Qi Refining for 3000 Years

At the age of seventeen, Bai was widely celebrated as a prodigy after reaching the tenth level of the Qi Refining stage, standing on the very precipice of a major breakthrough. His peers and mentors alike marveled at his extraordinary talent, fully expecting him to ascend rapidly through the higher realms of cultivation. Yet, what should have been a brief stepping stone toward greatness transformed into an unimaginable ordeal. Three thousand years later, Bai remains inexplicably trapped within the foundational Qi Refining stage, having somehow advanced to the staggering sixty-six thousand six hundred and sixty-sixth level without any sign of breaking through to the next realm. Despite being confined to what is universally considered the beginner phase of cultivation for three millennia, he has evolved from a respected grandmaster into something entirely unprecedented—a grand anomaly feared by cultivators across the ages. His prolonged stagnation has not diminished his strength; rather, it has forged him into a formidable force capable of dominating even the most powerful adversaries while still technically residing in the lowest tier of martial progression.