147: Two years later

Cultivation knows no years.

Although Long Aotian really wanted to go to Nanzhou to find exotic flames and come out of seclusion to practice Tai Xu Divine Steps to improve his speed, in order to enhance the overall strength of the Grand Void Dragon Clan, he still chose to continue his seclusion in the Peak Master's Immortal Cave.

For the last year of his seclusion, Long Aotian decided to wholeheartedly Cultivate Swordplay Technique.

Long Aotian's complete devotion to Cultivation was terrifying; it involved one hundred and eight split Soul bodies simultaneously engaging, meaning one year of Cultivation was equivalent to one hundred and eight years of Cultivation.

It was truly frightening!

Of course, these one hundred and eight years were not sequential, but rather one hundred and eight years of collaborative problem-solving.

Long Aotian would merge his Soul once every month, feeding back all the learning achievements of the split Soul bodies to his main body, then integrating and digesting them to form his main body's learning achievements, before splitting his Soul again to continue striving on the latest foundation of growth.

After more than a hundred years of frantic, day and night research, the upper part of the Swordplay Technique, the Swordplay of Existence, had almost been thoroughly understood by him; next was the lower part of the Swordplay Technique, the Swordplay of Nothingness.

The Swordplay of Nothingness was created after the Swordplay of Existence reached its Peak; only by mastering the Swordplay of Nothingness could one be considered a true Sword Dao expert.

Of course, the profundity of the Swordplay of Nothingness was such that ninety-nine point nine nine nine percent of Sword Cultivators could not even touch it.

In the perception of almost all Sword Cultivators, Cultivating the Ten Thousand Swords Return to Origin of the Swordplay of Existence was the ultimate Realm of Sword Dao, and even Sword Cultivators who reached the Ten Thousand Swords Return to Origin Realm of the Swordplay of Existence were one in a million.

This shows how difficult it is for Sword Dao Cultivators to even touch the Realm of Nothingness.

Long Aotian was different.

As the Clan Chief of the Grand Void Dragon Clan, Ao Zhan knew that the Grand Void Dragon Clan, having developed from the Three Desolation Era to the present, had experienced countless epochs, knew countless secrets of heaven and earth, and collected countless good things from heaven and earth. Nowadays, if a Sword Cultivator wanted to touch the Sword Dao's Swordplay of Nothingness Realm, he would need to Cultivate the Swordplay Technique of Existence Realm to its Peak and then slowly comprehend and explore it.

But what about him?

He only needed to Cultivate the Swordplay Technique, this Sword Dao Cultivation Technique, to Great Perfection.

The Swordplay Technique in Ao Zhan's memory completely recorded the entire process of Sword Dao's development from its inception to its Peak.

In other words, this Swordplay Technique was left behind by the founder of Sword Dao.

How could the Grand Void Dragon Clan possess such a valuable item?

Do not forget, the Grand Void Dragon Clan's founder, Tai Xu Supreme, was also a supremely powerful existence in that distant era.

The Grand Void Dragon Clan having the Swordplay Technique most likely meant that Tai Xu Supreme and the founder of Sword Dao might have had some kind of intersection.

Long Aotian did not know if the Grand Void Dragon Clan's founder, Tai Xu Supreme, was still alive, but because of Tai Xu Supreme, Long Aotian had obtained too many good things.

Tai Xu Divine Steps!

Divine Dragon Five Styles!

Swordplay Technique and more!

If he ever had the chance to meet Tai Xu Supreme in the future, Long Aotian would truly have to thank this Old Monster properly.

With all one hundred and eight split Soul bodies wholeheartedly dedicated to studying the Swordplay Technique, one year of Cultivation was equivalent to over a hundred years of Cultivation. After Cultivating the upper part of the Swordplay Technique, the Swordplay of Existence, to its Peak, Long Aotian did not immediately continue to Cultivate the lower part of the Swordplay Technique, the Swordplay of Nothingness.

Because the two years of seclusion had already ended.

The highly anticipated Cloud Palace Centenary Grand Competition was ready, just waiting for him to announce its start.

As the Grand Elder of the Cloud Palace, and the person at the core of the Cloud Palace's power, he could not fail to appear.

Although his heart itched for the Swordplay of Nothingness, he could only save it for his next major seclusion.

While only two years had passed in the outside world, Long Aotian had spent a full twenty years in the third-layer spatial world of the Treasure Pagoda.

He was now fourteen years old.

His height had also grown to one meter seventy, no longer appearing so short.

In two more years, as a Cultivator, his height would essentially be finalized, and he would grow into a true adult Cultivator.

However, even though he no longer appeared so short, if he went outside, other Cultivators would still be able to judge from his height that he was still a child, and not some Old Monster.

A Cultivator's height is finalized at sixteen, and over ninety-nine percent of Cultivators choose to have their height finalized between one meter eighty and one meter eighty-one, generally not below one meter seventy, and generally not above one meter ninety.

One meter eighty to one meter eighty-one is considered the most ideal height range in the Cultivator world.

Currently, Long Aotian's height had only reached one meter seventy, still at least ten centimeters short of the one meter eighty to one meter eighty-one range, which is considered the most ideal height range by the Cultivator world, and there was still a very obvious gap compared to the height of an adult Cultivator.

This was a hard truth!

Even a Prodigy like Long Aotian had no way around it.

As expected, when Long Aotian came out of seclusion, Ao Jingtain was the first to rush over to pat his head and measure his height.

"Junior Brother, you've grown another ten centimeters. You'll be an adult in two years. How tall do you plan to set your height?"

Ao Jingtain couldn't help but ask.

Unlike Mortals who cannot Cultivate, Cultivators have the power to decide, within a certain range, what value their height will ultimately reach.

After their height is finalized at sixteen, their height will no longer continue to grow.

This is only for male Cultivators.

Female Cultivators' height finalization time is even earlier; their height is essentially finalized at fifteen years old, growing even faster than male Cultivators.

Ordinary Mortals, however, are different; their height is left to fate, and their height can continue to grow until their twenties. But does a longer growth period help? Those who are meant to be short will still be short. In terms of height, ordinary Mortals simply cannot compare to Cultivators.

Even when comparing the height of ordinary Mortal males to female Cultivators, ordinary Mortal males are completely crushed by female Cultivators.

Although the height range in the Cultivator world is between one meter seventy and one meter ninety, in order to have a height advantage over Mortals, Cultivators generally set their height at one meter eighty or above.

Even female Cultivators do the same.

In contrast, almost one hundred percent of female Cultivators choose a height of one meter eighty, while male Cultivators mostly want to be a little taller than female Cultivators, generally controlling their height within the range of one meter eighty to one meter eighty-five.

Ao Jingtain's chosen height was one meter eighty.

Long Aotian smiled faintly: "One meter eighty-one, perhaps? Too tall and I'd be like a bamboo pole, which I don't particularly like. Too short isn't good either. One meter eighty-one is just slightly taller than the common height value for female Cultivators, and that's sufficient."

Long Aotian thought it was great that Cultivators could determine their height within a certain range.

When he was on Earth, he was the kind of person who couldn't grow tall no matter how hard he tried.

Fortunately, he worked in a hospital, which was a place where one earned a living based on skill, not on looks, height, weight, or background. His professional abilities were quite good.

Even if he didn't wield a scalpel, with his glorious record of working part-time in the morgue and becoming the longest-surviving normal person there, the hospital would still value him as a special talent.

Part-time work in the morgue also didn't care about looks, height, weight, or background; as long as one had the strength to carry corpses and enough guts, that was all that mattered. The one thing he never lacked was strength and courage, otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to hold a scalpel and perform surgery on living people to remove their illnesses.

"One meter eighty-one is good!"

Ao Jingtain's eyes lit up at Long Aotian's chosen height: "This height is the most ideal height for male Cultivators. Almost one hundred percent of female Cultivators choose to have their height finalized at one meter eighty, and almost ninety-nine percent or more of male Cultivators choose to have their height finalized at one meter eighty-one..."

"..."

Long Aotian's mouth twitched.

He hadn't expected this naive girl to know so much about height.

Was this the nature of women?