Wasted Spiritual Root to Embark on Demonic Cultivation

Chapter 400

The Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain was of immense importance. It practically represented the orthodox lineage of the demon race within the Ice Prison Realm. The inheritance obtainable upon reaching its peak was by no means ordinary.

Wang Yu did not know whether it would be beneficial for breaking open this prison that was the Ice Prison Realm, but it would certainly allow him to maneuver successfully among the many demon kings. Once successful, his status would be entirely different.

He would go from being merely a cultivator proficient in alchemy to becoming an honored guest of the demon race. The Beast God inheritance might even help the northern demon race give birth to a Spirit Transformation Heavenly Demon.

If he handled the balance well and added appropriate incentives, he might even gain some rather capable allies.

Of course, all of this was still Wang Yu’s own speculation. Even if everything developed exactly as he imagined, variables could still arise. He both hoped the Beast God inheritance would be powerful, and hoped it would not be excessively powerful.

Once it involved top-tier Spirit Transformation existences, things might very well become troublesome. As these thoughts passed through his mind, Wang Yu bade farewell to the others and directly descended from the aerial platform, returning toward the Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain.

The treasure exchange continued.

However, several early fourth-rank shapeshifting great demons secretly followed him. This was not done out of malice, but rather as a form of supervisory protection.

It both prevented greedy demons from taking advantage of the situation to strike from the shadows, and ensured that Wang Yu would not deceive everyone and directly leave the depths of the Northern Severed Boundary Mountains.

“Trust between humans and demons is still lacking.”
After reaching this conclusion inwardly, Wang Yu originally intended to head straight for the fifteenth-layer platform. But as he passed by the Heart Beast Tower, he suddenly paused, stopping once more before the tower gates.

Before he could speak, a familiar aged voice sounded.

“Young friend, do you have something you wish to ask?”

“Senior sees all.”

Not long after, the same old man who had been acquainted with Lei Yao earlier appeared. Wang Yu naturally addressed him as Third Master.

“Third Master, may I ask whether anyone, human or demon, has ever reached the summit of the Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain?”

The old man stroked his beard and studied Wang Yu for a moment.

“Of course there have been.”

“Then does the inheritance at the summit involve a Spirit Transformation venerable? It is said that this mountain was left behind by the Beast God to strengthen the demon race’s future generations. If this junior rashly reaches the summit, could it cause unnecessary trouble?”

It was not too late to ask at this point. The old man would no longer think Wang Yu was speaking arrogantly. His performance over the past two months was more than enough to prove his strength and potential.

The fifteenth layer was only three layers away from the eighteenth.

Throughout history, this already placed him among exceptionally outstanding prodigies.

After all, although the Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain did not restrict the race of those who challenged it, it was ultimately a holy land of opportunity that favored the path of the physical body. In this regard, the demon race possessed an innate advantage.

After some thought, the old man explained.

“You do not need to worry about that. Since you have signed the contract, once you obtain the inheritance, leaving behind a copy in the Heart Beast Tower will ensure complete safety.”

Wang Yu raised an eyebrow.

“And if I privately pass it on to others? For example… the Heavenly Roc Clan?”

The old man fell silent for a long time.

“It is not impossible. The inheritance granted by the Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain will certainly be the most suitable for you. Others may also cultivate it, but it will not match their physical bodies as well as it does yours.”

“So that’s how it is.”

There were things Third Master did not say outright, but Wang Yu understood clearly.

This was ultimately a demon race inheritance ground. The techniques granted would most likely be demon race methods. In a better scenario, it would be a supreme art, with a bestowed treasure bone as the scripture.

In a worse scenario, it would be an inherited demon art that required demon bloodlines to cultivate.

He could use the matter of obtaining the inheritance to gain a higher “political” status among the northern demon race, but he would also need to be careful not to leak the inheritance’s contents.

“As for the Heart Beast Tower, this junior believes all the elders here are people of their word.”

“Naturally. Since you covet the summit opportunity, do not delay any longer. Go early and return early.”

This Third Master had already tacitly acknowledged that Wang Yu could reach the summit.

From this, it was clear that the elders of the Heart Beast Tower held him in extremely high regard. He was already comparable to the top tier of peerless geniuses produced by the Ice Prison Realm since the birth of the cultivation world.

Famed throughout the realm was nothing more than that.

He also had competition with the demon race and the Holy Lord Heavenly Palace. Infiltrating the northern demon race in advance carried enormous benefits.

The brief conversation ended.

Wang Yu returned to the fifteenth-layer platform. After warming up slightly, he prepared to face the sixteenth layer’s trial. This layer was an illusionary combat trial.

The moment he stepped onto the stone stairs, his mind sank into an environment resembling a tranquil heart-lake. His opponents were outstanding youths of past generations who had left behind power imprints on the Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain.

Their strength was at the same realm as Wang Yu.

Combat within the illusion was no different from the outside world, but death within the illusion would not destroy the soul. Failing a battle would simply cause one to lose a single opportunity to challenge.

There were three opportunities.

And he was still using his first.

Naturally, he would not fall at the very first stone terrace. Yet this divine mountain had one thousand and eighty stone steps on every level, and each step was over ten feet tall.

They looked like sheer cliff faces. With his human youth-sized body, climbing was the only option, and at first glance the whole thing felt bizarre beyond belief.

The first opponent was a massive lion wreathed in roaring flames.

Ancient Beast, Blazing Flame Lion.

It had once been regarded by the human race as an auspicious beast, possessing innate flames capable of incinerating ghosts and burning souls.

It was related by blood to the Evil-Suppressing Azure Lion. Wang Yu had only seen records of it in ancient texts. Being able to fight it within this illusionary realm naturally broadened his horizons yet again.

Moreover, as he continued advancing, every victory in battle brought about a slight increase in his mental strength.

According to the classification of the Mind Dao, after the Pure Serenity Realm came the Empty Self Realm, then the third realm, the Flawless Realm, and finally the Glazed Realm.

Only at that point could one be considered to have achieved minor success in the Mind Dao.

Wang Yu had already attained the Empty Self Realm many years ago. Although the Prajna Heart Sutra had never been placed into an Idle Slot, he would silently recite it after every killing to dissolve karmic obstacles.

It was a form of mental cultivation.

The progress was slow, but the mental strength it produced was incomparably pure and powerful. Aside from using a portion of it in certain Mind Dao related divine abilities, Wang Yu actually lacked secret techniques to fully convert this power into combat effectiveness.

The Asura Killing Heart within his mind lake was itself a phased result.

It reflected the state of his mental realm. The once blood-soaked, slaughter-driven beating heart gradually became extremely pure, even faintly flickering with specks of golden light.

These were all signs of an imminent breakthrough into a Flawless Heart.

The mind was difficult to cultivate.

Compared to refining qi or refining the soul, it placed even greater emphasis on talent and temperament. What Wang Yu did most often was follow his true heart. This unrestrained yet disciplined attitude was precisely why his mental strength grew so rapidly.

Now, within this illusionary mental battle, he gained yet another layer of tempering.

Fighting against the past geniuses whose imprints were etched into this mountain had an indescribable effect on tempering one’s Dao heart. It helped Wang Yu forge an even more core trait.

Battle.

The Asura Heart was not only about killing intent, but also battle intent, and never regretting.

This refinement and advancement even caused his Asura Killing Fist to show signs of evolving to a higher tier, while his understanding of divine ability intent grew increasingly profound.

Seven full days passed like this.

On the sixteenth level, Wang Yu advanced faster and faster, finally landing on the reward platform of that level. Beast Ancestor essence blood descended, granting pure qi and blood power.

It helped him rapidly increase the total volume of his Silver Blood Divine Marrow.

Silver light gradually seeped from his skull. An aura of indestructibility surged forth from his body, and his strength reached the peak of early-stage fourth-rank Body Refinement.

“Excellent!”

After the intense and satisfying mental battle, the seventeenth level transformed into the harshest punishment hell. Every step felt as though blades were slicing into his body.

It sought to annihilate his flesh and carve away all his blood and meat.

At this point, he needed to rely on the indestructible undying divine properties within his bones to resist. Through this antagonistic tempering, the increase in qi and blood was once again swiftly mastered by him.

The mountain-climbing trial was tightly interlocked. Not a single step was superfluous.

The eighteenth level was the final one.

It was also the simplest.

All one thousand and eighty stone steps were infused with the pressure of a supreme powerhouse. That oppressive force, far surpassing Nascent Soul cultivators, had absolutely reached the Spirit Transformation tier.

It could not deal destructive damage to the physical body.

Yet it rendered him unable to move even an inch. This was also a form of momentum, a mental suppression. Break it, and all suppression could be broken.

No matter how vast and overwhelming the pressure, one must still have the courage to draw a blade and face it. In terms of difficulty, this was actually inferior to the previous stages, but the meaning hidden within it was deeply thought-provoking.

“The Beast God… what kind of existence was it, exactly? And what state of mind did it possess when it left this mountain behind as a legacy?”

It truly inspired reflection.

Perhaps only one day, after breaking free from the cage and leaving the Ice Prison Realm for a vaster world, would the answer become clear.

On the final level, Wang Yu walked very slowly, like a block of ironstone being gradually polished into a drawn blade, steadily revealing its sharp edge. The divine light in his eyes grew so keen it could stab directly into another’s mind.

He walked for a full two months.

As the final step fell, a torrential aura suddenly erupted from within Wang Yu, sweeping away all obstructions and impurities. His mental strength surged explosively.

A Flawless Asura Heart fully condensed.

He officially stepped into the third layer of the Mind Dao, the Flawless Realm.

…

…

The summit of the Ancient Beast Ancestral God Mountain was utterly unremarkable, resembling a vast platform. Only at the very center stood a stone altar, upon which rested a humanoid Beast God statue.

It was entirely cast from bronze, with a beast head and human body.

Fire crows circled its form, twin dragons coiled beneath its feet. It struck a pose as if riding clouds and mist, holding a trident angled toward the heavens.

Like a general charging into battle, it carried an aura of ferocious, never-regretting battle intent.

After reaching the summit, Wang Yu slowly walked beneath the statue.

As he looked up, it was as if some mechanism had been triggered. His consciousness wavered, and he arrived in a legacy space resembling a sea of stars. Within the swirling stellar clouds, a gigantic hexagonal dragon-faced beast visage slowly emerged.

One ancient, one newly born.

The two regarded each other in silence. After a long while, the other party finally spoke.

“What era is it now?”

Wang Yu did not answer. A waning moon imprint flickered within his eyes.

The other party reacted in surprise.

“This is… a remnant divine soul… you are dead?”

The Beast God’s massive head let out a soft sigh.

“When the cunning rabbit dies, the good hound is cooked. Killing the donkey once the millstone is unloaded is nothing more than this. Knowing too much is of no benefit to you either. Young friend, could you tell this lord what era the outside world is in?”

“If we start counting from the Immortal Dynasty era, then senior should be someone from… a hundred thousand years ago? Perhaps. This junior is not very clear on the ancient histories.”

This was the truth.

Too many secrets were buried within the ancient records. What he knew was still only the tip of the iceberg. How many years each historical hegemon ruled the Ice Prison Realm remained without a definitive answer even to this day.

There had simply been too many breaks in history, and the passage of time was far too long.

That the Beast God’s remnant divine soul had persisted until now was itself astonishing. Wang Yu could not help but ask.

“May I ask, senior, can immortals attain eternal life?”

The Beast God, still savoring the immensity of time, shook his head.

“To mortals, a hundred years may be considered longevity. To cultivators, a thousand or ten thousand years is longevity.”

After pausing briefly, he continued.

“To immortals, a hundred thousand years or a million years counts as longevity. As for living forever… even I do not know.”

After some casual conversation, the Beast God spoke again.

“Your eyes are missing something. They are insufficient to escape this realm.”

Wang Yu frowned.

The lament expressed earlier by the Beast God’s remnant will was very clear. It strongly suggested he had been discarded by higher-realm immortals once he outlived his usefulness. What exactly he had done remained unknown for now.

Whether these words were true or not also required scrutiny.

After all, before reaching the mountain summit, Wang Yu had never expected to encounter the remnant will of such an ancient existence. Whether to believe or doubt could be decided later.

If he could extract more information now, it was all profit.

As Wang Yu was thinking, power gathered within the starry clouds and rapidly condensed into a palm-sized dark gray fragment. The Beast God said, “This is a fragment of a lunar core that I obtained long ago from the Sea of Realms. It can help you establish a true connection with the Taiyin Star. The concept behind this eye technique is not bad, but your methods are still far too crude.”

When Wang Yu received the lunar core fragment, he felt the surging Taiyin origin power within it. His eyes widened instantly.

A lunar core fragment.

A remnant left behind after the real moon shattered? That was probably too exaggerated. More likely, it was formed from the shattering of a projection of the Taiyin Star in another world.

As a supreme celestial body, the power it contained was far beyond what a Nascent Soul cultivator could wield.

After putting away this priceless treasure, Wang Yu expressed his thanks and continued asking.

“May I ask, senior, is there something wrong with the Spirit Transformation inheritance spread by the ancient demons of this realm? And above Spirit Transformation, what realm comes next? Is it immortality?”

The Beast God was extremely patient, answering each of Wang Yu’s questions.

“The ancient Demons… are not of the human race.

“They are enemies of the True Spirit Realm and are also powerful figures of the Demon race. Their demon souls were extracted by great experts of the Immortal Palace and eternally sealed within the Demon Suppression Hall. Their physical bodies were pressed into the lower realm, bound by the rules of the Heavenly Dao.

“The inheritance instinctively spread by their bodies is not flawed, but it carries extremely severe demonic corruption. Without a sufficiently strong Dao Heart to stabilize oneself, it is very easy to be tainted by demonic influence, fall into corruption, and lose one’s sense of self.”

In other words, if one’s mental and spiritual realm was high enough, it was indeed possible to resist this kind of assimilation.

As the Beast God answered, new questions continued to arise in Wang Yu’s mind.

An overwhelming amount of information was crashing against his worldview.

The Demon race. The True Spirit Realm. The Immortal Palace. The Demon Suppression Hall.

“Are demonic cultivators despised by the Immortal Palace?”

“No.”

The Beast God replied.

“Above Spirit Transformation is Void Refinement. Above Void Refinement is Body Integration. Above Body Integration is Mahayana. After that comes the Tribulation Transcendence realm. After enduring the Three Calamities and Five Declines, the Heaven, Earth, and Human Tribulations, and finally the Nine-Nine Immortal Ascension Tribulation, one may become an immortal.

“The Immortal Palace has immortals, and it also has demonic immortals.

“It follows the principle of teaching without discrimination. Whether demon, beast, or fiend, all may enter the Immortal Palace to seek the Dao. The situation of the True Spirit Realm is complex and cannot be explained clearly in a short time. If you can one day break free from the shackles of this place, you will naturally understand it all.”

The Beast God could be said to answer every question without reservation.

Such generosity in satisfying Wang Yu’s curiosity naturally came with a request. A streak of golden light flew out from the Beast God’s brow and landed in Wang Yu’s hand, transforming into a stone scale.

“In the future, when your eye technique cultivation is complete, cast this item into the void. That will be the price for answering your questions. Is that acceptable?”

“Alright.”

Rapidly digesting the information he had just learned, Wang Yu agreed without hesitation. It seemed the Beast God approved of the Taiyin Nether Eye’s effectiveness, and that affirmation greatly boosted Wang Yu’s confidence.

“There is one more matter I would like to ask senior to clarify.”

“Speak.”

“This junior has heard that outside the Ice Prison Realm there exists a Six-Eared Thief that can hear the voices of all living beings within the realm. I wonder…”

“Hahahaha. That is merely an Immortal Palace Dao Soldier, only at the Void Refinement realm. I will grant you a secret art and a legacy. If fate allows, we may meet again in the True Spirit Realm.”

The secret art was called [Six Senses All Veiled].

Its rank was difficult to determine, but with it, Wang Yu would be able to conceal himself far more effectively. He would no longer need to worry about being monitored when discussing matters of the Ice Prison Realm with other powerful figures.

As for the legacy, it was somewhat peculiar…