The pathway formed a cycle of sorts, allowing the powers of life and death to flow, cycling between one another. Every circulation of the powers of life and death would cause the Life and Death acupoints to expand by a notch. At the same time, hints of fusion would emerge from them.
Although Chen Feng had opened up the Life and Death acupoints, he had only managed to do so by relying on brute force and the Longevity Tower"s a.s.sistance. He did not possess a deep understanding towards the dao of life and death. It had to be said, the fundamental laws of life and death were very difficult to comprehend and even some Immortal Humans from the Immortal Plane would not be able to claim complete understanding of the two daos.
Those two daos were two vast paths within the path of cultivation. The greater one"s comprehension of the two daos, the farther ahead one could reach in their path of cultivation.
To be honest, Chen Feng had yet to even place his first step on each of the two paths.
This time, however, Chen Feng managed to gain a great deal. Thanks to the Twin Swords of Life and Death, Chen Feng had seemingly entered a wondrous state. It felt like delving into a mystery within a mystery. For Chen Feng, he felt as though he was constantly hovering between the edges of life and death. It was a training of his soul.
Life.
Death.
Life and death…
Chen Feng lost all concept of time and his soul ended up in a state of both existence and non-existence.
Although he could not tell how long had gone by, Chen Feng could feel his heart and mind growing tougher and greater than before. His soul became increasingly stable. Additionally, even though there were no signs of it, even the Soul Subduing Mantra technique that he cultivated had improved considerably.
Following the rise in his soul power, Chen Feng"s Soul and Anima acupoints began roiling. The two Sacred artefacts placed within the two insight acupoints also began bobbing up and down to emit energy ripples.
The Sacred-tier bronze bell and drum emitted invisible soundwaves that others could not hear. However, the soundwaves made their way through the Soul and Anima acupoints to shake and wash Chen Feng"s soul non-stop.
Although this cultivation session was also improving Chen Feng"s fleshly body, the strength of his soul power had risen by leaps and bounds, going beyond that of a Human Immortal.
“This kid"s comprehension ability has been increasing lately. A pity, he still needs the help of external items.” Naturally, Tower had noticed Chen Feng"s cultivation progress. Tower had also made use of his power to create more time for Chen Feng.
When Chen Feng finally opened his eyes to end his cultivation session, he felt as though he had awakened from a big dream. He had seemingly gained a new life.
Chen Feng stretched his hand out and the Twin Swords of Life and Death rapidly shrank to a length of one chi each before flying into Chen Feng"s palm. Although the Twin Swords of Life and Death were seemingly unchanged, looking at them brought a look of shock and delight to Chen Feng"s face. Both the Twin Swords of Life and Death had levelled up to become grade 7 Sacred artefacts.
The higher a magic treasure"s grade, the harder it would be for the magic treasure to level up. This time, the two swords had managed to level up, allowing both their quality and offensive power to rise several times higher.
More importantly, they had given Chen Feng a direction in terms of cultivation. The two swords had laid down a foundation for him that he could further explore in the future.
As expected, these naturally-forming spiritual objects are highly malleable. However, I wonder when they will be able to fuse as one? Maybe, they will need to first rise up to the Dao artefact tier. Chen Feng flicked his hand and the two Sacred artefacts flew forward, circling across the sky once before returning, moving back into the Life and Death acupoints.
Even after the Twin Swords of Life and Death had disappeared, faint ripples could still be seen in the air. The earlier move from the two swords, streaking through the air there, had seemingly cut through s.p.a.ce.
Weng!
Once again, Chen Feng sent out the scanning waves, reaching a radius of 15,000 kilometres before charging forward.
This is the Ancient Battlefield of Immortal Humans after all. There must be a high amount of death energy left here. I can make use of the energy to refine the Death Sword. Chen Feng"s figure moved as fast as the wind to disappear from sight.
This time, Chen Feng moved at an even greater velocity. In the span of just two hours, Chen Feng had already covered a distance of hundreds of thousands of li and found three more spots with death energy. The death energy gathered there were all very thick. Additionally, the quality of the death energy there was also very high. This was a result of them having gathered for a long time. Chen Feng collected all the streams of death energy there and stored them inside the Longevity Tower. He would have the Death Sword absorb them after purifying them.
Eh, there is another stretch of death energy somewhere 5,000 kilometres ahead. Not to mention, there is a lot of them there. Chen Feng then changed his flight trajectory again.
After collecting so much death energy, Chen Feng felt highly delighted. The only issue was the lack of places with pure life force.
It was true that the spirit stones that he usually used for cultivation contained life force as well. However, the life force in the spirit stones could not compare against the life force within items like the Fountain of Life or the Longevity Wood.
Both the cultivation of the Longevity Scripture and the Life Sword required an enormous amount of pure, high-quality life force.
“It"d be great if I can find a few more Fountains of Life,” Chen Feng blurted.
It"s here. Chen Feng landed on a mountaintop. However, he did not immediately take action. There were already other cultivators within the valley of the mountain.
It was a 10,000-zhang-tall mountain and the valley beneath it was filled with death energy. The valley was also very deep, so much so that Chen Feng could not even make out the ground surface of the valley. Chen Feng had only noticed that there were others there after approaching the valley. However, Chen Feng had utilized his stealth technique, which retracted all his aura. Due to that, his figure seemingly occupied a special place within s.p.a.ce. Forget Sky Human stage cultivators, even most starter-level Human Immortals would find it impossible to detect Chen Feng"s presence.
There were three forces fighting each other within the deep valley. Two of the three forces were cultivators while the third force was a yao beast that Chen Feng had never seen before.
“There is a total of 20 Deathstill Fruits here. The way I see it, we should just divide them equally and save us the trouble of getting mutually wounded. Those casualties would be an unnecessary occurrence.” The cultivator who spoke was holding a fiery-red bead. As the una.s.suming bead spun, the three cultivators on the other side revealed looks of dread.
“Tie Liuzhi, you think that one Bloodsoul Bead is enough to make us share the fruits equally with you?”
“That"s right! Tie Liuzhi, you have the same cultivation level as the three of us. Not to mention, you are alone as well. Don"t force us to join forces and kill you. If you know what"s good for you, then hurry up and leave.”
“Ha ha ha, you three brothers of the Chang Family! Don"t forget, there is still a Silver-armoured Gale Wolf here. That"s a Yao King. The three of you will likely not be enough to deal with it. This Bloodsoul Bead of mine will do just fine in breaking its defence.” Tie Liuzhi laughed loudly, the bead in his hand rotating at an even faster pace.
The two sides had yet to even obtain the Deathstill Fruits, but they were already having an argument. As for the fruits" guardian, the Silver-armoured Gale Wolf, it did not make any moves. Instead, it simply stayed silent as it observed the two sides. At the same time, it secretly gathered its strength so that it could attack at any moment.
The Silver-armoured Gale Wolf could see that the cultivators" cultivation bases were not on the same level as itself. Their levels were lower. And yet, they gave it a feeling of danger. That was also why it had decided not to make the first move.
Not to mention, it would appear that the two sides would begin fighting one another. That would be the best-case scenario for it.
“Heh! If we had encountered this Yao King right after entering this place, we brothers would have had to expend quite some effort to take it down. But now? I"ll be honest, this stupid wolf is not worth anything in my eyes.”
“If that"s how it is, then let"s fight!” Tie Liuzhi took action the moment he said he would, hurling the Bloodsoul Bead in his hand at the three Chang Brothers. At the same time, he also fired out a beam of b.l.o.o.d.y light at the Silver-armoured Gale Wolf.
“Oh, no! He has more than one Bloodsoul Bead!” The Eldest Chang Brother cried out in shock. The three brothers backed away while utilizing their defensive moves as fast as they could.
Sensing danger, the Silver-armoured Gale Wolf quickly evaded the attack while firing out silvery radiance from its body.
“I"m won"t be playing with you fellows anymore.” After hurling out the two Bloodsoul Beads, Tie Liuzhi swiftly rushed towards the nearby Deathstill Fruits. Stretching his hand out, he grabbed hold of two Deathstill Fruits.
As Tie Liuzhi was about to pick the other Deathstill Fruits, everything before him suddenly went black and he lost his bearings.
There are some people lurking around! Tie Liuzhi was shocked. Promptly, he hurled out another Bloodsoul Bead. A formidable explosion of blood-coloured light erupted to smash the barrier of darkness encasing him. However, the remaining Deathstill Fruits, 18 of them, had disappeared.
“Detestable!”
Tie Liuzhi"s eyes turned red. Every one of the Bloodsoul Bead was as valuable as a Sacred artefact. He had hurled out three of those beads, an act which ached his heart. If it weren"t for the 20 Deathstill Fruits, he would not have utilized the beads. Those were good life-saving items, after all.
Sou!
Seeing a human figure flas.h.i.+ng far away, Tie Liuzhi brought out a jade talisman and crushed it. Next, a hurricane rose up from the ground to envelop him, swiftly bringing him forward to pursue the figure.
“Where do you think you are going?!” The three Chang Brothers and the Silver-armoured Gale Wolf charged out from the blood-coloured light in a somewhat wretched manner. When they saw Tie Liuzhi attempting to leave the place, they immediately thought that he had taken the Deathstill Fruits. Thus, they began pursuing him.
Naturally, the figure that Tie Liuzhi was after was none other than Chen Feng. After taking advantage of the situation to loot the fruits, Chen Feng decided against killing them and simply left.
However, seeing Tie Liuzhi, who was gradually closing the distance between them, Chen Feng grew somewhat surprised. He must be utilizing a Sacred artefact. Looks like he has quite a number of good items on him.
“Fellow friend, stop chasing. If you keep this up, I will not be holding back anymore.” Chen Feng"s voice floated backwards.
“Die!”
As the distance between them gradually lessened, Tie Liuzhi was finally incapable of holding back. Swinging his hand, he hurled two Bloodsoul Beads at Chen Feng.
Tie Liuzhi hated Chen Feng to the extreme. Thus, he wanted to kill him off with this one move.
Chen Feng snickered in response. He reached out with his hand to swiftly grab the two Bloodsoul Beads.
“Explode!” Seeing Chen Feng grab the beads, Tie Liuzhi sneered and he activated the magic arrays within the Bloodsoul Beads. Instantly, a blood-coloured light shone out from Chen Feng"s hand.
Tie Liuzhi believed that this cultivator who dared to grab the Bloodsoul Bead with his bare hand would be blown to pieces by the explosion.
What happened next, however, caused his eyes to pop out. For a moment, he wondered if he was dreaming.
Boom!
The blood-coloured light, caused by the explosion of the beads, spread outwards only to be blocked by a certain power after expanding to a radius of one chi. It was as though there was a spherical barrier there, which began compressing to forcefully press the blood-coloured light back down.
Chen Feng waved his hand. A thumb-sized energy ball, blood-red in colour, jumped upon his palm a few times. Next, Chen Feng threw a snicker at Tie Liuzhi before flicking his finger to fire out the energy ball in Tie Liuzhi"s direction. After flying five kilometres away from Chen Feng, the energy ball fell to the ground. Following that was a world-shaking boom, which tore open a very deep crater on the ground.
1 chi = 0.333 m
1 zhang = 3.333 m
1 li = 0.5 km