roots and talent.
However, Sun Dashan had told Ye Yun that while this appeared to be a simple lifting test to outsiders, the stone millstone was extraordinary. The moment a tester touched it, it would automatically detect the tester's talent and then adjust its own weight accordingly.
In other words, the stronger the talent, the lighter the stone millstone's weight.
Not far from the stone millstones sat three people. One was Ye Yun's mother, Luo Meiyun, another was the magistrate of Dragon Hang, and seated between them was the outer sect steward of the Qingyue Sect.
"I believe your elders have already explained the rules, so I will not reiterate them. Now, those whose names I call will come forward to be tested. The requirement is to lift the entire stone millstone above your head and hold it for three seconds, without fully straightening your arms."
"Now, please Li Ti, Zhang Ni... ten people, come forward!"
The steward held a list in his hand. This list contained the names of every child reported to the Qingyue Sect since birth.
Ten children came forward at a time. In three batches, over three hundred children, yet not a single one met the Qingyue Sect's requirements. A large portion couldn't even budge the stone millstone, let alone lift it.
Ultimately, out of over seven hundred children, besides Ye Yun, two other children met the requirements. In fact, one of them, a small and frail-looking girl, could lift the stone millstone with one hand.
After the test, Luo Meiyun directly called Ye Yun over and gave him a lengthy lecture and instructions. This was because after the assessment, the Qingyue Sect steward would take them directly to the sect, and they would be away for at least a year.
One year later, if they passed the sect's tests, they would become outer disciples. If they could break through to the Golden Core realm within five years as an outer disciple, they could enter the inner sect. Breaking through to Nascent Soul within twelve years would make them core disciples, and reaching Void Return within fifty years would make them true disciples.
It could be said that the Qingyue Sect had a rigorous promotion system. As long as one's talent was strong enough and their strength was sufficient, their corresponding position and status would be higher.
But all of this was meaningless to Ye Yun. He had come to this world to comprehend the myriad aspects of life. He also wanted to see how far he could go in the path of cultivation without the existence of the Heavenly Dao game.
Would he be a Saint? A Monarch? Or something even higher?