Chapter 631: Ghostly Shadows Wailing Soul

Volume 3, Chapter 5: Renowned in All Directions

"Senior Brother has a point. However, since Du Dong possesses the Cold Moon Wheel, it's not surprising that he made it to the end. But what about this Han Li? Does he also have a high-grade magical artifact?" the mustachioed middle-aged man asked again.

"Not exactly. While I don't know if Junior Nephew Han has a high-grade magical artifact, he is certainly very generous in his actions," the man in the late Foundation Establishment stage said with a wry smile.

"What do you mean? What does being generous have to do with a competition?" This time, it was the sallow-faced old man who asked, showing some interest.

"In his first match, Junior Nephew Han threw out over thirty fireball talismans at once, shattering his opponent's protective barrier before they even had time to summon their magical artifact. In the subsequent matches, he also employed mundane martial arts and a clever flame manipulation technique, along with the aid of talismans, barely defeating his opponents to win," the man explained.

"Leaving aside the martial arts and techniques, there's nothing strange about that. Many people join the sect already possessing skills. But using so many talismans at once certainly requires a lot of spirit stones. For us, it's naturally nothing, but for a Qi Condensation stage disciple like him, it's quite extravagant. Has this disciple been investigated?" the white-bearded old man asked, his expression slightly grave.

"Yes, he has been investigated. A few low-level disciples who have interacted with him said that although he is an unaffiliated cultivator, he seems to be proficient in talisman crafting and is quite well-off. That's why he can use low-grade talismans so lavishly," the young man respectfully replied.

"Oh, that makes sense then. It seems there's nothing problematic about these two. However, since this person knows some talisman crafting, it would be more suitable to assign him to Firecloud Peak," the white-bearded old man murmured after his expression softened.

"Senior Brother Feng, that's not right. Our Heavenly Spring Peak also has disciples proficient in talisman crafting, and we can certainly take this person under our wing. Senior Brother Duan, you don't really want him, do you?" the cultivator surnamed Xin said with a slight smile.

"Haha! Our Firecloud Peak has plenty of talisman crafting disciples; one more or one less makes no difference. We won't snatch Junior Brother Xin's disciple," the red-robed cultivator said breezily, waving his hand.

The middle-aged man surnamed Xin just smiled without a word.

For the rest of the time, these Core Formation stage cultivators discussed various sect matters before taking their leave one by one.

Han Li had returned to his cave dwelling on Small Stone Mountain. He stood outside the spirit beast room, an uncharacteristic solemn expression on his face, his gaze flickering as he peered into the stone chamber.

Just a short while ago, he had concluded his final round of competition. As he was conversing with a few Heavenly Spring Peak disciples who had come to congratulate him on his victory, the Soul-Crying Pearl within him suddenly became scorching hot. This startled Han Li, but he immediately realized that the Soul-Devouring Beast in his cave dwelling had finally reached the final stage of its evolution and was calling for him.

Filled with both surprise and joy, Han Li naturally didn't say much more to the Heavenly Spring Peak disciples. He quickly excused himself and immediately returned to his cave dwelling. However, the moment he stood outside the spirit beast room, he was greatly startled by the scene inside the stone chamber.

Within the stone chamber, it had somehow become dim and eerily dark, filled with swirling, shadowy ghostly aura. Countless icy cold yin energy also seeped out from within.

The Soul-Devouring Beast was nowhere to be seen. Instead, in one corner of the chamber, there was an oval, cocoon-like object about a zhang in size, jet-black and glossy, with faint black thorny spikes shimmering and circulating on its surface, as if something was gestating within.

Han Li didn't need to think to guess that the Soul-Devouring Beast was inside this black cocoon.

While feeling a degree of excitement, he also showed a greater sense of caution on his face.

Han Li did not rashly enter the stone chamber. After some thought, he sat down cross-legged outside the spirit beast room.

According to the ancient texts he had read previously, when a spirit beast evolves, the cultivator who is its master should ideally remain by its side and not leave, but also should not easily interfere with the evolution process. Only if the evolution fails and the spirit beast's life is in danger should one intervene to save it.

He intended to follow this advice.

With a sense of unease in his heart, time slowly passed.

According to Han Li's original estimation, he thought it would take at least several days for the Soul-Devouring Beast to complete its evolution and emerge from the cocoon. But to his surprise, by the morning of the second day of his wait outside the stone chamber, the black thorny cocoon underwent an abnormal change.

Han Li, who had been sitting cross-legged on the ground, meditating with his eyes closed, suddenly heard a crisp cracking sound. Although the sound was very faint, he opened his eyes with delight.

He saw that within the stone chamber, the cold ghostly aura was being sucked away by some powerful force, shooting towards a corner of the chamber—the exact location of the black cocoon.

Then, the black light in the room suddenly became dazzlingly bright. Han Li instinctively closed his eyes, and then a somewhat familiar yet strange aura abruptly appeared in the stone chamber.

Han Li raised his eyebrows, stood up without hesitation, and lightly patted the stone door with both hands, opening the door to the spirit beast room.

Standing at the doorway, Han Li swept his gaze across the room and saw that the black thorny cocoon had shriveled into two pieces, completely empty inside.

The other corners of the stone chamber were also empty.

Han Li was startled. Just as he was about to release his spiritual sense to search, a black light materialized out of thin air in a corner of the stone chamber. After a low cry, a black shadow shot towards Han Li.

Han Li was greatly alarmed and instinctively wanted to flicker his body to dodge, but with a sudden thought, he forced himself to stand still.

As a result, a cold little thing flew into Han Li's embrace and was immediately caught by him.

"This is?" Han Li held the little thing in his hands, a look of surprise emerging on his face.

What appeared in his hand was a miniature monkey about the size of a fist. It was undoubtedly the evolved Soul-Devouring Beast. At first glance, apart from its fur changing from silvery-white to pitch-black, the rest of the monkey seemed to have remained unchanged.

However, after examining it carefully several times, Han Li finally discovered two more differences from before.

At the bottom of the Soul-Devouring Beast's large nose, between its two nostrils, a tiny new hole had appeared, so small that a careless glance would not notice anything unusual.

The Soul-Devouring Beast was known to restrain ghosts and specters by relying on the Soul-Devouring Light sprayed from its nose. Could it be that with an extra hole beneath its nose, this fierce beast would become even more powerful than before?

Han Li had a wry smile on his face, still holding a sliver of hope for it.

As for the Soul-Devouring Beast's other peculiar feature, it was a blood-red ghostly figure that had appeared on the fur of its back at some point, resembling a phantom.

The ghostly figure in the pattern had a single horn on its head and three eyes. Although extremely faint, it was lifelike, giving anyone who looked at it a sense of fierce and sinister oppression.

Silvermoon, in Han Li's mind, also marveled at the Soul-Devouring Beast's transformation but couldn't offer any useful advice.

Due to the refining of the Soul-Crying Pearl, the beast was noticeably much more affectionate towards Han Li, continuously rubbing its furry little head against Han Li's robes.

As Han Li held the black miniature monkey in one hand, he also felt a subtle sense of knowing its joys, angers, and sorrows, and couldn't help but let out a carefree smile.

He played with the beast for a while, quite interested, and seeing that it seemed to be yawning with some weariness, he carefully put it back into his spirit beast pouch.

After leaving the spirit beast room, Han Li went to the adjacent insect room for a look. Only a few dozen of the gold and silver Devouring Golden Insects remained, having mostly devoured each other, and were now preparing to lay eggs.

Looking at these beetles, which were noticeably one-third larger than before, a satisfied expression appeared on his face. He then left the insect room and entered his meditation chamber to begin his routine cultivation.

On the day he won the selection competition, the referee who announced his victory had told him that the selected disciples could receive one-on-one guidance from several Core Formation stage cultivators. However, before that, they would have to cultivate diligently on their own. The guidance from Core Formation stage cultivators would only last for a few days, and he would be notified by a sound transmission talisman when it was his turn.

Han Li naturally wasn't too concerned about the guidance from Core Formation stage cultivators. Anyway, when he was truly notified, he would just go and deal with it for a few days.

Currently, he held the Spirit Eye Jade in his hands and cultivated silently in his private chamber.

As for Silvermoon, the artifact spirit, she was also released, possessing the demon fox body, and cultivated together in the adjacent room.

Speaking of which, Silvermoon cultivating while possessing a body was indeed quite unbelievable.

According to Silvermoon herself, although her artifact spirit cultivation was at the late Core Formation stage, the demon fox body she possessed only had the cultivation of a low-level demonic beast, barely having stepped into the threshold of a level one demonic beast.

Thus, while she could use the demon fox body to unleash astonishing cultivation, the duration was very short, and she could never increase her artifact spirit cultivation through practice. However, although the cultivation of this demon fox body was still shallow, the good thing was that it could slowly improve through future cultivation, which was where she could truly settle down and establish herself.

Therefore, after Silvermoon possessed the demon fox body, and with some low-grade pills provided by Han Li, her cultivation surged rapidly day by day at an astonishing speed.