Chapter 92: The Fifth Scripture Scroll, Invoking Deities!

After watching Chenlong leave, Wang Ping returned to his quiet room in the County Yamen, studied the Martial God Pictorial Record, and entered a deep meditation to cultivate.

'The Great Dao encompasses fifty, Heaven derives forty-nine, and humanity acts as the escaping one...'

The complete Martial God Pictorial Record consisted of forty-nine diagrams, symbolizing Heaven deriving the forty-nine, while a martial artist practicing this technique represented the escaping one of humanity.

Combined, they formed the Great Dao.

'Such a profound concept...'

Wang Ping sighed in admiration. Putting aside everything else, this underlying concept alone proved what an absolute genius the martial artist who created this internal energy manual had been.

The complexity of the Martial God Pictorial Record also far exceeded Wang Ping's expectations. The Heavenly Roc Dragon Capture Physique Diagram he had practiced before could not even compare; the gap between them was like the difference between a dragon and a snake. Any single one of the forty-nine diagrams from the Martial God Pictorial Record was far more profound on its own.

More importantly, it was not a fixed sequence.

'All forty-nine diagrams must be layered together to form the complete Martial God Pictorial Record. However, the order and method of that layering are not fixed.'

'It depends entirely on the person.'

'Different people have different bodies, with variances in their internal organs and different meridian sizes. Thus, the layering sequence changes and can be freely adjusted.'

'Through this method, the final condensed Internal Force physique might not be objectively the best, but it will absolutely be the most suitable for the practitioner's body. As the saying goes, the strongest is not as good as what suits you best. A physique cultivated this way can unleash power surpassing even so-called peerless martial arts!'

Wang Ping was incredibly shocked.

Take the simplest example: a peerless palm technique would still be utterly useless if given to a man with no arms.

But the Martial God Pictorial Record was different.

As a peerless martial art, anyone who practiced it could unleash its true might through the right permutations and combinations of its forty-nine diagrams!

How much blood and sweat had that required?

'To be able to synthesize these forty-nine diagrams, what Realm of microscopic control over the human body must the creator have reached? It's simply inconceivable...'

At the same time, Wang Ping finally understood what Chenlong meant.

'Relying solely on spiritual sense really isn't enough to truly master the Martial God Pictorial Record. I must select the most suitable combination of diagrams for it to count as a success.'

For him, with the aid of his spiritual sense, the most crucial step of the Martial God Pictorial Record—shaping an Internal Force physique—was not difficult. He could do it easily. However, selecting the best combination of diagrams was not something his spiritual sense could help with; he could only rely on his own martial comprehension.

'Well... that is a huge problem.'

Wang Ping frowned deeply. If he used brute force to try every permutation and combination of the forty-nine diagrams, the result would be forty-nine factorial—a terrifying astronomical number.

Although he could effectively rule out the vast majority of invalid combinations based on his understanding of his own body, the remaining possibilities were still massive.

'A promise worth a thousand gold... wouldn't work.'

The loans this scripture scroll could provide were limited to things he could accomplish himself within a thousand days. If a task exceeded that time limit, he wouldn't be able to borrow against it.

Even by conservative estimates, picking out the correct permutation would take over five, perhaps even ten years of effort.

The more Wang Ping thought about it, the graver his expression became.

'It'll be hard to put my absolute loan talent to good use at this rate.'

After pondering it over and over, Wang Ping finally let out a helpless sigh. "There's no other way. Undue delay brings trouble, and I don't have that kind of time. I can only use that thing."

A second later, he reached into his robes and pulled out a small flag. It was the Six Desires Heavenly Demon Flag. However, compared to its peak, the current Six Desires Heavenly Demon Flag was tattered and entirely dormant. Looking at its exterior, there was absolutely nothing profound or mysterious about it.

But this was perfectly normal.

'After all, I forced it to execute a near-lightspeed slash, it endured the aftershocks, and finally drained all its dharma power. It's a miracle it isn't completely scrapped.'

Wang Ping reached out and gently wiped the surface of the flag.

Soon, as his qualitatively transformed Divine Intent surged into the flag, a desolate, pitch-black, and lifeless space within the flag surfaced before his eyes.

"Ngh..."

Wang Ping pursed his lips, feeling the heavy pressure brought on by the Divine Intent. This was how martial artists activated divine weapons and magical treasures—using Divine Intent to awaken them.

In this way, the divine weapon would autonomously revive and absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth from the outside world. Even without dharma power, it could still display its original might—however, correspondingly, the martial artist's Divine Intent would be forced to bear the massive pressure from the divine weapon. Over an extended period, they would suffer madness at best, or sudden death at worst.

Right now, Wang Ping was still not strong enough to activate the Six Desires Heavenly Demon Flag.

Whether it was the Six Desires Heavenly Demon King at his peak or the army of tens of thousands of fiends, he couldn't use a single one because his Divine Intent couldn't bear the strain.

The only thing he could do was open the space within the flag.

So right now, the Six Desires Heavenly Demon Flag was just a spatial bag to him, a place to store things that were too inconvenient to show others.

Wang Ping then took something out of the flag.

It was a wooden puppet no larger than a palm, engraved with dozens, if not hundreds, of curse patterns. Right in the center of its brow, there was a glaring, hollow hole.

That was left behind by Liansheng Bodhisattva.

This puppet was precisely Perfected Wandering Spirit, the puppet that Daoist Nun You had previously controlled from afar. No one had paid attention to it afterward, so he had quietly picked it up!

Of course, the puppet itself no longer possessed any mysteries; Liansheng Bodhisattva had delivered a fatal blow. But the puppet's mysteries weren't what Wang Ping valued anyway.

It was its material!

As he stroked the puppet, a faint light flickered in Wang Ping's eyes. The towering book inside the Great Peace Mortuary reacted in kind, quickly providing an appraisal result.

[Intent-Bearing Spirit Wood (Earth Essence Extract)]

As long as the Taiping Sutra absorbed this puppet, it could immediately refine the fifth scripture scroll. However, Wang Ping had delayed doing this for half a month.

The reason was simple.

'Once I use this Intent-Bearing Spirit Wood, any subsequent attempts to add new scripture scrolls will require materials of the same or even higher quality.'

If possible, Wang Ping still wanted to save it.

Yet a full half-month had passed, and he had still failed to find any suitable material that was of a lower quality than the Intent-Bearing Spirit Wood but could still generate a scripture scroll.

With things having reached this point, he could no longer hold back.

"When it's time to act, act decisively!"

Wang Ping took a deep breath, instantly casting aside the hesitation in his heart. The puppet in his hands vanished, and simultaneously, the book inside the Great Peace Mortuary radiated brilliant light.

The fifth scripture scroll!

Immediately after, Wang Ping probed his consciousness back into the Six Desires Heavenly Demon Flag. Naturally, he had long prepared the corpse to be used for the fifth scripture scroll's settlement.

Thump!

The flag's surface trembled slightly, and soon, a nameless female corpse slumped onto the floor. There was not a single wound on her entire body; she was so lifelike she seemed alive.

More importantly, after the nameless female corpse appeared, a lingering scent of incense wafted through the quiet room, fully demonstrating her extraordinary nature.

This female corpse was the true Liansheng Bodhisattva. At the end of the Longxing County incident, she had been killed by Heaven-Stealing Thief, who had then replaced her identity. However, she had not dissipated, and Wang Ping had quickly stowed her away afterward. He had kept her until today specifically to use her for the Taiping Sutra's settlement.

This was Wang Ping's greatest harvest throughout the entire Longxing County incident!

In an instant, the corpse vanished. Unrivaled might descended from the void, dragging Wang Ping's consciousness down into the dark space of the Great Peace Mortuary.

Rumble!

Before his eyes, the towering book flipped rapidly before finally stopping on the fifth page. Dense images began continually flashing across it.

In the images was a woman in white with a sword on her back.

"It's her..."

Wang Ping recognized her immediately. At the same time, he watched the woman slowly carve three large characters into the brow of another woman who looked identical to her.

[Lian Shengyue].

"This is... her name? Lian Shengyue, an Immortal Gate true transmission just like Daoist Nun You... I see, so that's how Liansheng Bodhisattva came to be."

Without a doubt, Liansheng Bodhisattva was actually just a puppet, exactly like Perfected Wandering Spirit. It was just that as an Immortal Gate true transmission, Lian Shengyue's foundation was clearly much deeper than Daoist Nun You's, so the materials she used were much better. While Daoist Nun You was still using wood, Lian Shengyue was already using human material.

The next second, the images shattered.

Simultaneously, text surfaced on the fifth page of the Taiping Sutra:

[Scroll Five: Invoking Deities]

[With a sincere heart I take refuge, this disciple respectfully requests the Nine Heavens to command all spirits, to bestow blessings and pardon sins, to turn misfortune into fortune, to manifest Divine Powers, and enter my body. Execute this order swiftly as law!]

"This thing..."

Wang Ping narrowed his eyes and carefully read through the specific efficacy description of Invoking Deities. Soon after, his expression became odd.

'Invoking Deities. Just as the name implies, this scripture scroll can collect the consciousness fragments of others, piece them together, and then invite them into my own body to assist in cultivation.'

'Consciousness fragments are what dissipate outward when a spiritual being thinks. Once they accumulate to a certain amount, that person's complete consciousness can be pieced together.'

'At that point, Invoking Deities can be activated.'

'It sounds simple, but gathering consciousness fragments is actually incredibly difficult. Trying to piece them together just from what dissipates during thought would take at least three to five years to start.'

'So the better method is to take an object the target keeps on their person—ideally something they carry constantly—and collect the consciousness fragments lingering on it. If I'm lucky, a single item the target has carried for three to five years is enough to gather all the required consciousness fragments.'

Seeing this, Wang Ping felt somewhat distressed.

Just looking at this description, it didn't seem like Invoking Deities could solve the issue of his cultivation time for the Martial God Pictorial Record in the short term.

"This isn't my talent at all!" Wang Ping said, his face full of disappointment.

However, right at that moment.

"Hm?"

Wang Ping's consciousness withdrew from the Taiping Sutra. Suddenly, from the corner of his eye, he noticed that the Dragon Head Guillotine at his waist was currently emitting a strange light!

'These are... consciousness fragments!'

A massive amount of consciousness fragments!

In a flash, Invoking Deities responded. It completely swallowed the light from the Dragon Head Guillotine, eventually condensing slowly into a figure on the scripture scroll.

[Chenlong]!

"How is that possible..."

Wang Ping froze at the sight, then immediately realized. "Oh, right. The Dragon Head Guillotine used to be his weapon, so it retained a massive amount of consciousness fragments?"

He instantly realized the crux of the matter.

'Chenlong... this is a Martial Dao Grandmaster Rank of the Tribute Hall who practiced the Martial God Pictorial Record early on. If I invoke him into my body, could it speed up the process?'

Absolutely! Easily!

"As expected of my talent!"

Having thought this far, Wang Ping didn't hesitate in the slightest. He immediately activated Invoking Deities. Very quickly, large swaths of text began to surface on the scripture scroll.

[Chenlong has entered your body.]

Hsss!

Wang Ping gasped, his mind suddenly becoming exceptionally sharp and clear. His many previous doubts regarding the Martial God Pictorial Record were instantly met with a clear train of thought.

Not daring to delay, he immediately sat cross-legged and entered a state of deep meditation.

Following that, a terrifying, massive influx of inspiration roared forth. He didn't even need to control it; his brain began to operate expertly all on its own!

'This feeling... it's no longer me cultivating the Martial God Pictorial Record. It is a Martial Dao Grandmaster Rank who has long mastered it using my body to cultivate on my behalf! Operating from such a high vantage point, the efficiency has multiplied by far more than ten million times... my talent has finally been stimulated!'

Rumble!

At this moment, Wang Ping felt comfortably warm all over, as though he were soaking in a hot spring. Meanwhile, an earth-shattering upheaval was brewing inside his body!

Time gradually slipped away.

The sun set and the moon rose. Day and night cycled. Wang Ping sat silently in this deep meditative state for three days and three nights, until the rosy dawn of the fourth day arrived.

Whoosh!

In the quiet room, accompanied by a long, drawn-out exhale, Wang Ping opened his eyes. He stretched his arms easily and stared blankly at his own body.

His skin had changed. It was no longer flesh and blood in the traditional sense, but layer upon layer of flesh-colored scales, divided into a total of three types. Some were flexible, some were rigid, and some acted as connecting nodes. The three types of scales meshed together perfectly. Rather than skin, it was more like armor.

His skeletal structure had also changed.

Not only was its density massively reinforced, but its structure was also different. His ribs, for example, had drastically widened, forming a layered, plate-like structure similar to window blinds.

His muscles, blood, and organs.

Even his brain and the deeper neural networks had been altered to adapt to this strengthened body. He even had a second heart!

In total, there were twenty-two similar alterations inside his body.

"Reborn" wasn't enough to describe this transformation. In just three short days, the previously neat and clean quiet room was now littered with the flesh and blood he had shed.

"Incredible... Is this still an Internal Force physique?" Wang Ping sighed with heartfelt emotion.

The old, bloated, and inefficient human organs had been completely remodeled. Brand-new organs sculpted purely from a martial artist's Internal Force had perfectly replaced them.

Martial God Pictorial Record, successfully cultivated!