Chapter 674 – The Fifth Opening of the Magic Cube
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When he had first gone to Thundercrash Mountain, by pure chance, Lin Ming had encountered Mu Qianyu as she was battling the Thunder Flood Dragon. After, when Mu Qianyu had been wounded and was in trouble, Lin Ming had helped her recover within the nameless cave. With his past humble and low status, this was the first time he had ever come into contact with such a proud daughter of heaven. Three days later, Mu Qianyu had left without a word, leaving behind only a message. Finally, Mu Qinghong had visited the Seven Profound Valleys and had taken notice of Lin Ming during the Total Faction Martial Meeting. Then, in the sect training program, Lin Ming had been chosen as the only heaven-step talent…
All of this seemed as if it had happened just yesterday.
During Lin Ming’s early period of growth, Mu Qianyu and Divine Phoenix Island had helped Lin Ming many times.
Thundercrash Mountain, nameless cave, tens years time, the appointed meeting…
Lin Ming traced his hand over these letters and quietly clenched his fists. Ten years was the promise that he had originally made, but now, he had come back over seven years early. Since he had come back, he would no longer allow the situation in the South Sea to continue as it was.
He absolutely would not allow Mu Qianyu and the martial artists of Divine Phoenix Island to drift around like displaced refugees!
“I don’t need to use these ten years. Within three months, I will find you!” Lin Ming secretly made this oath to himself as he gazed at the words on that 10,000 year parasol tree. Then, he sat down next to it.
“Lin Ming, what are you doing?” Demonshine asked.
“Opening the Magic Cube.”
“Are you kidding? You’re going to open it here?”
“Opening the Magic Cube takes less than an hour and with the protective array formation of the Divine Phoenix Mystic Realm, this area can be considered safe!” As Lin Ming spoke, he took out the blood essence of the black-robed old man from his spatial ring.
When Lin Ming had first obtained the Magic Cube, he had gone into the space within the Magic Cube when he was sleeping. This was the first time he had opened the Magic Cube.
Afterwards, Lin Ming obtained the flexible armor that the Crown Prince had gifted to him. The flexible armor was marked with the blood essence of a Houtian master. This blood essence was then absorbed by the Magic Cube; this was the second time that the Magic Cube opened.
The third time was when Lin Ming had killed Ouyang Boyan. With Ouyang Boyan’s blood essence, he opened the Magic Cube once again.
The fourth time, Lin Ming had used the suppressive laws of the Demon God Imperial Palace and killed a Revolving Core master, using that master’s blood essence to open the magic cube yet again.
Now would be the fifth time!
From Houtian to Xiantian to Revolving Core and now Life Destruction!
Lin Ming began to unravel the spells on the cocoon until there was just the red glob of blood left. Lin Ming didn’t have the Magic Cube absorb this yet. Rather, he first entered into the ethereal martial intent and adjusted his mindset until he was as calm as a still lake.
Then, Lin Ming took off his clothes, revealing a strange mark on his left chest. This mark was the mysterious ancient symbol rune of the Magic Cube.
With a deep breath, he slowly pressed the black-robed old man’s blood essence into his chest.
Right after, Lin Ming felt a burst of burning heat in his chest; this was the blood essence being absorbed by the Magic Cube.
After being silent for several years, the Magic Cube once again welcomed the fresh blood essence of a powerhouse!
Chi chi chi!
As the blood essence was absorbed, it was just like a deadly poison that was scattered on the ground. It seemed to constantly corrode away, producing a slight trace of smoke.
Lin Ming felt within himself, perceiving the energy fluctuations of the Magic Cube within his chest. He could feel that after the Magic Cube had absorbed the blood essence, it seemed to beat in rhythm with his heart.
After 10 breaths of time passed, Lin Ming felt his spiritual sea shake. In the next moment, all of his consciousness was completely sucked into the Magic Cube. With a dizzying feeling, Lin Ming’s mind had arrived once again in that pitch black space within the Magic Cube.
Lin Ming was familiar with this place. In the vast and boundlessly dark sky, countless soul fragments glittered like infinite stars.
These soul fragments floated around in a haze of thick mist. In the center of all these soul fragments, there was a large sphere of light that was one foot in diameter, slowly glowing with a gentle light. Lin Ming suspected that this sphere of light was the previous master of the Magic Cube, that Saintess of the Verdant Feather Holy Lands.
After arriving in the Magic Cube space once again, Lin Ming’s mentality was extremely stable. Now he had a battle spirit and his willpower was much more formidable than it was before. He would be able to handle most of these soul fragments, unless that fragment was to contain the remnant consciousness and will of the Supreme Elder it once belonged to. If that were true, then swallowing a soul fragment like that might be a bit dangerous.
Linking his mind to the many soul fragments, because of Lin Ming’s stronger soul force, he was now able to clearly sense the energy that emanated from these soul fragments. Some had a gentle, soft energy, some were tyrannical, and some emitted an evil, bloodsoaked energy.
The smaller fragments were directly ignored by Lin Ming. He only looked at those that were at least two inches wide. Then, he began to sense them according to the energy they emitted, looking for a soul fragment that might have a cultivation method or other skill that was useful.
But there were simply too many soul fragments in the space of the Magic Cube. Even after searching through so many, it was difficult for Lin Ming to know just which one would be the most valuable to him.
At this time, Demonshine’s voice sounded out in Lin Ming’s mind, “Lin Ming, this Saint will help you choose. I can guarantee it will be enormously useful for you.”
“Oh?” Lin Ming’s eyebrows shot up. Although Demonshine did like to brag often, he had to acknowledge that this old dog really did have some ability.
“Useful for me? I can’t think of a soul fragment that would be too useful for me right now.”
Lin Ming had no lack of cultivation methods. Moreover, he had already begun to step onto the road of fusing his own martial arts method. He was hoping to look for some cultivation method within the Magic Cube that could provide a foundation for further martial arts fusion skills in the future.
“Hehe, you’ll know why once I tell you. That pale golden palm-sized soul fragment is the one. Let me warn you first, it’s quite possible that there is a remnant soul within that soul fragment…”
A Supreme Elder’s remnant soul… Lin Ming hesitated for a moment. It was hard to guess just what boundary these Realm of the Gods powerhouses had reached before their death. Even if it was just a remnant soul, he still had to treat it with caution.
Carefully stretching out his hand, an energy latched onto that pale gold soul fragment and dragged it over to Lin Ming. Lin Ming completely concentrated his mind onto this soul fragment. During the first several times that Lin Ming had opened the Magic Cube, he had avoided these Supreme Elder soul fragments as if they were poisonous snakes. He would never have tried to absorb it on his own initiative like he was now.
Discreetly feeling the strength of this pale gold soul fragment, Lin Ming felt confident he would be able to withstand it.
“Demonshine, just what’s in here that is so useful to me?”
“Hehe, if you absorb that memory fragment you’ll naturally know. This soul fragment, if I’m not wrong, should be an old acquaintance that the Demon Emperor once knew; I only recognized it because there is a bit of remnant soul left over in the fragment. If you absorb it, you’ll have a great harvest.” Demonshine bragged.
Lin Ming didn’t ask anything further. Demonshine had no reason to lie to him, and even if he did, it wouldn’t matter. He had confidence that he would be able to deal with the remnant soul within this soul fragment. Even if the cultivation methods within were useless, it could still serve as a reference point so that Lin Ming could study the various types of top martial arts and gain insights from them.
Putting out a hand, he gently touched the soul fragment. The soul fragment immediately turned into a white light that shot into Lin Ming’s body and disappearing, vanishing without a trace.
A soul fragment had a natural instinct to swallow all. Under the guidance of its instincts, it would begin to attack Lin Ming’s spiritual sea in order to capture it.
When the soul fragment broke into Lin Ming’s spiritual sea, the spear-shaped battle spirit that floated in the skies immediately began to issue out a keening howl, directly impacting towards that soul fragment.
Kacha!
With a violent collision, the soul fragment was struck by the spear-shaped battle spirit and sent flying away, its light dimming by several degrees.
Meanwhile, the black vortex of the Samsara martial intent appeared within Lin Ming’s spiritual sea, surging forwards as it enveloped that soul fragment.
Lin Ming closed his eyes and sat down, immediately entering into the ethereal martial intent. Like this, the Samsara martial intent and battle spirit began a fierce battle with the soul fragment within his spiritual sea!
A battle spirit was known as an existence that could cut away all to nothing. Of course, this included even the soul. With every strike, the soul fragment would fiercely tremble, causing the remnant soul within that fragment to gradually fade away.
After an hour of time, the war of souls finally ended. Although Lin Ming hadn’t been in any great danger, he was still left exhausted, his entire body wet with sweat and his complexion pale.
After eliminating that remnant soul, the remaining memory fragment sank into Lin Ming’s spiritual sea. In that moment, all sorts of chaotic and complex images and information began to pour into Lin Ming’s mind. These memories numbered many times more than before! Lin Ming gave a stuffy cough, feeling as if his head would explode at any moment.
Pictures began to flash through Lin Ming’s mind.
War, battlefields, death, cultivation method, rare books, sect.
All sorts of scenes replayed in his mind. But, many of these were also of raging flames, mystical symbols, as well as medicinal pills that shined with a golden light.
This person had been… an alchemist?
Lin Ming was suddenly startled.
After further exploring these memories, Lin Ming found that this person had not only been an accomplished alchemist but also an inscription master!
Inscription techniques were the first skill that Lin Ming had obtained from the very first soul fragment he absorbed from the Magic Cube. This skill was very powerful within the Realm of the Gods, but unfortunately, the soul fragment that Lin Ming had swallowed then was only the size of a grain of rice, and it was also very faded.
This was a choice he was helpless in making. Originally, Lin Ming had only been at the very first stage of body transformation. Just absorbing that rice grain-sized soul fragment had nearly cost him his life.
This also led to the inscription techniques Lin Ming had being incomplete, most of them the most basic of their kind.
Inscription techniques were divided into object inscription, medicinal inscription, body inscription, and soul inscription, four different types in total. Although Lin Ming had learned body inscription, that was only useful to him during the body transformation realm. After reaching Revolving Core or Life Destruction, the increased strength from these body inscription symbols would be negligible.
In addition, the reason that Lin Ming had neglected to keep up with his inscription technique was because practicing simply consumed too much time. As Lin Ming’s strength constantly grew, because he had neglected to practice his inscription technique, it now wasn’t able to keep up with his growth.
With Lin Ming’s current skill in medicinal inscription, he could at most enhance medicines like the Heaven Opening Pill or Shattered Demon Heart Crystal. If he wanted to place an inscription on something like the Nirvana Dragon Root or Demon God Bone, then that simply wasn’t possible because he wasn’t capable of placing an inscription on them that was of adequate rank.
In order to practice inscription techniques to a higher boundary, one needed to invest a massive amount of time and effort into it. But before this, the inscription techniques that Lin Ming had obtained were greatly incomplete. If he tried to reach a higher boundary, he would find himself besieged with difficulties.
Now that he had obtained this soul fragment, he had unintentionally filled in this gap.
“Demonshine, you want me to pick up inscription techniques again, and not only that but to become an inscription master and then use that as a basis to further become an alchemist?”
“Hehe, inscription techniques are mostly for you to create medicinal inscriptions. I want you to become an alchemist in order to further your cultivation of the Eight Inner Hidden Gates and the Nine Stars of the Dao Palace. The further your boundary goes, the more the rarity and value of the medicine you’ll need for your practice will horrify you. You obtained the Nirvana Dragon Root and the Nameless Divine Pill, but don’t think you’ll always be so lucky. If you don’t study alchemy, are you really hoping for others to just come up and offer all the help you’ll ever need? Your Cosmic Melting Furnace is already the best tool for alchemy to begin with!”