Han Li slowly stood up and waved his hand, producing a cloud of azure light, soon condensing it into a glistening egg-sized almost solid ball.
He stared at the pure spiritual power in his hand and muttered, “Following the strengthening of my Nascent Soul, my magic power has grown proportionally.”
Soon after, he shook his hand and the ball of light scattered.
He then slapped the top of his head and a beam of azure Qi flew out from it. It circled above his head to reveal an infant with his exact face.
His Nascent Soul was originally only two inches tall, but now it had grown another half-inch. Its body was also far more solid and distinct.
The Nascent Soul was holding a small azure cauldron with an emerald talisman and tens of flying pins circling above its head. The pins glowed a golden azure and appeared extremely gaudy.
The soul appeared excited to have emerged and joyfully flew around the room for nearly two hours. Then, it flew back into its original body as if it were tired.
Han Li reopened his eyes wearing a satisfied expression.
Before he took the Nascent Cultivating Pill, he was only able to move outside of his body for an hour. Any further than that would drain his Nascent Soul’s vitality.
It was rumored that when one’s cultivation reached late-Deity Transformation stage, their Nascent Soul would become truly solid, allowing them to live bodiless with no fear of celestial winds.
This was also the most reliable method for a cultivator to ascend to the spirit realm.
But despite his increase in magic power, he was still far from reaching the peak of mid-Nascent Soul stage. Oddly enough, after he refined the pill, he felt completely a.s.sured that he would reach that point after a hundred years of secluded cultivation without any problems or bottlenecks.
This strange feeling delighted Han Li.
Once his Nascent Soul returned into his body and settled down, he opened its mouth and spat out two golden streaks.
They fluttered around him and turned into two dim golden swords. They were the Bamboo Cloudswarm Swords that the Elder Devil had captured at Devilfall Valley.
Although their spiritual nature had yet to be entirely eradicated and could still be somewhat controlled, they were still incapable of being used to create the Aureate Sword Formation.
As such, Han Li specifically allocated some time to restoring the two.
Under his mental command, the swords flew a meter in front of him and remained still.
He spat out two clouds of his nascent flame and instantly enveloped thems within it.
When he saw crackling azure flame dancing on the blades, Han Li waved his sleeve, summoning several small bottles he prepared beforehand. They all opened of their own volition and their contents poured into the azure flames, staining them with various colors.
Han Li then stared at the two weapons with complete focus and cast spell seals with flicks of his fingers, putting him in control of the refinement process.
The repair of the flying swords continued for three entire days.
When Han Li’s complexion turned completely pale, he spat out blood essence and combined them into the flying swords
It was only then that the two swords were returned to their original glistening golden light and were cleansed free of any devilish Qi.
He then took the two swords back into his body and immediately sank into meditation once more.
After a day pa.s.sed, Han Li sensed that his magic power was restored and opened his eyes, now summoning an emerald wooden ruler into his hand: the Eight Spirit Ruler.
He traced the simple grains in the wood with a pensive expression.
Back inside the Devil Subjugating Pavilion, Han Li had already discovered that ordinary spiritual power seemed to not affect it, and due to a lack of time, he wasn’t able to research the matter.
He now held the hilt of the ruler in one hand, slowly pouring spiritual power into it as azure light roamed down his fingers.
Of course, the result was the same. Spiritual power was circulating in the ruler, but it didn’t display the slightest change apart from a few lines of green light flowing across the surface.
After pouring in a full tenth of his spiritual power to little effect, Han Li cut his magic power and lowered his head in contemplation.
A short moment later, he raised his other hand and extended a single finger in front of him.
Rainbow-colored light flickered from his fingertip, summoning the Vajra Barrier he kept within his body.
A thread of Buddhist light flashed from it and disappeared into the ruler without a trace.
Light then suddenly pulsed from Eight Spirit Ruler and it released a mist of azure light. Emerald-green characters appeared from within the mist to create a set of scriptures.
Surprised, he immediately focused his gaze.
After looking at it for a few moments more, Han Li let out a long sigh and guessed, “So it was what I had expected!”
The Eight Spirit Ruler was a Buddhist treasure and controllable through Buddhist light as he suspected. The scripture that appeared from the light it released was the artifact imprint technique for the treasure.
Han Li’s main cultivation art had always been Daoist in nature with a few very powerful devilish techniques mixed between. The only Buddhist technique he ever cultivated was the Brightjade Arts.
Although it was a top-grade Buddhist technique, it focused mainly on the body. It was incredibly difficult and was beyond painful to practice as a result of its effects of bodily purification. Since he only cultivated the art to the second layer, the technique wasn’t able to produce any Buddhist light.
However, the vajra barrier had an abundance of Buddhist light within, allowing him to cultivate the first layer of the Artifact Imprint Technique.
Han Li’s thoughts quickly flickered like lightning and he came to a decision in an instant. Even if he could only use a portion of its strength, it would still be an immensely powerful a.s.set.
With that decided, Han Li poured even more Buddhist light into the ruler, causing its Artifact Imprint Technique to become even clearer to read.
The imprint technique for the Eight Spirit Ruler greatly differed from that of the Heavenvoid Cauldron. However, it wasn’t very difficult either and could be cultivated with only a years time.
With that thought, he silently swept his sleeve and withdrew the ruler in an azure flash. Then, he flipped it to produce the damaged Black Wind Flag.
This treasure was now reduced to meager bits of flag, but a majority of the pole still remained.
But despite its tattered appearance, the flag still glistened with black light as if its spiritual nature was still present. It was clear to see how powerful it was while it was still whole.
However, Han Li didn’t take it out with any intention of repairing it. He was only curious about spatial treasures and wondered if he could learn anything from it.
After all, spatial type treasures were incredibly rare, even amongst Divine Spirit Treasures. As storage pouches were the lowest grade spatial magic tools, there was nothing to be gained from researching them.
It was a pity that Divine Spirit Treasures were truly beyond his current scope of understanding. After several days of strenuous observation, he wasn’t able to grasp anything about the flag.
Feeling a bit of regret, he put away the flag and exchanged it with the giant flame cauldron he acquired from the Spirit Change Hall.
Even before the treasure had unintentionally gained intelligence, it was a top-grade ancient treasure. As it was able to produce over a thousand pure yang firebirds, it couldn"t be underestimated.
Of course, the cauldron also came with a nameless transparent material, twelve flame pillars, and three variously sized black crystals. Although he knew these items were rare, he only now found the time to identify them.
As for the scroll and the earthy yellow devil rod that he acquired from Kunwu Hall and Old Devil Qian’s storage pouch respectively, their power was immense. With only a bit of refinement, he could control them as he pleased.
Unfortunately, the blood blade had left him quite disappointed.
The blade was clearly refined from a Devil Essence Diamond. He reckoned that it was created from one of the two he sold at the underground auction at the Jun Capital. The blade’s power was fearsome from absorbing the flesh and souls of several Nascent Soul cultivators, but now that power had disappeared, reverting it back into a common treasure.
Then with some thought, Han Li figured out the mystery behind this.
The blood blade was able to increase its might by devouring the flesh and blood of others, but it was incapable of storing it. After some time, the gained power would gradually dissipate. After all, it was a replica, and couldn"t be compared to the true Devil Dragon Blade.
Greatly disappointed, Han Li put away the treasure.
He lowered his head in thought for a moment more and slapped the back of his head. Afterwards, he spat out a sphere of golden Qi, the vajra barrier. There were five b.a.l.l.s of sparkling golden light within it.
Han Li looked at the golden sphere with a grave expression, and a trace of hesitation betrayed from his eyes.
He then frowned as a thought flickered through his mind. He raised his head to point at the barrier and it trembled before ma.s.sively growing in size.
Thunder roared from the five spheres and countless arcs of lightning flickered between to reveal five human skeletons covered in talismans. All of them had an additional jet-black skull at the pit of the stomach that was also covered in talismans, restraining them from making the slightest movements. These skeletons were Old Devil Qian’s Unbreakable Cinque Devils.