At the spot where the yellow speck of light had disappeared, a grey speck of light had replaced it.
This speck of light was far smaller than the yellow one and appeared to be extremely feeble, as if it could fizzle out at any moment. However, as soon as the grey speck of light appeared, it immediately began to move toward a certain direction.
Han Li was astonished to see this, and he couldn't just sit still and watch any longer.
Could it be that a wisp of that devil's soul escaped from the spatial storm? Even though he wasn’t sure just what this Jadebone Humanoid Devil was, the fact that even Spatial Tempering cultivators were scrambling to get away from it was a clear indication of just how fearsome it was. If it were still situated somewhere nearby, then there would be no end to his troubles.
From the speck of grey light on the silver screen, Han Li could tell that the thing that had escaped possessed extremely feeble spiritual pressure, which indicated that it was severely injured. As such, it shouldn't be very difficult to kill.
With that in mind, Han Li had arrived at a decision. He rose to his feet and left his cave abode as a streak of azure light, heading directly toward the location where the spatial storm had disappeared.
Moments later, he had arrived in the air above where the spatial storm once was.
As expected, the spatial storm had indeed disappeared. The small mountain had also disappeared along with it, leaving a massive crater over 1,000 feet in radius in its place.
Han Li skirted around the crater for a couple of laps but didn't detect anything amiss.
His brows furrowed as he stopped and hovered in mid-air before closing his eyes.
He released his powerful spiritual sense, which was not inferior to that of a Spatial Tempering cultivator, to encompass the surrounding area in a radius of over 500 kilometers, carefully searching through every single inch of land.
After just a short while, Han Li abruptly opened his eyes as a peculiar look appeared on his face.
After a brief moment of contemplation, he let loose a long cry, upon which brilliant azure light erupted from his body. He then shot forth toward a certain direction as a streak of azure light.
The azure streak of light only traveled for close to 200 kilometers before stopping in the air above a lush forest.
The light receded to reveal Han Li standing in mid-air with his hands clasped behind his back. Blue light then flashed through his eyes as he cast his gaze downward.
All of a sudden, he harrumphed coldly before grabbing the air down below with one hand.
An azure hand of light appeared beneath him, grabbing down toward a certain spot in the forest.
The hand emitted bursts of ringing sounds and even though it was only around 10 feet in size, it encompassed an area of over 100 feet down below, creating quite an intimidating sight to behold!
A streak of grey light suddenly shot forth from the forest beneath the azure hand before fleeing toward another direction.
Han Li seemed to have anticipated this, and he quickly raised his other hand to flick his five fingers toward the grey light.
Five red threads immediately flashed forth from his fingertips before disappearing into space.
In the next instant, the red threads reappeared before rapidly binding themselves around the ball of grey light.
The grey light immediately began to swell and shrink erratically as if it were trying to break free. However, Han Li had already made a hand seal as scorching crimson flames erupted from the five fiery threads, completely engulfing the grey light.
Anguished cries erupted from within the grey light and it seemed to be very feeble as it was completely eradicated by the crimson flames, revealing a pristine white object.
Han Li raised his eyebrows as he waved a hand downward expressionlessly. The flames on the surface of the object immediately receded, and it was forcibly drawn into Han Li's grasp.
Han Li focused his gaze on the object to find that it was a white bony hand with golden runes faintly shimmering over its surface.
He could tell from a single glance that this was one of the Jadebone Humanoid Devil's hands, but it was only at the size of a normal hand now.
Han Li carefully inspected the bone hand with his spiritual sense and his Brightsight Spirit Eyes, and the discoveries he made were quite astounding to him.
His spiritual sense revealed to him that this object was a treasure, and quite a powerful one at that. Meanwhile, his spirit eyes informed him that this was indeed the skeleton of a human hand.
This was a peculiar treasure that had been refined using human bones!
The grey light that was adhered to the surface of the treasure was a hint of spiritual nature, but it had been easily eradicated by Han Li's Fire Spirit Threads.
As such, this treasure was now nothing more than an inanimate object.
Most importantly, there was a white jade badge around an inch in size hidden within the thumb of this skeletal hand.
There was silver light shimmering on the badge, and there were also many glimmering silver runes carved on its surface, all of which were in the beveled silver text.
Han Li was able to quickly ascertain that this was one of the 72 outer pages of the Golden Jade Tome. Furthermore, it was a complete page, rather than a half-page like the one already in Han Li's possession.
Upon rough assessment, Han Li was able to decipher that this page seemed to include information regarding tool refinement.
Even though Han Li appeared to be quite calm and collected, he was ecstatic that he had stumbled across such a treasure.
However, now wasn't the time to carefully inspect the page of the Golden Jade Tome.
Spiritual light flashed several times in quick succession within Han Li's hands as he plastered a few restriction talismans onto the skeletal hand. He then carefully placed it into a jade box before immediately departing from the scene, returning directly to his cave abode.
Unbeknownst to Han Li, he had made an extremely wise decision in departing from that area so quickly.
Not long after he had snuck back into his cave abode, a formation suddenly appeared out of thin air above the spot where the spatial storm had once raged. Brilliant white light flashed as a shimmering golden ark emerged.
The ark was carrying two golden-armored Heavenly Guards, one with bushy brows and a cloth crown on his head, while the other was quite slender with a pair of thin delicate brows.
They were, respectively, a middle-aged man and a beautiful female cultivator.
"This is definitely the location that showed up on the All-Encompassing Disk. From the looks of the residual spatial fluctuations, the spatial storm appeared to have been quite a small-scale one and could've just been the result of a rare natural phenomenon."
"Hmm, it did indeed appear to be a rather small and relatively harmless spatial storm, and it seemed to have only lasted a short time. Otherwise, it would've done more than just raze that small mountain to the ground." The male cultivator nodded in response while examining everything in the surrounding area with his spiritual sense.
Chapter 1351: Hundred Meridian Refinement Mantra
The female cultivator frowned and said, “However, the space here was very stable before. It previously showed no signs of eruption. How can a spatial storm suddenly appear? Who is the cultivator residing in the nearby area?”
The man twirled his beard and calmly answered, “What is so strange? Small scale spatial fluctuations were always hard to predict. The Gold Court Boat may be wondrous, but they can’t predict them all. As for the master of the area, the land was recently acquired by a Deity Transformation cultivator. He should be a dark azure guard.”
The woman held a sparkling spell plate in her hand and fiddled with it a moment. Then with a frown, she suggested, “The Foreign Spirit Plate didn’t acquire the aura of any foreign tribes. It seems there aren’t any hiding here. Should we call the nearby dark azure guard and interrogate him? He might have something to do with the spatial storm.
”
The cultivator shook his head and spoke with a solemn expression.“Why is there any need to go through the trouble? So long as a foreign being isn’t here, it has nothing to do with us, even if the spatial storm is suspicious. Don’t forget that we have many other tasks to attend to. The Yin Yang Plate anticipates a large-scale spatial storm occurring in another area.”
After some hesitation, the woman giggled and agreed, “Brother Ma’s words are reasonable. I was too attached to this matter. Let’s go.”
The man nodded in satisfaction and flew back to the Gold Court Boat in a yellow streak.
The woman looked around her and soon boarded the boat.
A short moment later, the Gold Court Boat blurred and vanished. A teleportation formation of light briefly appeared underneath it before scattering.
Unbeknownst to Han Li in his cave residence, two Spatial Tempering heaven guards had examined the storm in a short amount of time. They even hurriedly left without interrogating him.
For the sake of carefulness, he immediately sealed his cave residence once it returned and temporarily halted monitoring on all of his Myriad Dragon Beads to avoid any expert from seeing through them.
After that, he headed straight to his secluded chambers and began to research his newly acquired bone hand.
Although the bone hand was peculiar as if it had been refined in a method he hadn’t seen before, Han Li didn’t pay much attention to that regard.
Instead, he bluntly spat out a golden sword that was several inches long.
The small sword trembled and fine golden lightning quickly coiled around the bone hand. The hand’s thumb was then silently split into two.
The inch-long jade badge appeared from it and it trembled before flying off of its own accord.
Han Li already anticipated this and easily grabbed at the air, activating an invisible restriction and firmly trapping it in his grasp.
With the pure white jade badge in his hand, he began to examine it with flickering blue eyes.
There were silver rune characters on the jade badge that reminded him of when he first made contact with the path of tool refinement. It contained knowledge that undermined most of what he understood about tool refinement and it greatly captured his interest.
However, the silver runes greatly differed from the ordinary ancient script. Were it not for his diligent study of the half page, he wouldn’t have been able to understand anything about the true spirit runes.
As a result, Han Li promptly entered the seclusion room with the outer page of the jade book and spent three days studying it before obtaining a general understanding of it.
In addition to an elaborate introduction to tool refinement techniques, its primary contents detailed a technique by the name of the Hundred Meridian Refinement Mantra.
This technique used the person’s meridians, flesh, and bones as a base, refining them into different magic treasures of inconceivable abilities.
Were it not for the tool refinement techniques he read from the half page, he would’ve believed what he read to be nonsense.
Additionally, the passage on tool refinement preceding the passage gave him flashes of new insights, leading him to gain more confidence in this technique.
Besides, from the bone hand he managed to acquire, it was clear that it was a product of this technique. How else was a bone hand able to escape a spatial storm of its own accord?
According to what the jade book said, those cultivating this ability would be able to forge their bodies into treasure entirely at once, or could slowly cultivate the ability bit by bit. But regardless of the method, the final product will have one’s body completely refined into a Buddhist Impervious Vajra Body.
After that secret technique was completed, regardless of one’s own cultivation, their limbs would possess world-shaking abilities and their bodies would approach near immortality.
Although the jade book described the completion of this technique in a few simple words, Han Li was able to perceive deeper information it contained and felt his breath turn cold.
Even if the text was exaggerated, the abilities were as fearsome as one could imagine.
Naturally, this method to cultivate one’s body into treasures also required nearly inconceivable requirements.
To start cultivating this technique, one needed a body like Han Li’s, which went through the completed cultivation of the Vajra Arts. If he wanted to continue cultivating this technique further and acquire the abilities that were described, he would need to strengthen his body even further.
If he attempted to continue cultivation while his body couldn't endure, his body would crumble.
After all, refining one’s body into treasures was a freakish matter bordering on heresy.
As he stroked the jade pendant, he spent a long while deep in thought.
Han Li sighed and muttered, “It seems I won’t have to look for any other techniques. I’ll need to choose a dual cultivation technique.”
With the appearance of the Hundred Meridian Refinement Mantras, it would push his body to its limits.
Originally hesitant on choosing a cultivation technique, he finally resolved himself and planned on using the set of revised human and demon techniques for dual body magic cultivation.
He stuck a restriction talisman on the jade page and placed it away in his storage pouch. He then took out a faint red jade slip.
When Han Li acquired Man Huzi’s Heavenbearing Devil Arts, he duplicated entirely on that jade slip. After leaving it alone for such a long time, he nearly forgot about it.
“Since this technique is split into three portions and are all unique, I may as well call them the Provenance True Devil Arts.”
As Han Li swept his spiritual sense past the jade slip, he softly muttered to himself and struck the jade slip on his forehead and he shut his eyes, earnestly comprehending the technique.
The last time he was at Deep Heaven City’s stone pagoda, he already attempted to cultivate this devil arc slowly, but without the aid of medicine pills, he didn’t acquire many results.
As a result, in the following months, Han Li spent the majority of his time in his secluded room. He did take some time to tend to his spirit medicines and began to refine Clear Jade Pills.
The pill was indeed for Deity Transformation-stage. After using an astonishing amount of spirit medicines and a good number of attempts, he was only able to produce three bottles.
Han Li didn’t mind this result by much.
He would gain more skill by refining it more. With enough time, his success rate will increase.
The amount of medicine he refined would be enough for him to cultivate.
Of course, while he cultivated the Heavenbearing Devil Arts, he would also find some time to comprehend the Hundred Meridians Refinement Mantra.
As such, his rest period was concluded in the blink of an eye.
During this time, no one else had come to bother him. It appeared that without any benefit, those Spatial Tempering eccentrics had no reason to waste their time on him.
Han Li was satisfied with this result.
With the half-year rest period almost finished, an azure streak shot out from the gorgeous miasma and it circled in the air before heading back to Deep Heaven City.
He needed to take part in the three-month patrol assignment before he could return to his cave residence and continue cultivation.
Three months later, Han Li returned without incident.
He immediately returned to his cave residence and began seclusion once more.
With half a year of cultivation, he emerged once more.
Time slowly passed by in this manner, and eventually, sixty years proceeded in a blur.
This amount of time didn’t amount to much for a cultivator, but this time, there was a hidden undercurrent flowing through the spirit realm. The higher echelons of various clans frequently gathered together in discussion. These clans were normally well informed and could predict when somethi
ng disastrous was about to occur, but they still remained apprehensive as they began to put safeguards in place.
As the frontmost area for the human and demon races, Deep Heaven City was able to sense any strange changes. At the very least, the cultivators patrolling on the outside could sense this vast chance as well.
One day, floating above a swamp, a squad of cultivators were slowly flying forward.
An old man with a short beard wore azure armor flew among them, leading the group of ten black-armored cultivators.
Be it the old man or the black-armored guards, they all wore heavy expressions. With the Foreign Spirit Plate in hand, they continued to look around them as if they feared something could attack them at any time.
The squad didn’t see anything after carefully flying for two hours, but then one of the guard’s plates began to drone.
Despite its soft sound, everyone immediately looked at it with shock.
A large man with the fierce expression looked at the white light shining on his companion’s Foreign Spirit Plate and couldn't help but shout, “We’ve discovered another foreign being! This happens too frequently. What tricks are they up to? Do their spies not fear death to come onto our border. Two of our members already died in the last battle.”
A middle-aged woman shorted and coldly said, “We’re still better off. I heard that half a year ago the fourth squad encountered a being from the Cave Hollow Tribe. As a result, most of them died, including their captain.”
Chapter 1352: Green Shadow
The azure-armored old man frowned and commanded, “Since the Foreign Spirit Plate has already sounded an alarm, we’ll need to investigate or else we’ll be punished when we return. Most foreign beings aren’t very powerful. So long as we’re careful, we should be able to take care of it smoothly.”
Since their Deity Transformation captain spoke, the rest of the squad kept silent, even if they were unwilling.
Soon after, the old man uttered a series of commands and the squad immediately split into several small groups before heading in the direction pointed by the Foreign Spirit Plate.
A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality c1-2248 Page 754