Enduring such myriad agonies, Ye Chen's Chaos Saint Soul showed signs of disintegration, yet he did not frown in the slightest, focusing intently on refining his true body without a moment's distraction.
This was the most critical juncture, not a single moment could be wasted.
The fusion of the three was far from being completed in a few short moments, hours, days, or even months as one might imagine.
The refining speed was extremely slow, because the three possessed immense mutual repulsion.
Ye Chen's Chaos Saint Body was unprecedented in all of history; even without sentience, it instinctively rejected the refinement of external matter.
The Great Emperor Reincarnation Body and the Half-Emperor Body were true flesh and blood of a Supreme Emperor Body, with Emperor Dao imprints within. Especially the Great Emperor Reincarnation Body, having been nurtured for a long time by a complete Emperor Dao origin, contained traces of Emperor Dao attributes, autonomously rejecting the refinement of any flesh and blood of a lower realm.
Precisely because of this, the fusion of the three required a gradual, step-by-step approach; rushing it was absolutely out of the question.
Ye Chen's plan was to first re-temper the skeleton, and only then refine the flesh and blood.
The Chaos Saint Body was originally an Emperor Lord Level Body, its hardness not inferior in the slightest to Emperor-level Dao Weapons. Now, under the burning of the strongest furnace fire, it slowly began to develop cracks. The same was true for the bone structures of the Great Emperor Reincarnation Body and the Half-Emperor Body.
This step required extracting the essence of the latter two and directing it towards the Chaos Saint Body skeleton for tempering.
However, this new tempering process was destined to be slow, not something that could be completed in a short while.
Thus, another one hundred and thirty-seven years passed.
The refining process over these one hundred and thirty-plus years was not as smooth as imagined. The mutual repulsion between the three was far more severe than anticipated.
The Chaos Saint Body skeleton consistently resisted the refinement and infusion of the bone essence from the Great Emperor Reincarnation Body and the Half-Emperor Body.
If not for the extreme, fearsome, and domineering nature of the furnace fire formed by the fusion of various terrifying flames, which forcibly melted the three and created a sliver of opportunity for fusion, it would have been utterly impossible for the three to truly merge; the repulsion was simply too great.
Afterwards, the fusion of the three continued.
Two hundred years passed.
By this point, the three were basically more than half fused, and the pace gradually accelerated.
At this moment, an unexpected event occurred.
The delicate balance that had been carefully maintained all along was finally broken. With a thunderous boom, the three actually separated.
All previous efforts were wasted!
Ye Chen was also infuriated, a rare hint of frustration and annoyance surfacing within him.
It must be noted that his entire cultivation journey up to now amounted to just over a thousand years. Yet here, the refinement of these three had consumed a full four hundred years, nearly half of his previous lifespan. Now, they suddenly separated, rendering all his efforts futile. How could he not be furious?
However, he also knew this matter could not be rushed.
Even if it took twice the time, it was still far better than spending ten thousand years slowly reaching the peak of Eternal Monarch through conventional means.
Readjusting his mind and body, he began the refinement anew.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!—
In the blink of an eye, three hundred years passed.
To date, from the beginning of his seclusion, a full seven hundred and thirty-plus years had elapsed.
By this year, his Chaos Saint Body skeleton had undergone a brand new reconstruction. Through the repeated cycles of shattering and reorganization, the Chaos Saint Body skeleton could be said to have been broken and then reborn, undergoing a nirvana-like transformation, far surpassing its previous hardness and indestructibility. Its entire body shimmered with a faint white light, appearing remarkably plain and unadorned.
However, upon closer observation, one could deeply sense how incredibly hard and indestructible this Chaos Saint Body skeleton was. Its entire body flowed with the most solid, indestructible radiance.
Vaguely, it seemed as if endless Monarch Rules adhered to it, transforming into indestructible power.
Even the slightest wisp of this indestructible light, if added to a mundane weapon, would be enough to instantly elevate that weapon into an indestructible armament that even an Ancient Monarch would find difficult to destroy.
The Emperor Bone essence from both the Great Emperor Reincarnation Body and the Half-Emperor Body had now completely merged into this Saint Body skeleton. Hundreds of years of burning and tempering had made it immeasurably more solid.
Ye Chen could sense that the indestructibility of this brand new Chaos Saint Body skeleton alone was such that even a fully awakened Emperor-level Dao Weapon striking it would likely fail to cause the slightest damage.
"Hundreds of years of repeated tempering, refining the bone essence of two parts of a Supreme Emperor Body... the Chaos Saint Bones are now indestructible and imperishable, likely approaching the level of the Emperor Bone's indestructibility of a Supreme Emperor Body," he murmured to himself. The indestructibility of the Chaos Saint Bones surpassed any Emperor Lord battle weapon.
Naturally, reaching the level of a Supreme Emperor Body was still a step away.
The Supreme Emperor Body was incomparably superior to an Emperor Lord Level Body.
However, to cultivate the Chaos Saint Bones to this level within the Sovereign realm was truly unprecedented.
Even more astonishing was that when the three alien Emperor Lords were transformed into the furnace fire, by a stroke of fortune, the hundreds of millions of Monarch Rules they had cultivated throughout their lifetimes did not disperse. On the contrary, under the burning of the strongest furnace fire, over two-thirds were forcibly hammered into the Chaos Saint Bones.
It must be noted that each Emperor Lord mastered over a hundred million Monarch Rules, and even possessed quite a few Supreme Emperor Rules.
Two-thirds of the Monarch Rules equated to over two hundred million Monarch Rules, completely refined and hammered into the Chaos Saint Bones.
That's right. This added, out of thin air, over two hundred million Monarch Rule powers to the original indestructible foundation of the Chaos Saint Bones, making them even more terrifying.
To put it seriously, just this set of Chaos Saint Bones alone was more fearsome than an ordinary Emperor Lord.
One could even say that this set of Chaos Saint Bones was countless times more terrifying than many Emperor-level Dao Weapons.
With such indestructible Chaos Saint Bones, Ye Chen was confident that once the brand new Chaos Saint Body was cultivated, his physical strength would far surpass the past.
If he were to face the First Imperial Envoy again now, he had sufficient confidence to directly crush him!
At the same time, he also sighed softly.
If he were not an Eternal Monarch with unimaginable potential, wanting to cultivate the Chaos Saint Bones to this level on the foundation of his original Emperor Lord Level Body would be impossible, even with the Great Emperor Reincarnation Body and the Half-Emperor Body. He would be subject to immense restrictions.
It was an intangible restriction stemming from the realm itself, not permitting anyone to cultivate their bone structure to such a degree, so close to a Supreme Emperor Body.
"The most fundamental bone tempering is complete. What needs refining next is the flesh and blood. With the bone foundation in place, refining the flesh and blood will be much simpler!"
With a thought, the blood that had fused together over hundreds of years under the furnace fire's burning, now shimmering with terrifying blood qi fluctuations, its entire body flowing with strands of Chaos True Blood and also manifesting Emperor Blood, trembled slightly, producing deafening roars.
The abundance of boundless blood light was so intense it could easily shock an Ancient Monarch to death.
This mass of blood was precisely the fused flesh and blood of the Chaos Saint Body, the Great Emperor Reincarnation Body, and the Half-Emperor Body.
During the hundreds of years of refinement, the flesh had disintegrated, leaving behind the purest blood.
Guided, the blood slowly surged towards the skeleton, merging with the Chaos Saint Bones. Boom! Boom! Boom! The bone structure shone brilliantly, blood light surged mightily, beginning to give birth to true Saint Body flesh and blood, bone and flesh connecting and uniting as one!