Chapter 990: Black Crystal

VIP Chapter 6: Heavenly Spiritual Treasures – A Mortal's Journey to Immortality

Half a month later, at the bottom of the Yin-Yang Grotto, Han Li found himself in a massive wind cave. Over twenty golden flying swords continuously whirled around his body, shredding the countless moth-like creatures that swarmed towards him, turning them into wisps of black energy.

These moths were several inches in size, entirely black. With a flap of their wings, tiny wind blades shot towards Han Li, but they were easily blocked by the golden light emanating from his flying swords.

Seeing the seemingly endless stream of moths charging forward, Han Li's expression darkened, growing somewhat impatient.

He suddenly grabbed the spirit beast pouch at his waist, casting it into mid-air. Immediately, golden flowers surged out from the pouch, spreading in all directions to meet the attack. This was Han Li's swarm of Gold Devouring Beetles.

As soon as the black moths and Gold Devouring Beetles made contact, the moths immediately began falling from the air, instantly put on the defensive.

Seeing this, Han Li recalled most of his flying swords and walked deeper into the cave.

Since this was a wind cave, the surrounding black winds were naturally exceptionally fierce. Even with his powerful spiritual sense, he could only perceive a few dozen feet ahead.

However, having gotten rid of the moths' entanglement, he was no longer afraid of this.

After walking to roughly the middle of the wind cave, blue light flickered in Han Li's pupils. His gaze instantly pierced through the surrounding black winds, allowing him to see everything nearby clearly.

After a quick scan, he let out a soft exclamation and changed direction, heading towards a specific spot.

After walking just over two hundred feet, Han Li raised his hand again. A white moonlight stone, enveloped in a faint green spiritual aura, flew into the air, instantly illuminating the immediate vicinity for several feet.

In the milky-white glow, a black crystal, about the size of a human head, was half-embedded in the opposite stone wall, only partially visible. What was surprising was that as the crystal pulsed with a dark glow, black moths continuously emerged from it, launching frantic attacks at Han Li and the conspicuous moonlight stone. However, they were all intercepted mid-flight by the Gold Devouring Beetles.

For a moment, the moths fell from the air, but then disintegrated into nothingness before hitting the ground.

"This is already the third one," Han Li murmured to himself. "But this one can actually conjure Netherworld Moths from the Yin Qi on its own. That's quite peculiar."

However, just as Han Li examined it closely, the black crystal across from him emitted countless black rays. Then, with a "poof," a giant moth, several feet in size, suddenly materialized within the black light.

The moment this moth appeared, its pair of blood-red eyes fixed fiercely on Han Li.

Han Li raised an eyebrow and quickly flicked his finger.

After a thunderous crack, a golden arc shot out, instantly shattering the giant moth into dust. Even if this colossal Netherworld Moth possessed strange abilities, it was utterly defenseless against the Demon-Slaying Divine Thunder, which specifically countered ghosts.

Without hesitation, he then reached out into the void towards the crystal.

A shimmering green hand materialized in front of him. With a "bang," the crystal was forcibly pulled out of the stone wall by the large hand.

The moment the crystal was extracted, the fierce Yin winds around them significantly weakened by more than half. The black moths that had been gnawing at the Gold Devouring Beetles also vanished, turning into black energy and dissolving into the wind with a flash of dark light.

Han Li paid no heed to this phenomenon. Although the previous two crystals were much smaller, they had also been found in wind caves, and similar occurrences had happened when they were extracted. This situation had initially surprised Han Li, but now he no longer paid it any mind.

Speaking of which, ever since he had found Elder Fu and recharged the Purple Gloom Divine Light, he had separated from Bai Yaoyi. Without her accompanying him, Han Li was naturally free to employ a wide range of his abilities without restraint.

In recent days, as he delved deeper into the center of the grotto, he frequently encountered high-level ghostly entities during his exploration. However, under the might of his flying swords and the Demon-Slaying Divine Thunder, they were all utterly annihilated. He hadn't even needed to use his Soul-Crying Beast once.

In terms of exploration speed, Han Li was almost more than double that of the others. By the time others had finished exploring one branch passage, he had already explored two.

However, for a place with the Yin-Yang Grotto's formidable reputation, it was illogical that high-level cultivators rarely explored it in the past. Despite delving so deep, they had gained nothing except some ordinary ores and a few damaged magic tools and treasures left by other cultivators.

It was only a few days prior, while chasing a fleeing ghostly entity, that he inadvertently stumbled into a small wind cave and discovered a black crystal. This sparked his interest in these wind caves, which he had initially been reluctant to explore.

One must understand that Yin-Yang Ganoderma could not survive in such violently swirling Yin winds. Furthermore, entering a wind cave would immediately accelerate the consumption of both the Purple Gloom Divine Light and one's own magical power. Naturally, no one would willingly brave such hardships to delve deeply into them.

Han Li, protected by his Demon-Slaying Divine Thunder and with ten-thousand-year spiritual liquid to restore his magical power, had no reservations about this. Instead, he was greatly interested in these crystals, often venturing deep inside to investigate.

Han Li had never seen these black crystals before, nor had they ever been mentioned in any ancient texts he had read. Although they bore a striking resemblance to Dark Marrow Diamonds at first glance, the two were distinctly different.

Black crystals were far less hard than Dark Marrow Diamonds. They didn't contain demonic energy either, but rather seemed to be a peculiar wind-attributed crystal that had condensed over long periods in Yin caves, yet also contained a large amount of Yin Qi.

However, these black crystals were not common. After searching dozens of wind caves, Han Li had only found three so far. The previous two were fist-sized and lacked the ability to conjure ghostly entities, making them incomparable to the current crystal.

Han Li squinted slightly, observing the now inert crystal for a long moment. Finally, he raised his hand and affixed several restriction talismans to it, then placed the black crystal into a large jade box and stored it in his storage pouch.

He then searched the massive wind cave thoroughly, and after confirming there were no omissions, he exited the area and returned to the passage.

After walking several hundred feet further and exploring another small grotto, the passage became increasingly narrow.

Finally, a stone wall sealed by ice appeared ahead.

Han Li sighed, but still took a few steps forward and sent a streak of green light to stab at it.

With a "fwoosh," the green light penetrated a full ten feet deep into the stone wall before vanishing.

Han Li didn't give up. He placed one hand on the stone wall and simultaneously swept his spiritual sense through it.

A moment later, after confirming the stone wall was solid and contained no mechanisms or restrictions, Han Li immediately turned without hesitation and flew back the way he came.

Having already swept through the path once, his escape speed was naturally several times faster.

Although he still didn't know the full extent of the Yin-Yang Grotto, based on the various ghostly entities encountered, they should be approaching the core of the grotto. Yet, no one had found any trace of the Yin-Yang Ganoderma, which was making Han Li somewhat impatient.

Having hastily refined the Three-Flame Fan and risked entering this place, he certainly didn't want to return empty-handed.

The difficulty of breaking through from the Mid-Nascent Soul to Late-Nascent Soul stage was imaginable, even though Han Li hadn't attempted it himself. Consider that every cultivator capable of reaching the Mid-Nascent Soul stage was a prodigy, yet only three individuals in the entire Heavenly South region had successfully broken through to the next level. While there were more Late-Nascent Soul cultivators in the Great Jin, relative to the vast number of cultivation sects and cultivators, they were still one in ten thousand.

Therefore, even with the Phoenix-Reversing Core Cultivation Technique as a means to break through bottlenecks, Han Li still had no certainty about whether he could truly advance to the Late-Nascent Soul stage in the future. Now that a Spirit-Nurturing Pill capable of solidifying the Nascent Soul had appeared, he naturally wouldn't let it slip away.

If he truly couldn't find the Yin-Yang Ganoderma in the Yin-Yang Grotto this time, he might have to find a way to obtain the Spirit-Nurturing Pill formula from Elder Fu. Although the hope was slim, if he had the formula, he would find a way to search for Yin-Yang Ganoderma elsewhere. It was impossible for the Yin-Yang Grotto to be the only place in the world where Yin Qi converged.

Han Li continued flying, his mind coolly contemplating these thoughts.

Suddenly, his expression shifted. He concentrated his gaze forward and saw a flash of light ahead; a green beam was flying directly towards him.

Without a second thought, Han Li flicked his sleeve, and a sheet of green mist flew out, enveloping the green light and pulling it down with ease.

The green light dimmed within the mist, revealing a verdant small sword with a red jade slip attached to it.

Han Li pursed his lips, raised his hand to remove the jade slip from the sword, and then casually tossed the flying sword into the air.

The small green sword let out a clear hum, circled once, and then disappeared into the black winds of the path he had come from. Han Li ignored this, instead lowering his head and immersing his spiritual sense into the jade slip.

"The Yin-Yang Ganoderma has been found, this truly is good news!" A moment later, Han Li's face broke into a smile as he withdrew his spiritual sense from the jade slip. Then, with a flip of his hand, a pale white array disk appeared in his palm.

He touched the array disk with one hand. With a flash of green light, its surface became as smooth as a mirror, and four faintly glowing, differently colored light points flickered upon it.

After a brief glance at the positions of these light points, Han Li immediately put away the array disk and shot forward, his escape speed instantly doubled.

Half a day later, Han Li arrived at a four-way intersection. There, the burly man surnamed Yuan and Elder Fu were seated cross-legged, facing a passage to the east. The Purple Gloom Pearl hovered motionlessly above Elder Fu's head.

"Fellow Daoist Yuan, you found it," Han Li asked with a soft exhale as his escaping light descended within the purple glow.

"Indeed, the Yin-Yang Ganoderma is in this passage. However, this spiritual object is exceptionally cunning, and I alone cannot capture it. I had to temporarily seal off this exit and wait for you all, fellow Daoists," the burly man surnamed Yuan said with a chuckle, a hint of excitement showing on his face.

"That's good. As long as we know the whereabouts of this spiritual object, capturing it is only a matter of time," Han Li said with a smile and a nod.

"Junior Sister Chang and Fellow Daoist Bai are still a bit far, so we'll have to wait a little longer. If everyone is here, our chances will be much greater," Elder Fu said, also with a joyful expression.

Upon hearing this, Han Li immediately felt relieved and sat down on the spot.

After waiting for several hours, the beautiful woman in black and Bai Yaoyi arrived one after another, also exceptionally pleased upon hearing the confirmed news.

Immediately, without any delay, the group first set up several simple formations at the intersection, then flew together into the eastern passage.

However, none of them knew that shortly after they flew away, a faint light suddenly flickered beneath the ground at this intersection. Then, three pitch-black desiccated corpses slowly emerged.

These corpses were all hollow-chested and skin-and-bones, but their eyes glowed with an icy green light as they stared emotionlessly in the direction where Han Li and the others had vanished.