The black threads were none other than the origin of the demonic fire.
Ever since taking residence in Luye, Qin Sang's true body had devoted himself to quiet cultivation, rarely stepping outside his cave abode.
Not only were his injuries improving day by day, but his divine consciousness had also made gratifying progress. He had completely absorbed and refined the Near-Dragon Saliva, and with its aid, the bottleneck in the Golden Lotus of Fire Seeds had begun to loosen.
Naturally, Qin Sang devoted all his energies thereafter to cultivating this secret art.
The fire lotus hovered before Qin Sang's glabella, bound to him by an invisible link that extended into his brow and reached all the way to his Purple Mansion.
The Mani Pearl drew close to the fire lotus. Those few strands of demonic fire source were like fish in water dodging capture, swimming incessantly within the red fire inside the Mani Pearl.
Qin Sang gazed at the demonic fire source, his face veiled in thought.
He had maintained this posture for several months already.
Before this, Qin Sang had been continuously dissecting the power within the demonic fire source, peeling back the layers thread by thread, absorbing and refining it bit by bit, until he finally isolated these few black threads—at which point he reached a stalemate.
Qin Sang could not say for sure whether these were the essence of the source or something else, but one thing was certain: the original master of the demonic fire had undoubtedly controlled it through these black threads.
He could sense that his divine consciousness had progressed as far as it possibly could, surely having reached the peak of the Nascent Soul realm, just one step shy of stepping into a new realm.
What came next was precisely to refine one or several black threads to charge at the bottleneck!
Over the past several months, Qin Sang had been constantly deducing and calculating, exhausting an immense amount of mental energy.
Suddenly, Qin Sang's eyes moved. His expression darkened slightly as his mind was made up; several wisps of spiritual fire branched out from the fire lotus, draping down to entwine the Mani Pearl.
The black threads within the red fire seemed to sense something, their swimming speed abruptly quickening. However, the demonic fire divided from the fire lotus shared the same source, and under Qin Sang's manipulation, he successfully drew out three of the black threads.
Indeed, Qin Sang intended to refine three black threads directly, seizing the momentum to break through!
The Mani Pearl drifted slowly to the ground and fell quiet.
The fire lotus before Qin Sang was gone now, replaced by a ring of fire. The three black threads were trapped within the flames, and wisps of spiritual fire separated out under Qin Sang's control, drawing close to probe the black threads.
After the time it took an incense stick to burn.
Whoosh!
The ring of fire abruptly contracted inward, and the spiritual flames converged from all sides, swallowing the black threads like a gaping, ravenous maw!
In an instant, waves of fire rolled through the cave abode. Black flames cast dancing shadows across the walls like clawed, menacing fiends, chilling the heart.
Eyes tightly shut, Qin Sang formed dozens of hand seals in an instant. The spiritual fire tightened step by step, and progress seemed extraordinarily smooth. Unexpectedly, a muffled pop resounded, and the clumped spiritual fire burst violently outward! The cave abode turned into a sea of fire, Qin Sang's figure swallowed beneath layer upon layer of fiery waves.
Within the fiery sea, the three black threads stood out most prominently. They appeared to be expanding, swelling from fine threads into the thickness of cords, radiating a violent, frenzied aura.
Without thinking, one could tell that if the energy within the black threads were to detonate, it would be terrifying beyond measure and could easily level the cave abode to the ground.
"Congeal!"
Qin Sang's voice was low, betraying not the slightest panic.
As soon as the word left his lips, the sea of fire subsided instantly. The spiritual flames drew together, and the fire lotus reappeared above the black threads, rotating slowly. A peculiar rhythm enveloped the black threads, finally placating the rampaging power within.
Having stabilized the situation, Qin Sang narrowed his eyes to inspect the black threads. A hint of delight surfaced on his face, and he murmured, "So that's how it is!"
No wonder refining the demonic fire source was so difficult!
According to the stages of the Golden Lotus of Fire Seeds, the first stage was forming the lotus seed from fire; reaching the second stage saw the seed develop into a flower bud and the fire lotus bloom; and the third stage transformed the lotus into a lotus pedestal.
At present, the fire lotus's petals had not fully blossomed, leaving it a long way from the third stage of transforming into a lotus pedestal.
In fact, even refining the demonic fire completely would not reach the third stage—such was the tremendous potential of this secret art.
Moreover, his Dao foundation was that of a spell cultivator rather than a spirit cultivator. Cultivating the Golden Lotus of Fire Seeds was not closely bound to his personal Great Dao, which normally should have made it easier, yet he had encountered barrier after barrier.
Only now did he realize that the bottleneck was not only due to himself, but also because of the demonic fire.
An imprint of its original master actually still lingered within the demonic fire source!
After countless years, the original master's aura within the imprint had long been erased. Had it been someone proficient in the secret arts of the Nine Nether Demonic Fire, they could have easily seized the imprint and made it their own.
Yet Qin Sang intended to devour the demonic fire; without obliterating the imprint, it was naturally fraught with immense difficulty. Fortunately, the Golden Lotus of Fire Seeds was extraordinary in its own right, and Qin Sang had procured rare items like the Near-Dragon Saliva to assist him, allowing him to finally uncover the root cause. Otherwise, discovering the problem would have demanded vast amounts of time and energy.
Having identified the crux of the issue, what followed became much simpler.
Qin Sang adjusted his strategy. He manipulated the fire lotus to envelop the black threads, coaxing the imprint to reveal itself, and then tested various methods to wear it down. In just a month, he achieved remarkable results.
Whoosh!
The previous scene played out once more.
The spiritual fire swallowed the black threads.
This time, the energy within the black threads did not erupt. Kept steady under Qin Sang's placation, the black threads seemed to melt away, bleeding and diffusing within the spiritual fire.
The demonic fire energy within the black threads was incomparably pure and formidable. The Golden Lotus of Fire Seeds greedily devoured it with voracious hunger.
Devouring three black threads at once was actually beyond Qin Sang's limits, yet this was precisely what he wanted. When the energy of the three black threads fused together, his divine consciousness poured out in full force, pushing the Golden Lotus of Fire Seeds to its absolute limit!
Qin Sang's brow twitched repeatedly as a sharp pain came from between his eyebrows.
This was not damage to his primordial spirit, but the consequence of expending too much divine consciousness in a single instant.
Gritting his teeth, he did not dare relax for an instant. His mind's platform remained serene and empty as he paid no heed to his divine consciousness gushing like a broken dam, on the verge of running dry at any moment, focusing solely on driving the secret art.
It felt as if only an instant had passed, yet also as though an eternity had slipped by.
A sudden tremor stirred within Qin Sang's heart. He opened his eyes, where starlight seemed to swirl, staring fixedly at the spiritual fire before him.
The spiritual fire gradually ceased its churning, coalescing into the fire lotus as new petals unfurled!
He shifted his gaze toward the cave abode's stone doors. His vision seemed capable of piercing through the stone, and his divine consciousness had already passed through the cave abode's defensive ward, dispersing into the world outside.
Back then, materializing his divine sense had been a monumental transformation.
The same was true now.
In his "eyes," this world was vastly different from before. His spiritual sense was far sharper, its reach broader; not the slightest movement within Luye could escape his perception. He could seemingly "hear" the sound of flowing spiritual energy, yet from extreme motion he could perceive profound stillness. Qin Sang experienced the sensations while reflecting on everything he had passed through.
With a slight thought, astral winds whipped up outside the cave abode. White air currents spiraled in the sky above, gradually condensing at the center of the wind into a humanoid phantom.
The phantom possessed full facial features, bearing an uncanny resemblance to Qin Sang!
Then, the phantom slowly opened its eyes, raised both hands, and glanced down at them before curling its fingers loosely, attempting to manipulate the spiritual energy of heaven and earth.
A sense of sluggishness and strain traveled back to him. Inside the cave abode, Qin Sang furrowed his brows, dissolved the phantom, pulled back his divine consciousness, and circulated his energy until he returned to peak condition. Gauging the strength of his divine consciousness, it was not far from how the Azure Fox Saint King and Saint Huiguang had appeared back then—at the very least, they were on the same level!
Elated, Qin Sang then attempted to commune with heaven and earth.
The result, however, was disappointing.
From this, it seemed the Ghost Mother's theory on "entering the Dao" was no falsehood. He had entered the Dao through the Essence Cultivation and Sword Nurturing Chapter, his foundation lying in spell cultivation; while the transformation of his divine consciousness would certainly benefit future breakthroughs and allow him to resist the heavenly-and-earthly pressure of Deity Transformation cultivators, it could not grant him true communion with heaven and earth.
The benefits brought by this divine consciousness certainly did not stop there.
On the most basic level, had Qin Sang entered the Formless Immortal Sect with his current strength, the Deity Transformation cultivators of the two races could never have approached Mount Dishou without him noticing.
Qin Sang was in no hurry to leave seclusion to experiment. He remained in his cave abode to refine the rest of the demonic fire, his progress vastly accelerated after the breakthrough.
In less than a year,
the Mani Pearl returned to its original state.
Qin Sang had finally refined the Nine Nether Demonic Fire completely!
At Qin Sang's instruction, Luye had drifted to an uninhabited region in the western reaches of the Northern Barrens.
He rose, stepped out of his cave abode, and appeared amidst a vast wilderness.
Vegetation grew thick among the wild grasses, looking like fertile ground, but in truth, it was ravaged in turn at regular intervals by the Nine Disasters of the Northern Barrens. Unfit for habitation, not only was it desolate of human presence, but even insects and beasts were scarce.
His brow flashed, and the fire lotus slowly drifted out.
Two layers of petals could be seen open around the fire lotus, but the bud at its center remained tightly closed. Immense energy surged within the black lotus.
Qin Sang shook his sleeve and released the Sun God Tree as well, intending to test whether the fire lotus or the simultaneous unleashing of the six birds held greater might.
Moments later.
Thunderous roars shook the wilderness in rapid succession.
The entire wasteland and surrounding peaks trembled, terrifying all living creatures.
Floating above the wilderness, Qin Sang looked with astonishment at two bottomless pits below. One continuously billowed scarlet flames, while from the other flew a black flame dragon, circling Qin Sang before returning to the form of the fire lotus.
With his divine consciousness having advanced by leaps and bounds, his control over the Sun God Birds had also improved. Though it could not reduce the consumption, he could now simply guide the direction of the six birds' attacks.
Naturally, it could not compare to the fire lotus; this flame was entirely under Qin Sang's control, functioning as smoothly as his own limbs, with far lower consumption, and possessed power that undeniably reached the Deity Transformation level.
However, when Qin Sang directly compared the two, he discovered that even after thoroughly refining the Nine Nether Demonic Fire, the fire lotus's might still fell short of unleashing all six birds together. Amidst his surprise, this granted Qin Sang a newfound appreciation for the Nanming Primordial Fire.
The fire lotus hovered above Qin Sang's head like a black crown.
Qin Sang glanced left and right. Seeing that no cultivators had been alerted by the anomaly, he retrieved the fire lotus and adjusted his breathing for a moment. Splendid light flared behind his back as his phoenix wings spread wide. Then, with a thought, he executed the Heavenly Demon Transformation; azure light shimmered behind his head, revealing the Qingluan aspect.
After reaching the Nascent Soul realm, his path of body refinement had made no progress, leaving the Qingluan aspect largely unchanged and still exceptionally illusory.
Yet Qin Sang recalled that back when he first materialized his divine sense, he had been able to command the Qingluan aspect to a preliminary degree, channeling the thunderous power within the phoenix wings to enhance his Thunder Escape.
Now that his divine consciousness had undergone another metamorphosis, would there be new developments?
Qin Sang tested it immediately. The Qingluan aspect flickered, and a resounding thunderclap erupted from the phoenix wings. Azure electric arcs danced between the feathers, and blinding lightning like molten thunder almost completely enveloped Qin Sang.
Crack!
Thunder roared as lightning tore across the sky, piercing through the wilderness and vanishing deep into the mountains.
When the lightning faded,
it did not return. On a mountain beyond the wilderness, a human-shaped crater had formed, surrounded by scorched vegetation and spiderwebbing fissures—the mountain had nearly split apart!
A sharp intake of breath sounded from within.
Qin Sang climbed out in disarray, feeling pain wracking every inch of his body, as though his flesh and bones were about to shatter.
Just as he had anticipated, with his divine consciousness having advanced immensely, his Thunder Escape had indeed improved substantially under the empowerment of the Qingluan aspect.
Unexpectedly, on a whim, he had driven the Thunder Escape with all his might, immediately suffering for it. A moment's thought revealed the reason.
The Thunder Escape channeled the Qingluan thunder power within the phoenix wings rather than his own strength, imposing a burden on him. The expenditure of true essence was secondary; the problem was that his Heavenly Demon Refining Form had stagnated, leaving his physical body equivalent only to the early Nascent Soul realm. While he could endure it before, it had now exceeded his body's limits.
This served as a warning: unless his physical body improved, he should never unleash the Thunder Escape at full power unless he was fleeing for his life.
Even when holding back, however, his escape speed far surpassed before. With the demonic fire and this escape technique, he finally had the means to contend and buy time when facing a Deity Transformation cultivator.
Qin Sang's eyes flickered as he looked southward, but he did not plan to retrieve his incarnation. When it came to Deity Transformation cultivators, he still harbored deep wariness.
Luye changed direction and drifted eastward.
Before long, it came to a stop over an area of rolling mountains.
Standing at the entrance of Luye, Qin Sang looked down and saw several Daoist temples built atop a mountain peak, with young Daoists in vestments bustling within.
Outside the temple, a stone stele was erected, bearing the inscription "Qingyang Temple Lower Branch."
This was the spirit vein that Shen Chen and the others had scoured the Northern Barrens to find. There they had established their tradition as the Qingyang Temple Lower Branch; only when sect disciples broke through to a certain realm would they earn the qualification to know of and enter Luye to cultivate.
Having cultivated for only a short time, these disciples' realms were still modest.
Yet under the management of Shen Chen, the Dark Moon Guard, and others, several batches of talented disciples had been brought up the mountain, already lending the place an air of prosperity. The Qingyang Temple in Zhongzhou had another advantage: so long as Luye was not lost, its flourishing was only a matter of time.
"Greetings, Master!"
Shen Chen led the Dark Moon Guard flying up into Luye, kneeling in salute. His cultivation had progressed once more.
"From now on, focus your efforts on cultivating to break through to the Nascent Soul realm, and leave mundane affairs to the disciples..."
Qin Sang gave a few admonishments, instructed the Dark Moon Guard to keep watch on the matter of the beast hunt, and then returned to his cave abode.
He was naturally eager to obtain the Four Sages Spirit Gathering Array and cultivate the Heavenly Demon Spirit Reflection Sutra, but he had to exercise patience. Only when the fierce beast appeared and the Deity Transformation cultivators were occupied with the hunt could he recall his incarnation!
Back in the cave abode,
while cultivating, Qin Sang began to devote himself to comprehending the Panhu True Scripture.
With the precious guidance left behind by the Ghost Mother, combined with his past experience, the various difficulties encountered in comprehending this scripture were readily resolved. Barring any surprises, he could begin transitioning his cultivation to this scripture!
No one knew how much time had passed.
Qin Sang opened his eyes and looked at the Heavenly Eye Butterfly resting on his left shoulder.
Having refined the Near-Dragon Saliva, the Heavenly Eye Butterfly had also reaped immense benefits, her cultivation advancing faster than in the preceding two centuries, and she had not even completely absorbed the energy of the Near-Dragon Saliva.
"Once I transition to the Panhu True Scripture and employ the Spirit Nurturing Technique, combined with the medicinal pills gathered by the incarnation, the Heavenly Eye Butterfly will soon break through to the late Fourth Transformation and catch up with me..."
Qin Sang murmured to himself, calculating his subsequent path of cultivation.
Within the Panhu True Scripture, the Spirit Nurturing Technique was the most critical core secret art. Incorporating various Witch Clan secret arts such as blood refinement, spiritual feeding, and secret medicines, it allowed one to swiftly elevate the cultivation of one's natal insect-gu to approach that of its master.
This was the true essence of the Witch Sect's art of natal insect-gu. The reason it was called a natal insect-gu was precisely because it could advance in harmony with its master and serve as mutual support—the greatest distinction between it and ordinary spirit insects.
Regrettably, Qin Sang had not received the true transmission back in the Canglang Ocean, which had caused the Heavenly Eye Butterfly to be restricted and stagnate.
Now, every difficulty was readily resolved.
"Let us begin..."
Qin Sang summoned the Heavenly Eye Butterfly with a thought.
The Heavenly Eye Butterfly gently brushed against Qin Sang's cheek, then flew into his dantian.
Chapter 1703