The Shark Emperor True Flame!
Luo Chen was no stranger to this deep blue flame.
Back when he first entered the Land of the Fallen Demon and clashed with Shark Emperor Liu Jun for the first time, he had faced this fire head-on.
It was a curious thing, made specifically to target the flesh of living beings.
Desolate beasts above all!
The more vigorous the blood and qi, the greater the Shark Emperor True Flame's power. The flesh and blood of an enemy's body was like fuel—once touched by the Shark Emperor True Flame, it clung like a burrowing maggot and would not stop until it had burned everything away.
That year Luo Chen had accidentally caught a trace of it, and it had forced him to cut off his own arm on the spot to narrowly escape being burned to ash.
Later he had looked through the relevant records and arrived at a rough guess.
The Merfolk had a long heritage in the Northern Sea cultivation world, but they had never been a major power.
In ancient times, the Merfolk were prey—food for many kinds of desolate beasts.
In the eras before and since, because of their beauty and the treasures their bodies contained, they were hunted on a grand scale by powerful human cultivators.
Shark Emperor Liu Jun's eager participation in the campaign to destroy the Yuan Demon Sect had also been the effort of a racial sovereign determined to change his people's plight.
And the Shark Emperor True Flame was a method devised in ancient times by the Merfolk's mightiest experts to escape the desolate beasts' predation.
Using the oil of Merfolk bodies, they nurtured a sourceless fire and raised it bit by bit to the fourth rank, crafting it specifically to restrain desolate beasts possessed of powerful flesh.
Over several thousand years, who knew how much oil and essence-blood of powerful Merfolk this oil lamp had absorbed!
By rights, having been cultivated and nourished by generation after generation of experts over so long a span, the Shark Emperor True Flame should long ago have advanced to the fifth rank. Yet in Shark Emperor Liu Jun's hands, it had not performed all that impressively.
At least, by Luo Chen's present standard of judgment, Shark Emperor Liu Jun had never drawn out the flame's full might.
With a thought, the oil lamp spun and flew to hover before Luo Chen.
He fixed his gaze on the little blue flame and sent his divine sense probing deeper and deeper.
A moment later, understanding dawned.
"No wonder!"
Xiao Bai asked curiously, "Master, no wonder what?"
"No wonder Shark Emperor Liu Jun couldn't bring out the flame's full power." Luo Chen gave a light laugh and pointed at the blue flame. "Thousands upon thousands of years of nurturing, tainted with the oil and essence-blood of countless Merfolk experts—this flame is mixed with far too many wills, so many that they've suppressed the birth of the sourceless fire's own fire spirit! And given Shark Emperor Liu Jun's own cultivation realm, he cannot suppress the stray thoughts of his predecessors, so naturally he can only draw out part of its power."
Xiao Bai made a sound of understanding, but she was not much moved. As a creature of yin souls, she had no love for these powerful flames.
But the demon monk Kongchan, standing to one side, thought differently.
If the Shark Emperor True Flame truly held so many stray thoughts that even its inheritor Liu Jun could not fully control it, yet Luo Chen could suppress it with ease and even turn it back on its master—then one could see just how far Luo Chen's soul foundation had grown!
For a moment, the look he gave Luo Chen grew all the more reverent.
Had Luo Chen known what Kongchan was thinking, he might have agreed with part of it.
Part of it, because the means by which he suppressed the Shark Emperor True Flame was not only a powerful soul foundation.
There were many factors at play.
First, the Heavenly Phoenix Nirvana Scripture that Luo Chen chiefly cultivated was itself the strongest fire-type method in the world; in the art of controlling fire, it had no equal!
Second, Luo Chen possessed the two fifth-rank divine fires, Wither-Bloom and Nirvana. Even a wisp of their aura leaking out was enough to suppress a Shark Emperor True Flame that had not yet reached the fifth rank.
And last, it had to do with Luo Chen's comprehension of the law's true intent—the Fire Origin!
Before the Fire Origin, no matter what unique traits these sourceless fires displayed, their essence was still fire. How would they dare flaunt themselves before him?
After explaining it briefly to Xiao Bai, Luo Chen held the lamp in one hand and stroked his chin with the other, sinking into thought.
Xiao Bai and Kongchan dared not disturb him and stood quietly to the side.
In the howling north wind, the deep blue lamplight swayed gently, giving off a hazy glow.
Suddenly!
Luo Chen extended his left hand, two fingers pressed together like a sword, and slowly drew outward toward the starlike flame.
Kongchan let out a low cry. "Soul-Hooking Draw!"
Luo Chen glanced at him and said casually, "What is the Soul-Hooking Draw?"
Kongchan was taken aback. "Isn't what you're performing right now the high-tier soul art, the Soul-Hooking Draw?"
Luo Chen's dark brows twitched. "This is only the Soul Intimidation Technique, a low-tier spell."
The Soul Intimidation Technique?
Kongchan swallowed. He felt all the more keenly how unfathomable Luo Chen's attainments in the soul were.
He had actually used the lowest-tier Soul Intimidation Technique to achieve the effect of the high-tier soul art, the Soul-Hooking Draw.
These were two soul arts that seemed alike but whose power was utterly different.
Both drew out souls, but the former could only pull and draw a soul when the enemy had no body. The Soul-Hooking Draw, however, ignored the shackles of flesh and forcibly hooked a living being's soul right out of its body.
Once Kongchan explained, Luo Chen's interest was roused.
"It seems you know this high-tier soul art. Do you carry the original method with you?"
"This humble monk does indeed know the art. I came across it by chance after the Yuan Demon Sect was destroyed—though only a copy."
"A copy will do!"
Kongchan respectfully produced a sheet of yellow hide and presented it to Luo Chen.
"Human-skin paper?"
Luo Chen saw the nature of the material at a glance. Calmly he unrolled the hide, and the writing on it leaped into view.
After studying it for a while, Luo Chen's fingertip movements shifted slightly.
His sword-straight index and middle fingers bent a little, hooking like a crescent moon. He silently recited the incantation, and his soul power no longer took intimidation and suppression as its aim, but instead formed a bewitching lure.
As his fingertips trembled, illusionary figures appeared one after another within the blue flame.
Each figure had a superb physique—tall and handsome, or elegant and slender—and even their blurred features showed the beauty they had possessed in life.
These were all top experts of the Merfolk from ages past!
Kongchan stood beside him, eyes wide, face full of disbelief.
He had only just obtained the secret manual of the Soul-Hooking Draw, and he had already mastered it.
Just what level had his attainments in the soul reached?
As Luo Chen continued casting, a great quantity of lingering stray thoughts was drawn out of the Shark Emperor True Flame.
Gradually, the originally deep blue flame grew profound and pure.
There was even a faint shadow of a small fish swimming and drifting within it.
"Come out!"
Luo Chen gave a low shout, and his primordial spirit abruptly united as one.
A pressure like the majesty of heaven descended upon the area, and threads of power even more formidable than divine sense wove to and fro.
That was divine thought!
As Luo Chen's divine thought surged, he forced the little fish to take solid form.
The next moment, the fish leaped from the fire, and waves of flame rippled outward like rings on water.
Xiao Bai cheered, "Congratulations, Master, on gaining another powerful flame!"
Luo Chen shook his head with a smile. "For now I've only removed its impurities and forced its fire spirit into being. Its rank is still fourth, so it's far from powerful."
He opened his mouth and inhaled, and the little blue fish was swallowed, finally entering his purple mansion.
The moment it arrived, the little blue fish sensed two auras far stronger than its own.
One was like a tree, branches spreading wide.
The other was like a bird, soaring and circling.
It dared not disturb these two "seniors." Obediently it settled in the purple mansion, unfurling layer upon layer of flame waves to form a sea of blue fire, and vanished within it.
The Wither-Bloom fire spirit paid it no mind.
The Nirvana fire spirit, however, grew eager for a try, its sharp beak pecking lightly as it circled above the sea of fire.
But when a certain gaze fell upon it, the Nirvana fire spirit was forced to fly off, not daring to scheme after the little blue fish any longer.
Thus the little blue fish finally relaxed, and felt a trace of fondness for the owner of that earlier gaze.
On the glacial wasteland.
Luo Chen weighed the oil lamp in his hand, then handed it to Xiao Bai.
"Take it. This counts as a very strong True Artifact. Though I've taken the Shark Emperor True Flame from it, the Merfolk oil left on it can still call forth the flame many more times."
Xiao Bai accepted it in delight. "Thank you, Master, for granting me a treasure!"
What Shark Emperor Liu Jun left behind was not only an oil lamp and a flame, but also a storage pouch.
But Luo Chen was in no hurry to inventory his spoils.
To him at present, the legacy of a Nascent Soul demon cultivator was only so much.
Compared to the storage pouch, Luo Chen cared more about the "spirit pet" he had so easily subdued.
"Demon Monk Kongchan, I hear your true form is a Sutra-Chanting Monk. Show me your original shape!"
Faced with Luo Chen's somewhat flippant, even contemptuous words, the demon monk Kongchan showed not the slightest displeasure.
In the instant Luo Chen's divine thought had burst forth earlier, he had already understood why Luo Chen was so strong—so strong that he could not muster a single thought of resistance.
This was someone who had condensed his primordial spirit ahead of time!
He had even grasped the law's true intent!
Add to that the Qingyang Great Handprint that had destroyed Taisui with a single strike, drinking in the world's vital essence along its path.
Kongchan swallowed.
A primordial spirit, the law's true intent, the manipulation of the world's vital essence—every one of these traits belonged only to a Deity Transformation great power.
To master one was to be a peerless prodigy.
To master all three—what difference was there between this young man before him and a Deity Transformation great power?
*Boom!*
A colossal thing sat cross-legged upon the glacial wasteland.
Luo Chen looked up and saw a bizarre creature that resembled an octopus, or perhaps a jellyfish.
A huge, glossy, perfectly round bald head, a humanlike face with human features, black dots like ordination scars covering its body, and eighteen tentacles covered in gaping slits.
"Master, this is my true body."
As the bald head spoke, the slits on the tentacles all opened as well, producing the same voice.
Nineteen mouths speaking at once, buzzing in a way that set the mind on edge, like a nagging monk droning sutras without pause.
"So that's where the name Sutra-Chanting Monk comes from!"
Luo Chen smiled and waved a hand.
"Better change back to human form. Your true body really is a bit ugly."
Amid swirling demon qi, the enormous Sutra-Chanting Monk dispersed and became Kongchan's gaunt body once more.
He stood respectfully before Luo Chen, hands at his sides, showing no trace of the great demon emperor who had once run rampant across the Northern Sea.
Luo Chen set off, golden light blazing in his eyes, walking in a certain direction across the Yuan Demon Sect.
As he walked, he casually questioned Kongchan about matters of the demon race.
Especially the specific circumstances of the Yuan Demon Sect's destruction that year.
"In that battle, Beili Great Sage and Sea Emperor Whale joined forces against the Soul Refining Patriarch, shattering his physical body, and Sea Emperor Whale scattered even his primordial spirit. Before he died, the Soul Refining Patriarch dispersed his primordial spirit and set up a grand array that trapped the rest of us in the Yama Heavens for a hundred years."
"As for the Yuan Demon Patriarch of the Yuan Demon Sect, that battlefield wasn't on our side, so I don't know who was fighting him."
"I only remember that battlefield once leaked a wisp of golden flame, and it carried off over a million experts of both the demon and human races."
Luo Chen's steps paused.
"Golden flame?"
Kongchan nodded, then seemed to recall something, and his eyes filled with uncertainty and alarm.
Earlier, in the Blood Lake, the method Luo Chen had used to slay the corpse giant had seemed to be a kind of golden flame.
Could it be...
Luo Chen's eyes flickered. Certain guesses from back then had finally been confirmed at this moment.
The mighty Yuan Demon Sect had actually been destroyed by the demon beasts they had suppressed for three thousand years—and the truth behind it was indeed not simple.
In it, Monarch Qixia had acted personally!
Destroying the Yuan Demon and burying Mingyuan had left the two great provinces of the Northern Sea and Eastern Desolation hollowed of strength, drawing the Tianyuan Dao Sect to send troops and occupy them.
Her ultimate aim had actually been the Tianyuan Dao Sect.
And later, Monarch Qixia had indeed personally stormed into the Central Plains.
But why had Monarch Qixia not moved against the Western Desert and the Southern Border?
No!
Perhaps she had not refrained from moving.
The Western Desert's Buddhist lands had grown alert and closed the Hanging Temple ahead of time, only throwing wide their mountain gates after the Central Plains collapsed.
And in those years, the demon race of the Western Desert had also mobilized, which was what had prompted the Tianyuan Dao Sect to send out troops.
As for the Southern Border?
With Divine Lord Youli holding it down, even one as strong as Monarch Qixia would not rashly storm their mountain gate.
And yet the Tianyuan Dao Sect had indeed later sent people to the Southern Border, leaving the Central Plains hollow of strength, allowing Monarch Qixia to slip in.
"Monarch Qixia schemed so painstakingly to create the perfect conditions for her assault on the Central Plains. What was her purpose?"
"According to intelligence, the final battlefield of that battle in the Central Plains was Heaven and Earth Peak, and upon Heaven and Earth Peak sat the Star Gate, one of the Dao Sect's three treasures."
"After Heaven and Earth Peak broke apart, the Star Gate's organization crumbled to nothing. Word has it that even the spirit treasure Star Gate went missing."
"Could Monarch Qixia's ultimate goal have been to seize the Star Gate?"
Luo Chen pondered carefully, his pace slowing considerably.
No voice came from behind him, so he prompted, "Continue. Tell me about the recent attacks by the Northern Sea demon race on the Tianyuan Dao Sect's three continents."
Kongchan did not dare be negligent, and laid out what he knew one item at a time.
"I don't know much about this matter either. I only know it was ordered by the two patriarchs."
"Some guess it was to avenge the Tianyuan Dao Sect's interference in the Northern Sea war over the past century, which thwarted the demon race's unification of the Northern Sea cultivation world."
"But in this monk's view, the retaliation isn't very intense—at least, no experts of the great demon emperor level took part."
Luo Chen blinked and stopped before a mountain that was mostly still intact.
An order from the Northern Sea's two patriarchs?
Perhaps this had something to do with Li Canghai.
He stopped pursuing the thought. At least for now, Li Canghai was his ally.
An ally's ally might not be an ally, but before any true conflict of interest arose, neither was an enemy.
"You may go back!"
"Keep watch over Taohai City, and don't let anyone break into the Yama Heavens and disturb my cultivation."
Kongchan nodded, then hesitated before leaving.
"Master, the Yama Heavens' fifth-rank spirit vein was shattered in that battle. It's not suitable for breaking through to the Deity Transformation realm."
Luo Chen smiled. He was not about to break through to Deity Transformation here.
It was simply that he had gathered a large amount of firmament qi in hand, and could now proceed to the next stage of refinement.
As a fifth-rank sword method, the Myriad Firmaments Myriad Transformations Sword Scripture at the grandmaster level could already let him answer a Deity Transformation strike. But Luo Chen was not satisfied.
Only at great perfection could it truly threaten a Deity Transformation great power!
Luo Chen did not explain further. He waved a hand, signaling Kongchan to leave.
Once the place was completely quiet, Luo Chen followed the ruined mountain body, step by step, toward the mid-slope terrace that had been cut away by a single sword strike.
Along the way, he kept planting array flags, personally setting the earth veins in order.
Three days later.
When Luo Chen's foot came down upon the flat mountainside,
the fourth-rank spirit vein deep within the mountain had been mostly set right, and could now supply him with no small amount of spiritual energy.
He tossed something casually.
*Thud!*
The Nine Firmaments Urn stood firmly upon the ground.
Luo Chen sat cross-legged, formed a sword seal with his fingers, and opened his mouth to inhale.
At once, a wisp of purple-tinged firmament qi flew from the great black urn and was drawn into his body, where his magic power began rapidly refining it.
As if sensing it, the Myriad Firmament Sword Seed he had condensed also began to spin.
Chapter 1057