Chapter 894 – Preparation is the Key, Third Stage of Life Destruction
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When Lin Ming had swallowed the thunder Dao fruit in the Temple of Marvels’ dimensional realms, he had gained the ability to impact the third stage of Life Destruction. The only reason he had been forced to give up that idea was that the situation at the time had been far too dangerous. Otherwise, although Lin Ming still wouldn’t have been Yang Yun’s opponent, he wouldn’t have had to escape in such a distressed and desperate manner.
“I wonder just what sort of ancient species the divine tree that gave birth to those 12 thunder Dao fruits is. Perhaps Demonshine might have known…”
As Lin Ming was fleeing, he had already sent Demonshine a message to have him return to the South Sea immediately and personally oversee the Giant Leviathan, having it travel deep into the South Sea.
According to Old Man Good Fortune, the Sky Spill Continent and Holy Demon Continent were both landmasses on the opposite sides of a single planet. There was an immeasurably vast distance that separated the two. Theoretically speaking, as long as the Giant Leviathan continued deep through the South Sea for a long enough time, it could even arrive at the borders of the Holy Demon Continent.
But the deeper one went into the South Sea, the more strange and mysterious existences there would be. Although the Giant Leviathan had extraordinary defensive capabilities, it still had its limits. It was a creature that only contained a light bloodline of an ancient desolate Saint Beast; it couldn’t be compared to a true Leviathan or Roc God Beast. If the Giant Leviathan met some mystical existence deep in the South Sea, it was likely that it would experience danger. If that old dog Demonshine was personally commanding the Giant Leviathan then Lin Ming would feel much more at ease.
Lin Ming placed all his harvests on the stone bed and began to slowly organize them.
12 thunder Dao fruits, of which Lin Ming had eaten a part of one. The mysterious thunder lines on the skin were the most precious treasures.
22 top grade spirit essence stones, each one of them a treasure that a Divine Sea Supreme Elder would savagely wrestle others for.
The Extreme Violet Ring, which had a massive amount of jade slips inside, of which the Concept of Thunder jade slips were the most useful to Lin Ming. In addition, there was also a medicine garden that had many spiritual herbs that were over 100,000 years old. These were the treasures that Lin Ming would be relying on to further open the Eight Inner Hidden Gates.
As for the pills left behind by Jiang Ziji, Lin Ming hadn’t looked over them too carefully in his haste to leave the Temple of Marvels. As he looked over the pills, he was actually disappointed to discover that even if these pills had been sealed in wood spirit jade bottles, after 100,000 years had passed, they had lost most of their spiritual nature, causing their medicinal efficacy to sharply drop. Some of them were even completely useless by now.
100,000 years was simply far too great a span of time. Those plants in the medicine garden were able to absorb the spirit energy of the heavens and earth, constantly growing, but dead objects like these pills weren’t as well off.
Before obtaining the top grade spirit essence stones, Lin Ming had also gathered a massive amount of thousand year or even ten thousand year medicinal herbs in the dimensional realm. Old Man Good Fortune had lent Lin Ming a profound spirit pot so that he could maintain the life of these medicinal herbs, but afterwards Lin Ming had completely transported all of them into the Extreme Violet Ring. This was just how important a transportable medicine garden was to Lin Ming. There was no need to mention the high level medicinal herbs, but even the lower level ones could be used for practice.
The most precious of the medicinal plants he had gathered in the dimensional realm had been a crimson and sturdy tree called a Dragonheart Tree. It was 50,000 years old, and the fruits on its crown beat like living hearts.
This was a miracle medicine particularly used for body transformation. It was no worse than those medicinal herbs found in the Extreme Violet Ring’s medicine garden.
There was Jiang Ziji’s bracelet that was able to enhance his soul and perception. This would be immensely valuable for his future comprehension of Laws.
And last of all, there were Jiang Ziji’s remains. The shining crystal skeleton had been completely preserved, not even decaying a bit after 100,000 years of time. The divine crystal that was embedded in the skull was like a rainbow gem, constantly emitting a gorgeous and dazzling radiance.
“It’s time to start breaking into the third stage of Life Destruction.”
After Lin Ming reorganized his possessions, he took a top grade spirit essence stone in his hands. When Shibai had given Lin Ming a top grade spirit essence stone, it was only one-sixth the size of a regular one, causing some of its charm to be lost. Its mystical nature was far from being comparable to this complete spirit essence stone.
This top grade spirit essence stone had mysterious patterns covering its entire surface; it unexpectedly seemed similar to the chaos stones at Timeworn Phoenix City. Although its intricacy wasn’t comparable to the chaos stones, it still had several points of their charm. This was the extraordinary nature of a top grade spirit essence stone; it contained a part of the Great Dao Laws and the aura of source energy. This was the reason that so many Divine Sea powerhouses were obsessed with it.
Lin Ming placed the top grade spirit essence stone between his eyebrows and began to absorb the energy. This sort of scene was a top luxury that a Divine Sea Supreme Elder would curse to the heavens if they saw. It had to be said that a top grade spirit essence stone was the very source of a spirit essence stone mine. it was even able to increase the chances of an early Divine Sea martial artist reaching the middle Divine Sea. And yet it was wasted by Lin Ming in order to cross the third stage of Life Destruction. This was simply an obscene extravagance.
Of course, Lin Ming also had his reasons for doing this. The energy he would need to break through to the third stage of Life Destruction far surpassed the requirements of an ordinary martial artist, and no one had ever complained about their foundation being too solid.
The reason that Lin Ming was able to attack the third stage of Life Destruction was all because his foundation had reached the limit of solidity. This was truly an example of preparation being the key to success.
Of course, there would always be some drawbacks in advancing one’s cultivation too quickly. Using the pure origin energy of a top grade spirit essence stone to break through to the third stage of Life Destruction would be able to eliminate those drawbacks to a certain degree, once again allowing him to develop a stable foundation.
The energy from the top grade spirit essence stone rapidly flowed into Lin Ming’s body. At that same time, he also galvanized the golden red lightning within the Heretical God Sprout, and chose 81 acupoints of his body to crazily absorb the surrounding heaven and earth origin energy.
In the dark chamber, one could clearly see the top grade spirit essence stone between Lin Ming’s eyebrows shining with a brilliant light, separating into 81 wisps of energy, each as thick as a finger, that flowed into his acupoints. These acupoints were like stars in the endless night sky, quietly sparkling.
The energy of a top grade spirit essence stone was far too pure. In fact, it couldn’t even be described with the word ‘pure’. Rather, one could say that this energy was close to the source energy of the universe.
Before the formation of the universe, all that existed was utter chaos. Then, the world opened, and yin and yang formed. Thus there was energy. This energy was also known as source energy.
Afterwards, the five main elements gradually came into existence and the variation energies differentiated from each other. All of these energies scattered throughout the universe, forming all matter and life. Since then, the energy of the universe had become diluted and polluted, far from being comparable to the pure energy of the forming universe. This was also why the chaos stones were so valuable – they were engraved with the trace lines from the source energy of the forming universe.
A top grade spirit essence stone’s energy was close to the universal source energy. Even a tiny bit of this source energy could increase one’s understanding of the world.
Sucking in a bit of this energy would refresh and revitalize the body, even purifying the dantian.
This absorption process continued for two hours. Lin Ming had long ago entered the ethereal martial intent, delving into a completely concentrated state. He felt as if his body had turned into a pure energy form without the least bit of impurities.
Peng!
With a light cracking sound, the top grade spirit essence stone split apart. It lost its lustrous crystal sheen and turned into ordinary white jade.
At this time, the energy within Lin Ming’s body was stored to the limit.
“Break apart…”
As Lin Ming quietly said these words, golden red lightning shot out from the Heretical God Sprout. It combined with the top grade spirit essence stone energy within his body and then erupted.
There was no great explosive sound as one would expect. Instead, the detonating energy expanded outwards, swallowing up Lin Ming’s entire body. Every inch of his meridians shattered and his body disintegrated into an incomparably fine blood fog, fusing together with the pure heaven and earth origin energy.
A moment later, the crimson blood fog vanished and Lin Ming’s body disappeared without a trace. But, the truth was that he hadn’t really disappeared. Instead, his body had been disintegrated into tiny particles that were even smaller than dust, completely invisible to the naked eye. These particles fluttered about in the chamber as they withstood the baptism of energy.
This was the third Life Destruction as well as the last time that the physical body was tempered. The fourth to sixth stages of Life Destruction focused on tempering the dantian.
And this tempering was far more thorough than that of the first two times.
Lin Ming’s consciousness wandered about this sea of energy. As he watched his own body vanish, his mind and perception were extremely clear. This feeling of being separated from his body gave him many insights as to the nature of energy itself. At that moment, it was like he had become a pure energy lifeform.
Time slowly passed…
One day, two days, three days…
After seven days passed, those tiny particles that fluttered in the heaven and earth origin energy began to gather together, condensing. From forming small pieces to forming large pieces, Lin Ming’s body began to slowly take form.
First was the crystalline skeleton that seemed carved from the finest jade. Then, the blood vessels began to form as gushing crimson blood filled them, as viscous and potent as liquid mercury. Then, powerful and tight muscles formed, covering his body with a layer of beautiful flesh.
Every muscle striation seemed to flow like a river, appearing like art itself. While Lin Ming’s muscles contained an aesthetic beauty, they also contained a crazy explosive force.
His back was broad, his spine strong. His legs were long and filled with potent power. His eyelashes were thick and his eyes were like priceless black gems. His nose was straight and his face seemed to be carved by the sword of a master. After being decomposed and reformed three times, Lin Ming’s body had reached perfection.
Even his hair shone with brilliance. From the countless pores on his body, pure heaven and earth energy freely flowed outwards.
Every breath he exhaled was fragrant and his saliva was sweet like honey. His entire body appeared clean and refreshed. This was the true meaning of being otherworldly and untouched by the smoke of the world. Even bathing couldn’t clean him any more than he was right now.
Lin Ming’s spirit body completely formed. As his handsome naked form stood in the darkness of the chamber, a bright light flashed through his eyes like a bolt of lightning, making one unable to look directly at him.
With a casual wave of his hands, countless rays of thunder collected together, forming a loose robe that draped around him. He had finally completed the third stage of Life Destruction!
At this time, Lin Ming even had a feeling that if someone managed to cut off his hands and feet, he could regrow them.
Of course, this was only an illusion of the mind. Even a Divine Sea martial artist didn’t have this ability. When crossing Life Destruction, the energy Laws that were involved were extremely special. In a situation where there was no external force disturbing it, the physical body could disintegrate and then reform. But this was only reforming – true regeneration was impossible. It was easy to rejoin a cut off limb, but wanting to regrow a lost limb would require a great deal of effort. Also, a newly regrown limb would have to be tempered all over again, otherwise it would become a martial artist’s great weakness.
However, if Lin Ming could open the Gate of Life of the Eight Inner Hidden Gates, then he really would gain the ability to regenerate his limbs. Moreover, doing so would only consume Lin Ming’s energy; it would still be the same as his original body.
This was a special characteristic of the body transformation cultivation route. In the legends, it was even said that if one could open the Natal Life Dao Palace of the Nine Stars of the Dao Palace, then one could be reborn from a single drop of blood. As long as their energy did not fade and their will remained immortal, then that person would never die. Such an opponent was difficult to defeat and even harder to kill.