Chapter 871 – Sea Serpent Crystal
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This was the final stage of refining the Myriad Spirit Pill as well as the most critical stage. All of the plant essence was sealed within the wood spirit jade bottle, where it would be condensed into a pill through the flames. If there was even a single mistake in this process then all of Lin Ming’s efforts would have become wasted.
Before continuing with this step, Lin Ming rested for seven days and seven nights. He lit incense, bathed, washed his hands, and meditated for two hours.
These rituals were not useless. Rather, he had to go through these rituals in order to adjust his mind to its best state.
Hu! Hu! Hu!
Flames flickered and burned. Lin Ming watched as that million year wood spirit jade bottle rolled in the scorching fire.
There was no need to uncap the bottle for the final stage of refinement. The several thousands of medicinal herb essences had their own spiritual intelligence, so it was easy for them to flee. They were sealed into that wood spirit jade bottle via its special characteristics of isolating all perception. However, if the bottle were to be opened then these plant essences would escape over time.
By throwing the entire bottle into the Cosmic Melting Furnace, the bottle itself would be refined and become a part of the Myriad Spirit Pill.
A million year wood spirit jade bottle was highly heat resistant. Lin Ming had to burn the bottle with the Burning Star Flame for several hours in order to refine it. As the bottle melted, all sorts of rainbow-colored plant essence dissipated out with a trace of green, floating away like a foggy smoke!
Lin Ming immediately released his true essence to wrap around the million year wood spirit essence liquid. If this fog was burnt by the flames then it would turn to ash.
After stabilizing the temperature of the wood spirit jade liquid to an absolutely accurate range and without the slightest bit of heat fluctuation, Lin Ming continued to maintain the output with his own mental strength.
Two hours… four hours…
Lin Ming’s forehead was wet with sweat, but his mind was still steady like a mountain.
After, another four hours passed. This was a total of eight hours of complete mental concentration. Broken blood vessels began to appear as a sharp bright red in Lin Ming’s eyes.
As he watched the million year wood spirit jade liquid be evaporated by the flames, it slowly began to solidify into a translucent green sphere. This was the main form of the Myriad Spirit Pill.
And in the center of this green sphere, there were all sorts of colored threads running within like endless snakes. Some wandered about, some were long like silk and some were short like the hairs of an ox. Some areas were dense and some areas were sparse, but all in all there were thousands of these threads!
These threads were the refined medicinal essence of the pill.
The pill had formed!
In that moment, bursts of shaking sounds emitted from the Cosmic Melting Furnace. It was like a night wind blowing over the forested mountains, or waves crashing into the shore to an endless beat.
This sound started out faint but it began to become increasingly loud, until it sounded like raging waves and crushing landslides!
Above the pill furnace, a five colored ray of light shot upwards like the dawn. It was like a rainbow, dazzling and brilliant.
At this time, Lin Ming’s entire focus was concentrated on the pill furnace, his eyes unblinking. Veins had risen up on his forehead, sticking out all over.
At this time, there was a loud sound like a dragon roaring. The lid shot upwards and a fist-sized deep green ball of light suddenly flew out.
And within this ball of light, there was actually a pigeon egg-sized bead that was a vibrant green!
The Myriad Spirit Pill had concentrated so many plant essences that it had naturally formed its own rudimentary intelligence. Once it left the furnace it would inevitably attempt to fly away.
Lin Ming was already prepared for this. He displayed ‘Golden Roc Shattering the Void’, taking a single step forwards and grabbing that green bead in his hands.
After the pill left the furnace it should have been boiling hot. But as Lin Ming grasped it in his hands, he could actually feel an extraordinary cool feeling spreading through his limbs and bones, and even his mind seemed as if it had become much clearer.
“Success!”
Lin Ming let out a long breath of relief. He hadn’t wasted this last year of effort!
After taking ahold of Myriad Spirit Pill, Lin Ming could feel the immense energy contained within. The rank of the Myriad Spirit Pill was in no way inferior to the Fivefade Void Pill.
But compared to the Fivefade Void Pill that opened the Gate of Wonder, the Gate of Pain was much more difficult to open. The Gate of Pain’s function involved striking power and lethality of abilities. It was an extremely powerful gate and the most important of the first four Eight Inner Hidden Gates, only being inferior to the Gate of Life and the Gate of Death in the last four gates.
Just this Myriad Spirit Pill could guarantee a 70% chance of opening the Gate of Pain.
Although his chances were not small, Lin Ming couldn’t afford even a 30% failure rate. This was a pill that was refined from 16-17 million spirit essence stones, an amount of resources capable of raising a Divine Sea Supreme Elder. This was an amount of wealth that even a Divine Kingdom would find unbearably painful to bring out. If he failed his breakthrough then he wouldn’t have the resources to refine a second Myriad Spirit Pill.
He had to guarantee absolute success!
“70% chance… I would rather not take such risks. But now, all of the heavenly treasures on me, including the heaven-step Demon God Bone and Twinlife Thunder Crystal, have been used up. If I want to collect some more materials that can help me open the Gate of Pain then that will be easier said than done…”
Lin Ming didn’t want to ask the Forsaken God Clan for five or six million spirit essence stones’ worth of raw materials to make pills. The Forsaken God Clan themselves were limited to this dimensional realm and couldn’t leave. Thus they could only gather resources from here and their resources were also very tight. In this clan with countless geniuses waiting to use them, they were simply far too stretched.
Before, Lin Ming had received a shard of a top grade spirit essence stone from Shibai, and he hadn’t yet repaid this favor. This had always been floating somewhere on his mind. At this time, he couldn’t request so many resources, not to mention that the Forsaken God Clan most likely couldn’t afford it.
As Lin Ming mulled it over, there was only one kind of heavenly material that was extremely easy to obtain and didn’t have too poor a value. That was… Sea Serpent Crystals.
The sea serpent was a divine dragon that lived deep in the 8000 Mile Black Swamp. It absorbed the essence of the sun and moon, turning it into a gas that it released into the world. This sea serpent gas could be drawn into the Cosmic Melting Furnace and then refined using a special technique to obtain Sea Serpent Crystals.
The method of refining the Sea Serpent Crystals came from Demonshine; the martial artists of the Sky Spill Continent might not know of it. Moreover, in that sea serpent gas, most martial artists would already spend the majority of their time protecting themselves, so how could they possibly study the sea serpent gas to refine its essence?
When Lin Ming was crossing Life Destruction, he had used up a good number of Sea Serpent Crystals. He was deeply experienced with the formidable energy contained within them.
If he could use the Myriad Spirit Pill and add on several dozen more Sea Serpent Crystals, then his chances of opening the Gate of Pain would rise to over 90%!
An over 90% chance was more than enough. If he failed then he could only chalk it up to fate.
Of course, there was no small risk in going to the 8000 Mile Black Swamp. But this was actually a risk that Lin Ming had to take, because in order to break through to the second stage of Life Destruction, he had to return to there.
Although it would be much easier for Lin Ming to cross the second stage of Life Destruction, it was still more difficult than it would be for a pure essence gathering system martial artist. He would need to use a massive amount of energy to do so. Using pills for this energy would have negative effects, and there would be a great waste. It was far better to use the golden red lightning from the Nine Heavens Thunder Dominion.
When Lin Ming crossed into Life Destruction, he had exhausted all of the golden red lightning he had stored in the Heretical God Sprout. Now he had to go to the Nine Heavens Thunder Dominion to gather up some more golden red lightning.
“Mm? You want to go to train?”
Shibai didn’t think that Lin Ming would want to leave as soon as he left seclusion. Although Situ Yaoyue was currently held within the Forsaken God Clan, that was only enough to guarantee that the Asura Divine Kingdom wouldn’t publicly and blatantly kill Lin Ming. After all, if they wanted to kill Lin Ming now they could only send out a Divine Sea Supreme Elder to do so. But on the entire continent there were only around 100 Divine Sea masters, and it was easy to trace just what background they came from. If it wasn’t a Divine Sea Supreme Elder that was directly related to the Asura Divine Kingdom, who would take the risk of trying to kill Lin Ming and offending the future highest under the heavens?
But… if Lin Ming went out adventuring, especially in those inaccessible and far off danger zones, then that was a different story.
If Lin Ming’s whereabouts were to be discovered by the Asura Divine Kingdom, then they would spare no expense to secretly send Supreme Elders to kill him. In that sort of place, it would be impossible for the Forsaken God Clan to find enough evidence of who was responsible. It was impossible for them to execute Situ Yaoyue on the basis of some speculation. After all, there was always the danger of dying when one went out to adventure.
Shibai frowned, “You want to go out?”
“Yes…”
“Would it be a bad idea if I had my clansmen escort you?”
“It might not be a good idea…” Lin Ming shook his head. Not everyone could refine Sea Serpent Crystals; they had to use Demonshine’s secret method as well as have the Cosmic Melting Furnace and the Burning Star Flame. Moreover, the 8000 Mile Black Swamp was dangerous for any non-Divine Sea powerhouse.
“Alright, I understand…” As Shibai saw Lin Ming having firmly decided what he wanted to do, he didn’t argue any further. Since Lin Ming was able to arrive at this step today, he naturally had to have the ability to distinguish the danger of the situation, so he had to have his reasons for leaving now.
“My Forsaken God Clan has a hidden transmission array in this dimensional realm that directly connects to the outside world. I suspect that the outside has already been covered with spies from the Asura Divine Kingdom. If you use this transmission array to leave, that should reduce the risk of you being found to the minimum. But… this transmission should be used as little as possible. Once the energy is activated, there will always be the risk that it is exposed. Leave early and return as soon as possible. Be careful.”
“I understand. Senior Shibai, please feel relieved.”
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Lin Ming didn’t immediately leave. Instead, he took up the Great Desolate Blood Halberd and called Demonshine, asking him, “Demonshine, do you know what the curse on the Great Desolate Blood Halberd is?”
In this last year, Demonshine hadn’t followed Lin Ming, but instead stayed in the dimensional realm to restore his divine soul. In fact, with his current ability, there was very little assistance he could provide to Lin Ming.
Demonshine licked his lips and said, “The Great Desolate Blood Halberd is an ominous weapon that the Demon Emperor found near the edge of the Eternal Demon Abyss. The blood halberd is heavy like a mountain and also contains the strange curse of the Eternal Demon Abyss. Even the Demon Emperor was unable to remove it. When the Demon Emperor possessed the Great Desolate Blood Halberd, he also feared that he would be influenced by it. In fact, when the Demon Emperor ascended into the Divine Realm, his passage didn’t go smoothly at all…”
As for what the Demon Emperor had experienced 70,000-80,000 years ago, it was impossible to find out, or even begin to find out. But, what was certain was that the Demon Emperor had encountered a great catastrophe. The Demon God Imperial Palace had once been a sixth-grade sect that was located in a dimensional realm. However, an unparalleled war had erupted there and the entire dimensional realm was shattered apart, leaving behind the present broken world. Within a few thousand years, that world would finally collapse!
It had to be known that a dimensional realm would only collapse if the Realmheart was destroyed. And, the Forsaken God Clan’s Realmheart Great Hall was known as a structure that even the highest under the heavens could not break.
From this it could be seen just how powerful the Demon Emperor’s enemies had been. Moreover, for some unknown reason, the Cosmic Melting Furnace and the Great Desolate Blood Halberd had been left behind.