''Northern Sovereign, have you made your choice yet?'' Young lady Niu asked calmly as she looked at the beautiful, silver-robed woman in front of her.

Although the Northern Sovereign was a peak Sovereign realm expert, in reality, as the personal disciple of 'old freak Gao', young lady Niu's status was considered to be even slightly above the Northern Sovereign's.

Shaking her head, the Northern Sovereign had a calm, uncaring look on her face as she looked at the young woman in front of her, before she answered seriously

''Young lady Niu, as the lord of the Northern Sovereign city, how could I possibly hand over the golden skeleton to senior Gao?''

Senior Feng and young lady Niu both narrowed their eyes when they heard this, before they turned to look at each other.

If the Northern Sovereign was really unwilling to hand over the golden skeleton, then there was really nothing they could do. Even if senior Feng decided to go all-out to steal the skeleton, his chances of success were less than 10 percent.

However, knowing 'old freak Gao's' nature and how much he needed the golden skeleton, young lady Niu and senior Feng were naturally unwilling to give up so easily.

''Hmph! In that case, I can only ask that guy for the golden skeleton myself! As long as we get our hands on the skeleton first, then even if Lu Qigang wants to obtain it, there is nothing she can do! If she truly dares to steal something that belongs to master, even the Tianhuan dynasty won't be able to protect her.''

The Northern Sovereign's expression changed when she heard this, before a look of killing intent momentarily flashed through her eyes as she stared at young lady Niu.

Naturally, young lady Niu hadn't concealed her words as she intended to scare away the Northern Sovereign.

After all, although the Northern Sovereign's strength was the strongest among the experts present, even she wouldn't dare to offend a figure like 'old freak Gao'.

However, a moment later, the Northern Sovereign's expression quickly returned back to normal while the look on her face became calm.

Indeed, if young lady Niu managed to convince Shun Long to give them the golden skeleton, things would truly become tricky, but the Northern Sovereign was confident that she would be the one to obtain the golden skeleton in the end, even without using force.

While the surrounding experts were all staring at Shun Long, waiting for him to complete his breakthrough, Shun Long himself wasn't paying attention to any of them, as he had placed his entire focus on the 81 silver-colored balls of qi inside the 'Monarch's Hourglass'!

Using the energy from the Heavenly Tribulation inside his body, Shun Long had already condensed the 81 balls of qi together, until 41 of them were left.

The 41 silver-colored balls of qi soon turned into 20 and then into 10, while the energy of the Heavenly Tribulation inside Shun Long's body was being used up at an extremely rapid rate.

In the blink of an eye, an hour had already passed before only 3 balls of qi were left inside the 'Monarch's Hourglass'.

Shun Long could sense that he was on the cusp of reaching the Dao King realm, but the remaining energy from the Heavenly Tribulation inside his body was almost completely depleted by now.

He had already used the energy of the 9 bolts of white lightning long ago, while even the crimson bolt of lightning had less than 10 percent of its energy left.

Finally, a few minutes later, just as the last bit of energy from the crimson lightning bolt was used up, the last 3 silver-colored balls of qi had also disappeared from the 'Monarch's Hourglass', and in their place, a single, golden-colored ball of qi could be seen lying there.

The moment that the last 3 silver-colored balls of qi fused together to produce the golden-colored qi ball, Shun Long could feel his mind shaking, while the final shackles that were keeping him into the Nascent Soul stage were instantly broken apart, allowing him to take the final step!

The moment his cultivation broke past the peak of rank 9 of the Nascent Soul and reached the early rank 1 of the Dao King realm, Shun Long could feel the 'Stone of Time' inside his spiritual space shake violently, while his spiritual sea started to rumble in response.

At that moment, Shun Long could also feel all of his senses being elevated to another level, before his mind suddenly turned blank.

Shun Long had the indistinct feeling that something was changing inside his spiritual sea, while different scenes flashed through his mind at the same time.

Information about many different types of ores and minerals under the Heavens along with countless mysterious runes and patterns all entered Shun Long's mind, as the endless barrage of information seemed to forcefully integrate itself directly into his soul!

And yet, although this process was extremely painful, compared to the pain he had felt when he was absorbing the information inside the golden book, Shun Long could feel that this was truly nothing in comparison.

He could sense that the information that was entering his mind was actually less than 10 percent of the knowledge that he had regarding medicinal herbs alone.

Of course, although this pain wasn't as bad as when his soul was being forcibly torn apart, the pain was still enough to bring Shun Long to his limits.

The Northern Sovereign and the surrounding experts all saw the contorted expression of pain on Shun Long's face, leaving them completely baffled as they were unable to understand what was going on. Gritting his teeth, Shun Long kept enduring the pain as countless different scenes flashed through his mind one after the other.

A couple of hours later Shun Long finally collapsed on the ground, his body fully drenched in sweat, as the scenes in his mind finally came to an end.