Chapter 1745: Harvest

Chapter 1719: Harvest

A crisp sound echoed!

The disk burst forth with dazzling golden light, twisting and deforming under the influence of a powerful law, then shattering inch by inch. This golden disk was surprisingly fragile, instantly transforming into countless specks of light and vanishing without a trace in a flash. Only faint spatial fluctuations remained in the void.

Just as this extraordinary treasure was destroyed, in a secret room deep within the Spirit Realm, a tall, slender figure, previously motionless and cross-legged on the ground, suddenly raised its head. Two green flames emerged within its hollow eye sockets, illuminating its face with unusual clarity! It was a bony, skeletal face, with the two green flames flickering incessantly in its eye sockets, appearing extremely eerie.

Not far in front of the skeleton, twelve ancient bronze lamps, about a foot high, were arranged, each flickering with green flames of varying sizes. The largest were egg-sized, while the smallest were as thick as a thumb.

A hint of surprise and doubt appeared in the skeleton's eyes. It tilted its head, contemplating for a moment, before seemingly recalling something. Suddenly, it opened its mouth and spat out a ball of silver light. Within the silver light, a palm-sized silver disk appeared. Apart from its size and color, its style and shape were identical to the golden disk destroyed in the Cold Realm. However, the silver disk was now covered with countless long, thin cracks on its surface, and the moment it was spat out, it let out a mournful wail and dissipated.

Upon seeing this, the mysterious skeleton's eyes flared with a 'whoosh,' the green flames surging several times in size, becoming as large as fists. A mighty roar erupted from the skeleton's mouth, a cry of extreme shock and rage!

The skeleton suddenly stood up. In its fury, a boney hand suddenly reached out and grabbed at the void to one side. Immediately, spatial fluctuations surged, and a dark, colossal claw materialized out of thin air, raking down the adjacent wall. With a thunderous 'boom,' the impossibly thick wall of the secret room was shattered by the giant claw.

The skeleton, seemingly still unable to vent its anger, opened its mouth towards the other wall. Immediately, black light flickered within, as if about to spit something out. But just then, its gaze shifted, suddenly falling upon the twelve ancient lamps with flickering green flames on the ground. The green flames in its eyes flickered, and it ultimately closed its large mouth slowly, calming down considerably. The skeleton's fangs gnashed wildly for a while. After some time, it finally let out a resentful snort and sat back down cross-legged.

A moment later, no sound was heard from the secret room. The pale green flames on the twelve ancient lamps flickered, casting shifting shadows that made the room alternately dim and bright.

The Profound Heaven Sword flashed with an emerald glow, its blade flickering and dissipating, returning to its original wooden stick-like form. Then, with a clear chime, the sword transformed into a ball of yellow light again and floated towards Han Li's arm. Immediately, a faint yellow mark reappeared on the surface of his arm. The Profound Heaven Sword was sealed once more!

Han Li looked at the mark on his arm, his face naturally filled with both surprise and joy. He let out a long breath, and with a movement of his body, he was about to stand up from the pit. The moment the golden disk was destroyed, the pain in his body vanished completely. This gave him a strong feeling of having escaped death.

However, Han Li's joy was clearly premature. The moment he stood upright, before he could make any other move, he suddenly felt his legs give way, and with a 'thud,' he collapsed back to the ground. His entire body then became exceptionally numb, and for a time, he had no sensation anywhere in his limbs. Han Li was greatly alarmed. He quickly released his spiritual sense and swept it through his body. The result made him smile bitterly!

Although he was currently at the peak of the late Void Refinement stage, his body was utterly empty; not a single trace of magical power remained. Clearly, the Profound Heaven Sword's strike, while irresistibly powerful, had also drained every last bit of spiritual power from his body. This was even with the mysterious energy also being completely absorbed. Otherwise, without his Golden Body Dharma Idol by his side, he would have been utterly unable to activate the Profound Heaven Sword or possess the power for such a strike. Now, he had merely exhausted his magical power; he hadn't significantly damaged his vital essence or seen a major drop in cultivation level, which was already a stroke of great luck.

However, because the meridians throughout his body had previously been overfilled with that mysterious energy, they had unknowingly sustained some damage. Now that the energy and magical power had suddenly vanished, the after-effects naturally manifested immediately. Nevertheless, Han Li wasn't concerned. With his physical body's strong regenerative abilities, these minor injuries would heal in a short while. It was the immense expenditure of magical power that would take a considerable amount of time to recover.

But in any case, his mood at this moment was naturally one of extreme delight. Although he was confident that, unlike ordinary cultivators, advancing to the late Void Refinement stage was only a matter of time with the aid of various elixirs like the Soaring Dragon Pill, unexpectedly advancing to such a realm out of nowhere saved him five or six hundred, or even a thousand years of arduous cultivation. This was, of course, a tremendous boon. Compared to this, his current minor troubles were negligible.

Thinking this, a faint smile appeared on Han Li's lips, and his gaze shifted to the center of the high platform. The three-headed, six-armed Golden Body was floating in mid-air, also cross-legged in meditation, its six eyes slightly closed. Through the mental connection between his main Nascent Soul and his second Nascent Soul, he instantly knew that the second Nascent Soul was also unharmed. It had merely leaped across so many cultivation stages and was now frantically trying to stabilize its current realm. Otherwise, a single lapse could cause it to immediately drop back one or two levels. This was also because Han Li's main body was already a Void Refinement cultivator. If the second Nascent Soul had truly been an independent entity, leaping across so many realms at once, the backlash from the heart demons generated by such a massive difference in realms alone could have driven it insane and killed it immediately.

Even so, the second Nascent Soul wouldn't be able to engage in any combat or magical duels for a short period. Without over a decade of meditation and calming its mind, heart demons could appear at any time, destabilizing its realm.

However, what truly amazed Han Li was the current state of the Brahma Saint Golden Body. After being melted and tempered repeatedly by that mysterious energy, this Golden Body was now covered in countless purple-golden runes, and the aura it exuded was more than twice as powerful as before. The Brahma Saint Golden Body was already extraordinary, and if its power could truly double, its terrifying potential was unimaginable. For Han Li, this was naturally another pleasant surprise. Although Han Li tried his best to maintain a calm expression, the slight smile at the corner of his mouth naturally could not be concealed.

An hour later, Han Li moved his body, sat upright, and then resumed his cross-legged meditative posture. The damage in his meridians had now healed by more than half. With a flip of one hand, several medicine bottles of different colors appeared in his grasp. He poured out several exceptionally fragrant pills from them and swallowed them all at once. With both hands moving in unison, the medicine bottles vanished, replaced by two exceptionally emerald-green crystals. Without a word, Han Li closed his eyes and began to frantically absorb the pure spiritual energy from the top-grade spirit stones in his hands, aided by the medicinal power.

Not long ago, Han Li had been so overwhelmed by the excessive spiritual power in his body that he wished he could expel it all. Now that his body was truly devoid of spiritual power, he had no choice but to painstakingly gather it again, bit by bit. Such a wryly amusing situation naturally left Han Li somewhat speechless.

Time passed swiftly. In the blink of an eye, more than half a day had passed. Han Li's tightly closed eyes suddenly opened, a dark, sharp glint flashing within and quickly fading, indicating that his magical power had recovered somewhat. He frowned slightly but still slowly stood up. Because he had consecutively jumped two cultivation stages, the amount of magical power his body could hold was far greater than before. The spiritual energy here was much denser than the outside world, and with the aid of elixirs and spirit stones, after such a long time, he had only recovered about two-tenths of his current full magical power. Of course, this amount was already comparable to nearly half of his magical power before his advancement.

However, at this moment, Han Li naturally couldn't afford to sit here in meditation for several days and waste so much time. Only after feeling he had some self-preservation ability did he take action again. He didn't immediately walk towards the door but instead lifted his leg and walked towards the center of the stone platform. Although the most precious treasure here, the golden disk, had been destroyed, the other remaining treasures still greatly tempted him, and he intended to collect them.

The emerald-green chair before him was naturally one of them. When this chair had previously collaborated with the golden disk in the air, it had glowed brightly with spiritual light and flickering runes, clearly extraordinary and undoubtedly of significant origin. With a flick of Han Li's sleeve, a wave of green light swept past, and the spiritual chair instantly vanished.

After his gaze swept around once more, his figure shifted, and he strangely appeared in front of an armored puppet. Compared to the spiritual chair, Han Li was more interested in the puppets. Now, with the disappearance of the golden disk, these puppets had reverted to their original motionless state, becoming inert objects once more. But Han Li dared not underestimate the puppets in the slightest. Earlier, when these armored puppets were activated, the spiritual pressure they emitted was so immense that almost each one was comparable to a Body Integration stage cultivator. If he could truly control these armored puppets, the gains would be immeasurable.

Thinking this, he moved his spiritual sense, sending threads of divine thought into the puppet before him. But a moment later, Han Li's expression became exceedingly strange. The structure of these puppets was surprisingly simple and crude. The only thing Han Li couldn't understand was that instead of ordinary spirit stones, the cores of these puppets were inlaid with never-before-seen blood-red strange stones. It was unknown what these strange stones were. Their surfaces were smooth as mirrors but covered with countless golden threads that shimmered faintly and continuously. Their spiritual light was extremely dim, appearing as if they could extinguish at any moment. It was clear that the puppets' previous actions had consumed most of the energy contained within the strange stones. If fully activated, this puppet would at most have enough energy for one or two more attacks. Han Li frowned for a good while, but ultimately, with a flick of his sleeve and a flash of green light, he intended to collect this puppet as well.