Chapter 112: Deducing the Second Layer of the Cultivation Method

After leaving Di Xin's residence, Long Xuan returned fully loaded; following this transaction, the materials needed to set up the Five Elements Reversal Great Formation were almost completely gathered, with fewer than a hundred types of materials still uncollected.

But the most difficult to collect, the Top Grade Spirit Stones, were now fully assembled: the Long Clan's Treasure Tower held two with Fire Metal Attribute, and he had just obtained two with Water Earth Attribute from Di Xin.

This final piece of Top-Grade Wood Spirit Stone was something he had accidentally dug out from the Storage Bags of those two Gu Kings, which could only be called a coincidence.

Soon after, the Space Ring hanging around his neck trembled twice; he immediately retrieved a Communication Talisman from within it and began to examine it.

This Communication Talisman carried a message sent by the Flame Clone from within the Long Clan.

Just earlier, Long Xuan had sent the list of remaining uncollected materials to him via Communication Talisman, instructing him to post these materials in the Long Clan's Task Hall, setting up a bounty to release them as missions.

Since he was anxious to set up the Five Elements Reversal Great Formation and wanted to gather the materials as quickly as possible, he had the Flame Clone offer a higher Contribution reward; he even used Spirit Grass, which was now completely useless to him, as part of the bounty reward.

He did not believe that Spirit Grass would fail to tempt them.

He had not expected that shortly after sending the Communication Talisman to the Flame Clone, a reply would arrive immediately.

Long Xuan immediately took out the Communication Talisman to read the information upon it.

The general meaning was that due to the generous rewards offered, everyone was scrambling to accept the missions he released, and all tasks were snapped up not long after being posted.

Although many people did not possess those materials themselves, they knew where to find them—whether by trading goods with others or by gathering them in the wild—but that was no longer his concern.

However, since all the missions had been accepted, gathering these materials was merely a matter of time; he need only wait patiently...

Upon seeing the information on the Communication Talisman, Long Xuan revealed a satisfied smile; with this, work on the Five Elements Reversal Great Formation could now commence.

He handed all the newly collected materials over to his Clone, then set off to return to his own Medicine Garden.

That was right; he did not plan to go to the Long Family again, leaving all array-setting tasks entirely to his Clone, while his main body would not participate.

Setting up such a Peerless Fierce Array would consume a vast amount of time; his main body was busy with myriad important matters and would not waste effort on such manual labor, so it all had to be left to his Clone.

Undoubtedly, the Clone had replicated everything of his; since he could perform Alchemy, naturally he could also set up arrays, and moreover, he was highly skilled at it; under the power of the Ice Cold Divine Flame, any metal would be melted by them, so there was absolutely no need to worry about their capability being insufficient.

After returning to his Medicine Garden, Long Xuan sat once again in that familiar Pavilion, took out paper and brush, and finally prepared to begin the work of deducing the Second Layer of the Ten Extremes Scripture.

This was also the main reason he had not participated in setting up the array; he was simply too busy, and after advancing to the Cultivation Stage: Essence Refining, the original First Layer of the Ten Extremes Scripture was now useless, so he had to deduce the Second Layer of the Ten Extremes Scripture, suitable for cultivation at the Essence Refining stage, as quickly as possible.

This matter could not be delayed, as the Cultivation Method concerned his Cultivation Speed; the sooner it was done, the better.

After finishing the deduction of the Ten Extremes Scripture, he still had to deduce the Second Layer of the Purgatory True Demon Art, otherwise his Body Refining progress would also come to a standstill.

He had much to keep him busy and would need to enter secluded cultivation for a long period.

When his secluded cultivation ended, the Five Elements Reversal Great Formation would presumably have already been successfully set up by his Five Clones; only then would he move, transferring all the Spirit Medicine in this Medicine Garden into the range of the Spirit Spring.

With the Five Elements Reversal Great Formation providing protection, he could truly rest easy without worry at that time.

Long Xuan smiled, began to move his brush, and wrote the first character on the white paper...

Time flew like a white horse passing a crevice in an instant; in the blink of an eye, half a year had passed.

Long Xuan sat cross-legged on the ground, forming various complex hand seals with his hands; suddenly, his eyes opened, and a flash of sharp light passed through them.

"Yan Power! Condense for me!"

With his roar, the Flame Spiritual Power within his body instantly boiled over.

Yan Power was formed by Fire Wood Generation, a Mutated Spiritual Power created by fusing the two attributes of Wood and Fire together.

Water Generates Wood, and Wood then generates Fire; when the three attributes of Water, Wood, and Fire merge, they produce a Fire attribute even more terrifying than ordinary flame; Long Xuan named this Fire attribute 'Yan', calling it Yan Power, or Yan Spiritual Power.

He had long understood the principle, but once putting it into practice, difficulties piled up, encountering all sorts of problems; merely the issue of the fusion ratio of attributes had given him a headache for a long time.

Finally, through his unremitting efforts and repeated trials within the Original Realm, the powerful Yan Spiritual Power was successfully researched by him.

After a period of turmoil within the Spiritual Power in his body, the Flame Spiritual Power finally began transforming into Yan Spiritual Power, and soon the conversion was completely successful.

Long Xuan had no time for joy; since the Flame Spiritual Power had suddenly transformed into the stronger Yan Spiritual Power, the Fire attribute Spiritual Power within his body was now far stronger than the Spiritual Power of the other attributes.

This would inevitably cause one side to become excessive, leading to an imbalance of the Five Elements, whereby the Five Elements would no longer cycle.

Therefore, he had to balance the Five Elements as soon as possible, and the simplest method was to let the power of the other four attributes achieve equilibrium with the Yan Spiritual Power.

Fortunately, everything is difficult at the start; once he had successfully researched the Yan Spiritual Power formed by fusing three attributes, researching the other Mutated Spiritual Powers born from the fusion of three attributes was no longer difficult.

The research process was exactly the same, the ratios of Spiritual Power required were also exactly the same; the only difference was the attributes involved.

Using the template from researching Yan Spiritual Power as a reference, Long Xuan merely changed the attributes, and in just a few months' time, the four powerful Mutated Spiritual Powers of Sen, Miao, Xin, and Yao were successively born from his hands.

Sen Power was formed by the fusion of the three attributes Metal, Water, and Wood.

Miao Power was formed by the fusion of the three attributes Earth, Metal, and Water.

Xin Power was formed by the fusion of the three attributes Fire, Earth, and Metal.

Yao Power was formed by the fusion of the three attributes Wood, Fire, and Earth.

Once the Five Great Mutated Spiritual Powers of Xin, Sen, Miao, Yan, and Yao were completed, the quality of Long Xuan's Spiritual Power would rise another notch, causing his combat power to undergo an earth-shaking change, with his attack power doubling once again.

He was already invincible among peers before; now that his combat power had doubled again, he could completely crush anyone of the same realm.

Long Xuan opened his eyes, exhaled a mouthful of turbid air, clenched his fists tightly, felt the newly added power, and revealed an expression of wild joy in his eyes.

Although he had not advanced in realm, he now felt as though he had already advanced; feeling his power was stronger than ever before, he could not help but want to go out and test his strength.

But he restrained this thought; his current power was still insufficient, as the Second Layer of his Purgatory True Demon Art had not yet been successfully deduced, meaning his Body Refining aspect was not yet perfect; he decided to strike while the iron was hot and push through to forge the Second Layer of the Purgatory True Demon Art in one go.

He quickly walked to the Pavilion, took out paper and brush, and without taking any rest, began deducing the Second Layer of the Purgatory True Demon Art.

When he was still at the Spirit Gathering Stage, deducing the Second Layer of two Cultivation Methods had been fraught with difficulties, getting stuck everywhere, and completely unable to proceed.

He had not expected that after advancing to the Cultivation Stage: Essence Refining, possessing the insights of that realm, deducing the Cultivation Method for this realm would flow as naturally as water finding its channel.

Following the patterns established earlier, he could almost do it in one continuous, flowing motion, completely avoiding situations where he would encounter difficulties and get stuck for several months.

Thus, half a year later, two illusory figures suddenly appeared in a certain patch of sky: one Golden Crow and one Divine Dragon.

The illusory figures of the two Divine Beasts appeared out of thin air in mid-air, emitting a terrifyingly immense pressure.

The illusory figures were huge; although they were clearly lifeless, looking at their eyes, majestic and sharp, they seemed alive; beneath the two great illusory figures, Long Xuan could fully feel the endless pressure emitted by the two great Divine Beasts, filling his heart with shock.

"Is this the Dharma Idol? What a terrifying presence! It is truly hard to imagine that a mere Body Refining Cultivation Method could produce such a terrifying Heavenly Phenomenon!"

Gazing at the two great Dharma Idols in the sky, Long Xuan felt both shock and joy in his heart, muttering to himself continuously, his expression extremely excited.

These two Dharma Idols were too powerful; although they were merely illusory figures and could not be used for attack, they could bear part of the power possessed by the Divine Beasts onto his own body.

Though the amount of power was small, it was the power of a Divine Beast; even a tiny fraction of a Divine Beast's power was terrifying enough for humans. Since human bodies were frail, that seemingly insignificant sliver of Divine Beast power was sufficient to cause a human's combat strength to skyrocket.

Moreover, Long Xuan's Dharma Idols differed from those of ordinary people; while others possessed only one Dharma Idol, he could wield two.

By superimposing the power of both Dharma Idols onto his body simultaneously, he had become incredibly strong now, his physical strength so immense that it made even his own heart palpitate with fear.

This was merely with two Dharma Idols; one had to remember that the Purgatory True Demon Art he had created himself granted an additional Dharma Idol for every layer cultivated.

As his Cultivation Realm continued to rise, once he engaged in battle, a crowd of Dharma Idols would appear behind him; what a terrifying sight that would be! Without even mentioning the destructive power, the sheer intimidation alone could frighten enemies, causing their momentum to weaken by thirty percent spontaneously.

When the power of all Dharma Idols was superimposed together, just how colossal would that power be?

Long Xuan dared not imagine further; it was simply too frightening. At this moment, he was even scared by the Cultivation Method he had created himself—was this truly a Cultivation Method that a human could create? It was literally enough to scare a person to death.

He truly could not imagine whether there could still exist a Body Refining Cultivation Method in this world that was even more Heaven-defying than this one.

Even if the Purgatory True Demon Art he had created was not the number one Body Refining Cultivation Method in the world, it surely deserved a place among the top ten, right? Long Xuan's heart pounded wildly.

After sensing the power of the second layer of the Purgatory True Demon Art, he finally dismissed the two great Dharma Idols.

The second layer of the Body Refining Cultivation Method had already been successfully deduced, sufficient to complete his cultivation during the Cultivation Stage: Essence Refining.

However, although the Cultivation Method had been created, someone still needed to practice it.

The cultivation content for the first layer of the Purgatory True Demon Art was swimming in Lava, while the content for the second layer was swimming in an ice river; swimming was not strictly required, but cultivation absolutely had to take place in an extremely cold environment.

Long Xuan frowned slightly; such an environment was not easy to find. The Great Snow Mountain offered natural cold, yet it was not cold enough.

Furthermore, the Ice Cold Divine Flame had already acknowledged him as its master; fire does not harm its master, and both he and his Clone had already developed extremely high resistance to the Ice Cold Divine Flame, so using the Ice Cold Divine Flame for cultivation might not yield very good results.

But since he could not currently find a suitable extremely cold environment, he could only make do with the Ice Cold Divine Flame for now; arranging the ice river swimming for his Clone needed to be done as soon as possible...

(End of Chapter)