Chapter 366: Ten Years of Practical Training

The Sand Wyrm never expected the human in front of it to be so bold—clearly weaker in strength yet still daring to provoke it. It expelled two plumes of dust from its nostrils, a hint of brutality flashing in its eyes, as its massive black tail swung toward Ye Feng at a speed even faster than his own.
“Boom!” The huge tail collided again with Ye Feng’s fist, the dull roar echoing across the sky. If this were a battle in the real world, such a collision would surely attract many powerful beings to watch secretly.
Ye Feng was pushed back several dozen feet by the tail. He grew even calmer. “If I don’t use the forbidden techniques from the Martial Canon, given the current situation, I have no chance of winning.”
“This Sand Wyrm has terrifying defensive strength, an attack power no weaker than mine, and its divine essence is several times greater than mine…” Ye Feng frowned. “Without those two forbidden techniques, if I encountered this guy in the real world, my chances of dying would be high, right?”
“It seems I must improve my overall strength rather than relying solely on those two forbidden techniques to survive.” After confronting this Sand Wyrm, Ye Feng realized his shortcomings. “The Martial Canon is just one of the ultimate secret manuals; surely there are others who have mastered other ultimate secret manuals. If I rely only on the forbidden techniques from the Martial Canon to grow, my chances of winning against those who possess other ultimate secret manuals will be slim…”
After weighing the pros and cons, Ye Feng decided not to use those two forbidden techniques.
Seeing that Ye Feng didn’t react for a while, the Sand Wyrm grew impatient and swung its tail again. This time, Ye Feng didn’t meet it head-on but dodged. He knew he couldn’t win by brute force.
Failing to land a hit, the Sand Wyrm seemed surprised. In previous attacks, Ye Feng had taken them head-on, but this time he had dodged without fleeing, merely observing it from a distance. The Sand Wyrm’s gaze toward Ye Feng changed slightly. It had thought this little guy who dared provoke it could be easily killed, but it seemed not to be the case. The fact that the opponent wasn’t fleeing meant he wasn’t afraid of it, and his observation suggested he was trying to find a way to defeat it.
At this thought, the Sand Wyrm felt a faint sense of unease arising from somewhere unknown. It hated this feeling and glared at the human even more fiercely.

With emotions he could hardly express, he unleashed a rapidly spinning gale from his mouth—his innate divine ability, the Wind Wheel.
“This is… an innate divine ability?” Ye Feng didn’t expect the Sand Wyrm to use its killing move on him without any warning. Just as he prepared to dodge, something unexpected happened.
Two strands of sand climbed up his ankles unnoticed and wrapped around his waist in less than a breath’s time, leaving Ye Feng completely immobilized.
“Damn it, I was so careless. I forgot this guy has dual attributes.” Ye Feng cursed himself for not being more cautious.
As the gale that created spatial rifts neared him, an idea flashed through Ye Feng’s mind. Then the gale passed, and the spot where he had been was now empty.
A figure appeared in front of the Sand Wyrm’s still-open mouth. “I refuse to believe the flesh inside your mouth is as thick as your skin.”
As soon as the words were spoken, the figure plunged into the wyrm’s mouth.
The Sand Wyrm immediately closed its mouth, trying to swallow the person, but moments later let out a painful scream.
Blood sprayed from the back of the wyrm’s head, and its massive body collapsed heavily.
After a while, the struggling giant was completely motionless. A figure emerged from its half-open mouth.
“Sigh, I’m still too inexperienced…” The blood-stained figure shook his head with a bitter smile. “No matter how powerful an opponent is, there must be a weakness. Once found, it can be exploited for a fatal strike. I only discovered a weak spot at the back of its head after entering its mouth—it’s the junction of two bones…”
“If it weren’t for recalling that my clone technique could move my true body, I would have died back then…” The blood-stained, faceless man was actually Ye Feng.
“Try another divine beast…” Ye Feng checked the time and said without hesitation…
Ten hours on the Demon Realm Continent equaled 1,000 times as much time in the Training Realm, or over 410 days. For Ye Feng, no training method matched the effectiveness of actual combat—especially since just one night could grant more than a year’s worth of combat experience.
From the first day when he entered the third layer of the Training Realm and nearly died at the hands of the Sand Wyrm’s innate ability, to the next morning in reality, Ye Feng finally managed to effortlessly kill several mid-tier divine beasts without using the forbidden techniques from his martial arts manual. Both his clone technique and movement skills had improved significantly.

In the following days, Ye Feng went to auctions during the day with the others, and spent nights in the Refining Realm to practice in actual combat. Every night, he challenged various mid-tier divine beasts with different attributes. Over nine nights, he faced more than a dozen mid-tier divine beasts and over twenty peak demi-gods from various races, including those from the dragon race, demon race, shaman race, Buddhist realm, hell, purgatory, heaven, and even some ancient races. Nine nights in the Refining Realm was roughly equivalent to ten years. Although his cultivation level didn’t improve much, his practical combat skills were now incomparable to before.

The reason he chose only mid-tier divine beasts was that high-tier divine beasts were already at the level of true gods with complete divine essences from birth, and there were no high-tier divine beasts in the third realm of the Refining Realm. Mid-tier divine beasts in the demi-god realm, though still in their juvenile stage, had no weak combat instincts. So, after challenging nearly a dozen deadly mid-tier divine beasts, he turned to challenging strong beings from different races, some of whom could even defeat early-stage true gods by overcoming rank differences.

Ye Feng learned from his failures time and time again, only switching to a new opponent after defeating the previous one. Thus, during those ten years in the Refining Realm, aside from the mid-tier divine beasts, he challenged just over twenty strong beings.

This day was the last day of the auction. Of the items Ye Feng had put up for auction earlier, only two mid-tier divine artifacts remained unsold. All the low-tier divine artifacts, supreme-grade pills, and materials for refining and potion-making brought in nearly a hundred thousand high-tier magic crystals in total.

Ye Feng, who arrived at the auction venue early, went straight to the backstage.

“Mr. Dao Feng, what brings you here?” The auctioneer had certainly heard of Ye Feng’s legendary stories, but he remained polite yet reserved.

“I have a few items that need your help in auctioning,” Ye Feng replied. The auctioneer’s attitude made Ye Feng regard this auction even more highly.

“But, Mr. Dao Feng, as you must know, our quota of a thousand items is already full. Moreover, we no longer accept any items since the first day of the auction began.” The auctioneer frowned slightly. Though he knew refusing this powerful figure could bring trouble, Ye Feng’s request indeed violated the auction rules. “However, Mr. Dao Feng, you can choose to auction your items in the backstage, which won’t violate our rules. But before the auction, we must confirm the grade of the items.”

“Sure!” Ye Feng nodded. He had also heard of backstage auctions before, but never expected to encounter one himself.

“Then let’s register first.” The auctioneer looked up at Ye Feng. “Mr. Dao Feng, what items would you like to auction?”
“Ten medium-grade divine crystals, and one top-grade divine crystal!”
“What???” The auctioneer almost jumped at Ye Feng’s words. “Are you sure what you’re saying is true?”
“True.” Ye Feng calmly picked up his teacup and took a sip. He had expected such a reaction. After all, he had already learned from the Purple Extreme Sage just how precious medium-grade divine crystals were, not to mention top-grade ones.
“Do you have them with you right now?” the auctioneer pressed further. “If so, I’ll take you to an appraiser first for an inspection.”
“Sure.” Ye Feng placed his teacup back on the coffee table and, led by the auctioneer, arrived at a small room.
The auctioneer knocked on the door twice. “Master, I have a customer who wants to conduct a backroom auction. There are items that need to be appraised.”
“Come in!” The voice from inside the room was elderly. Ye Feng immediately realized it belonged to an older person.
After getting permission, the auctioneer pushed open the door and gestured for Ye Feng to enter.
Of course, Ye Feng stepped in without hesitation.
As Ye Feng had expected, the auctioneer was indeed an old man. His silver hair stood upright energetically, with short grayish-white beards above his lips and chin. His eyes were sharp, and aside from a few wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, his face was as smooth as a baby’s, fair with a rosy tint.
“Are you Dao Feng?” While observing the old man, Ye Feng also noticed that the old man was examining him. After a brief pause, the old man asked in surprise.
“Mm.” Ye Feng saw no need to deny it. “I have some items I want to sell through you and would like your help in appraising them.”
“You must have quite a few valuable items on you, right?” The old man suddenly asked this, leaving Ye Feng slightly stunned.
“I’m here to auction divine crystals…” Ye Feng ignored the appraiser’s question. However, he understood that the old man had recognized him not because of his fame, but because he assumed Ye Feng possessed many treasures. To this old man, Ye Feng was merely a mobile treasure trove, not a person.
“Oh, my apologies.” The old man scratched his hair awkwardly and smiled sheepishly.
“Go ahead and take a look!” Ye Feng said, taking out the ten medium-grade divine crystals and handing them to the old man.

“So many mid-grade divine crystals?” The old man recognized them as mid-grade divine crystals at a glance. Before he could recover, Ye Feng took out another golden crystal and placed it next to those ten mid-grade divine crystals. “This… this is…” The old man’s gaze was fixed on it the moment it appeared. “Is it a high-grade divine crystal?”