Innate Immortal Seed

Chapter 317: Chapter 315: Pink Crystal Shattering Jade Technique

’I never thought I’d succeed on the first try. Now I can finally call myself a Tier Three Refiner...’

Bai Zichen weighed the Mountain Stepping Stone in his hand, feeling he had chosen the wrong artifact to refine.

This kind of crude, common Low-Grade Magical Treasure was useless to Foundation Establishment Cultivators and scorned by Core Formation True Men.

Even if it were placed in the Secret Hall for newly advanced Core Formation True Men to choose from for free, few would give it a second glance.

’Oh well. This was just for practice, anyway. It’s not like I was trying to earn Spirit Stones with it.’

He tossed the Mountain Stepping Stone into a small stone grotto, and the sheer weight of the Magical Treasure caused it to sink several inches into the dirt floor.

He tossed it in with the Sound Bamboo Sword he had previously refined. He could give them to some junior disciples he took a liking to in the future, or just send the whole lot to the Artifact Refining Hall for some Contribution Points.

He took a stroll around the Jade Pool, listening to the crisp splashing of spring water against the rocks and feeling the cool droplets land on his skin.

Bai Zichen completely emptied his mind, thinking of nothing, allowing his Sea of Consciousness to relax.

’The high-intensity Visualization of the Glazed Fire Jade is already a heavy burden on my Sea of Consciousness. Add to that dividing my attention for Water Refining... Even if the Water Refining Technique is said to consume little mental energy, that’s only relative.’

After several hours, he let out a long breath, as if expelling all the fatigue from his chest.

’The best Spirit Tea in the Sect is only Tier Two Top Grade, which is nowhere near enough for me... Only Tier Three Spirit Tea can soothe the strain on my Divine Sense.’

In the entire Black Mountain Area, the highest-grade tea trees were the three Silver Needle Tea Trees in Red Leaf Valley, the main source of Spirit Stone income for the Red Leaf Fang Family.

There didn’t seem to be any High Tier tea trees planted in Hejian County either, making it difficult for Bai Zichen to get so much as a sip of Tier Three Spirit Tea.

After resting for a month and recovering his full mental vitality, he once again threw himself into the great undertaking of the Water Refining Technique.

This time, Bai Zichen chose to forge a Mid-Grade Magical Treasure called the Yin Yang Rod, a weapon with completely opposite attributes at either end.

The Yang Rod was scorching hot, its power like the blazing sun, capable of incinerating all it touched.

The Yin Rod radiated a ghastly Ghost Qi, its cruel, bone-chilling cold capable of reaping souls.

In terms of refining difficulty, the Yin Yang Rod was far more complex than the Mountain Stepping Stone; the difference was much greater than a single grade.

He used Daoist He’s Mourning Stick, which he had previously severed in two, as the main material for the Yin Rod. After rummaging through several Top-Grade Storage Bags for what felt like half a day, he found a piece of Jade Fire Crystal Iron to use for the Yang Rod.

This Magical Treasure was recorded in the Tier Four Refining Inheritance he possessed, which noted it as one of the more powerful Mid-Grade Magical Treasures.

If an Artifact Refiner was skilled enough to leave a channel for Yin and Yang conversion during the process, it could directly become a Top-Grade or even a supreme-quality Magical Treasure.

This would require an Artifact Refiner to not only be at the Tier Three Peak realm in their craft, but also possess a certain level of comprehension of the Yin Yang Path.

Bai Zichen, of course, didn’t dare to have such lofty ambitions. He only hoped to successfully forge a Mid-Grade Yin Yang Rod.

At this steady, step-by-step pace, perhaps in another decade or so, he could start attempting to refine a Tier Three Flying Sword.

The initial preparations alone took many days, as he used his Pill Fire to refine the two Spiritual Materials.

When the two sets of Spiritual Materials were cast into the Spiritual Spring, the water first let off plumes of white steam, its temperature becoming scalding hot.

Soon after, Yin Qi began to flow, turning the spring water bone-chillingly cold, as if one were in an ice cellar.

Within the Eye of the Spirit Spring, hot and cold alternated as Yin and Yang circulated.

Bai Zichen waited until the refining process for the Yin Yang Rod was on the right track before sitting down cross-legged.

In his Sea of Consciousness, alongside the Five Crystal Divine Iron that hung from the dome-like firmament like a field of stars, chunks of Glazed Fire Jade now also appeared.

They were like resplendent, colorful silks, dyeing the celestial dome with a swirl of mesmerizing colors.

The Five Crystal Divine Iron and the Glazed Fire Jade complemented one another. The once-illusory Glazed Fire Jade became more substantial, its form slowly transforming.

Three hundred sunrises and sunsets passed. The two Spiritual Materials in the Eye of the Spirit Spring failed at the final step of collision and fusion. The failure kicked up a violent Spiritual Energy Vortex, as if a giant boulder had been dropped into the Jade Pool.

The convergence of Yin and Yang had failed. The rare Spiritual Materials for the Water Refining Technique were utterly destroyed, a complete and total loss.

But a faint smile played on Bai Zichen’s lips; he didn’t seem to mind the failure to refine the Yin Yang Rod in the slightest.

Just yesterday, he had finally achieved initial mastery of the Glazed Fire Divine Body.

A body of Glazed Fire, capable of incinerating all things and impervious to all evils.

He immediately understood the true power of this Body Refining Realm and how vastly different it was from the temporary Glazed Fire Divine Body he’d gained by sacrificing his Second Layer of Glaze Body.

’This Light White True Flame I can now summon can bypass defenses and directly burn a person’s Divine Sense... And the most sinister part is that the flame uses Divine Sense as fuel, growing stronger the more it burns.’

Bai Zichen stared at the wisp of Light White True Flame in his palm. A dark golden light swirled within it, a detail one could only notice by paying extremely close attention.

’The Glazed Fire that others refine, including Brother Ge, follows the path of the Great Sun True Flame. None of them have undergone this sort of mutation. But mine is completely different. Could it be because I cultivate the Fire Dragon Returning Essence Scripture?’

In the entire history of the Qingfeng Sect, only three people had successfully cultivated the Glazed Fire Divine Body. The founding Ancestor and Master Ge Cang both followed the orthodox Glazed Fire path. But Bai Zichen’s had become the Platinum Glaze Fire, which burned Divine Sense.

With so few reference cases, it was impossible to say for certain what had caused this variation.

The wisp of Platinum Glaze Fire in his palm quickly dimmed and went out. Having just reached the initial mastery stage, he couldn’t yet command much of its power.

Cultivating the Fire Dragon Returning Essence Scripture to its highest realm already allowed one to transform into a Fire Dragon and spew Pure Yang True Flame, which was also capable of melting all things.

Since their destructive powers would have overlapped, the fact that the Platinum Glaze Fire had taken a different route—attacking and burning Divine Sense—was actually a better outcome for him.

At the same time, achieving the Glazed Fire Divine Body unlocked two new Divine Techniques for him to cultivate.

One was Close as the Palm of Your Hand, Far as the Ends of the Earth, which he had already seen Master Ge Cang use on multiple occasions.

It relied on a powerful physique to achieve an effect akin to short-distance teleportation, a perfect Divine Technique seemingly tailor-made for powerful Body Cultivators.

With this Divine Technique, if Bai Zichen ever again faced a Core Formation True Man who was running rampant in a confined space with an Escape Technique, he could catch them with absolute certainty.

With Close as the Palm of Your Hand, Far as the Ends of the Earth for short distances and Sword-Controlling Cyan Nether for long distances, it was becoming increasingly difficult for any Core Formation True Man to escape his grasp.

The other Divine Technique was the Pink Crystal Shattering Jade Technique.

This technique involved shattering the Five Crystal Divine Iron and the Glazed Fire Jade that he had spent countless hours of painstaking Heart Power to visualize within his Sea of Consciousness.

His Five Crystal Permanent Casting Body would shatter, inch by inch, transforming into the ultimate, ferocious Divine Power.

His Glazed Fire Divine Body would ignite completely, invoking the divine might of Celestial Fire to obliterate everything.

Besides resetting his Five Crystal Glaze Body realm to zero, the devastation wrought upon the user by the Pink Crystal Shattering Jade Technique multiplied with every breath it was maintained.

Even a cultivator at Core Formation Perfection could only endure for a hundred breaths at most. Any longer, and the outcome would be a crippled Cultivation and a completely shattered physical body.

Once the effects of the Pink Crystal Shattering Jade Technique wore off, only death awaited.

But during that time, the user would possess true Tier Four Power. They could essentially be considered an Early-Stage Nascent Soul Cultivator, albeit one without their own personal Realm.

’No wonder Brother Ge was so confident that any Nascent Soul Cultivator who came to Black Mountain would have to pay a price and couldn’t just do as they pleased...’

Bai Zichen muttered to himself. Just as he’d expected, the Glazed Fire Divine Body came with an incredibly powerful Divine Technique that allowed him to fight across tiers.

If he were to disregard his life from the very beginning, paying no mind to his body or Cultivation, he could even maintain the Pink Crystal Shattering Jade Technique for a full quarter of an hour.

If an invading Nascent Soul Cultivator was someone like True Monarch Jiulian—old and with little lifespan remaining—or the newly ascended Blood God True Man, who had just broken through and had yet to establish his Realm, he could make them pay a terrible price by catching them completely off guard.

A Core Formation True Man defeating a Nascent Soul True Monarch was an event so rare it might not be seen once in tens of thousands of years.

Merely being able to contend with and injure a Nascent Soul True Monarch was already the absolute limit of what a Core Formation True Man could achieve.

’Regardless, this Divine Technique is an absolute trump card, better than any Tier Four Secret Treasure... And as long as I keep the duration short, the only price is the destruction of my Five Crystal Glaze Body realm; the other side effects aren’t as severe.’

’If a true life-or-death day ever comes, who would care about the after-effects of the price? Securing one’s life is all that matters.’

’Trading the progress in a Body Refining Technique for temporary Nascent Soul-level power—I believe almost any cultivator would know the right choice to make.’

Bai Zichen waved his Daoist Robe, flicking the shattered remnants of the Spiritual Materials out of the Eye of the Spirit Spring. He no longer paid any mind to the Water Refining Technique.

He swallowed the Body Refining Elixir that Han Qing had painstakingly refined. The moment it touched his blood, it released an immense vitality that pulsed through every inch of his body.

Where it would have originally taken him sixteen years to completely master the Glazed Fire Divine Body, this Great Medicine would shorten that time to a mere six years.

At almost every moment, as the rhythm of the Great Medicine synchronized with the beating of his heart, he could feel his physical body growing stronger by leaps and bounds.

Within his body, wisps of Platinum Glaze Fire began to flow.

At first, they were just specks like shattered stars, mere threads of light.

Soon, they connected, eventually forming a cocoon of light that completely enveloped him.

「Six months later.」

Tong Huan came seeking an audience, but received no response and could only retreat.

「Two years later.」

Huo Feiyan came to the edge of the Jade Pool to kowtow and give a report, but she too was met with silence.

「Another two years passed.」

Zhou Suqing arrived with cultivators from the Array Hall to set up the Heavenly One Mysterious Ice Array at Ten Thousand Immortals Creek.

She paid him a personal visit, standing outside the Jade Pool for a full hour before gracefully departing.

She informed Tong Huan and the others that Master Bai was perfectly fine, merely cultivating a Great Divine Technique, and that he should not be disturbed for any trivial reason.

With the Dragon Turtle standing guard over Feiyue Lake, coupled with the Tier Three Grand Array, there was no need to panic even if besieged by several Core Formation True Men.

For instance, the last time Zhou Suqing had taken the initiative to attack a group of Corpse Stiffs, she hadn’t expected a Golden Armor Corpse to be hidden among them.

She was no match for the Golden Armor Corpse, whose strength was equivalent to an Early-Stage Core Formation Cultivator, and had been forced to flee back to Feiyue Lake in disarray.

But in truth, even when the Golden Armor Corpse led its horde of Corpse Stiffs to surround Feiyue Lake, they failed to break through even the outermost layers of mist from the Three Thousand Six Hundred Rings Water Smoke Array. Feiyue Lake itself was as impregnable as a fortress.

Therefore, even though Feiyue Lake was quite far from the Mountain Gate, Zhou Suqing had no worries about leaving it unattended, allowing her to successfully complete the deployment of the Heavenly One Mysterious Ice Array.

She had originally wanted to exchange insights on post-Core Formation cultivation with Bai Zichen. But as she approached the Jade Pool and saw him from a distance, she could sense he was at a critical juncture. Even though she hadn’t practiced the Five Crystal Glaze Body and couldn’t identify his technique, she knew the moment was crucial.

She had been about to leave directly, not expecting that Bai Zichen could still dispatch his Divine Sense from his body in such a state. This allowed the two of them to communicate.