Chapter 68 – Phantom Spirit Mimicry: Blue Flame

As the temperature around Li Fan’s body rose, the figure of Crimson Flame within his sea of consciousness became clear once more.

But…

Even though Li Fan pushed the Xuanhuang Heart-refining Mantra to its absolute limit, ignoring the faint smell of burning emanating from his own body—

At the very moment before the Crimson Flame phantom spirit was about to fully take shape, Li Fan was inexplicably ejected from his visualization state.

“Could it be that the heat is too intense, exceeding my body’s upper threshold?”

Li Fan pondered this and began searching the Celestial Mystery Mirror for medicines that could resist extreme heat.

He spent 10 contribution points and purchased an Ice Heart Pill.

After taking it, Li Fan began his attempt once more.

This time, as soon as the scorching sensation from visualizing Crimson Flame appeared, a cool stream of energy simultaneously surged from his dantian.

This energy circulated throughout his body, suppressing the heat.

No longer needing to divide his attention to suppress his body’s discomfort, Li Fan concentrated all his mental energy on condensing the Crimson Flame phantom spirit.

But…

It was useless!

The phantom spirit still shattered at the very last moment before fully taking shape.

It was as if some unseen existence was deliberately obstructing him—the phantom spirit simply could not be formed.

After more than a dozen attempts, the Ice Heart Pill’s effects began to fade.

Li Fan stopped.

“The Spirit of Heaven and Earth truly is extraordinary. I can’t even condense a phantom spirit using it as a template…”

“There must be some rule or restriction at play here that I’m not aware of.”

Li Fan thought for a moment, then searched the Celestial Mystery Mirror for information related to the Spirit of Heaven and Earth.

As he expected, the Celestial Mystery Mirror informed him that his access level was insufficient to view the information.

For the time being, Li Fan’s plan to condense a Crimson Flame phantom spirit had reached an impasse.

However, he had no intention of giving up.

The greater the restriction, the greater the reward once he succeeded.

The power of the Spirit of Heaven and Earth was still vivid in his memory. Even obtaining one ten-thousandth of it would be extraordinary.

Still, the specifics of how to proceed required further careful deliberation.

And so, Li Fan maintained the assisted cultivation mode and, in the state of Spirit Awakening, quietly closed his eyes to think.

One day, two days, three days…

Time passed day by day, and contribution points burned away bit by bit.

Finally, after seven days, Li Fan opened his eyes.

The Spirit of Heaven and Earth was the manifestation of one of heaven and earth’s laws.

If the “flame” of Crimson Flame represented laws related to fire, then what special significance did the “crimson” of Crimson Flame hold?

Besides Crimson Flame, were there other types of flame?

Li Fan immediately began experimenting.

He visualized the Spirit of Heaven and Earth as before—the figure and aura identical to the Crimson Flame in his memory.

The only difference was that the figure’s color changed from crimson to green.

This time, the phantom spirit formed successfully. But it was extremely weak, as if it were nothing more than an empty shell, completely lacking any offensive power.

He dispersed the newborn phantom spirit from his sea of consciousness.

Li Fan tried again.

This time, the color changed from green to black.

The black flame, like the crimson flame, could not form a phantom spirit. But unlike the crimson flame, visualizing the black flame produced no scorching sensation.

He switched to yet another color and tried again.

…

Li Fan tested every color he could think of.

He discovered that there were four distinct outcomes.

The first was like Crimson Flame—unable to form, with a searing sensation during visualization.

The second was like the green flame—able to form, but nothing more than an empty shell without any power.

The third was like the black flame—unable to form, with no anomalies occurring during visualization.

And the fourth was the most special of all.

Within Li Fan’s sea of consciousness, a spectral figure nearly identical to Crimson Flame slowly coalesced.

Only its color was blue.

As the Blue Flame phantom spirit gradually appeared, the temperature around Li Fan’s body began to plummet dramatically.

Layer upon layer of frost patterns spread outward from the ground beneath Li Fan’s feet.

His hair and eyebrows were coated in white frost, and his body gradually became as rigid as a block of ice.

Even the Xuanhuang Heart-refining Mantra, which had been running silently all along, slowed under its influence, as if it might stop at any moment.

Li Fan’s heartbeat grew slower and slower, and his vital signs rapidly declined.

Yet Li Fan’s consciousness had entered a wondrous state.

It was as if his soul had left his body—like an outside observer watching the various changes happening to his physical form.

Without any emotional fluctuation whatsoever.

Li Fan had a premonition that in this state, even if his body were destroyed and death and dissolution of one’s Dao came the very next second, he would not feel the slightest fear.

This was a state of absolute calm and rationality.

It was precisely in this state that Li Fan silently watched as his body was completely frozen over.

As if plunged into absolute zero, everything fell into utter stillness and deathly silence.

At the same time, within Li Fan’s sea of consciousness, the Blue Flame phantom spirit fully took shape.

The temperature did not rise, but vitality rapidly returned to Li Fan’s body.

It was as though that absolute cold could no longer affect him.

Li Fan stirred his spiritual sense, and the Blue Flame in his sea of consciousness flickered slightly. The extreme cold vanished from his body in an instant.

In the blink of an eye, Li Fan had returned to his original appearance, and he emerged from that state of absolute rationality.

That extreme cold seemed like nothing more than an illusion, leaving behind no trace whatsoever.

“So this is… the power of the Blue Flame?”

Within his sea of consciousness, the small, newborn Blue Flame phantom spirit had fallen into slumber.

But Li Fan knew he could awaken it at any time and reproduce the state he had just experienced.

“The four different outcomes I encountered when visualizing flames of different colors should correspond to the various states of the Spirits of Heaven and Earth.”

After a period of contemplation, Li Fan formulated his hypothesis.

The Spirit of Heaven and Earth was the physical embodiment of the Heavenly Dao’s laws. At the same time, cultivators could also refine and merge with a Spirit of Heaven and Earth to achieve the Dao Merging realm.

Therefore, during his earlier visualization experiments, those that could take form but possessed no power must represent types of Spirits of Heaven and Earth that did not exist.

Those that could not take form—like Crimson Flame—should be ones still belonging to the system of heaven and earth’s laws. He could invoke their power but could not claim them as his own. Those like the black flame should be ones already refined by a Dao Merging cultivator, no longer part of this world’s laws.

Then what did this Blue Flame represent?

“A law on the verge of coming into being?”

“In other words, sometime in the near future, somewhere in the cultivation world, a true Spirit of Heaven and Earth—the Blue Flame—will descend?” Li Fan fell into deep thought.

After a long while, Li Fan let out a long breath and buried all his speculations about the Spirits of Heaven and Earth deep within his mind.

Regardless, although he had not managed to condense a Crimson Flame phantom spirit, he had inadvertently visualized a Blue Flame phantom spirit through a twist of fate.

The two possessed diametrically opposite attributes, yet the Blue Flame’s power seemed no less formidable than the Crimson Flame’s.

Delighted by this development, Li Fan struck while the iron was hot and began cultivating the Nether Spirit Illusion Art.

He attempted to nurture and strengthen the Blue Flame phantom spirit so it could be used for spiritual sense attacks against others.

Time flowed slowly by as he cultivated.

Before long, Li Fan was abruptly pulled out of the assisted cultivation mode.

As it turned out, the prolonged cultivation had consumed so much that his contribution points had dwindled to just over a hundred.