A Record of a Mortal’s Journey to Immortality

“Stop!” A man’s voice ordered from within the chariot as it came to an immediate stop along with the streaks of red light that accompanied it.

Soon after, each of the red radiances disappeared to reveal young beautiful women, each wearing light green palace robes. They had their black hair rolled up in a bun and two swords on their back. These female Foundation Establishment cultivators stood at the sides of the chariot and had their heads bowed in solemn expressions.

An astonished voice came from the chariot, “How strange! How can there be someone using a heretical, heaven-defying technique here? From the Yin Qi that’s gathered, it seems to be the Soulrise Technique rather than the Sunform Technique.”

A young woman’s voice soon followed, “With such an astonishing heavenly omen, why can’t it be the appearance of a wondrous treasure?” Although her tone was chilling, it carried an unconcealable sweet allure.

The first voice chuckled and spoke with confidence, “You think I can’t differentiate between a heretical technique and the appearance of a treasure?”

After a moment of silence, the woman icily snorted and bluntly said, “That’s just what you say, perhaps it truly is an omen of a treasure appearing. In any case, I can’t tell the difference between the two.”

“It you want to know whether or not it’s true, then how about we go take a look! Regardless of whether it’s the Sunform Technique or the Soulrise Technique, they both require a Core Formation cultivation to perform. Additionally, one’s cultivation would greatly suffer after performing such a technique. Even having one’s cultivation drop an entire stage is to be expected. I am quite curious to see who is performing this technique. If their cultivation is deep enough, then let’s take them in. Our Divine Dove Hall is currently lacking a few enforcers!” The man appeared exceptionally indulgent to the woman.

The woman hesitated for a moment before agreeing, “Fine, the beast chariot has flown for nearly a month, and I am feeling somewhat bored. Let’s go to the island for some relief.”

“Just a moment. I’ll disable the protective barrier!”

Soon after he said this, the chariot flashed with white light and the radiance slowly faded, revealing the man and woman sitting within.

The man appeared to be a youth in his late twenties wearing a tall hat and hemp robes, giving him an elegant and refined appearance. As a result of an unknown cultivation art, his forehead faintly glowed with golden light.

At his side sat a young woman that appeared to be in her late teens. She was dressed in white muslin robes, with skin as smooth as jade, and long, black satin-like hair. However, the woman’s complexion was deathly pale, giving her the dream-like appearance of an otherworldly Immortal.

The young woman leaned against a corner of the chariot and frowned as if she were displeased, but after seeing the light barrier dissolve, her expression stirred as she stood up and left the carriage.

The man gently watched the woman and followed her out with a faint smile.

The young woman glanced in the direction of the island and wantonly said, “Fellow Daoist Wen, do you think the odds of a ghost mist appearing nearby is high? According to what I know of the most mysterious natural disaster, ghosts mists have no clear set of patterns.”

Accustomed to her odd behavior, the man held his arms behind his back and smiled, “There are no exact patterns that can be found from ghost mists. However, I have spent quite a bit of effort in gathering data for the ghost mists that have occurred in the last few hundred years and discovered something that was quite interesting. Ghost mists often immediately occur after there is a volcanic eruption nearby. Although this isn’t always the case, there is at least a one-third correlation. These seas happened to have had two volcanic eruptions nearby, so I reckon the odds of a ghost mist appearing are relatively high.”

When the young woman heard him, her eyes revealed a strange expression. After a moment of hesitation, she slowly asked, “Did Fellow Daoist Wen spend such a long time traveling with me to this place in order to see the ghost mist? When ordinary cultivators encounter a ghost mist, they perish. Why would you take the initiative to go searching for a ghost mist?”

“Why shouldn’t I? I have no present matters at hand, and wouldn’t be better to see whether or not my hypothesis is true? Don’t tell me that if a ghost mist truly appears here that I won’t be able to flee?” The youth surnamed Wen waved his sleeve with an indifferent expression.

When the young woman heard him, she remained silent for a time and pointed to the heavenly omen above the island and calmly asked, “Are we going now? It seems the cultivator is in the middle of a crucial period of the ritual. Wouldn’t we be bothering them?”

An arrogant expression appeared on the elegant man’s face and he bluntly said, “Me, a bother? I, Wen Tianren, wish to have a chat with the Core Formation cultivator. If he dares to be rude to me, then I will kill him.”

The woman glanced at the youth in silence, but it was true that this man’s abilities were vast and profound. Although he had yet to condense a Nascent Soul, he was peerless among cultivators of the same grade. He was famed as the strongest Core Formation cultivator in the Scattered Star Seas, and it was likely to truly be the case.

“Yi!” The man’s expression suddenly stirred and he glanced at the island in astonishment.

“What, is something the matter?” Although the young woman was curious, she asked with a cold and detached tone.

A trace of seriousness appeared on his face as the man observed the island, “How interesting, there are three Core Formation cultivators on this island. Two of them are lacking and are at early Core Formation, and one of them is using a somewhat impressive concealment technique, but he is still beneath my notice. However, there is a late Core Formation cultivator present that appears abnormal, and has noticed my spiritual sense sweeping over him. In fact, his spiritual sense may be greater than my own.”

When the young woman heard this, she was shocked. She had personally witnessed his spiritual sense rivaling that of Nascent Soul eccentrics, but now he had met a Core Formation cultivator with an even stronger spiritual sense. This was truly hard for her to believe, causing an odd expression to appear on her face for the first time in a long while.

However, the young woman knew that while this man appeared gentle and refined, he was by no means magnanimous. Rather, he was a cunning, sinister, fickle and temperamental man that would kill others at a whim in a display of overwhelming power. Fortunately, the man seemed to view her personality as interesting and hadn’t treated her forcefully, much to her relief.

Although his expression appeared normal, she reckoned that he was already filled with killing intent. After all, he was incredibly proud of having his spiritual sense match that of a Nascent Soul eccentric. How could he allow a similar grade cultivator with abilities superior to his continue to exist?

The young woman sighed and could only feel a trace of pity towards the cultivator on the island.

While this was occuring, there was a piercing whistle that shrieked across a rocky area on the small island several kilometers away from the valley. Afterwards, an extremely huge tri-colored lance appeared from the south and passed through the area in an instant.

Puff... Light glimmered as the huge lance suddenly struck a mist of white Qi. The person inside the Qi barrier wavered and revealed a panic stricken face.

He gaped in terror and immediately spat out a violet jade club, but in that same instant, the barrier of Qi had been broken. Before the white silhouette could do anything with his magic treasure, a hole had already appeared through his body.

The corpse filled the air with blood as it fell to the ground, and with a bang, the corpse disappeared into the rocky area below. The lance then transformed back into a swarm of insects that now enveloped a storage pouch and a violet jade club as they returned to the valley with a low buzz.

A short moment later, Han Li grabbed the storage pouch and swept his spiritual sense through it. In his other hand, he held the violet club and was fiddling with it absentmindedly. A short moment later, Han Li put the items away and slowly turned his head to look into the distance with a gloomy expression.

Not long after he had released his Gold Devouring Beetles, he had felt a well concealed spiritual sense sweep past his body, causing him to nearly jump in fright. It had left an impression very similar to that of a Nascent Soul Eccentric. As a result, he had carefully tracked it back to a group of cultivators that had just appeared. He was shocked after discovering the owner of the fearsome spiritual sense to be an imposing late Core Formation cultivator with a young appearance. In fact, he didn’t seem all that different from Han Li himself.

Han Li was dumbstruck! In the instant he had swept his spiritual sense past the cultivator, the cultivator had discovered his prying and used some sort of restriction to forcibly repel his spiritual sense and leave him incapable of observing any further. Han Li grew sullen at the sudden development.