Chapter 45 – Teleportation to Ten Thousand Immortals Island
by spirapiraChapter 45 – Teleportation to Ten Thousand Immortals Island
The moment he stepped into the Qi Refining stage, Li Fan felt the earth-shattering changes within his body.
Spiritual energy surged and circulated within him, silently and gently improving his already slightly aged physique.
The fine wrinkles on his face vanished, and his skin became smooth and supple once more.
A long-absent vitality surged through Li Fan, as though he had returned to his youth, brimming with boundless energy.
He had reversed his aging, and his constitution had been enormously strengthened.
Most importantly, Li Fan could finally command the spiritual energy of heaven and earth.
Wisps of spiritual energy danced under his control, shifting into various shapes.
Unfortunately, he was currently manipulating it on instinct alone. To use spiritual energy more efficiently, he would certainly need corresponding spells.
After experimenting for a while, Li Fan dispersed the spiritual energy in his hands and focused his attention on the 【Return to Truth】 panel.
Name: Li Fan
Realm: Early Qi Refining
Physiological Age: 47/199
Psychological Age: 510/2169↑
After breaking through to the Qi Refining stage, Li Fan’s maximum lifespan had reached the limit of one hundred and ninety-nine years.
The 《Five Spirits Qi Sensing Method》 had mentioned that although cultivators’ lifespans far exceeded ordinary mortals, compared to ancient times, they had been greatly suppressed.
A Qi Refining stage cultivator’s lifespan could not exceed two hundred years at most.
And Foundation Establishment cultivators could only live an additional hundred-odd years beyond that before reaching the end of their allotted time.
Only by achieving Golden Core—glimpsing the laws of heaven and earth—would one’s lifespan surge dramatically, reaching around five or six hundred years.
In contrast to his physiological age was his psychological age.
It had barely increased at all.
After all, it had already been greatly expanded through cultivating the Xuanhuang Heart-refining Mantra, so Li Fan was not particularly surprised.
Next, Li Fan retrieved 《The Jade Realm Thousand-Arts Golden Canon》 from the Taiyan Vessel.
He had obtained this Nascent Soul realm technique from Kou Hong long ago, but without spiritual sense, he had been unable to examine it.
Yet it had been weighing on his mind all this time.
Now that he had finally entered the Qi Refining stage, Li Fan could hardly wait to learn its contents.
“《The Jade Realm Thousand-Arts Golden Canon》, a Nascent Soul realm technique. Current number of cultivators practicing it: 0.”
As he picked up the jade slip, the technique’s description naturally appeared in his mind.
Li Fan knew this was another change brought about by the Great Heavenly Calamity—the restriction that prevented simultaneous cultivation of immortal arts.
His spiritual sense interfaced with the jade slip, and in an instant, countless words and images flooded into Li Fan’s mind like a tidal wave.
Reading a jade slip for the first time, Li Fan was still somewhat unaccustomed to the experience.
He felt as though a great deal of information had been crammed forcefully into his brain, and his temples throbbed faintly.
Fortunately, his spiritual sense was considerably stronger than that of an ordinary Qi Refining cultivator. He quickly adapted and returned to normal.
He settled his mind and concentrated, carefully studying the technique.
After a long while, Li Fan finally had a general understanding of it.
《The Jade Realm Thousand-Arts Golden Canon》 was a technique cultivated by the ancient Celestial Mysteries Sect.
In ancient times, the philosophy of unity between heaven and humanity was paramount.
The Celestial Mysteries Sect believed that all things in heaven and earth, just like humans, possessed their own consciousness.
This was imperceptible through ordinary means.
But just as a person harboring killing intent would emanate killing qi, all things in heaven and earth would occasionally release traces of vital qi.
When heaven unleashed its killing qi, the myriad things would wither, and the stars would shift from their courses.
When earth unleashed its killing qi, seas would turn to mulberry fields, and dragons and serpents would rise from the land.
By capturing and refining the various vital qi between heaven and earth, one could trace them back to their source, achieving a state of resonance and unity with them.
《The Jade Realm Thousand-Arts Golden Canon》 was precisely such a technique—one that sensed and refined vital qi for one’s own use.
Upon mastering the technique, not only could one borrow heaven and earth’s killing qi to harm others, but one could also deduce and predict the future through the extrapolation of vital qi.
This technique was immensely powerful. But cultivating it was equally dangerous.
How vast was the will of heaven and earth? Even a single thread of vital qi it stirred was a hundred or a thousand times greater than what a cultivator possessed.
Rashly making contact with it could easily result in injury from the vital qi itself.
One might even be unknowingly assimilated, becoming a puppet of heaven and earth’s will.
Therefore, when the ancient Celestial Mysteries Sect practiced this technique, they would not directly refine and sense the vital qi of heaven and earth. Instead, they would settle for the next best thing and employ various substitute methods.
Nurturing one’s own killing qi, drawing upon the burgeoning life force of spring’s myriad things, sensing vital qi from certain heaven-and-earth spirit materials…
By gathering countless types of vital qi to mask one’s own presence, they could obscure the heavenly mysteries and sense the will of heaven and earth.
In theory, cultivating this method to its highest realm would allow one to merge with heaven and earth, transforming into the Dao itself.
A pity that this was only in theory.
In practice, even with these shortcut methods, cultivating 《The Jade Realm Thousand-Arts Golden Canon》 was extraordinarily difficult.
The ancient Celestial Mysteries Sect’s legacy spanned ten thousand years, and the cultivators who practiced 《The Jade Realm Thousand-Arts Golden Canon》 numbered in the tens of thousands.
Yet the highest anyone had ever reached was the Nascent Soul realm.
If that was the case even in those times, it went without saying for today’s cultivation world, where the malice of heaven and earth was omnipresent.
However, Li Fan had 【Return to Truth】 to assist him, so he need not worry too much about the risks of cultivating this technique.
Li Fan pondered for a moment. There was no rush to decide on a primary cultivation technique.
He could first visit Ten Thousand Immortals Island to see how things stood in the current cultivation world before making his plans.
And so, Li Fan made his way to the central formation array of Glazed Glass Island, intending to see He Zhenghao.
He had just arrived outside the formation when he found several servants already waiting for him.
Led by the servants, Li Fan once again met He Zhenghao.
The place where He Zhenghao was now was no longer that towering peak from before, but an utterly ordinary small hill.
Surrounded by other mountains, it was completely unremarkable.
He Zhenghao sat upright in a small pavilion at the hilltop.
“I sensed some fluctuation in the island’s spiritual energy just now and knew it must be you breaking through.”
He Zhenghao looked at Li Fan with an expression of gratification. “It took you a bit long, but you’ve broken through all the same.”
“I have Senior to thank for his guidance,” Li Fan said courteously.
“It was merely a small effort on my part.” Sensing the slight increase in his own cultivation, He Zhenghao spoke with a smile.
“You’ve come to see me—are you heading to Ten Thousand Immortals Island?”
“Indeed. I have no more worldly concerns to attend to and can depart at any time,” Li Fan nodded.
“Very well. In that case, follow me.”
He Zhenghao flickered to Li Fan’s side in an instant and grasped his shoulder.
“Don’t resist.”
He Zhenghao’s voice reached his ears, and Li Fan complied, dispersing the spiritual energy that had instinctively risen to protect him.
Carried by He Zhenghao, Li Fan soared into the sky, ascending upward.
The speed was extraordinary—in the blink of an eye, they pierced through the sea of clouds and rose above the mountain peaks.
“Draw!”
He Zhenghao formed a seal with one hand and pointed down at the sprawling mountain range below.
Moments later, from countless peaks across his field of vision, beams of white light shot forth, converging before He Zhenghao to form an enormous sphere of light.
“Open!”
He Zhenghao thrust his hand skyward.
The sphere of light surged forward with tremendous speed, shooting straight up in the direction He Zhenghao indicated.
In an instant, it formed a pillar of light that pierced heaven and earth.
It struck the sun hanging in the sky above.
The sun’s surface warped and distorted, then split apart, cleaving in two.
Between the halves, a teleportation gate formed.
“Let’s go!”