Chapter 68
Chapter 68: Refining the Spirit with Yin Qi
“The Spirit-Communing Jade hairpin is destroyed,” Jiang Yun Jiang said, voice tight. “Are you borrowing my body for now?”
“No.” Dan Hua’s voice sounded faint, strained. “Yun Jiang, my soul has been depleted too much. You must be extremely careful of that girl, Shao Heng.”
“Even I have never seen or heard of that colored light. It’s far too strange.”
“It’s still grinding away my soul origin without stopping.”
Dan Hua paused, as if gathering herself.
“Even if I borrow your body, my only option now is to use the Return-to-Spirit Ruins Secret Art to fall into deep slumber and wait. When you find a treasure that can greatly increase soul power, then…”
Her words broke off.
Dan Hua’s phantom dispersed, leaving only a tiny crimson mole between Jiang Yun Jiang’s brows.
“Shao Heng.”
Jiang Yun Jiang’s face darkened. She pulled two pills from her storage bracelet and swallowed them without hesitation.
She wiped blood from her lips. The face that had once looked as fresh as a lotus after rain had been hammered by Shao Heng’s punches again and again. Now it was bruised and swollen, the corner of her brow darkened.
The pills were Second Grade Qing Chen Pill and Ginseng-Heart Return-to-Origin Powder, personally refined by Dan Hua. Their quality was excellent, their medicinal power pure, and they took effect quickly.
Jiang Yun Jiang’s injuries began to heal. Her spiritual power started to recover.
But the rage and unwillingness in her chest burned hotter, a flame that refused to go out.
No… not like this. If I keep letting anger steer me, I’ll only ruin myself.
She closed her eyes and drew several slow breaths. Only when her violently pounding heart eased toward calm did she open them again.
In the earlier fight, Shao Heng’s spiritual power showed no floating at all. She was mid First Realm, just as Jiang Yun Jiang had guessed.
And her cultivation felt even stronger than Jiang Yun Jiang’s.
But Jiang Yun Jiang cultivated a mid-grade method—far better than Shao Heng’s Origin-Nourishing Qi-Raising Art. Even so, Shao Heng’s foundation seemed deeper, perhaps by a hundred furnaces… maybe even two.
And she’d done it in the outer sect.
What terrifying speed.
Shao Heng couldn’t possibly be lower-grade aptitude. She had to be top-grade.
And that colored power—like Jiang Yun Jiang’s White Tiger killing intent—could it be an aptitude talent?
Jiang Yun Jiang forced her emotions down and stayed ruthlessly rational, combing through every detail she’d seen.
When the pieces clicked into place, she lifted her head and stared at the crescent moon hanging in the sky.
Ling Jiang’s inheritance.
She had to obtain Ling Jiang’s inheritance.
Only by seizing the inheritance of that half-step Eighth Realm expert could she achieve the fish-dragon transformation.
The Eighth Realm was the Spirit Roaming Realm, where the primordial spirit left the body and Dao laws gathered upon the cultivator, earning the title of Saint.
According to the secret lore Jiang Yun Jiang had researched, Ling Jiang had been only one threshold away from advancing into the Eighth Realm back then.
And Ling Jiang had refined a Tai Yin star fragment, intending to make it her life-bound core—using it to cultivate the Tai Yin Great Dao and break through her bottleneck.
Jiang Yun Jiang’s gaze burned as she stared at Ming Yue overhead.
And the call she’d sensed came from Ming Yue in the sky. Ling Jiang’s inheritance site had already chosen her.
“Who else but me?” she whispered.
…
Elsewhere, even after watching Dan Hua flee with a secret escape art, Shao Heng had no strength to pursue.
Dan Hua’s burst—power exceeding the First Realm—had slammed into her. No matter how tough her body was, bones had snapped, flesh had split, and she was drenched in blood.
“That old thing still had a hidden trick,” Shao Heng said through clenched teeth as she wiped blood from the corner of her mouth. “When I find you again, I’ll drag you out and tear your soul to pieces so you’ll never reincarnate.”
Her voice was cold, but her hands were steady.
From the earlier dragon-blood tempering, dragon-blood essence and medicinal power still lay hidden in her acupoints. Now, under threat, that essence surged up from deep within, knitting bone and sinew back together, restoring her strength with frightening speed.
Shao Heng stood and used the Blood Pact to call Ao Chuan.
Then she swept the area with her senses—and her heart tightened.
Every trace of Jiang Yun Jiang’s aura had been cleaned away. Dan Hua’s methods were truly those of a high-realm cultivator.
Shao Heng took a slow breath and cast Dust-Cleansing Technique again and again, wiping away every drop of blood she’d left behind. With repeated cleansing, even her remaining aura became faint, hard to detect.
After entering the Mystic Moon Secret Realm, she’d seen too many strange arts. If someone obtained her blood, who knew what vicious curse they might cast.
Only after she’d cleaned everything did Shao Heng withdraw.
At the foot of the mountain, she reunited with Ao Chuan, who’d been waiting.
The little white dragon flew toward her, already chattering as it aimed to coil back into its tattoo form on her arm.
“How did it go? Did you kill those two old undead and the little undead who wanted to steal my blood essence?”
“That’s a terrible way to put it,” Shao Heng said dryly. “No. They didn’t die.”
“That lingering soul is still a high-realm cultivator. She burst her power and escaped. They got away.”
“Huh?”
Ao Chuan had already wrapped around her right arm—then paused.
“But it won’t be easy for her,” Shao Heng continued, eyes narrowing. “My power invaded her soul. It’ll keep grinding down her origin. She can’t remove it. She’ll weaken until there’s nothing left.”
“Wait.” Shao Heng’s gaze snapped down. She caught Ao Chuan with her left hand and lifted him away from her arm.
He’d been long and slender before.
Now he had several bulges along his body.
“What did you eat?”
Shao Heng poked one bulge with a finger. Ao Chuan flinched and answered vaguely, “Just… a tiny bit of food.”
“Every word out of your mouth is like saying nothing.” Shao Heng gave two humorless laughs and pinched the bulge more firmly.
“With a True Dragon body, you could swallow a white-jade mammoth without getting bulges. What did you really eat?”
Ao Chuan stared up at her with golden slit pupils, then tried an ingratiating tone. “I found a place where the earth-vein yin qi gathers. There were three Shattered Moon.”
Shao Heng’s eyes sharpened. “Didn’t you say that if I found Shattered Moon, I could refine them myself?”
Shao Heng’s aptitude was unusual—perfectly suited to moonlight, sunlight, and starlight. Shattered Moon could be absorbed quickly by her.
Ao Chuan’s body was strong, but to refine them completely still took time.
“You were afraid I’d go back on my word and snatch your Shattered Moon, so you swallowed all of them at once,” Shao Heng said flatly.
The unrefined power sat in his belly like indigestible stones, forming those bulges.
Ao Chuan’s dragon face went guiltily blank.
Shao Heng sighed, then said, “Take me to the place where the earth-vein yin qi gathers.”
“What for? There’s no Shattered Moon left. I already collected them all.”
Shao Heng flicked his dragon head. “I want to use yin qi to temper my spiritual sense.”
“The Great Expansion Spirit-Refining Art is profound. The key lies in the word refine. By running its method, I can draw in all kinds of strange powers from heaven and earth to temper my spiritual sense.”
“This is also the foundation for the second level of the art—divine sense turning into weapons.”
Ao Chuan slipped back onto her arm, returning to the tattoo form, and guided her onward.
Half an hour later, Shao Heng reached a freezing stretch of land. A small hole in the ground had been dug open—Ao Chuan’s work.
She used Earth Escape Technique and sank several feet underground, then found the natural cavern Ao Chuan had described. The yin qi inside was astonishingly dense, cold enough to bite through bone.
Shao Heng swallowed a Rejuvenation Pill and sat cross-legged.
Dan Hua’s attack had only been endured because of the foundation laid by dragon-blood tempering, letting Shao Heng keep moving. But her injuries hadn’t truly improved. She needed somewhere safe to heal.
This extreme yin place was rarely visited—perfect for seclusion.
It would also let her refine her spirit with yin qi.