A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality

The first thing Han Li realized about the rib bone was that it was obviously not the Sage Bone’s true rib bone. Its current form was merely a trick that the old devil had used to deceive the eyes of others. Without even mentioning the odd material that it had been created from, one could already tell it wasn’t any sort of magic treasure from the faint spiritual Qi that it released. However, there was no doubt that it was a man made item. But regardless of whether Han Li immersed it with spiritual sense or spiritual power, the rib didn’t respond in the slightest.

Han Li furrowed his brow and immediately recalled that the old devil had tread the path of a demon ghost. Perhaps this item required Yin Soul Qi in order to control it.

Although Han Li didn’t possess any Yin Soul Qi himself, he did have the Soul Congregation Bowl1 that he had acquired long ago. He had already consumed all of the Yin souls in order to refine his puppets, but the bowl itself still possessed a great amount of Yin Qi.

He took out the Soul Congregation Bowl from his spirit pouch, and casually stared at the pitch-black bowl in his hand before emitting a flash of blue light from his palm. A trace of Yin Qi then flowed into his body through his hand. After slowly circulating the Yin Qi throughout his body, he grasped the rib bone with his other hand.

Han Li rigidly started at the rib bone as it quickly became enveloped in a ball of icy, black Yin Qi.

The rib bone finally responded. The originally flawless white exterior of the rib bone started to turn black, absorbing the Yin Qi surrounding it, turning half white and half black.

Han Li wasn’t particularly surprised by this transformation; he merely raised his eyebrow at the sight. After closing his eyes in thought, Han Li sat up in his bed, suddenly emitting a blinding azure light from the hand holding the Soul Congregation Bowl. At the same time, ghostly wails could be faintly heard from his other hand, gathering an even darker cloud of Yin Qi around the rib bone.

The rib bone wildly devoured the Yin Qi without the slightest restraint. After the time it took to finish a cup of tea, the rib bone eventually turned completely black.

The bone suddenly began to release a low-pitched hum and emitted rays of pitch-black light, filling the room with a freakish, eerie aura.

Han Li hesitantly put away the Soul Congregation Bowl and relaxed his grip on the bone, allowing it to float from his hand. The Yin Qi that had surrounded the bone was then dispersed by the shock of the black radiance that it suddenly emitted.

Han Li’s gaze continuously flickered as he watched the bizarre scene.

Apart from the continuous low-pitched hums and flickers of radiance, the black bone no longer showed another other changes.

After a moment, Han Li’s expression stirred, and he suddenly beckoned towards it.

Woosh. The bone flew into his grasp. After taking another look at it, he immersed his spiritual sense into it. This time, his spiritual sense was no longer obstructed, allowing him to easily enter the rib bone.

As a result, black light flashed before his eyes, revealing a stream of huge ancient characters and pictures into his mind.

“Jade slip!” Han Li muttered with an expression of shock.

The bone was some sort of unique jade slip, something that he had previously guessed. After restraining the excitement in his heart, he started to earnestly analyze the words within.

“Profound Yin Arts!”

Han Li read through the first half of the words and found them extremely familiar. He was certain that he had read them before. Although he hadn’t personally cultivated this renowned Devilish Dao cultivation art, his avatar Crooked Soul had refined a derivative of it, the Divine Bloodlight. After reading through it, Han Li came to the conclusion that while the cultivation arts had many minor differences, as a whole they were largely the same. The rib bone jade slip actually contained the so-called Profound Yin Scriptures.

To tell the truth, Han Li was somewhat disappointed. Since he already cultivated the Azure Essence Sword Arts, he wasn’t about to foolishly abandon them to recultivate with this technique even if it did possess an overbearing power.

However, he didn’t immediately withdraw his spiritual sense from the Profound Yin Scriptures. The Devil Dao secret techniques that were contained in the second half were something that he could possible cultivate.

Soon after Han Li read through each of the unbelievable secret techniques, his original disappointment turned into surprise, then slight solemness, and finally, excitement.

The secret techniques were powerful and truly inconceivable. He was confident that once he cultivated the ninth layer of the Azure Essence Sword Arts and the suitable secret techniques of the Profound Yin Scriptures, he would be able to escape from any Nascent Soul cultivator that crossed his path. No longer would he be doomed to helplessly accept death if he encountered any of those Nascent Soul Eccentrics!

Among these secret techniques were Zenith Yin’s Heavenwide Corpsefire. As for the Heavenwide Demon Corpse, they were merely refined corpses that happened to be produced in the process of refining the Corpsefire.

Unfortunately, these secret techniques required the Profound Yin Arts as a cultivation base and required a cultivation at the Nascent Soul stage or higher. Otherwise, he would’ve definitely attempted to refine it for himself. After all, he had personally witness the ferocious power of the Heavenwide Corpsefire.

But even as powerful as it was, the weaknesses of the Heavenwide Corpsefire were made clear from its cultivation chant.

When Han Li saw this, he coldly chuckled. If Zenith Yin tried to use Heavenwide Corpsefire to deal with him in the future, Han Li would surely give him a nice surprise!

After looking through it for a moment more, Han Li was able to find three secret techniques that he fancied that a Core Formation cultivator to refine. He then committed them to memory until he could find the time to cultivate them.

Han Li carefully put away the small rib bone. Along with feelings of great satisfaction from what he had gained, he could feel his heart brimming with excitement.

It was then that Han Li recalled what he had originally planned. Han Li’s hand grasped onto the storage pouch containing the Heavenvoid Cauldron with his curiosity once again set aflame.

He instantly stood up from his bed and directly headed towards the hidden room in his cave residence.

If he could somehow manage to open the Heavenvoid Cauldron, he could acquire many ancient treasures, not to mention Heavenmend Pills. He would be able to substantially increase his strength.

With those thoughts in mind, Han Li began a routine where he would observe the Gold Threaded Silkworms every day before spending the rest of the day studying the Heavenvoid Cauldron. In addition, he would occasionally browse through all sorts of ancient jade slips in an attempt to find any hints regarding a way to open the cauldron.

Unfortunately, after half a month passed, Han Li had exhausted all the methods he could think of. He had no choice but to concede that the Heavenvoid Cauldron, the ranked one secret treasure in the Scattered Star Seas, wasn’t capable of being opened by a mere Core Formation cultivator such as himself.

The cauldron was truly impressive. Be it heat, water or any of the many treasures that Han Li had used, none of them were able to leave so much as a trace on the cauldron. Even a strike from his recently restored Divine Devilbane Lightning wasn’t able to scratch the Heavenvoid Cauldron.

As for other unconventional methods of opening the Heavenvoid Cauldron, Han Li had tried each and every one of them to only be met with failure.

In the end, Han Li could only place the Heavenvoid Cauldron back into his storage pouch and leave the matter be.

As for Han Li’s suspicion that the Heavenvoid Cauldron could be opened with the Celestial Ice Pearl, he didn’t dare to test it. The Celestial Ice Flames were an existence that inspired fear even in Nascent Soul cultivators. He fundamentally had no thoughts of attempting to refine and control the pearl until he reached either the Nascent Soul stage or perhaps late Core Formation. Han Li was still able to recognize his own limits.

During that half month, the two Gold Threaded Silkworms that consumed the rainbow beads showed no reaction in the slightest. They remained entirely the same as if the beads possessed no medicinal qualities at all. As for the tens of thousands of Gold Devouring Beetles Han Li had brought back with him from Heavenvoid Hall, they had already started cannibalizing each other en mass and were on the verge of laying new eggs, much to Han Li’s delight.

As of current, Han Li’s next matter at hand would be tempering his seventy-two Bamboo Cloudswarm Swords.

He didn’t plan on allowing the refined crystal that he had acquired on the Path of Molten Rock to go to waste either. He wanted to temper traces of the crystal into each of his flying swords. While he wouldn’t dare to proclaim his Bamboo Cloudswarm Swords as indestructible after the inclusion of the refined crystal, the number of items that could damage them in this world would be very few. It would prove to be quite advantageous in his future battles against high grade cultivators.

However, processing the crystal was an extremely grueling process.

As the item itself was an extraordinary material, Han Li reckoned that the crystal would require at least half a year to refine with the aid of formation spells. But if he were to run out of magic power halfway and interrupt the procedure, the crystal would be completely destroyed.

This was no joking matter!

Originally, he wouldn’t have dared to make an attempt with his measly early Core Formation cultivation, even with the aid of spiritual medicines. However, he now had the Myriad Year Spirit Milk. Although he had used a portion of it in his rush to Heavenly Star City, he still had more than enough to process the crystal.

Since he would encounter no small amount of danger in the nearby seas, it was imperative that Han Li tempered his flying swords so that he may withstand any dangers that he encountered.

1. Acquired in chapter 330, after Han Li slayed the head of the Black Fiend Sect.