Chapter 365 - 363: Turmoil in the Blood Sea

Chapter 365: Chapter 363: Turmoil in the Blood Sea

’The Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony is in ten years. Perfect. In five years, I’ll go watch Senior Tang Fei’s sword duel, then journey to the Endless Sea of Suffering... When I return, I’ll be just in time for the auction.’

Bai Zichen ran the numbers. The schedule worked out perfectly.

In five years, the Qing Emperor Longevity Sword’s concealment and tempering would be complete, giving him a fighting chance even against a Nascent Soul True Monarch.

A few years was too tight for a trip to the Central Domain; he’d have to rush back before he even had a chance to properly explore.

By contrast, he had a map of the Thirty-Six Demon Caves of the Sea of Suffering, making it a much more suitable destination.

’These Demon Cultivators in the Sea of Suffering have all committed monstrous evils. They couldn’t survive in the Cultivation Realm, and even the Demon Path Sects wouldn’t protect them, forcing them to flee here... I’ll sweep through the Demon Caves to hone my Swordsmanship and, while I’m at it, see if I can accumulate some capital for the Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony.’

He had never heard of a Nascent Soul Demon Cultivator appearing in the Thirty-Six Demon Caves.

Given a choice, no one would want to live in the Endless Sea of Suffering.

Inside the Demon Caves, it was perpetually dark, Spiritual Qi was scarce, and one had to endure the invasion of Yin Qi, a pain as excruciating as a knife scraping bone.

Outside the Demon Caves, the Sea of Suffering’s unique Gang Wind blew for ten months out of the year. To be caught in it meant being crushed to dust.

The Thirty-Six Demon Caves didn’t form because Demon Cultivators set out to create thirty-six different factions. Rather, in the entire Sea of Suffering, only these caves could withstand the Gang Wind, making them the only places suitable for long-term survival.

Thus, countless Demon Cultivators used the Demon Caves as their residential hubs, gradually forming their own organizations around them.

Without any Nascent Soul True Monarchs present, Bai Zichen had no fear, no matter how many Core Formation True Men they threw at him in human wave tactics.

’So what if there are many Core Formation True Men from the Demon Sects of the Central Domain? Can any of them block a single strike from my sword?’

His only worry was that these Demon Cultivators were all dirt-poor and wouldn’t yield much in the way of Treasure. Worse, he would have to rely on Top-Grade Spirit Stones to recover his True Essence while in the Sea of Suffering.

He’d better not tally his accounts at the end only to find that he hadn’t made a profit, but had actually lost a pile of Spirit Stones.

Whether it was a Tier Three Flying Sword or a Tribulation Crossing Secret Treasure, the auction prices wouldn’t be cheap.

At every Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony, such items were always popular lots, and hordes of Core Formation True Men were sure to compete fiercely for them.

After Bai Zichen became a Core Formation Ancestor, almost all of his expenses had been covered using Sect Contribution Points; he hadn’t used Spirit Stones in a long time.

But this time, back in Zengguang Immortal City, no one would recognize his Sect’s internal Contribution Points. Only Spirit Stones would do the talking.

He had two Top-Grade Spirit Stones. One was placed as the array core in the All Heaven Fiery Array, drawing in the Earth Fire from Flame Mountain. The other, a Gold Element Top-Grade Spirit Stone, lay quietly in his storage bag.

He also had over one hundred and thirty Top-Grade Spirit Stones.

If he wanted to avoid using his Top-Grade Spirit Stones, he might very well not have enough funds.

It was best to prepare more Spirit Stones in advance; better safe than sorry. It would give him more confidence when bidding against others at the Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony.

’If it’s really not enough, I’ll just have to suck it up and go back to being a miner. I can work in that large Spirit Stone Ore Vein for two years, picking only Top-Grade Spirit Stones. I’m sure I can gather enough that way.’

Bai Zichen had high hopes for the Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony, hoping to win the bid for an item he truly desired.

Of all the rare and Exotic Treasures at the Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony, at most a third came from Zengguang Immortal City itself. The majority were put up for consignment or barter by the attending Nascent Soul True Monarchs and Core Formation True Men who used the event as a platform.

People were willing to entrust their Treasures to the city for auction precisely because its platform could attract a sufficient number of High-Tier Cultivators.

He still had several Exotic Treasures on him. If he wanted to sell them for Spirit Stones, the Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony would undoubtedly fetch the best possible price.

For many Spiritual Objects, it was hard enough to find even one buyer on a normal day, so there was no chance of creating a competitive bidding atmosphere.

But at an event that gathered High-Tier Cultivators from the Five Domains and the Outer Sea, it was highly likely that several people would set their sights on the same Treasure at once.

After just a few bids, the closing price would skyrocket.

His batch of Celestial Star Silver Sand, for example, would surely fetch an astonishing price if he was willing to enter it into the auction.

Collecting Celestial Star Silver Sand was simply too tedious and difficult; a batch of a thousand grains appearing all at once was a rare sight in the Cultivation Realm.

Not only did Bai Zichen have no intention of selling it, but if he saw more Celestial Star Silver Sand for sale at the Ten Thousand Immortals Ceremony, he would want to buy it.

While deeply studying the Star Luo Swordsmanship, a sudden inspiration struck him: he could try to use the Celestial Star Silver Sand to refine a Divine Sand-Type Treasure modeled after a Star River, which he could then use to comprehend the vastness of the starry sky.

Celestial Star Silver Sand was a type of meteorite from the Outer Heaven that carried traces of Star Power. The greater the quantity, the more effectively it could recreate the Power of the Stars.

This was a method he had devised purely out of consideration for the difficulty of inheriting the Starry Sky Sword Intent, combined with his knowledge of the various Magical Treasures that could be refined from Celestial Star Silver Sand.

Whether it would actually work remained to be seen.

...

「Qii Mountain’s Peak.」

Once the place of True Monarch Jiulian’s secluded cultivation, the palace gates were now tightly shut, with no soul in sight.

Untended for decades, the Spirit Plants had grown wild, covering the stone tables and rockeries. Tangled vines had toppled jade stools that weighed hundreds of pounds.

The winding paths were completely overgrown with Spirit Plants. Only by pushing aside the Spirit Grass could one faintly discern the original landscape of stacked stones, meandering streams, and the courtyard’s pavilions.

In the deepest part of the Cave Mansion, Qu Yang was slumped on the floor. His usual magnificent and heroic image was gone, replaced by an ashen face and disheveled hair.

"Come! Take my body as your nourishment! Merge with me and grow!"

Qu Yang spread his arms, activating the Secret Technique left behind by True Monarch Jiulian. A chill swept through the area, coating every Spirit Plant in a layer of frost.

Even though he had long steeled himself for this, now that the moment was upon him, he still hesitated.

’Time waits for no one! This is the best way to save the Sect, and I might even have a chance to embark on an alternative Longevity Path!’

A freely moving Snow Lotus appeared behind him, suddenly swelling to dozens of times its original size and enveloping him completely.

The lotus flower pulsed as countless roots channeled Heaven and Earth Spiritual Power into it. It was as if a new life was gestating inside the Snow Lotus.

In the past, to pursue a higher Cultivation, True Monarch Jiulian had risked merging with this Tier Four Top Grade Snow Lotus.

He had originally hoped to use the Snow Lotus’s incomparably pure Innate Vitality to break through the bottleneck of the Early-Stage Nascent Soul realm, cleanse his physical body, and extend his lifespan all at once.

Who would have thought that a mighty Nascent Soul True Monarch would end up being constrained by a mere Spirit Plant?

Not only did he have to pay a terrible price every time he left Qii Mountain, but he also gained no benefit from the Snow Lotus. On the contrary, some of his True Essence flowed back into it, aiding its growth.

When True Monarch Jiulian reflected on this major miscalculation in his life, he concluded that the Secret Technique for borrowing a Spirit Plant’s power was flawed, and that he had chosen the wrong specimen to begin with.

This Snow Lotus was a natural Exotic Species, possessing the ability to strengthen itself by devouring the roots of other Spirit Plants. It had been growing atop Qii Mountain for an unknown number of millennia.

The previous True Monarchs of the Holy Lotus Sect had set boundaries for the Snow Lotus, taking a few of its petals every 60-Year Cycle to use in Alchemy.

Only when True Monarch Jiulian truly merged as one with the Tier Four Top Grade Spirit Plant did he discover that its reserves of Wood Element Spiritual Power far surpassed his own as an Early-Stage Nascent Soul Cultivator—by several, even dozens of, times.

Although its Spiritual Power was diffuse and slow to circulate, the sheer volume of it was terrifying.

It exceeded the normal upper limit for a Tier Four Top Grade Spirit Plant.

This meant the Snow Lotus had plundered the life force of far too many other Spirit Plants. In terms of sheer volume, it was already several times that of an ordinary Tier Four Top Grade Spirit Plant; only other limiting factors prevented it from breaking through to become a Tier Five Spirit Plant.

Plant spirits were different from Demon Beasts. A Tier Four Demon Beast, unless it possessed an exceptionally powerful bloodline, could already shed its Demon Body and successfully achieve Transformation.

A Tier Four Spirit Plant, however, could not even leave the soil to move freely and had few defenses against external threats.

Only upon reaching Tier Five would a plant spirit undergo a metamorphosis and exhibit all manner of incredible changes.

But for a plant to break through to a Tier Five Spirit Plant was no easier than for a Nascent Soul True Monarch to achieve a Breaking Realm. And with the decline of nature’s spiritual energy, Tier Five Spirit Plants had long since vanished from the Cultivation Realm.

True Monarch Jiulian had fallen prey to the Snow Lotus. Unresigned to his fate, he spent centuries studying ways to break free, yet he could not escape its shackles and only sank deeper.

But in a stroke of unintentional genius, he developed the Secret Technique along a different path.

Since controlling the Snow Lotus was impossible, he abandoned the idea entirely. Instead, a Core Formation True Man could actively offer to merge with it.

The power disparity between the two was too vast; the Tier Four Top Grade Snow Lotus would scorn the meager power of a Core Formation True Man and would instead infuse the Cultivator’s body with pure Innate Spiritual Power.

By borrowing the Snow Lotus’s immense Spiritual Power, one could, within the bounds of Qii Mountain, wield power infinitely close to that of a Nascent Soul Cultivator.

The "alternative Longevity Path" referred to the one-in-ten-thousand chance that if the Snow Lotus ascended to become a Tier Five Spirit Plant, it would instantly pull the merged Core Formation True Man up with it, elevating him to the Nascent Soul realm and even bearing a portion of the Celestial Tribulation’s damage.

The drawback was that one would be truly trapped on the peak of Qii Mountain, unable to leave even by severing the connecting roots and paying the price of a rapidly draining lifespan, as True Monarch Jiulian had.

Furthermore, it was not a case of a human refining a Spirit Plant, but of becoming the Snow Lotus’s Human Puppet. It was highly likely one would be assimilated by the Snow Lotus, becoming little more than an extension of the plant itself.

But thinking of the Holy Lotus Sect’s internal and external troubles, not to mention the recent appearance of Celestial Principle Sect Cultivators near Qii Mountain, Qu Yang could not afford to continue his slow Cultivation.

He could only harden his heart, take out the Secret Technique True Monarch Jiulian had left him before departing for the Black Mountain Range, and walk this path of no return.

The courtyard fell silent. Several months later, a powerful, heartbeat-like thumping finally echoed from within the Snow Lotus.

Its petals opened and closed, the lotus looking as if it could bloom at any moment.

...

As far as the eye could see, there was only an eerie, scarlet, ten-thousand-mile Blood Sea.

In the vortex at the very center of the Blood Sea, a Blood Shadow circled a long sword plunged into the seabed, endlessly refining it.

Countless bloody tendrils shot out from the Blood Shadow’s body, connecting to the Blood-Colored Long Sword before quickly snapping and dissipating like smoke.

Here, at the very center of the ten-thousand-mile Blood Sea, the murderous, bloodthirsty aura radiating from this Blood-Colored Long Sword could not be contained, overpowering the aura of the entire Blood Sea.

It forced the Blood Beasts, each as powerful as a Core Formation Cultivator, to keep a wide berth, not daring to draw near.

SNAP!

A Blood-Colored Jade Token on the Blood Shadow’s body cracked. A fissure first appeared at its edge, then spiderwebbed across the entire surface in a matter of breaths before it snapped in two.

’Junior Brother!’

The Blood Shadow opened its mouth, but no sound emerged. Instead, the Blood Sea roared and churned as if whipped by a storm.

Two Blood Pearls streamed from the Blood Shadow’s eyes, rapidly crystallizing instead of merging with the Blood Sea. A surging killing intent spread out, and with a series of POPS, every Blood Beast in the vicinity exploded into a bloody mist.

The long sword in front of it flared with a bloody light, thrumming as if in exultant response.