Meanwhile, back on the shore, Victor was seated calmly on a large boulder, eyes closed, deeply focused as he ran through revisions of his latest alchemy formula. His spiritual sense combed through each line, each reaction possibility, hunting for flaws, potential failures, or overlooked variables. He was determined to get it right on the first try, no matter how improbable others said it was.
But eventually, his eyes slowly opened, and he looked out at the massive lake before him.
Nearby, the seven pandas were still playing and splashing, their gleeful voices echoing faintly. But Victor's gaze shifted farther ahead, toward the deeper parts of the lake. There, distant water jets burst high into the air at seemingly random intervals—loud, sharp, and powerful—like explosions beneath the surface.
Victor narrowed his eyes, unimpressed. "...Noisy as always."
"Are they the pandas Leyvi said he just tamed?" Victor muttered, seeing them for the first time. "They look useless. Why would he even tame them? Just adding unnecessary mouths to feed. Oh right, probably because of his wife, that Alchemist Panda. Hmph, I hope he didn't neglect my sister."
With a small sigh, Victor extended his spiritual sense outward, sweeping across the area a few kilometers ahead. From a bird's-eye perspective, he spotted flashes of growing light beneath the water's surface—bright, building energy signatures, followed by violent explosions that launched massive jets of water high into the air.
"Is Leyvi practicing his martial skills down there? To produce an explosion this big underwater… no wonder he could shake the entire mountain, killing a commander-level demonic beast. No wonder Father spoke highly of him. Tch, must be nice being tall."
With an irritated flick of his fingers, Victor retracted his spiritual sense. No point watching any longer. Comparing himself to Leyvi would only stir up more unnecessary annoyance.
Time passed, and dusk gradually painted the sky in shades of amber and indigo.
After hours submerged in battle, Leyvi finally emerged from the water. Having dealt with several dozen demonic beasts, the underwater chaos eventually ceased. No more challengers arrived. He figured he must've wiped out all the stronger ones nearby.
As he neared the shore, he noticed the pandas had stopped playing in the water. They were now perched comfortably on the nearby coconut trees, lazily hugging the trunks in blissful rest.
The moment they saw him rise from the lake, the seven pandas immediately perked up, leapt from the trees, and rushed toward him with excited cheers.
"Panda Boss, Panda Boss is back!" "We are tired of playing." "And hungry!" "Time to rest!"
"Hahaha! Tired already? Alright, you guys can go back in the spirit beast bag." Leyvi smiled as he touched the bag at his waist, sending the pandas back in with a light ripple of Qi. At the same time, he transferred a generous portion of essence paste into their shared space, enough to fill their tiny bellies and lull them into a nap.
With that done, he glanced around the area.
Victor was still in the same general spot as before, but he wasn't on a rock anymore. Instead, Leyvi noticed something curious: a boulder that looked a bit too cleanly shaped. Using his see-through spiritual sense, he spotted the familiar silhouette of someone sitting calmly within.
This guy... now he's pretending to be a rock? Leyvi chuckled to himself. No wonder he managed to survive all this time without engaging in any fights. With camouflage like that, even demonic beasts would walk right past him.
Aside from Victor's "rocky" disguise, one other person was still unaccounted for—the crown prince.
Leyvi scanned the lakeside and frowned slightly.
"Don't tell me this guy is serious about getting all the coconuts? Or did something happen to him?" he muttered under his breath, eyes narrowing toward the horizon. But after a moment's thought, he shook his head.
"Hmm... maybe not. He wasn't the same inexperienced guy who couldn't react to a dangerous situation properly anymore." Leyvi muttered, recalling their first meeting.
"If he met with danger, he knows what to do. We'll just wait here," Leyvi concluded with a calm nod, settling into a more relaxed posture.
He wasn't in a rush to cross the vast lake. After countless underwater battles earlier, Leyvi had grown more accustomed to the environment. He had begun to notice subtle nuances in how his techniques behaved beneath the surface, clues that could help him refine his fighting style. He decided to take the opportunity to reflect on what he'd learned and practice again tomorrow.
Additionally, something he had forgotten resurfaced again.
Cavitation.
A phenomenon that had fascinated him years ago suddenly reentered his thoughts.
Back then, he had been intrigued by how extreme movements or sudden pressure changes in water could create vapor bubbles—cavitation—that collapsed violently, releasing shockwaves. It felt like a concept that was closely aligned with the destructive force he sought to wield. But at the time, he was limited: his cultivation realm was lower, his understanding of pressure shallow, and his Qi control still lacking.
Now, eight years later, things had changed.
He was a realm higher, with far more experience in using pressure, especially spiritual pressure. His Qi control had improved significantly. And today, while observing the aftermath of his Big Bang attacks underwater, he had noticed something striking:
Cavitations. Again.
Back then, the idea had fizzled out before it could take root.
But now?
Now, maybe he could work out something with it. If it still didn't work, he could wait until his abilities improved again.
Ever since discovering it for the first time, Leyvi had developed a curious fascination with cavitation. He couldn't explain why, but something about it just drew him in. If possible, he wanted to craft a cool martial skill around it. One that combined both explosion and implosion. Just imagining the destructive elegance of such an attack made his blood stir.
Explosion and implosion. If he could harness both forces together, now that would be something.
With that thought lingering in his mind, Leyvi brought out his family carriage and climbed inside to rest for the night.
By the next day, Dastan still hadn't returned.
Victor? Still sitting motionless inside a boulder like some antisocial tortoise in deep cultivation. From an outside glance, no one would've guessed a human was hiding in there. But Leyvi, with his spiritual sense, could clearly see the silhouette of his brother-in-law focused on his research, exactly like yesterday.
Facing the boulder, Leyvi called out, "Brother Victor, I'm training in the water again today. If Dastan returns, inform him about it. Or just tell me."
"K." That was all the reply he got.
Leyvi turned around, shaking his head, but wasn't offended. He was used to Victor's curt attitude by now. His brother-in-law wasn't one for small talk. The man barely tolerated interaction, and Leyvi respected that.
Without wasting any more time, Leyvi stripped down to his shorts again and leaped far out, diving cleanly into the water, ready to explore cavitation further.
Time passed quickly, and by dusk, Leyvi finally emerged from the water. But unlike yesterday's triumphant return, he looked far more beaten up today.
His entire body was covered in deep blue bruises and angry swellings. He turned into a blue Leyvi.
Earlier in the day, he had started off by fighting a few demonic beasts to warm up. After that, he dove deep into his true goal—experimenting with cavitation bubbles. Over and over again, he focused on creating and studying them.
Compared to eight years ago, the process has become significantly easier. Whether through physical methods, Qi manipulation, or mental means, he could now form cavitation bubbles at will. But what stood out to him was how effective the mental method had become—using his spiritual pressure.
A few years back, Leyvi made an important discovery about spiritual pressure that wasn't taught by anyone else, not even emphasized in the Complete Cultivation Manual for Spiritual Cultivator: Royal Family Edition. While most people knew that spiritual pressure could increase pressure in a given area, he had realized it could also decrease it.
Spiritual force converges inward—compress, increase pressure.
Spiritual force diverges outward—decompress, decrease pressure.
But very few spiritual cultivators were aware of this. Why? Because increasing pressure had clear, dramatic applications: crushing, pinning, immobilizing, intimidating. Its effects were immediate, visible, and instinctively useful in combat.
Decreasing pressure, on the other hand? It didn't crush bones or slam people into the ground. It didn't make your enemy feel like they were drowning in invisible weight. It was subtle, too subtle, and had few direct uses in a fight. So even when people stumbled upon it, they just shrugged it off as useless and moved on.
But Leyvi wasn't like most people. In fact, he was absolutely ecstatic when he discovered that his spiritual pressure could lower the pressure of an area.
This revelation was huge. It meant he no longer needed to rely on extreme-speed movement, whether through sheer physical motion or spinning up violent Qi vortices, to create a low-pressure zone for cavitation to occur. Now, with just his spiritual pressure alone, he could generate those conditions far more precisely and efficiently.
And the result? The cavitation bubbles he produced were much larger than before, and their violent implosions packed a lot more punch—enough to seriously injure anything nearby, including himself.