Longevity starts with choosing Hextech enhancement

Chapter 472 Sea-Swallowing Carp and Double-Striped Honey Fruit

The remaining Qianchuan Baicao Jiang was carefully stored away again.

Xiao Chen turned to look at the lightest of the Spirit-Nourishing Treasure Boxes.

Gently lift the lid of the box, and you'll see four identical small blue jade bottles inside.

"Could this be a fourth-tier spirit pill?"

Xiao Chen was curious because he recognized that the jade bottle in the box was the same type used to hold elixirs.

However, when he opened one of the small jade bottles, a strong smell of blood wafted out.

Upon closer inspection, the small blue jade bottle was clearly filled with blood!

It also contains a relatively strong spiritual energy, and there is a clear outward dissipation of wood spiritual power.

"what?"

After a brief moment of surprise, Xiao Chen immediately realized, "This is a bottle of essence blood from a high-level cultivator!"

He immediately recalled the demonic traditions he had read, and then compared and distinguished them again.

It was quickly determined that this was indeed the essence blood of a Nascent Soul cultivator with a Wood Spirit Root.

Based on the degree of preservation, it can be deduced that the person's cultivation level before death should have been at the early stage of the Nascent Soul realm.

It can even be determined that this bottle of essence blood is relatively fresh, and the extraction time should not exceed twenty years.

"So, within the last twenty years, a Nascent Soul True Monarch with a Wood Spirit Root has perished?"

Xiao Chen was surprised by his own conclusion: "Is the Yin Corpse Sect still secretly hunting down other Nascent Soul True Monarchs?"

"They still have this ability?"

To be honest, this is actually quite outrageous, almost unbelievable.

It's not that it's particularly difficult; after all, the Yin Corpse Sect has a large and powerful force, and ordinary people really can't defeat them.

The key is that the number of Nascent Soul True Monarchs is quite limited; losing even one would be big news.

If the Yin Corpse Sect were truly hunting Nascent Soul cultivators in secret, it should have been discovered by other sects long ago.

The storm sea will never be as calm as before, with no wind or sound escaping.

Xiao Chen immediately checked the other three jade bottles.

It doesn't matter if you don't see it, you will be shocked when you see it.

The other three small blue jade bottles each contained a portion of the essence blood of a Nascent Soul cultivator, and they were all different.

They are a Nascent Soul cultivator with a Gold Spirit Root at the early stage, a Nascent Soul cultivator with a Water Spirit Root at the middle stage, and a Nascent Soul cultivator with an Earth Spirit Root at the early stage.

"Metal, Wood, Water, Earth, so what's missing is Fire?"

Xiao Chen checked it again to make sure he hadn't misread it: "Good heavens, it's still following the Five Elements theory. What are they trying to do?"

To be honest, something's obviously not right here!
Normally, even if a demonic cultivator secretly harms other True Monarchs to extract their essence blood, they wouldn't specifically observe the other party's spiritual root attributes.

They basically target whoever is easiest to harm.

There must be another purpose behind deliberately collecting the essence of the five elements like this.

Moreover, this means there are four Nascent Soul True Monarchs!
With so many True Monarchs missing from the Storm Sea, how come the other major forces are completely unaware of it?
Isn't that a bit too... useless?
Xiao Chen was really starting to lose his composure. Surely all the major sects couldn't be blind and deaf, completely indifferent to what was happening outside.

Fortunately, he soon noticed that there was a significant difference in the spiritual energy contained in the four bottles of essence blood.

After careful comparison, the age of the bottle of gold-type essence blood was close to that of the first bottle of wood-type essence blood, but there should still be a difference of several years.

The other two bottles of essence blood were actually quite old.

The water-type bottle is at least sixty years old, and the earth-type bottle is even older, probably close to a hundred years old.

However, because they have always been stored in this batch of specially customized elixir bottles, the spiritual energy and power in the essence blood have been locked in to the maximum extent.

So despite the passage of so many years, there has been almost no loss.

"Oh, I knew it! So it was premeditated all along."

Xiao Chen finally understood a bit better.

Even if we extend the timeframe to a hundred years from now, this still seems incredibly absurd.

However, this does create some room for maneuver, allowing them to avoid directly attracting the attention of other forces.

Of course, compared to the specific details of the cause and effect.

Xiao Chen was more concerned about the effects of this essence blood: "I didn't see any relevant records in the Yin Corpse Sect's scripture pavilion or in the storage rings of several True Monarchs."

"Why are they going to all this trouble to collect Nascent Soul essence blood of different attributes? What are they trying to do?"

His gaze fell on the last two unopened Spirit-Gathering Treasure Boxes: "Since they're not found anywhere else, could the answer be hidden inside?"

There were originally two Spirit-Nourishing Treasure Boxes left.

Xiao Chen was really torn about which one to open first.

However, if we follow this line of thought, the treasure box containing the relevant records probably wouldn't be very heavy.

So he weighed the remaining two treasure boxes again and opened the lighter one first.

As expected, inside this Spirit-Gathering Treasure Box was a small jade slip and two separate small wooden boxes.

Xiao Chen then opened the two small wooden boxes as well.

Inside were a stack of handwritten notes and a blue and purple conch shell.

He carefully read through the relevant records and finally understood the main course of events.

First up is this two-tone conch shell, which has quite a history.

It was a communication token given by a sea-swallowing carp to the Yin Corpse Sect.

The Yin Corpse Sect was able to collect so many Nascent Soul cultivators' essence blood without being detected by the other sects in the Storm Sea.

It can be said that everything depends on its contribution.

According to the descriptions Xiao Chen had read in ancient books, the Sea-Swallowing Carp was one of the mythical beasts from ancient times.

Although it cannot compare to the famous mythical beasts such as the Qilin and Kunpeng, it is far superior to ordinary mutated monsters.

Moreover, it has a special talent: it is naturally unaffected by most illusion arrays.

The specific cooperation method between the two parties is that the Sea-Swallowing Carp will search for secluded islands in the outer reaches of the Storm Sea and even in the Kunpeng Sea to find hidden Taoist sects that have gone out of town.

Thanks to its innate ability, as long as it is willing to spend time searching in different places, it can always find the human cultivators who are hiding by bypassing the formation.

Once it finds it, it will return and contact the Yin Corpse Sect via the conch shell.

Then, the Yin Corpse Sect was tasked with secretly surrounding the island and hunting down all the cultivators inside, leaving no one alive.

Afterwards, those who swallow the sea carp can obtain the physical body of a Nascent Soul True Monarch, as well as at least ten thousand portions of blood food.

If there aren't enough cultivators on the island, the Yin Corpse Sect will secretly capture rogue cultivators to make up the numbers.

In any case, people will care if a Nascent Soul True Monarch goes missing, but no matter how many low-level rogue cultivators go missing in the outer sea, it won't attract any attention.

The fact that Lord Yangjiu was able to possess a full nine Nascent Soul Corpse Puppets, instead of the five or six speculated by outsiders, was also largely due to this cooperation.

"Damn the Yin Corpse Sect, isn't this just colluding with a powerful demon to turn against their own people?"

Xiao Chen finally understood the truth: "He cultivates the demonic path and colludes with the sea race. He is a complete scoundrel and a traitor to the human race!"

"Fortunately, Your Excellency went to the Sea of ​​Compassion earlier."

"If the Storm Sea comes, wouldn't those bastards from the Yin Corpse Sect be the first to turn against us?"

That makes sense, since they've already cultivated the demonic path, they're not going to do all sorts of bad things.

If he had even a shred of conscience, he wouldn't have fallen into demonic cultivation.

From this perspective, colluding with powerful demons is quite consistent with the general situation that all demonic cultivators are a bunch of lunatics and psychopaths.

That's fine.

Next, we'll get to the real story.

It all started when the Yin Corpse Sect acquired a powerful demonic inheritance from the outside world.

The jade slip inside the treasure box is the inheritance jade slip with only one reading opportunity remaining.

It not only records some demonic arts, but more importantly, it also records a special demonic altar.

As is well known, demonic cultivators often deplete their own essence and blood when practicing and using demonic arts.

This results in them facing far greater difficulties than righteous cultivators when attempting to break through to the next major realm.

This can be considered one of the major drawbacks of cultivating the demonic path.

However, this demonic altar can help the worshipper undergo a complete transformation by offering specific sacrifices.

Imitating the innate five elements spiritual body in ancient legends, it uses external objects to forge the acquired five elements demonic body.

Although it's a replica, if used correctly, it can achieve nearly 60-70% of the effects of the original.

In this way, one can not only enjoy the benefits of cultivation brought by the acquired Five Elements Demon Body.

More importantly, when breaking through to the Nascent Soul stage in the future, one can also gain an additional 20% success rate in the breakthrough.

This will compensate for the impact of depleted essence and blood on cultivation and breakthroughs.

"Wow, there's actually such a way?"

Xiao Chen's eyes were opened to a whole new world.

The only problem is that demonic arts often have significant flaws, but these flaws are not noted on these sheets of paper.

Moreover, the specific arrangement methods are not recorded in a comprehensive manner.

No matter, Xiao Chen immediately picked up the inheritance jade slip and stuck it to his forehead.

He then channeled his divine sense into it and began to browse the specific contents of the inheritance.

Coincidentally, this demonic art did not come from anyone else, but from the local forces of the Storm Sea, the infamous Yin Sha Immortal Sect in ancient times.

Moreover, this is a core secret.

It contains detailed records of many sect secrets and internal struggles unknown to outsiders.

It also left behind a large number of demonic secret techniques, including many methods that have long been considered forbidden by the outside world.

However, after seeing the complete inheritance of the Acquired Five Elements Demon Body, Xiao Chen also learned about its three major difficulties and shortcomings.

First, the requirements for the offerings are extremely high.

Not only do we need to collect the essence blood of five Nascent Soul True Monarchs with different spiritual roots, but we also need to consume five fourth-grade high-quality Five Elements spiritual items.

These five spiritual items also naturally require the presence of the five elements.

It should be noted that fourth-tier high-grade spiritual items are almost non-renewable, belonging to the kind of unique items where once used, there are fewer and fewer available.

Gathering five high-grade fourth-tier spiritual items with different attributes is a rather difficult task, even for a Nascent Soul cultivator at the Great Perfection stage.

For most cultivators, seeing this would be enough to give up.

Secondly, there are instances of sacrificial failures occurring for unknown reasons.

That's right, even if a demonic cultivator gathers all the offerings, the sacrifice is not guaranteed to succeed.

At least when this jade slip of inheritance was made.

Of the four sacrifices, two resulted in the successful forging of a demonic body, while the other two resulted in nothing.

Because there are so few cases, and the offerings used in all four instances were different.

Therefore, the Yin Sha Immortal Sect has not yet been able to find the reason for the failure of the sacrifice.

However, even if the above two points are not a problem, there is still one last hurdle.

Thirdly, if the sacrifice is successful, the changes that the acquired Five Elements Demonic Body brings to the cultivator are unique and irreversible. The so-called uniqueness is actually quite easy to understand.

That is, once a cultivator possesses the acquired Five Elements Demonic Body, they can no longer possess any other Dharma Body or Spiritual Body.

For example, Xiao Chen had previously heard of the True Yang Transformation Pill in Hundred Herbs City, which could help users with fire spiritual roots cultivate a True Yang Body.

Some ancient books also record even more powerful spiritual objects or elixirs.

It can help cultivators cultivate a spiritual body that is superior to a physical body.

To put it bluntly, it's still the same old path of the demonic path—sacrificing future possibilities for immediate gains.

This can also be understood as raising the lower limit by lowering the upper limit.

As for irreversible, it's even simpler: it just means there's no way to undo it.

"Alas, in the end, we can't escape the inherent problems of the demonic path."

Xiao Chen sighed and shook his head: "Although the effect is good, it still feels a bit uneconomical to lower the upper limit."

Although for the time being, there seems to be no upper limit to the aptitude of his miscellaneous wood spiritual root.

If it were any other cultivator, they would be overjoyed, let alone have the chance to obtain a spiritual body, or even a magical body.

However, it's really hard to say what Xiao Chen's future potential will be.

He may well have the opportunity to obtain a true spirit body in the future, and it's even possible that he'll get the relevant option in the next Hextech.

Of course, even disregarding Hextech Optimization, which is completely uncontrollable and relies entirely on luck.

Sooner or later, Xiao Chen will travel to the other regions, to the Three Mountains Grotto Heaven, and even to the Holy City of the New Cultivation World.

In those places, he might obtain special spiritual objects or elixirs that could help him cultivate a complete spiritual body.

It should be noted that the Acquired Five Elements Demon Body is ultimately a replica, and the original version is still more powerful.

"Hey, if a 60% effect can increase the breakthrough success rate by 20%, then wouldn't the original version increase the breakthrough success rate by 30%?"

After a quick calculation, Xiao Chen immediately realized that the difference seemed quite large.

This is not as simple as the difference between 20% and 30%.

If you use every means to accumulate it to the end, it could very well be a significant difference between 90% and 100%.

"In that case, let's keep it as a backup."

Thinking of this, Xiao Chen immediately put all these things away again.

Unless absolutely necessary in the future, it is best to prioritize the normal breakthrough route.

"And this little sea snail."

Xiao Chen directly refined it again so that he could also receive messages.

If that sea-swallowing carp still dares to make contact, then go and take it down!
The Storm Sea will not tolerate such an arrogant monster.

There is one Spirit-Nourishing Treasure Box left.

Xiao Chen took another deep breath and placed it properly in front of him.

Then, with a glimmer of hope, I opened it.

The moment the lid was opened, a beam of emerald green light shone out, dazzling the eyes.

Wrapped in bright yellow silk was a round, fist-sized spiritual fruit.

Its surface is interwoven with turquoise and white patterns, naturally forming a truly exquisite design.

What's even more amazing is that the pattern was actually flowing slowly, causing the aura to change accordingly.

It looked as if the spiritual fruit was still breathing.

"A fruit that glows?"

Xiao Chen reached out and picked it up.

The moment he touched the surface, he sensed an exceptionally powerful spiritual force hidden beneath the fruit peel.

It is ten times or even dozens of times more potent than ordinary fourth-tier spiritual fruits.

Therefore, in an instant, Xiao Chen realized that this was definitely a fifth-order spirit fruit!
And if nothing unexpected happens, it should be the Double-Striped Honey Fruit that he once saw in ancient books.

According to those who have tasted it, it is sweet, like honey.

It is said that this spiritual fruit is divided into five different types based on its color.

For example, the one in Xiao Chen's hand contains both green, representing wood elemental power, and white, representing water elemental power.

After consuming it, you can have the next hour.

Through a series of changes within one's own body, one can fully appreciate the profound mystery of the mutual generation of the five elements, specifically the generation of wood by water.

If it is turquoise or red, then it is fire generated by wood, and so on.

Because the Double-Striped Honey Fruit is effective even for a Nascent Soul cultivator, it has been offered for a high reward for many years.

According to the records in that ancient book.

Since ancient times, if a cultivator is lucky enough to obtain a Double-Patterned Honey Fruit, he can almost offer it to most Nascent Soul Venerables in exchange for rewards.

Because most Nascent Soul cultivators might not be able to use their abilities due to incompatible attributes.

They would also buy the Double-Striped Honey Fruit at a high price and then exchange it with suitable like-minded people for better things.

"Oh my, this is a really good thing."

Xiao Chen's eyes lit up immediately: "This is made from water and wood, isn't it perfect for me to eat!"

Although he usually wields the Azure Wave Penetrating Needle in his left hand and the Crimson Sky Breaking Mountain Palm in his right.

But if you look into it, he is indeed a wood-elemental cultivator.

Such a spiritual object, which clearly helps one comprehend the Great Way of Wood, could be considered the perfect match.

Therefore, Xiao Chen definitely did not intend to offer it as a tribute. Instead, he brought the double-patterned honey fruit to his nose and gently smelled its fragrance.

Then it was put back into the Spirit-Nourishing Treasure Box for safekeeping.

I plan to keep it and use it to aid my spiritual practice when needed.

"All done."

After putting away the Spirit-Nourishing Treasure Box, Xiao Chen checked the remaining miscellaneous items again to make sure he hadn't forgotten anything.

Then he stood up and reassessed his location.

He immediately used water escape techniques and headed straight for the Pure Sky Sea.

Now that the Yin Corpse Sect has been dealt with, the next step is naturally the three major families.

Since we're already here, we can't leave anyone out.

Xiao Chen had even planned out the route.

First, travel from the northern part of the Storm Sea through the Black Rock Sea where the Five Thunder Temple is located, and then directly arrive at the Pure Sky Sea.

We stopped by the Jinxia Sect's library to borrow some scriptures, focusing on learning about the raising of spirit insects.

Then it travels from the southern part of the Storm Sea, passing through the Wanxian Islands.

The Jin family of Wanxian Island had searched for him for a while back then, so he settled that score as well.

Then continue south, cross the South Laohai Sea to reach Zhanlong Sea, and attend the Spirit Fish Banquet that was arranged with True Lord Lieque.

This creates a circular route, which is convenient and fast.

Meanwhile, within the Pure Sky Sea, the three major families were completely unaware of the impending purge.

Since receiving the order from the Pagoda True Lord two years ago, they have been busy mobilizing manpower to mine the fourth-order spiritual veins and fourth-order spiritual mines within their territory.

This can be seen as preparation or an attempt to prepare for the opening of the Great Sea Secret Realm.

Firstly, it's to collect mid-grade spirit stones for Pagoda True Monarch, so that they can be used to trade for some fourth-tier consumables.

Secondly, we hope to find rare and special ores before the secret realm opens.

Once a special ore is mined, it can not only help the Pagoda Lord, but also allow them to receive additional rewards.

Although they are collectively referred to as the three major families when speaking to outsiders.

However, they are not entirely united.

For example, the extra rewards promised by the Pagoda True Lord can only be claimed by families that have mined special spirit mines.

If nothing is gained, then there is almost no reward.

Providing them with shelter and allowing each of them to occupy one-third of the Jingkong Sea to develop their families is already a tremendous reward.

Otherwise, the three of them alone would not be able to safeguard the foundation of Jingkonghai.

Therefore, the three families became competitors with each other at this time.

They all went to collect their rewards themselves.

However, relying solely on their own manpower is clearly not efficient enough.

After all, mining fourth-order spirit ore is inherently a difficult and tiring task, and the large number of Foundation Establishment cultivators can hardly offer any help.

Basically, all that everyone can rely on are Golden Core cultivators and Golden Core spirit beasts.

Under such circumstances, those rogue cultivators who, while not highly skilled, were numerous enough, naturally attracted the attention of the three major families.

They all issued lists of heroes, announcing that they had hired temporary retainers to complete a treasure hunt mission.

It's basically just a nicer way of saying "miner".

The so-called treasure hunt mission is simply to dig for treasure in the mines and hand over the fourth-tier spirit ore they find.

Objectively speaking, this was originally a good thing.

Since independent cultivators lack income, they don't mind selling their physical labor in exchange for some cultivation resources.

The problem lies in this treasure hunt mission.

The three major families wanted the assistance of the Golden Core cultivators, but they didn't want to actually pay a large sum of money.

So they very cunningly claimed that there were very rare and special minerals inside the mine.

If someone manages to mine a special ore, they can directly exchange it for an extremely generous reward.

However, they also used this excuse to offer extremely low buyback prices for ordinary fourth-tier spirit ore.

After all, I've given you the opportunity to go treasure hunting and I'm not charging you an entrance fee, so it's not unreasonable for me to recycle these ordinary spirit ores at a low level.

To put it bluntly, they completely repackaged mining as a treasure hunt.

Moreover, in order to attract more monks to participate.

The three families also specially arranged some shills.

They either lied to the public, claiming that they had made a fortune through mining.

Or they might pretend to be ordinary cultivators and infiltrate a mining team, then take out a special ore they had brought with them before entering the mine and claim that they had just dug it up.

Anyway, it's really hard to tell whether ores are new or old.

The three major families would also publicly reward these accomplices.

They want people to believe that as long as they work hard, they might become rich overnight.

What if a rogue cultivator really does find a special ore?

The solution is quite simple.

It's nothing more than another so-called 'mysterious disappearance case' or a 'surprise incident'.

(End of this chapter)