One of the better Xianxia you'll find. The story is not as formulaic as other xianxia and it always keep things interesting by mixing it up. The MC's adventure is interesting to read and not just go here -> insult this generic villain -> find treasure -> kill villain's entire family. Villains in this novel has personality and not just some jumped up rich boy who gets offended by everything that the MC does.
The pacing is also excellent. You don't feel like the MC is rushing from one thing to another with no stop like some other xianxia (cough cough Martial World). Took off one star for the horrendous romance. Er Gen knows how to do many things but romance is not one of them. The main love interest is a non-character that is somehow the "driving force" for MC even though their time together is shallow to say the least. There's a quasi harem that gets going but you will end up feeling sorry for the harem member more than anything else.

Overall, if you discount the romance this is a must read. Especially if you are tired of formulaic and repetitive xianxia.

“The initial arc tries to remind us that Wang Lin has emotional ties to his parents, and yet time passes as if it means nothing. Months and years are written off as the MC secluded himself and cultivate multiple times, making you wonder what’s the point of all the characters introduced so early if they aren’t used regularly. What you are going to encounter after the dramatic defeat of the MC’s sect is chapters and chapters of struggling to power-up while in life-and-death circumstances. Lots of description of seclusion and powering up. Lots and lots of it. Power up yes, but to what end? I appreciate the efforts of the translators, but there is no driving force, no motivation to the MC’s behavior except to survive. It’s like reading on and on about some kid painstakingly solving his math homework. The only mystery is in his cheat item which houses a powerful immortal (as usual), but after 90+ chapters I am not aware of any long term goal set by the MC. Initially he wanted to take revenge on the said arrogant cousin, but after the authors made the time skips, the goal seemed insignificant compared to the power scale being talked about.”

Have to agree this is an accurate summary of the story at least up to chapter 300 which is where I dropped it. He powers up, gets revenge, then continues powering up for no apparent reason (oh yeah, to free that old man in the marble, I forgot that since it literally happened 400 years ago).

The comment about time scale is extremely accurate. MC secluding himself and training for 400 years straight is considered NORMAL. There are people waiting THOUSANDS OF YEARS for a plan to hatch. Distances in the millions of kilometers are used to describe the length of an ocean. There are Gods who can literally eat planets, and these Gods have physical bodies which survive for MILLIONS OF YEARS that MC can somehow travel in. The sense of time and space is totally distorted. I heard by the time MC travels back through the ocean to his love interest she died of old age already... that is in line with the rest of the novel. Lightning bolts... yeah, you can’t eat them. Don’t know if this is a translation error but... yeah, you can’t eat lightning bolts, sorry. idk why the author thinks you can eat lightning bolts as if they're physical objects or something.

Also, MC comes back to avenge his family... in the process of doing so he causes the death of his only surviving family member. This guy is not smart, I’ll tell you what.

in chapters 1200 issth we learn that she goes with another one he didn't care enough for her and solely focused on cultivation