Chapter 139 – Pseudo-Core Formation Stage
The flying swords were fast, but the Earth Escape Technique was even faster. Wang Lin followed them from a distance as over 100 cultivators flew through the sky and arrived at the location of the spirit vein.
There were strong spiritual energy fluctuations emanating from numerous holes in the ground. There were bodies everywhere, and the strong smell of blood pervaded the area.
As the 100 cultivators arrived, countless Hou Fen cultivators appeared and the battle began.
At the same time, eight rays of light charged in, and a powerful aura enveloped the area. Wang Lin’s eyes narrowed. These eight people were all Nascent Soul cultivators.
As they approached, they were targeted by the patrolling Nascent Soul cultivators of Hou Fen. The Nascent Soul cultivators from both sides began to fight. The earth shook and the sky changed color.
Shortly after, 100 more teams appeared in the distance and joined the battle.
Wang Lin’s gaze turned cold. After looking for a moment, his Ji Realm Divine Sense shot out from the ground and charged toward the battlefield.
A Foundation Establishment Xuan Wu disciple had just killed a 15th-level Hou Fen disciple. Just as he was about to attack again, a red light struck him. He felt like he had been struck in the head by a giant hammer and lost consciousness. His soul shattered without any resistance, and he fell from the sky.
Eight Xuanwu Foundation Establishment cultivators used a sword formation to trap a Hou Fen Core Establishment cultivator, but after the red light flashed, all eight of them trembled and their faces froze. They felt their souls being thrown into chaos and losing their form as their bodies fell from the sky.
The trapped Core Formation cultivator was shocked, but the current situation didn’t give him time to think as he charged towards the enemy.
After a pseudo-Core Formation cultivator at the Xuanwu Realm killed several cultivators of the same level with the aid of a Nascent Soul-ranked flying sword, he grabbed a female cultivator at the neck of an early Foundation Establishment stage. He tore off her clothes, revealing her pink pocket. She screamed, sounding incredibly weak in the chaotic battle.
The pseudo-Core Formation cultivator licked his lips. His eyes revealed a sinister expression as he quickly retreated, holding the female cultivator in his arms. However, a red light flashed nearby, and his body trembled. He released the female cultivator, and his body fell from the sky.
After he died, his flying sword didn’t stop, instead it plunged into the ground. Just as it was about to touch the ground, a hand appeared, grabbed the sword, and returned it to the ground.
As more and more Foundation Establishment cultivators from Xuan Wu fell from the sky for no apparent reason, the Xuan Wu cultivators began to pay close attention to the matter. A purple-robed Core Establishment cultivator from Xuan Wu stared at the ground and pointed with his finger. He used some unknown method to transmit a message. Then, ten late-stage Foundation Establishment cultivators charged in that direction.
Wang Lin’s expression was calm. He turned to leave at a leisurely pace using the Earth Escape Technique. One of the ten cultivators held a compass and chased after Wang Lin.
After moving more than ten kilometers, Wang Lin stopped and sent out his Ji Realm. Before the Foundation Establishment cultivators, Wang Lin was king, with complete control over their lives and deaths. The ten of them didn’t even have time to react as their souls were destroyed.
The current Wang Lin no longer had the naive or kind nature of a village youth; he would now kill anyone who dared to stand in his way.
There is no right or wrong on the battlefield; there is only life and death. If he had the slightest bit of mercy, then he would be the one to die. Along with the power that Alam Ji bestowed upon him, it also quietly transformed his nature. Alam Ji focused on the extremes. If the user planned to walk the path of good, then he would become a hero of a generation who would fight against all evil.
If anyone were to follow the path of evil, then that person would undoubtedly be a demon king; evil enough to make demon cultivators fear him and worthy of the title of demon king.
Under the influence of the Ji Realm, it is impossible to have a personality that switches between good and evil.
Wang Lin, with his upright personality, wanted to become an immortal hero and create a righteous path to honor his ancestors. Unfortunately, the appearance of Situ Nan caused his personality to slowly change, ultimately leading to disaster.
Which family should be respected when their own has been destroyed? Ji’s nature caused his personality to change. Since he couldn’t become a hero of his generation, he would become a demon king.
Wang Lin’s eyes were expressionless as he collected the storage bags without looking at the corpses. He returned to the ground and headed to another part of the battlefield.
However, not long after, he emerged again. He looked at the battlefield, then took out some spirit stones, formed a formation, and threw ten corpses into it. Each corpse exploded into a bloody pulp before being absorbed by the formation.
When the last body exploded, Wang Lin bit his fingertip and dripped a drop of blood onto the spirit stone.
Suddenly, a wisp of purple smoke emerged from the formation and circled around him once. The purple smoke disappeared along with the spirit stones. If one didn’t pay close attention, they wouldn’t have noticed the difference.
After finishing all that, Wang Lin sank back to the ground and returned to the battlefield.
The battle grew increasingly tense as everyone joined in. The battle between the Nascent Soul cultivators also intensified, forcing the other cultivators to avoid them.
At this very moment, Xuan Wu cultivators of the Foundation Establishment stage began to mysteriously fall from the sky, their bodies covered in blood as they hit the ground.
As more and more Xuan Wu Foundation Establishment cultivators died under mysterious circumstances, the Xuan Wu cultivators panicked. The Hou Fen cultivators took this opportunity to attack.
The purple-robed middle-aged man who had sent ten Foundation Establishment cultivators to kill Wang Lin frowned. His eyes swept across the ground like lightning before locking onto a spot on the ground. He pointed at the spot, and an early stage Core Formation cultivator charged out without a word.
As the Core Formation cultivator charged, Wang Lin immediately fled. The Core Formation cultivator sneered as he slammed his hand into the ground. A large palm print appeared on the ground, forcing Wang Lin out. Wang Lin emerged from underground and immediately ran toward the formation he had set up.
The Core Formation cultivator smiled mockingly. He was certain that Wang Lin was only able to kill so many Foundation Establishment cultivators because he was using a powerful magic treasure. He thought that with a little caution, he could easily kill Wang Lin.
With that in mind, he waved his hand, and a golden awl appeared before him. The awl paused for a moment before charging toward Wang Lin. The awl’s speed was too fast. It created ripples in the air as it moved.
Wang Lin didn’t even turn his head as he threw the treasure Hou Fen had given him. The treasure transformed into a silver fist and struck the awl.
As they collided, the awl spun faster and pierced through the silver fist. The awl dimmed, but it didn’t slow down. It continued to chase Wang Lin.
Wang Lin appeared calm. The moment the awl caught him, he jumped to the ground again. He activated the Earth Escape Technique to move several dozen meters before escaping again. Wang Lin did this several times before arriving at the formation he had created.
The Core Formation cultivator leisurely followed. His eyes were filled with contempt as he shouted, “You little rat! Don’t you have any other skills besides ambushing people?”
Wang Lin didn’t say a word. He charged through the formation without stopping. After passing through, he stopped and turned to look at the Core Formation cultivator above the formation.
Wang Lin’s eyes turned cold and he shouted, “Open!”
As he shouted those words, purple smoke poured out of the formation, trapping the Core Formation cultivator within. If someone were to look from a distance, they wouldn’t be able to see what was happening through the thick purple smoke.
Wang Lin sat cross-legged and sneered as he threw the treasure Yang Sen had given him. Suddenly, a ring of energy shot out from the treasure and surrounded Wang Lin. The awl struck the ring of energy, but only caused it to ripple slightly.
Wang Lin didn’t even pay attention to the awl as he stared at the purple smoke and took out his flying sword. After he touched the sword, red smoke came out of it and a demon appeared. The demon stared at the purple smoke with greed in its eyes. It wanted to devour the person inside, but it hesitated because of Wang Lin.
Wang Lin took a deep breath and closed his eyes without saying anything. The red light rays gathered to form a red cloud, which came out of Wang Lin’s consciousness.
This was the first time the Ji Realm had exerted its full power and left Wang Lin’s body. When the demon saw the red cloud, his face filled with fear and he stepped aside.
The red cloud immediately turned into a circle and circled the demon once before dragging it into the purple smoke. The Core Formation cultivator sat cross-legged within the formation with a dark expression on his face. A gourd was floating around him, slowly absorbing the purple smoke.
This was an extremely vicious formation called the Heaven Devouring Demon Formation. Its main materials were the bodies of cultivators, which served as the foundation of the formation. Wang Lin used ten Foundation Establishment cultivators to set up this formation, so it wasn’t too difficult to trap a Core Formation cultivator for a while.
If he had the body of a Core Formation cultivator, he would only need five to kill a mid-stage or lower-stage Core Formation cultivator. However, this formation had high physical requirements. He would have to kill those people himself, making it extremely inconvenient to use.
As Wang Lin’s Ji Realm Divine Sense entered the purple cage, the Core Formation cultivator noticed something was wrong and opened his eyes. Wang Lin quickly charged into the Core Formation cultivator’s consciousness with the devil, completely ignoring the gourd.
Within the Core Formation cultivator’s consciousness, the cultivator’s soul transformed into a giant and roared angrily at Wang Lin. The Ji Realm Divine Sense activated its full power against the cultivator’s soul. Wang Lin commanded the red cloud to send out countless bolts of red lightning to attack the Core Formation cultivator’s soul.
The giant showed a pained expression and his body shrank. He quickly waved his hand and a bolt of red lightning split in two.
Soon after, the red cloud transformed into more red lightning and attacked the giant once again. The giant’s body became smaller, but his fists became more deadly. With each punch, a large amount of red lightning shattered.
With Wang Lin’s cultivation level, he could barely handle an early-stage Core Formation cultivator. If he were at the pseudo-Core Formation stage, it would be much easier for him.
But Wang Lin wasn’t a reckless man. Why would he fight if the only chance of victory was in his hands? As the battle reached its climax, the demon received Wang Lin’s command and reluctantly attacked.
The giant panicked. He immediately struck the demon with his hand, shattering it into pieces. The giant breathed a sigh of relief before panic returned to his face. He watched as the demon reappeared in his hand. The demon began to bite his soul.
No matter how hard the giant swung its arm, the demon clung to it like it was part of its body. Eventually, the giant gave up fighting the red lightning and used its other hand to continuously pound the demon. Each strike caused the demon’s body to dim slightly, but not only did the demon never let go, it began devouring it even faster.
In truth, the devil was also in quite a sorry state. If he let go now, Wang Lin would definitely kill him. If he let go, he would die, but if he persisted, there would be a chance for him to survive. If he could devour this Core Formation cultivator, there would be a chance for him to become strong enough to face Wang Lin. Once he faced Wang Lin, he would be free to do whatever he wanted.
With that thought, the demon became determined and began devouring even faster. It could be said that the demon was concentrating all his energy on devouring.
The giant began to weaken. His attacks grew weaker. His giant body shrank rapidly until it turned into a smaller golden soul, which was devoured by the demon.
The demon displayed a gleeful expression as it tried to quickly devour the soul, but a red cloud suddenly surrounded it. The demon let out a frustrated roar as it slowly vomited out the Core Formation cultivator’s soul.
After passing through the demon’s body, the soul’s consciousness had been erased. It had become an ownerless divine sense. Wang Lin controlled his Ji Realm to leave the collapsed consciousness with his divine sense and return to his body.
Wang Lin suddenly opened his eyes and smiled coldly. The Core Formation cultivator’s divine sense was floating in his consciousness and was slowly being devoured by his Ji Realm.
The golden awl that had attacked Wang Lin lost its light and fell to the ground. Wang Lin put away the treasure that had been protecting him. He grabbed the awl and, after examining it, put it away.
Then he stepped forward and stopped at a corner of the formation. He dug out a piece of spirit stone from the ground and crushed it. The purple smoke dissipated, revealing the corpse of a Core Formation cultivator.
Wang Lin stood beside the corpse. He pointed his hand at the corpse’s forehead and shouted, “Get out now or I’ll kill you immediately!”
A ray of red light involuntarily shot out from the cultivator’s head and transformed into the form of a demon. His eyes were filled with hatred, but he soon sighed and obediently returned to the flying sword in Wang Lin’s storage bag.
Wang Lin stared at the cultivator’s body. Various thoughts flashed through his mind. He took the cultivator’s bag of holding and waved his hand. The body was burned to ashes, but within the ashes was a sparkling golden core. The golden core was rapidly shrinking and its color was dimming. It looked like it would soon disappear.
Wang Lin grabbed the golden core and put it into his mouth without hesitation. Then he stepped back and sank into the ground.
Wang Lin sank more than 1,000 feet into the ground and sat cross-legged. He began to digest the essence. The essence soon disappeared, and spiritual energy flowed freely throughout his body.
This spiritual energy was too powerful for Wang Lin’s body to handle, causing him to bleed from his mouth and nose. Wang Lin pointed at his brow, and the Heaven-Defying Bead appeared. He grabbed it and disappeared into the Heaven-Defying Bead’s space.
Within the heaven-defying space, Wang Lin immediately flew to Situ Nan’s Nascent Soul and began cultivating. He began to bleed all over his body, and veins began to show through his skin.
Wang Lin’s hands formed a seal. He entered a strange position with one hand on his forehead and the other on his stomach. This formed a complete circle.
A large amount of spiritual energy was rapidly circulating through his body, and each rotation would strengthen his body.
After two months had passed inside the Heaven-Defying Bead, Wang Lin suddenly opened his eyes. However, they were cloudy and it took some time before they became clear again.
“The Evil Demon Sect’s jade slip states that one can increase their cultivation level by devouring the core. This seems to be true as long as I follow the seal and chant the incantations on the jade slip. Unfortunately, I need to use the same cultivation method as them to absorb more than 20% of the core’s spiritual energy. Currently, I can only absorb 10%.”
Wang Lin stood up and checked his cultivation. He silently thought, “I only absorbed 10% of the core spiritual energy, but it allowed me to break through the middle stage of Foundation Establishment and reach the peak of the late stage of Foundation Establishment, placing me at the pseudo-Core Formation stage.”
Two months in the Heaven-Defying Celestial Realm was like ten days in outer space. As soon as Wang Lin left the Heaven-Defying Celestial Bead, he immediately moved away using the Earth Escape Technique. It was already late at night.
Wang Lin arrived at the battle site. There were many corpses scattered around and the spirit veins had been pulled out of the ground by someone, leaving a bottomless chasm.
After checking for a while, he immediately charged towards the mountain where Hou Fen Union was. As soon as he arrived at the foot of the mountain, he emerged from the ground and jumped onto his flying sword.
There were many cultivators patrolling the area, but once they saw the jade slip Wang Lin used to record his kills, none of them stopped him. Wang Lin headed straight for one of the side buildings at the top of the mountain. This was where Fen Luo had last summoned him.
There were two female Core Formation cultivators cultivating outside. They opened their eyes as he walked toward them, but when they realized it was Wang Lin, they closed them again.
Wang Lin stood outside the building and said loudly, “Students greet the teacher.”
“Come in.” Fen Lou’s gentle voice came from inside the building.
Wang Lin entered without a word and saw Fen Lou sitting on a stone bench. There was another person beside him, Yang Sen. He nodded at Wang Lin before turning his gaze back outside and frowning.
Feng Lou’s expression looked tired as he looked at Wang Lin and asked, “What’s wrong?”
Wang Lin didn’t say a word; he simply threw the jade away. Feng Lou was shocked. He hadn’t examined the jade, only Wang Lin. After his divine sense entered the jade, his expression became strange.
Yang Sen took the jade slip from Feng Lou and scanned it with his divine sense. His face brightened, and he smiled. “Not bad. You killed 61 Foundation Establishment cultivators and one Core Formation cultivator. If you can keep this up, then you have a chance to obtain the Distant Heaven Pill. But I’m very curious. You were only at the middle stage of Foundation Establishment before. How did you reach the pseudo-Core Formation stage so quickly? And even then, it should be nearly impossible for you to kill a Core Formation cultivator. How did you do it?” Toward the end, his voice grew more serious.
Wang Lin had already anticipated these questions before he came here. His expression was calm as he said plainly, “That Core Formation cultivator was already severely injured by others before escaping. I was fortunate enough to catch him off guard and take his core. Then, I used the Evil Demon Sect’s technique to devour his core and reach the pseudo-Core Formation stage.”
“The Devouring Technique…” Yang Sen’s gaze pierced Wang Lin. He noticed traces of core spiritual energy within him. This made him slightly believe Wang Lin’s story, and he remained silent.
Feng Lou gave Wang Lin a meaningful look, then tossed the jade slip back to him. He said, “This is the second piece of the map. I’ll count those Core Formation cultivators as ten Foundation Establishment cultivators. If you manage to kill 150 Foundation Establishment cultivators, then you can come to me to claim the third piece.”
Wang Lin nodded. He examined the jade with his divine sense and discovered that it was indeed a map. If he combined the two maps, he would have a clear understanding of Hou Fen’s surroundings.
Hou Fen borders the Demon Sea. According to the map, there is no Zhao around Hou Fen. According to the description on the map, there is another continent on the other side of the Demon Sea. He believes that in Part 3 there will be some information about that other continent.
There was also a detailed explanation about the Sea of Devils, but Wang Lin didn’t pay much attention to it as he withdrew his senses.
Yang Sen looked at Wang Lin with a positive look and said, “The Xuan Wu cultivators have gathered for a great battle. If you want to gain praise, then this will be your best opportunity.”
Wang Lin was about to speak when a sudden scream came from outside. Yang Sen and Feng Lou instantly disappeared as they charged out.
Wang Lin immediately went out and saw the severely injured Nascent Soul. Its spiritual energy was leaking everywhere. The Nascent Soul said, “Fellow cultivators, the country-sealing array has been broken… the fire monster is on its way…”