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Chapter 281: Mid-Realm Hunyuan Master
Chapter 281: Mid-Realm Hunyuan Master
Shen Yi took out the golden pearl, which had a slight crack on it. He instructed Qinghua to stay nearby and be ready to transform into a golden body at any moment.
Then, he opened his panel and channeled the demon's life force into the Swallowing Heaven Elixir to consume its power. Perhaps there was a trick to refining spiritual roots. For example, a master might personally observe a disciple's spiritual root and daemon infant, then create a unique refinement method for them. However, Shen Yi knew he wouldn't receive such treatment.
Wutong Mountain clearly had no intention of taking in more disciples, and Xuanguang Cave might have been a possibility before, but after he had slain their Deity Transformation cultivator and two Upper Realm Hunyuan Masters, that path was completely closed to him.
Slow and steady, he thought to himself.
Year One: You enter a state of introspection, carefully observing the Swallowing Heaven Daemon Infant. This life form, born from your inner dan, is completely occupied by your consciousness, and you know it inside and out.
The True Yang Qilin Stone, tainted by baleful energy, was originally unrelated to the daemon infant. However, after the stone was corrupted, the two surprisingly managed to coexist in harmony.
You are not careless; instead, you carefully sense the changing aura on the True Yang Qilin Stone to avoid any mishaps.
As Shen Yi watched his demon life force diminish, he remained calm and patient. When it came to matters of life and death, it was necessary to spend as much demon life force as needed. Although his physical body was currently robust and youthful, no one could guarantee that problems with the daemon infant wouldn't affect his mortal form.
Hunyuan Masters cultivated in hundred-year units. Merely observing a stone had already cost Shen Yi hundreds of years' worth of demon life force.
Year Six Hundred and Thirty: You interact with the Qilin Stone using your aura. In your perception, it transforms from an inanimate object into a being that seems to have a fondness for you, like a child.
The next moment, Shen Yi suddenly felt the burning purple stone in his palm cool down. The purple-gold flames, as if recognizing him, wrapped around his hand but maintained a slight distance. Then, the stone slowly sank into his skin and made its way to his Qi Sea.
Shen Yi shook off the residual flames from his hand, his expression unconsciously tensing up. Was this because it felt they had communicated enough, and it was now ready to begin refinement?
He no longer needed the panel's prompts.
The Swallowing Heaven Daemon Infant's aura surged, transforming into crimson tendrils that sought to envelop the True Yang Qilin Stone entirely. As the scarlet tendrils touched the stone, thick white mist sizzled and crackled.
"Ah!"
Shen Yi's expression changed drastically, and he clenched his fist tightly, his powerful grip threatening to crush his fingertips. He tried to divert his attention, but the piercing pain in his soul still made him break out in a cold sweat.
Scorching! Burning!
It felt like his soul was being melted.
Aside from the baleful energy that had corrupted the stone, the essence of the Qilin Stone was extremely yang and hot. Shen Yi's aura could blend with the baleful energy, but it clashed with the stone's extreme yang nature.
Year One Thousand Nine Hundred: You find yourself in a molten inferno, and your daemon infant shows signs of melting. You have no choice but to continuously exchange auras with the baleful energy on the stone, hoping that it will tone down its scorching heat. It seems to understand your words, or perhaps it's because you've been harmonizing for many years, but you finally feel a lessening of the pain.
Within his Qi Sea, the crimson tendrils emanating from the daemon infant had already wrapped tightly around the True Yang Qilin Stone and were slowly dragging it into his body. Shen Yi's eyes glowed with a reddish mist, and his body radiated light.
Unconsciously, he had summoned his daemon infant. And within that red light, purple-gold flames flickered gently.
He had once incorporated this energy into his body, transforming it into dew and condensing it into an inner dan, but it was only at this moment that he felt he truly understood it.
Connecting with the heavens and earth through one's spiritual root.
Shen Yi's face remained devoid of any sign of joy, as just a single breath's time later, a searing pain snapped him back to reality.
As if that fleeting moment of enlightenment had been nothing but an illusion.
[Year 2,300: You successfully incorporate the True Yang Qilin Stone into your daemon infant, but you realize that the refinement has only just begun], the panel informed him.
Shen Yi's muscles twitched uncontrollably, and the power within his flesh, capable of cleaving through mountains and rivers, was of no use at this moment.
All he could do was endure and wait.
Compared to the advancement of his golden body, the path of a Hunyuan Master was exceedingly difficult and torturous.
However, Shen Yi had already seen through to the essence of it all.
A cultivator, at their core, borrowed power to achieve their means.
The golden body borrowed the might of the people of Dagan's Nine Provinces, while the daemon infant borrowed the power of the heavens and earth.
It was evident that compared to the heavens and earth, Dagan was a feeble crutch, always at risk of annihilation.
Should Dagan perish, so too would the golden body.
Shen Yi did not wish for the accumulation of his cultivation to suddenly vanish one day.
Investing in the daemon infant was the most reliable choice.
The process of refining a spiritual root was actually quite monotonous.
It was like picking up a stone, embedding it into your skin, and then slowly grinding it with your muscles until it became a part of your body.
At this moment, the True Yang Qilin Stone was gradually being assimilated by the daemon infant.
[Year 4,600: The Swallowing Heaven Daemon Infant and that purple stone gradually merge as one. You begin to move it, forming a heart from stone, thus creating the heart of your daemon infant], the panel whispered in his mind.
In a flash, that brief experience returned.
Shen Yi's entire body was drenched in sweat, and his legs trembled slightly as he stood up, his scarlet eyes gazing once more upon the chaotic heavens and earth.
The Qilin Stone in his heart seemed to have become a conduit, connecting him to the heavens and earth.
[Year 5,300: The daemon infant forms its heart from the stone, condensing an upper-grade spiritual root. You have achieved the Mid-Realm of Hunyuan Mastery], the panel declared.
[Remaining Demon Lifespan: 22,700 years].
As the panel's prompt ended, a surging aura erupted from Shen Yi, transforming into purple-gold flames that enveloped his entire body.
Gold was the original color of the True Yang Qilin Stone, while purple was the manifestation of the baleful energy that had corrupted it.
He slowly clenched his palm, attempting to control the stone's power.
The purple-gold flames swiftly retracted into his body, traveling along the Qilin Stone in his heart and transforming back into scarlet demonic energy.
Using the spiritual root as a medium, he could transform it at will.
"Is the efficiency and speed of transformation related to the quality of the spiritual root?" Shen Yi wondered aloud, feeling the smooth and unobstructed flow of energy.
Based on his observations of other cultivators' daemon infants, he had formed a hypothesis.
Possessing a spiritual root meant achieving the Mid-Realm of Hunyuan Mastery, while the Upper-Realm was attained when all five viscera were complete. Both Chang Qing and Zheng Zisheng had daemon infants with five viscera of the same attribute.
The combination of all five should result in an even more remarkable effect.
However, given his situation, things were more complicated.
He needed a spiritual root tainted by baleful energy, and finding five types of spiritual roots from the heavens and earth that shared the same attribute, yet were all corrupted by baleful energy, would be exceedingly difficult.
To avoid being a jack-of-all-trades, master of none, each spiritual root had to be of sufficient quality, perhaps even rivaling the combined power of five spiritual roots of other cultivators.
And the answer to that was clear.
A peerless spiritual root.
(End of Chapter)
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