Aspiring to the Immortal Path

\'The fifth natural Dao armament\'?

Tang Jie was stunned to hear this. He raised his head to look at Liu Qianyi, and his tone suddenly became cold and sinister. "You think that this sort of boring lie can fool me?"

"No, no!" Liu Qianyi frantically shouted.

Tang Jie snorted. "The Flame Celestial Sovereign has already explored the Treasure Paradise, and if there really was a fifth Dao armament, he would have already taken it. Or are you telling me that the Southern Heavenly King managed to find what the Flame Celestial Sovereign couldn\'t?"

"No, to be more precise, it regards some information about the fifth Dao armament, not the Dao armament itself," Liu Qianyi quickly corrected herself. "This matter was not hidden from Grandmaster, but the Fate Celestial Compass is difficult to find, and even now, Grandmaster is unable to find it."

Through Liu Qianyi\'s recount, Tang Jie learned that while the Flame Celestial Sovereign had not found the fifth natural Dao armament of the Treasure Paradise, the Fate Celestial Compass, he had still found a clue regarding it in the Hall of Three Immortals, proving that it existed within the Treasure Paradise, though it had vanished from sight for some reason.

After finding this clue, the Flame Celestial Sovereign hid it, but afterward, the Southern Heavenly King found the clue.

"Why did he hide the clue instead of taking it with him?" Tang Jie asked.

"Because the clue is a formation. It can\'t be moved," Liu Qianyi replied.

What the Flame Celestial Sovereign had found in the Hall of Three Immortals was an Elemental Simulation Formation left behind by the Fate Celestial Compass. This formation had been naturally formed from the influence of the Dao Runes carved into the Fate Celestial Compass and had been imprinted into the hall, becoming one with the hall and Divine Genesis, which made it extremely difficult to move.

This formation had no power of its own, but its ability to simulate and calculate all things was extremely formidable. However, when the Flame Celestial Sovereign tried to use it to divine the direction of the Fate Celestial Compass, it failed.

"Doesn\'t sound very useful to me," Tang Jie coldly said.

Tang Jie wasn\'t so naive as to believe he could do something the Flame Celestial Sovereign couldn\'t.

Liu Qianyi anxiously said, "I\'m not telling you to use it to find the Fate Celestial Compass, but you can use it on yourself. You can see your own future and developments to a certain extent. It\'s just that Grandmaster\'s cultivation level is so high that only the Celestial Compass would work for him, so the formation didn\'t work for him. But for you, it is an incredible opportunity!"

Tang Jie understood what she meant. "Your master knew of this, so she had you enter the Hall of Three Immortals to comprehend the formation?"

Liu Qianyi\'s face turned red, and she dropped her head. "Back when my master discovered this formation in the Hall of Three Immortals, she activated it and ultimately managed to comprehend its secrets, gaining three Infatuation Seeds and mastering the supreme Heavenly Charm Art. Master wanted me to take the same path, using the Elemental Simulation Formation to divine my fate and glimpse the will of the heavens, seeking out my fortune and a direction upon the Immortal path."

Tang Jie fell silent.

The Immortal path was clouded in fog, and the path ahead was difficult to predict.

No one could say what problems, obstacles, or trials one might encounter later on, let alone how to deal with them.

Major sects had so many more resources and experts than minor sects because they had Soul Transformation, Violet Palace, and even Immortal Platform cultivators keeping watch, seniors to point the way and tell juniors what they needed to watch out for.

Even then, these people couldn\'t guide every single disciple.

The path of cultivation was complicated and multifaceted, and this wasn\'t even considering individual differences. If the Immortal Platform ancestor of Horizon Ocean Pavilion instructed Tang Jie, the effect might not be any better than if Ming Yekong had taught him instead. After all, Tang Jie was a Basking Moon disciple.

Tang Jie still didn\'t have to worry about the path ahead, for the Basking Moon Sect had plenty of people at the Celestial Heart Realm, with all kinds of different experiences. At the Celestial Heart phase, the foundation had already been laid down and leveled out, and everything that had needed to be pointed out had been pointed out, and there were plenty of different ideas to consider, both authoritative and non-authoritative. There were plenty of broad and open roads to take.

But things were different at Violet Palace.

The Basking Moon Sect had only five Violet Palace cultivators, and only one Immortal Platform cultivator. There was only this small number of ancestors, and even if one considered those individuals who were already part of history, they could still be counted with one\'s fingers. There was no vast sea of experience to draw from.

The Fate Celestial Compass was a legendary Dao armament that could calculate the past and future of everything in the world. This treasure was so mysterious that it was said that the world could not tolerate it, and anyone who possessed it was liable to be afflicted by calamity, so it was also known as the Slayer of Fate. Thus, rather than being unable to find it, it might be that the Flame Celestial Sovereign didn\'t dare to find it.

But the Elemental Simulation Formation left behind by the Fate Celestial Compass, though lacking the ability to divine everything in the world, had more than enough ability to predict a person\'s future path of cultivation. While one wouldn\'t be able to turn disaster into fortune, at least one could use it to avoid many unneeded detours on the path of cultivation.

Until now, Tang Jie hadn\'t gone down any detours, and his foundation was extremely solid. While others might regard every tier of Celestial Heart as a threshold, Tang Jie could cultivate all the way to Soul Transformation without a problem. But he wasn\'t sure about what came after that.

The difficulty of Violet Palace could be seen from Ming Yekong, who had been hesitant to challenge it even after one hundred years of preparation, for it could easily end in his death. If Tang Jie\'s performance in the Immortal Fortune Conference hadn\'t given him that final push, he might even now have been working up the courage to take that last step.

But things might be different with the simulation formation.

The look in Tang Jie\'s eyes changed.

Liu Qianyi saw that Tang Jie was hesitating, so she quickly said, "Only I know where the formation is and how to activate it. Moreover, once the formation is activated, it has a Fog Dome ability that can protect the people in the formation from the divine sword. As you know, the Hall of Three Immortals is the place where the divine sword\'s power is the strongest, and the simulation formation is the safest place. If you want to deal with that… that man, you need this formation!"

Tang Jie\'s gaze sharpened. "You know who the person I need to deal with is?"

Liu Qianyi froze, and then she said, "Those Hemos clearly weren\'t four brothers, but four avatars. And how many people are there in the world who can have such powerful avatars that possess that level of blood essence…"

Her voice dwindled away, her mind clearly uneasy. She couldn\'t understand how Tang Jie had offended this kind of Titan.

Her two companions, Li Feng and Zhao Wei, however, were still confused.

Tang Jie didn\'t admit to anything, looking at Liu Qianyi and saying, "If you help me, aren\'t you worried about him taking revenge on you?"

Avatars ignored distance and could communicate across the world. Even though the Blood River Lord\'s actual body couldn\'t interfere in the Treasure Paradise, he could sense everything that was happening within it. If Liu Qianyi meddled, the Blood River Lord would definitely find out.

Liu Qianyi casually replied, "While that man has heaven-reaching abilities, my grandmaster is not any weaker than him, so why should I be afraid? Moreover, my life is in your hands and hanging by a thread, so I don\'t have the luxury of thinking that far ahead. And in the end, so what if I offend him? It\'s better than dying here, right?"

Tang Jie was startled, and he couldn\'t but feel some admiration for this girl\'s mindset.

She was rather similar to Zuo Quanming, both of them fighting hard to survive. It was just that Zuo Quanming had nothing to sell except his shame and dignity, while she had somewhat bigger pockets. She could sell information, treasure, and strength, and sell them very thoroughly.

After some thought, Tang Jie asked, "How should I trust you?"

Liu Qianyi was delighted to hear this, knowing that she had kept her life. Smiling, she said, "Does Young Sir still not know any methods of managing people? If necessary, you should just use them. I just want Young Sir to swear an oath on your Heart Demon that if I have done anything to offend Young Sir, you will show grace and not kill me for it."

"No problem. Not only that, I will allow you to keep all the treasures you obtained." Tang Jie swore an oath on his Heart Demon, and only then did he thrust out his finger, sending warm slivers of energy into the bodies of Liu Qianyi\'s group of three.

This wave of warmth made Liu Qianyi feel uncomfortable all over, and she felt embarrassed. Although she cultivated charming arts, she was actually unmarried. She couldn\'t but think to herself, How could this man be so vulgar, using such lowly methods to bully me?

But this was an unjust accusation. While Tang Jie was skilled in many things, when it came to imprisoning and restraining methods, he was actually quite average. On the other hand, Liu Qianyi was the granddisciple of a Celestial Sovereign, and though she seemed to have only her charming arts, she actually had quite a few tricks hidden up her sleeves. It was just that power wasn\'t her strong suit, so the Flesh Millstone had managed to restrain her. If she had been allowed to use her abilities, she definitely wasn\'t someone to be underestimated, and that wasn\'t even considering her two companions. If Tang Jie had used ordinary methods, there was no predicting what might happen, so Tang Jie decided to plant sparks of the Pale Cloud Flame within their bodies.

The Pale Cloud Flame was under his control, and if Liu Qianyi\'s group did anything suspicious, he could activate this divine flame, which would burst out from within them and burn them to ashes. While Liu Qianyi was the Flame Celestial Sovereign\'s granddisciple, she didn\'t cultivate the Dao of Fire, so she had no resistance to this flame. Thus, she couldn\'t even tell that it was the Pale Cloud Flame that had been planted in her.

After putting in this restriction, Tang Jie called back the Flesh Millstone.

As they were no longer enemies, everyone became a lot more talkative.

Tang Jie asked Liu Qianyi how she had been able to see him from 1.5 kilometers away.

Liu Qianyi took out an item, a fiery-red vertical eye. It seemed like a ball of flame, but that vertical eye was constantly looking around.

Tang Jie curiously asked what it was. Liu Qianyi replied, "This is the Blaze Eye, a Celestial Eye that my master refined when comprehending the Pale Cloud Flame. It has the abilities of Insight and the ability to see through obstacles. It was this that I used to see you through the sea of fire."

When Tang Jie heard that it was an eye that had been refined from the Pale Cloud Flame, Tang Jie immediately became interested, and he quickly took it to observe. He found that while this eye really did have a major relationship with the Pale Cloud Flame, it was also fundamentally different.

The Pale Cloud Flame that Tang Jie had obtained was an actual flame that could be absorbed, but the Blaze Eye had been refined from the will of the Pale Cloud Flame. It was not a real flame, but an ethereal flame that had been formed after one had absorbed this will.

The Flame Celestial Sovereign\'s Pale Cloud Flame had been left all this time on that statue in the Celestial Flame Pagoda, able to be touched, but across the millennia, nobody had dared to touch it. Even the Four Heavenly Kings only observed it every day, none of them daring to take it as their own.

Even though none of them had ever held the Pale Cloud Flame in their hand, thousands of years of comprehension had allowed them to long ago grasp the will of this holy flame, and the Southern Heavenly King had used her insights to refine this Blaze Eye. There were countless mysteries contained within it, and it had far more abilities than just Insight and the ability to see through obstacles. It was just that Liu Qianyi had a natural Water Spirit Body and had never cultivated the Dao of Fire, so she could not use the real power of the Blaze Eye.

Tang Jie immediately realized the extraordinary properties of this time, and he blurted, "A good item! I want it."

Liu Qianyi paled. "Master gave it to me. I can\'t give it to you!"

"That\'s not up to you," Tang Jie said, putting the Blaze Eye away.

"You bastard!" Liu Qianyi stomped her feet in rage. "You said that I could keep everything I had if I cooperated with you."

"This part wasn\'t in the Heart Demon Oath," Tang Jie indifferently replied.

Perhaps unsettled by his own guilty conscience, after some thought, Tang Jie added, "I\'ll just compensate you with some treasures."

Liu Qianyi was so angry that she almost fainted.

――――――――――

Just like with Zuo Quanming, after putting his restrictions on Liu Qianyi\'s group, Tang Jie let them go.

Once they were gone, Tang Jie took out the Blaze Eye and began to carefully examine it.

The Blaze Eye twinkled with a strange light before Tang Jie.

Just when Tang Jie was going to use the Contraflame Mantra to absorb it, a voice rang out in his mind: "Kid, that\'s not how you use this."

It was the Vermillion Bird!

Tang Jie\'s agreement with the Vermillion Bird for one drop of essence blood a year also included a clause that allowed the Vermillion Bird to attach a sliver of Divine Will to his body so that she could see the outside world.

But this Divine Will was on the original body, not the avatar.

The Vermillion Bird\'s Divine Will could freely communicate with the avatar like the original body, but she couldn\'t tell what was going on around the avatar. Moreover, as the original body spent most of his time in the Mountain River State Diagram, the Vermillion Bird still actually didn\'t know what was going on outside.

But the original body occasionally told the Vermillion Bird about what was happening outside, and he had just told the Vermillion Bird about the Blaze Eye. The avatar was currently hearing the message that the original body had passed from the Vermillion Bird.

"Then how should I use it?" Tang Jie asked.

The Vermillion Bird replied, "The real flame is the vessel and the ethereal flame is the will. Since it is a conceptual flame, it should be comprehended. Vainly attempting to use the Contraflame Mantra to absorb the Blaze Eye is an absolute waste!"

Tang Jie blushed in shame. He only knew that the flame was valuable and was bursting with the concept of Fire, so comprehending it was bound to let him advance far on the Dao of Fire, or at worst serve as a major supplement to the Pale Cloud Flame. He hadn\'t expected there to be so many secrets to it.

"But the concept of Fire is abstruse and difficult to understand, and my understanding on this is limited. The Contraflame Mantra can only subdue a flame, not comprehend its concept, so it can\'t help me. Would Miss Vermillion Bird be able to teach me anything?"

The Vermillion Bird giggled. "Of course I know how to do it. But why should I teach you? You tricked me out of five hundred years of essence blood, and I have yet to settle that account with you."

While the Vermillion Bird was naive, she had come to understand with time that Tang Jie had swindled her. But the original body had regaled her with stories of the outside world while they were in the diagram, and she had found them very interesting. Their relationship had improved to the point where she no longer minded this matter.

Even so, the Vermillion Bird would still occasionally bring up this matter and use it against Tang Jie.

Tang Jie understood what she wanted and said, "Miss Vermillion Bird, if you are willing to teach me, I am willing to reduce your debt by ten drops of essence blood. What do you think?"

"No, one hundred drops."

"Then forget about it. It\'s just a means of absorbing the concept of Fire. Even if you taught me, I wouldn\'t be able to use it immediately. It\'s not worth that much."

"Hey, hey, when my Vermillion Bird Sacred Ancestor reigned, she controlled the Daos of Yin Yang and Five Elements. Although she had not reached Sovereign, she was still hailed as peerless in the cosmos, and the Dao of Fire is only one of the Five Elements. Absorbing the concept is a minor trifle for my Vermillion Bird Tribe. My blood contains memories concerning this, and if you learn it, you will be able to easily absorb the concept of Fire. You could even absorb the Pale Cloud Flame in the core of Holy Fire Valley!"

Tang Jie was shaken by what he had heard.

He had seen with his own eyes the power of the Pale Cloud Flame in the heart of Holy Fire Valley. But he wasn\'t skilled enough in the Contraflame Mantra to absorb it. Even that sliver of Pale Cloud Flame drawn out by the tiger fiend was but a tiny fraction of the flame in the core.

Using his little flame to subdue the core flame would take at least eight years.

But grasping the concept of the Pale Cloud Flame changed things.

Using that little bit of real flame as the bait, and the concept of Fire as the lure, Tang Jie really did stand a good chance of subduing that ball of Pale Cloud Flame.

It had already been proved that the Pale Cloud Flame would weaken the Blood River Lord\'s Blood Sea Divine Connection by at least 30%, which was huge for Tang Jie.

Realizing this, Tang Jie replied, "Twenty drops—that\'s my limit. That Blood River Lord is fighting to the death with me for a single drop of Black Tortoise essence blood, so twenty drops of Vermillion Bird essence blood is pretty good value."

The Vermillion Bird angrily said, "That Blood River Lord is a manifestation of the Blood River, so he naturally considers blood like his life. Moreover, his chasing you stopped having anything to do with essence blood a long time ago, and it\'s more about face and dignity now. And one\'s honor isn\'t something to be taken lightly! But I\'m different from him! If you want to learn from me, it will take at least eighty drops!"

"Twenty-five drops, and that\'s the most I can give, or else I would rather not learn it," Tang Jie firmly said. "Even without this concept of Fire, I can still absorb the Pale Cloud Flame. At worst, it will take more time for less, and it will have less transformative powers."

"Hey, hey, haggling doesn\'t work like this. You should be going up by ten while I go down by ten so that we agree to fifty drops!" The Vermillion Bird stomped her feet in Tang Jie\'s mind.

Tang Jie replied, "Don\'t fret. You can tell that there are still many things on the path of cultivation that I don\'t understand, while the knowledge from your bloodline memories is endless. In the future, there will be more opportunities where I seek you out, so do you really think you won\'t be able to work down that debt of five hundred drops of essence blood?"

The Vermillion Bird considered this and decided that it was true. Alas, while she had gotten smarter, her mind still worked rather slowly, and she had been intimidated by Tang Jie\'s "stubborn" attitude and thought that he wasn\'t going to offer any more. Moreover, she felt that Tang Jie wasn\'t just going to give up on the Daos of Yin Yang and Five Elements after coming this far, so there would be opportunities in the future, so she ultimately agreed.

The Vermillion Bird sent over a sliver of thought that transmitted to Tang Jie the method to comprehend the concept of Fire.

This method was called the Triple Sense Beholding Spirit Art. The spirit was used to enter the fire, draw out the fire, and control the fire, and it was the fundamental art the Vermillion Bird used to comprehend the Dao of Fire. It could be used to comprehend the mysteries of all the flames of the world, and it even surpassed the Flame Celestial Sovereign\'s Ever-Burning Omniflame Mantra. If the Flame Celestial Sovereign knew about the Triple Sense Beholding Spirit Art, let alone twenty drops of essence blood, he would have paid one hundred. Of course, he would have needed that much essence blood first.

Tang Jie circulated this art, and the Blaze Eye began to shrink in his hand as he gradually absorbed it.

Just like that, the tiny bit of will that the Southern Heavenly King had comprehended through years of observing the holy flame was absorbed by Tang Jie, and in his Spiritual Space, his spark flickered.

It didn\'t get larger or change colors, but it exuded more divinity, and if one looked closely, one would notice that there was more variation to this once-serene spark. Before this, the spark was rather still and lifeless, but now, it had more vitality and spirituality.

Besides that, the center of Tang Jie\'s forehead became a little hot.

While the Blaze Eye had been refined from the concept of the Pale Cloud Flame, the ultimate result was still an eye. Tang Jie had absorbed its ability to see through obstacles, and his Celestial Eye had grown more powerful. The eye now occasionally gleamed red, and a pattern had appeared around it.

Another Insight Dao Rune had been born.