A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality c1-2248

by Translator: Johnchen

  Han Li’s heart sank and he hurriedly opened his mouth, shooting out a dense bolt of golden lightning. The golden light slightly flickered for a moment, but they didn’t sustain any damage. At that moment, the golden light had become interwoven with his red-yellow light barrier. The barrier started to sway as if it were about to be penetrated by the golden light.

  Han Li’s face paled as he suddenly waved his jade scepter and madly poured spiritual power into it. The yellow-red light barrier shimmered with light and its color soon became an illustrious silver, repelling the golden light with its complete strength.

  When Wen Tianren saw this, he revealed surprise, but soon a trace of hostility appeared within his eyes. He formed an incantation gesture with his hands and his small mirrors suddenly pointed at the top of Han Li’s head, the golden light converged above Han Li and started to turn into balls of golden flames.

  Wen Tianren became completely solemn. His hands unceasingly formed various complex incantation gestures and he began to mutter an incantation.

  He soon opened his mouth and spat out several balls of pure blood essence. Each mouthful of blood left him slightly more pale. When each of the balls of blood essence entered the golden flames, his complexion had turned deathly pale and blood could no longer be seen from his face. However, the eight golden flames had instantly flared with immense light, increasing their pressure several fold.

  Wen Tianren coldly glanced at Han Li and eerily said, “You are worthy enough to die from the Divine Golden Flames. With your cultivation, it’d be quite remarkable for you to last most of an hour.”

  Without any further hesitation, he pointed to the eight golden flames that were above Han Li, and had them drop down from above him.

  Han Li was immediately submerged in the golden flames.

  Wen Tianren’s figure blurred and appeared above the golden flames in a cross-legged meditation position. Afterwards, he began to form extremely strange incantation gestures, and released a faint gold thread from his horn into the flames. At the same moment as Han Li was enveloped in flames, Wen Tianren slowly closed his eyes.

  Beyond expectation, Han Li remained calm and stared at the golden flames surrounding him with a solemn expression.

  After the golden flames had appeared, he began to circulate the spiritual power within his body at six times the normal speed in order to sustain the silver light barrier. Otherwise, it would’ve dispersed underneath the flames.

  It appeared that Wen Tianren wished to use the golden flames to exhaust Han Li’s spiritual power and turn him to ash. He would’ve taken a moment to inspect just how powerful the jade scepter shield were if he didn’t fear that the golden flames would take his life.

  The Divine Golden Flames were truly unordinary. Although they weren’t as powerful as the Celestial Ice Flames, let alone the Sacred Asura Flames, they were still on the same level as Zenith Yin’s corpsefire.

  Han Li was inwardly analyzing exactly how powerful the golden flames were.

  Chapter 576: The Ghost Mist Appears

  Were it a common late Core Formation cultivator, they wouldn’t be able to withstand the golden flames for even a quarter of an hour!

  However, Han Li was anything but common!

  At that moment, he stared at the golden flames surrounding him with a frown and slapped his storage pouch, taking out a small bottle.

  Han Li glanced at the small bottle and let out a sigh. It was the Myriad Year Spirit Milk he had just acquired, and it already appeared that he wouldn’t be able to last much longer without it.

  It was quite the cruel joke. Had he not acquired the spirit milk from Yuan Yao, he would’ve found himself in a dead end. But at the same time, were it not for this spirit milk, he wouldn’t have encountered Wen Tianren, a disciple of Archsaint Six Paths, and be in this situation!

  Han Li felt extremely conflicted about how this situation had developed.

  According to current situation, he was currently losing, but with the half bottle of Myriad Year Spirit Milk, he felt completely secure. Regardless of the golden light that trapped him or the golden flames that scorched around him, Wen Tianren was incapable of persevering without paying a heavy cost. If Wen Tianren wanted to compete in a battle of endurance, then victory assured for Han Li. Wen Tianren’s own actions were about to doom him!

  With that thought in mind, a sneer momentarily appeared on Han Li’s face before he sat down inside the light barrier, preparing his counter attack once Wen Tianren had exhausted himself.

  Consequentially, a baffling scene transpired. The air that had recently been filled with rolls of thunder and flashes of dazzling light had suddenly turned serene and peaceful. Wen Tianren and Han Li were both sitting down, forming their own incantation gestures in silence. However, the ten meter tall golden flames continued to burn.

  When Fairy Violet spirit saw this, her luminous eyes shifted and she inwardly sighed.

  From what she saw, Han Li was bound to be defeated as he was trapped within the golden flames. Although Han Li currently had a silver light barrier around him, she believed it would only provide temporary protection at most.

  She stood there while wearing a complicated expression, but she had no intention of stepping forward. It appeared she didn’t intend to take any action until the battle between the two of them was concluded.

  At that moment, the Mei siblings, Old Man Zhao and the other low grade cultivators were grouped together about fifty kilometers away from the island. Although they were too far away to see Han Li’s battle with Wen Tianren, they were able to see the brilliant flashes of light in the distance and hear the deafening explosions. This alone had left them greatly alarmed.

  They had mistakenly believed that this was caused by a battle between the Core Formation cultivator on the island and the white silhouette. As such, they hadn’t dared to leave, but now that all signs of fighting had disappeared, they were all left in dismay. They didn’t know who was victorious or if something unexpected had occurred. Since they still didn’t dare to rashly depart, they could only force themselves to stay put.

  On the other side of the island, the beautiful female cultivators that had been escorting the carriage were also whispering to each other with apprehension.

  Although they were all the personal maids of Wen Tianren, they were no different than true concubines and were treated favorably by him. On that note, if something were to happen to Wen Tianren, their fates were already sealed once they returned.

  However, because Wen Tianren had given them orders to remain at the carriage when he approached the island, these concubines didn’t dare to rashly take action.

  ...

  Time slowly passed while the confrontation continued.

  Day eventually turned to night and night turned to early morning. Nearly an entire day passed in complete silence as if yesterday’s battle had never even occurred.

  At that moment, both groups of cultivators on either side of the island were impatient and filled with doubt as other cultivators were beginning to appear nearby.

  After an entire day of having the heavenly omen above the island, word spread that a peculiar treasure had appeared on this small island. Naturally, cultivators began to appear nearby. A vast majority of these cultivators were at Foundation Establishment stage but there were also a few overly confident Qi Condensation cultivators mixed in.

  These people began to arrive at the island from every direction. When they grew near, they discovered Old Man Zhao’s group along with the female cultivators around the carriage.

  Those who met Old Man Zhao and the Mei siblings were better off. As Old Man Zhao and the Mei siblings were quite well connected, many cultivators came to them to find out what had happened.

  After these cultivators heard that Core Formation cultivators had already entered the island, they apprehensively muttered to themselves and gathered near the old man’s party, holding no foolish thoughts of rushing the island.

  As for the cultivators on the ot
her side of the island that chose to speak to the beautiful female cultivators next to the carriage, the female cultivator in charge had taken out a banner of the Starfall Coalition without any reservations and immediately threatened them. Each of these cultivators immediately turned tail with pale faces. Since the Starfall Coalition cultivators were participating in whatever was happening on the island, nothing good would come about from staying around.

  After more time had past, two Core Formation cultivators eventually arrived. They were travelling together, and one of them was the deputy island lord of Bright Emperor Island. These two arrived on the side with Wen Tianren’s maids, and naturally questioned them with baffled expressions.

  Because the two were Core Formation cultivators, the female cultivators didn’t dare to slight them. The female cultivator in charge casually mentioned Wen Tianren’s name to them as she answered.

  The two Core Formation cultivators were shocked upon hearing his name. While Bright Emperor Island was considered neutral, they didn’t dare to provoke the overbearing power of either the top figure of the Devil Dao or the Starfall Coalition. After casually mumbing some sort of excuse, the two immediately flew back from where they came.

  What a joke! Although they didn’t even know whether or not a treasure existed on this island, since a disciple of Archsaint Six Paths had arrived, they naturally had no thoughts of involving themselves. Since the young master had yet to return after approaching the island, if something had truly happened to him and they became involved, then they’d be just be heading to their deaths.

  Although a small portion of cultivators were scared away by the Starfall Coalition’s reputation, about forty cultivators had gathered around the island from other directions. When they weren’t able to detect any Core Formation cultivators nearby, they rushed in.

  These cultivators harbored sinister designs of their own and weren’t about to leave the island of their own accord. They planned to take advantage of the current chaos for their own benefit.

  As the black cloud above the island continued to swirl, it had already spread out to cover the entirety of the small island, blocking all the light from shining onto the island.

  A dark green beam of light suddenly shot up from the island towards the Yin clouds. At that moment, the clouds furiously roiled for a moment then began to slowly descend and remained about four hundred meters above the island before becoming serene.

  The emergence of these pitch-black clouds had given the impression that a tempest was about to approach.

  The heavenly omen’s transformations shook the hearts of the cultivators nearby. However, a few of the more quick witted ones felt delight as they believed the green beam of light to be the sign for the emergence of a treasure.

  These cultivators were suddenly overwhelmed with greed and glanced at each other for a moment before flying towards the island in groups of ten. They believed that with so many Foundation Establishment cultivators joining hands, even a Core Formation cultivator wouldn’t be able to make light of them.

  As for the portion of cultivators that hadn’t joined, they were extremely calm and examined the other’s actions with detached gazes. Since there were others willing to scout the path ahead, they were happy to sit back and watch before taking action.

  At that same time, Wen Tianren’s maids were no longer capable of just waiting and approached the island with the carriage in tow.

  Unbeknownst to all these people was that deep within the oceans near the small island, a strange black light started to shine after an appearance of a slim black crevice. Soon after, countless threads of pitch-black Qi emerged from the crevice forming into a mist.

  This pitch-black mist was only about ten meters wide at the start but it quickly began to expand. In only a short moment, it had already spread to an area of five hundred meters and continued to grow. Not only could ghostly wails be faintly heard from within the fog, but there were unceasing flashes of bizarre black lightning. Even more strange was how the nearby sea creatures were drawn into the black mist like moths to the flame.

  An instant later, all life in the nearby seas had already been swept clean, but nevertheless, the black mist continued to expand as if it were unsated.

  One kilometer, two kilometers...

  It eventually began to emerge from the ocean’s surface, allowing it to be clearly seen by those present. When everyone saw this, they became numb with fear.

  From the looks of it, the mist would soon spread across the small island.

  Everyone on the island, including Han Li, were at a loss as they watched its progress.

  Chapter 577: Indescribable Danger

  Inside the silver light barrier, Han Li raised his head and took a drop of spirit milk before glancing down at the small bottle with a pensive expression.

  It was the morning of the next day and he had now taken his fifth drop of spirit milk, but the golden light outside the light barrier still didn’t show the slightest sign of weakening. The flames, however, had begun to shrink. It seemed Wen Tianren wouldn’t be able to sustain them for much longer, and Han Li would be able to escape fairly soon.

  With that in mind, Han Li’s hand flashed with white light and he calmly placed the bottle back into his storage pouch. He then glanced at the Yin clouds in the sky and unconsciously frowned.

  He had clearly seen the beam of green light shooting into the skies from the direction of the valley that seemed to have been caused by Yuan Yao’s spell ritual. Although he didn’t know what had specifically happened, based on the black clouds lowering down, it appeared that the Soulrise Technique had yet to finish.

  As quickly as these thoughts appeared in Han Li’s mind, he buried them. He couldn’t afford to be concerned with anything else until after he escaped the prison of golden light.

  After taking a deep breath, he felt his magic treasures begin to surge with excitement. At that same moment, the silver wings could faintly be seen once more from his back.

  Floating above the golden flames, Wen Tianren no longer appeared as proud as when he had initially trapped Han Li. Instead, his face had begun to pale and a layer of faint black Qi had started to form. The golden horn on his forehead also appeared to be an inch shorter than the day before.

  Wen Tianren gloomily scowled, but his heart brimmed with furious alarm as a faint trace of dread began to take hold.

  When he had taunted Han Li that he would only be able to withstand the flames for an hour at most, he had been exaggerating. Knowing precisely how powerful the Divine Golden flames were, he had honestly believed that it would’ve been difficult for Han Li to persevere for even half an hour. As such, he had been willing to expend a bit of his Origin Qi to eliminate Han Li and prevent him from becoming an even greater problem in the future.

  But an hour later, Han Li still showed no signs of wavering, somewhat surprising Wen Tianren.

  When it had reached two hours, Wen Tianren was alarmed to find that Han Li had yet to turn to ash.

  After four hours, Wen Tianren had started to feel trepidation after seeing how Han Li still endured.

  He faintly felt that he had made a mistake, as Han Li hadn’t shown any fear at the prospect of contesting his magic power with Wen Tianren’s own. It was clear that Han Li either possessed some kind of item that allowed him to quickly replenish his magic power or had some other mysterious ability. According to what he knew, the only item that could allow this kind of replenishment of magic power was the extremely rare Myriad Year Spirit Milk. Could it be that Han Li truly possessed some?

  Wen Tianren quickly found his guesses to be true.

  However, he had reached the point where he could no longer afford to stop. With a majority of his apex devil incarnations already eliminated and his unrestrained use of the Golden Mirrors of Eight Gates, he had greatly exhausted his cultivation. If he were to let Han Li go, it wasn’t likely for him to win.

  However, Wen Tianren was aware that given how rare the Myriad Spirit Milk was, ordinary c
ultivators couldn’t possibly possess all that much. As a result, he had resolved himself to continue to exhaust his true essence and continue his attempt to roast Han Li in the Divine Golden Flames.

  The current damage to his true essence would take at least thirty years of secluded cultivation to repair.

  With each passing moment, Wen Tianren’s complexion grew slightly paler, while the silver light barrier appeared as dense as ever. Wen Tianren wouldn’t be able to persist for much longer.

  He didn’t know how much spirit milk Han Li had left and he was still stuck in a deadlock. As he desperately searched for a method to breakthrough his plight, something eventually came to mind.

  Wen Tianren pursed his dry lips and coldly commanded, “Violet Spirit! Go over to where he came from and capture his Dao companion. That person should be at a crucial moment in the ritual and should be incapable of resisting you.” His originally refined appearance was now completely gone, revealing a trace of sinister malice.

  When Fairy Violet Spirit heard this, her expression changed. This battle was truly beyond the scope of reason. She had originally believed that Han Li wouldn’t be able to persist for long, but he had remained unscathed throughout the entire night. Instead, Wen Tianren was now in a difficult situation, much to her surprise.

  After hearing his command, she was startled for a moment before realizing his intentions.

  This young master of the Starfall Coalition intended to use the woman conducting the ritual to force Han Li into submitting! Since Han Li had agreed to act as her protector, their friendship should run deep. However, being forced to use this shameful method only further illustrated that the disciple of Archsaint Six Paths had truly reached his absolute limit.

  Fairy Violet Spirit quickly recovered her ice-cold expression and silently remained in place.

  A cold glint ran through Wen Tianren’s eyes and he sinisterly said, “What? Could it be that you believe that because of how damage my cultivation is that I cannot take your life? Or is it that you’ve always wanted to defect from the coalition ever since you were forced to join? Don’t forget that the Starfall Coalition rules over half of the Scattered Star Seas, and you are only an early Core Formation cultivator, so where could you possibly run? Obediently follow my orders, and I will turn a blind eye to your disloyal inaction.”