Chapter 511: Nurturing the Soul

At the edge of the Forbidden Land of Ice.

After cultivating using the soul crystals, Song Tingyu, Xie Jingxuan, Du Xiangyang, Luo Chen, Xue Moyan, and Pan Qianqian were in high spirits.

“Soul crystals truly are amazing things.” Joy filled Pan Qianqian’s face as she gripped a soul crystal. “Even with her status in Illusory Demon Sect, it’s extremely difficult for Sister Xue to obtain soul crystals.”

Xue Moyan nodded slightly.

Unlike spirit stones, soul crystals weren’t supplementary spirit materials that were commonly seen in a powerful force. Xue Moyan and Luo Chen were both illustrious individuals in Illusory Demon Sect and Heavenly Sword Mountain. They were the ringers of their respective sects.

Yet even they struggled to acquire soul crystals to aid in cultivating their True Souls while they were in the Netherpassage Realm, the stage in which condensing one’s True Soul and increasing their soul energy was most important.

Even people with the status of elder within the nine great Silver rank forces could not always temper their souls using soul crystals.

Soul crystals were expensive, and although the nine great Silver rank forces did have some soul crystals stored away, they were usually used to help martial practitioners whose souls were damaged. Soul crystals could help such martial practitioners stabilize their souls and maintain their realms.

If Luo Chen didn’t have the luxury of constantly cultivating with soul crystals, there was no way people like Pan Qianqian or Du Xiangyang could!!

Song Tingyu and Xie Jingxuan came from the Scarlet Tide Continent, and soul crystals were even rarer in Profound Heaven Alliance. It was unlikely that Song Yu or Xie Yaoyang had the opportunity to cultivate using soul crystals, let alone their daughters.

Each person in Qin Lie’s group had acquired a sizeable number of soul crystals from the thunder lagoon. They could clearly sense their souls getting stronger as they continued to temper their souls, empowering them with the energy from the soul crystals.

“From here on out, breaking through each realm will rely on the transformation of one’s soul!” Du Xiangyang exclaimed excitedly. “From the Netherpassage Realm to the Fulfillment Realm… the Nirvana Realm and the Imperishable Realm… the benefit that these soul crystals will have on our cultivations will show itself more prominently in the future!”

Everyone’s eyes were alight with passion.

“I originally thought that we’d never run out of the soul crystals we gathered from the thunder lagoon,” Pan Qianqian said. Then her voice became tinged with regret. “But now that I look at the amount we have now… It may not necessarily be enough.”

“Soul crystals aren’t things that anyone would say that they have enough of,” Du Xiangyang said with a shrug. “Unfortunately, the Pure Soul Springs are even more valuable.”

All six of them subconsciously glanced at Qin Lie.

Qin Lie sat on the ground nearby, frozen in a thick layer of ice. While they talked amongst each other, he appeared to be an unmoving, human-shaped ice sculpture.

After absorbing the Pure Soul Springs and blood essences, a switch in the Soul Suppressing Orb seemed to have been flipped, causing it to extract his blood and his soul energy. This made Qin Lie feel incredibly weak once he awakened from his trance.

Qin Lie was currently in the process of replenishing his soul energy with the soul crystals that Song Tingyu and Xue Moyan gave him.

When everyone looked at him, he opened his eyes and laughed bitterly. Then he said, “The Pure Soul Springs, eh…? I don’t what’ll happen to them in the future.”

“We understand.” Du Xiangyang smiled, thought to himself for a moment, and then said, “You can use the soul crystals to replenish your soul energy, but how will you replenish your depleted blood supply?”

“Qin Lie cultivates the Blood Spirit Art, so every single drop of blood in his body contains a terrifying amount of blood spirit energy. After losing so much blood, it’ll be impossible for him to recover all of it in a short time. Well, unless we capture some powerful spirit beasts and construct a blood pool. He’d be able to use a pool of spirit beast blood to recover.”

As the heir to Blood Fiend Sect, Xue Moyan possessed a deep understanding of the miraculous Blood Spirit Art. She glanced at the white world around her and shook her head. “There probably aren’t any spirit beasts here. Even if we could find a single one, it would most likely be the ice spirit. We also don’t have the means to construct a blood pond.”

“It’s fine, I have a way to replenish the blood in my body.” Qin Lie smiled slightly.

Xue Moyan suddenly shot him a look. “You do?”

“Mn.” Qin Lie took a brief moment to think before saying, “I can use the bloody aura of the Demon Sealing Tombstone. With it, I’ll be able to quickly create more blood!”

“The Demon Sealing Tombstone possesses a blood aura?” Xue Moyan asked in shock.

“It does!” Qin Lie exclaimed.

As he said this, Qin Lie moved his mind consciousness, and rays of bright, icy light flooded the ice encasing him.

“Crack!”

The thick layer of ice around his body instantly shattered.

Qin Lie struggled out of the ice and summoned the Demon Sealing Tombstone from his spatial ring, causing it to land in the snow in front of him.

He reached out and touched its surface with his finger, softly circulating the Blood Spirit Art.

Seven rainbow lights shone from the Demon Sealing Tombstone, its ethereal chains twisting restlessly within. Wisps of thick blood aura gushed out of the tombstone like a breached dam and mingled with the godly light.

Everyone had been watching closely, eyes glued to the Demon Sealing Tombstone, so all of them reacted the moment its thick blood aura gushed out.

Song Tingyu, Xie Jingxuan, and Du Xiangyang wore expressions of envy.

Luo Chen’s complexion, on the other hand, became a gloomy pale.

When he previously had the Demon Sealing Tombstone in his possession, he tried to touch it. However, before his fingers could ever make contact with its stony surface, he was always sent flying by a terrifying force.

He tried again and again, but he was just repulsed over and over. In the end, although extremely reluctant to do so, he admitted defeat.

The Demon Sealing Tombstone ultimately never acknowledged Luo Chen.

The Demon Sealing Tombstone currently stood before Qin Lie and he could use it to cultivate, extracting its blood aura and using it to replenish his lost blood.

A complicated mix of feelings washed over Luo Chen.

“What a pure blood aura! Qin Lie… c-can I give it a try?” Xue Moyan bit her bottom lip, expectation welling in her eyes.

Since Xue Moyan cultivated the Blood Spirit Art as well, she could sense the surging blood energy within the blood aura of the Demon Sealing Tombstone. If she could find a way to use that energy while she cultivated, she would be able to raise the blood spirit energy in her blood to new heights with the Blood Spirit Art.

“Go on ahead,” Qin Lie said generously.

Xue Moyan walked over, her face filled with joy, then reached out her tender, pale hand and slowly approached the Demon Sealing Tombstone.

The instant the middle finger of her hand was three inches away from the tombstone’s surface, a ray of bloody light erupted from it. The light forced Xue Moyan’s delicate body backward, pain appearing on her face.

After stabilizing herself, Xue Moyan let out a soft sigh and shook her head helplessly. “It’s rejecting my aura.”

“You were better off than I was. Back when the Demon Sealing Tombstone was in my possession, it blasted me away more than tens times in a row,” Luo Chen said bitterly. “It wasn’t until I was severely injured that I decided to give up. Now that I think back, I still don’t know why…”

It was obvious that Luo Chen still hadn’t completely accepted that outcome.

“It appears as though the Demon Sealing Tombstone only allows its master to use it.” Du Xiangyang rubbed his chin, then suddenly asked, “How did you get the Demon Sealing Tombstone to acknowledge you as its master, Qin Lie?”

“Maybe I got it to acknowledge me when I got hurt and accidentally spat a mouthful of blood on it.” Qin Lie himself wasn’t sure. “Who knows?”

“It was that easy?”

“Mn.”

“You’re ridiculously lucky.”

“Hehe.”

After this simple back and forth, everyone in the group was either envious of regretful. Yet they were no longer curious about the Demon Sealing Tombstone.

In the meantime, Qin Lie continued to replenish his blood using the Demon Sealing Tombstone’s blood aura. It took him six hours before he finally managed to refine some blood.

“Shall we attempt to enter the Forbidden Land of Ice?” Du Xiangyang suggested.

Nobody rejected the idea.

For the next few days, Qin Lie’s group summoned their respective shields of light and ventured deeper into the Forbidden Land of Ice, enduring bone-chilling winds.

The deeper they went, the colder it became.

Their speed gradually slowed because they constantly had to stop and replenish their spirit energy, which they were always using to keep their shields of light up continuously.

Qin Lie, on the other hand, completely exposed himself to the elements. His body could still endure the intense cold of the Forbidden Land of Ice on its own. The frost natal palaces inside of him had been filled to brim with refined frost energy a long time ago, and even now, it continued to gradually take in more.

Every time the group stopped to recover spirit energy, he was either using the blood energy of the Demon Sealing Tombstone to refine more blood for himself or replenishing his soul energy using the soul crystals.

A few days later, just when he replenished half of the blood he lost and restored around sixty to seventy percent of his soul energy, the powerful suction force of the Soul Suppressing Orb started up again.

Like a giant beast that only devoured soul energy and blood, the Soul Suppressing Orb opened its bloody maw once more. Just like before, Qin Lie’s soul energy and blood flowed into the Soul Suppressing Orb.

Once the process began, Qin Lie immediately dropped to the icy ground with a pained look on his face. Helplessness flashed through his eyes as he passively endured his soul energy and his blood draining out of him.

This time, the Soul Suppressing Orb’s merciless absorption lasted for an hour.

However, the blood that Qin Lie had refined and the soul energy he had used the soul crystals to replenish… had been completely absorbed.

This latest bout of draining had thrown him back to where he started a few days ago, exhausted of both soul energy and blood.

Chapter 512: Great Danger

Qin Lie quietly sat atop an icy rock. His face was pale as he refined blood for himself using the Demon Sealing Tombstone’s blood energy.

As he did this, the rest of his group were accumulating spirit energy from spirit stones to maintain their shields of light.

When Qin Lie opened his eyes a considerable amount of time later, he inadvertently smiled when he saw that everyone was looking at him.

It recently felt as if he had fallen into a never-ending nightmare. Every time he replenished his soul energy and blood to a certain point, the Soul Suppressing Orb would generate a powerful sucking force.

A large majority of the soul energy and blood that Qin Lie worked so hard to replenish would then be drained from him.

However, the Soul Suppressing Orb would avoid some of the soul energy and blood in his body, refraining from causing his body any real harm.

As for the soul energy and blood that the Soul Suppressing Orb did take, they would be drained and absorbed behind the sealed door within the orb.

Each time he replenished more of his soul energy and blood, the Soul Suppressing Orb would just extract it. The cycle kept repeating.

This brought a sudden halt to Qin Lie’s cultivation, keeping him stuck at his current realm and preventing him from making any more breakthroughs in his various spirits arts.

All of his time and effort were spent on replenishing his soul energy and blood. He couldn’t afford to care about anything else.

The Soul Suppressing Orb’s drain on his soul energy and blood also led to a large decrease in his combat potential, cutting it down to half of what it would be.

His companions fared a bit better.

As Qin Lie’s group headed deeper into the Forbidden Land of Ice, the air grew colder and colder, forcing their pace to get progressively slower. Only after spending a lot of time replenishing their spirit energy with spirit stones did they dare to continue onward.

More than half a month passed by, and their group of seven slowly approached the center of the Forbidden Land of Ice.

As of this moment, they were quietly sitting among frozen trees and recovering their energy. Translucent, icy peaks could be seen in the distance, pure white snow accenting their frigid outlines. Arctic winds weaved through these mountain-tops with shrill, earsplitting howls.

“The Land of Buried Gods should be the coldest place in the Forbidden Land of Ice. That is the only place in which the remains of the deceased would never rot. In addition to that, the dispersal of the energy in their bodies would decrease to an extremely slow speed.

Xue Moyan slowly got to her feet and looked into the distance. A serious expression surfaced on her face.

“Black Voodoo Cult, Celestial Artifact Sect, Ten Thousand Beast Mountain, and the eastern barbarians…” She sighed softly. “There really are quite a few people coveting the remains of those elites. Even if we did find the Land of Buried Gods, we wouldn’t necessarily be able to obtain anything like we did in the Forbidden Land of Thunder.”

She looked at Qin Lie, a hint of worry in her eyes.

Everyone could see that Qin Lie wasn’t doing so well. If it weren’t for the constant loss of soul energy and blood, Qin Lie’s combat strength still could’ve been considered extraordinary even outside of the Forbidden Land of Thunder.

But now…

“How many soul crystals do you have left?” Song Tingyu asked gently.

“About thirty or so.” Qin Lie frowned.

For the past half a month, Qin Lie needed to continuously consume soul crystals to replenish his soul energy. Back in the Forbidden Land of Thunder, since he had taken the priceless Pure Soul Springs, he allowed the others to take the soul crystals.

They had ended up sharing them to a certain extent..

Now, however, since he required soul crystals to replenish his soul energy, Song Tingyu, Xie Jingxuan, and Xue Moyan would give him soul crystals every so often.

Because of an urgent need for soul crystals at the moment, he naturally didn’t turn them down. As a result, he had been using up their soul crystals for quite some time now.

The number of soul crystals that each of the three girls had was swiftly decreasing..

“I’ll give you another fifty.”

Song Tingyu took numerous translucent soul crystals out of her spatial ring and gave them to him.

“I also have a lot of soul crystals. If you don’t have enough, I can give you some more.” Pan Qianqian raised her voice.

“These will be enough for now.” Qin Lie smiled and accepted the soul crystals that Song Tingyu gave to him. His eyes, however, were far from relaxed.

—He had no idea when this torture would end.

Every time Qin Lie replenished his soul energy and blood, recovering a little bit, the Soul Suppressing Orb would trigger its draining effect and steal everything he had worked so hard to accumulate.

This cycle of absorption felt like a hole in which he was freefalling and couldn’t see the bottom of..

It weighed down on his heart, causing it to sink lower and lower..

“I wonder how Chu Li is doing,” Du Xiangyang suddenly said.

“He’ll be fine,” Luo Chen interjected. “Considering how strong he is and the fact that he no longer has He Wei and those other Terminator Sect fools holding him back, no one will be able to take him down without a fight.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll definitely run into him here in the Forbidden Land of Ice,” Song Tingyu said.

Qin Lie nodded and stood up. “Let’s get going. We need to continue searching for the Land of Buried Gods.”

The group continued on their journey once more.

Another five uneventful days passed by until, suddenly, Pan Qianqian shrieked in surprise.

“There’s a body here! Someone froze to death!”

Lying amidst the numerous icy trees was a young man. He was garbed in eastern barbarian clothing, and his white skin bore many exquisite tattoos. His body was encased in ice, having first been frozen and then covered in snow.

“At first I thought he was an icy rock. It was only after I pushed the snow out of the way that I realized there was an eastern barbarian inside of it,” Pan Qianqian explained.

Everyone in the group gathered around the corpse of the white eastern barbarian and swept the all of the snow aside, carefully inspecting it.

“I don’t see any wounds or traces of combat. Nobody killed him,” Du Xiangyang said firmly.

“Judging from his appearance, this person probably froze to death. He was most likely in the early stage of the Netherpassage Realm. Perhaps he rushed here without replenishing his spirit energy and was overwhelmed by the frigid air. His nerves would have then gone numb, leading to him being frozen alive.”

After she took a moment to examine the man, Song Tingyu paused. A serious expression appeared on her beautiful face.

“I believe we should take this as a warning. We need to make sure we have as much spirit energy as possible at all times. Otherwise, if we encounter unforeseen circumstances and expend too much, the frigid air may overwhelm us! We might suffer the same fate as him!”

“Mn. We need to be more careful,” Du Xiangyang said, his expression becoming more serious as well.

“Black barbarian… scarlet barbarian… white barbarian…” Xue Moyan muttered a few words to herself, her brow deeply furrowed. Then, as a realization occurred to her, she spoke up, her voice filled with worry. “The eastern barbarians may prove to be even more of a problem than we originally thought.”

All eyes immediately turned to her.

“The barbarians we encountered in the Forbidden Land of Thunder, Sen Ye and his men, all had dark skin. All of them were black barbarians of the Black Barbarian Tribe,” Xue Moyan explained grimly. “I initially thought that they made up all of the eastern barbarians in the Graveyard of Gods. However, this white barbarian we’ve stumbled across means that the black barbarians weren’t the only eastern barbarians to enter the Graveyard of Gods. There are probably white barbarians and scarlet barbarians here as well. The number of eastern barbarians in the Graveyard of the Gods might exceed our expectations… by an obscene amount. Similar to how each of our nine great Silver rank forces sent people here, each of the eastern barbarians tribes may have sent their own.”

“Compared to us, the eastern barbarians are definitely more united. They also despise us to their very cores. This Trial… may actually prove to be rather difficult.” Du Xiangyang started to feel a headache coming on.