Chapter 29: This Is an Opportunity

Yang Zhengfeng stood before the alchemical furnace at this moment.

What startled Jiang Ning was that he seemed utterly depleted, more so than when they last met; the spiritual energy within him spilled out uncontrollably. The flesh of his hands and feet appeared shriveled, his whole person shrouded in a pall of death.

“Something’s wrong, this aura of death…”

Jiang Ning broke out in a cold sweat as realization struck.

“This aura, it’s identical to the death energy that clung to Yang Xiangtian and the others!”

What was happening?

He had always felt something was off—Yang Xiangtian, when fighting him that day, was not only wrapped in death energy, but even his combat style differed from what others had described before. And those two elders… The Enforcer Squad… All were enveloped by this same aura.

Jiang Ning glanced again at the fragrant furnace in the center of the chamber.

“Could it be this old man has seen through my celestial spirit physique and wants to use me for alchemical refinement?”

He was filled with suspicion and dread.

Just then, Yang Zhengfeng slowly turned his head.

Jiang Ning was startled by his face!

Twisted scars, like old tree roots, spread across his cheeks. His lips were parched and cracked; his skin stretched tightly over bone, bloodless. As he seemed about to speak, he suddenly coughed up blood, wiped it away without expression, and looked back at Jiang Ning, a sharp glint flashing in his eyes.

That gaze was as if he were beholding a priceless treasure!

It made Jiang Ning’s hair stand on end.

“This old man’s look—it feels like those with unsavory tastes…”

He was covered in goosebumps.

“Rise!”

Yang Zhengfeng wasted no words, gathering his power to seize Jiang Ning as if plucking him out of thin air.

“What do you want, old man?”

At this point, there was no more pretense; both knew what was at stake.

Jiang Ning shouted and struggled.

“If you’re going to use me for alchemical refinement, you’re making a mistake! My body isn’t exactly palatable!”

“At least let me have a meal before I die, will you?”

“Don’t tell me you have a thing for handsome men like me, old man?”

Yang Zhengfeng’s expression remained flat, gripping Jiang Ning, as if intent on seeing through all his secrets.

Jiang Ning struggled relentlessly, but a god-demon powerhouse on the verge of transcendence was still a god-demon powerhouse. He could not resist at all.

The gulf in cultivation was too vast.

But Jiang Ning refused to give up.

He cursed incessantly.

“Old man, if you throw me in the furnace, I’ll leave you a mess inside!”

“If you’re not afraid your painstakingly refined treasure turns pitch black, go ahead!”

“I’ll... damn you, let me go!”

He hurled every insult imaginable, and even as the esteemed sect master, Yang Zhengfeng now wore a face full of dark lines.

“You’ve broken through to the peak of the Enlightenment Realm—no wonder you erased some of the Dao markings I left,” Yang Zhengfeng finally spoke.

“But this is precisely what I wanted.”

At this stage, there was no point pretending to offer spiritual energy blessings; it was obvious he intended harm.

With a flash of his spatial ring, a massive cauldron appeared.

It emanated an ancient aura, the presence of heaven itself—a spiritual artifact.

Jiang Ning judged that it was certainly more than a first-grade item, though its exact rank he could not yet discern.

As he was held suspended, gazing into the cauldron, he was stunned.

“It’s filled with the essence blood of monsters!”

Seeing Jiang Ning fall silent, Yang Zhengfeng prepared to toss him in.

“Wait!” Jiang Ning cried out.

“What are you doing, old man?”

Yang Zhengfeng paused, casting an extra glance at Jiang Ning.

His cracked lips moved again, and he said, “This is an opportunity for transformation.”

Transformation, my foot.

Jiang Ning cursed inwardly, not believing a word.

Yang Zhengfeng said no more, lifting Jiang Ning like a chick and with a thud, tossed him into the cauldron.

At once, intricate lines of light spread across the cauldron, weaving a net of spiritual energy that slowly enveloped and sealed it.

“Nine heavens…”

Yang Zhengfeng’s lips moved, speaking softly.

Watching Jiang Ning enter the cauldron and observing for a moment, he ceased paying attention and returned to sit cross-legged before the furnace.

“Damn it!”

Jiang Ning was submerged in the cauldron, with only his head exposed.

Sensing the cauldron’s seal, he knew escape was impossible.

“A stabbing pain…”

Immersed in a vat of monster essence blood, Jiang Ning felt a cold, piercing agony, as if countless silver needles were pricking his skin.

“This is no opportunity. For ordinary cultivators, this wild energy would kill them in a day!”

He cursed, but his voice was isolated, unable to escape.

Fortunately, Jiang Ning possessed a celestial spirit physique, able to contain all things.

Even if the energy was violent, he could withstand it.

“Wait, something’s happening with my evolution method!”

He had been too focused on cursing to notice before, but now recalled—the evolution method absorbed bloodline power.

With so much monster essence blood, if any belonged to a first-grade bloodline, wouldn’t he profit greatly?

Excitement surged within him, and he began to probe.

Soon, he opened his eyes.

“There really is!”

The cauldron held essence blood from many types of monsters, mottled and viscous, its energy wild—so much so that even his celestial spirit physique at the Enlightenment Realm struggled to endure.

Yet within it, two streams of first-grade bloodline essence flowed, which Jiang Ning’s evolution method detected.

“Absorb the bloodline, erase the Dao markings—perhaps I could even break through to the Body-Refining Realm!”

He was stunned; in the blink of an eye, crisis had turned into opportunity.

“That old man must not know I possess a celestial spirit physique, only that I am uniquely constituted.”

He realized, Yang Zhengfeng likely believed he would die here, submerged in monster essence blood, achieving some goal of his own.

If he knew Jiang Ning’s true physique, would he really hand over such a transformative opportunity? He’d have thrown him into the furnace for refinement long ago.

The so-called opportunity was clearly meant for Yang Zhengfeng himself, not Jiang Ning.

“No matter, I was fretting over how to erase the Dao markings, and now the chance has come to me.”

Jiang Ning was not one to be polite; he immediately sat cross-legged, resisting the chaotic energy while seeking out the first-grade bloodline, separating it from the rest before slowly absorbing it.

…

Meanwhile, elsewhere in Idle Cloud Sect.

Within a manor.

“So it’s finally begun…”

Lin Qian stood in the courtyard, gazing up at the sky above Idle Cloud Sect.

“Is it all too late?”

Her eyes held a hint of reluctance, but more of sorrow. Thinking of all that had happened, she could not make up her mind.

“What a pity—if Wang Shuo were still alive, I could have tested the waters first…”

She sighed softly.

Nine days remain…