A breeze blew, and the stars in the sky twinkled.
The forest was still shrouded in a thick fog. From time to time, ferocious beasts would pass by, glancing in that direction fearfully before leaving in a hurry.
“Puff!” In the fog, Ou Yangming spat out another mouthful of blood.
He collapsed on the ground, losing all his strength.
Fortunately, he was enveloped by his power of laws at this moment. Otherwise, his state would be very dangerous.
“I failed again… ” Ou Yangming struggled to get up.
Compared to the last time, he was more seriously injured this time, but there were still some benefits.
This time, he seemed to understand the reason for the failure.
Those Ancient Devil Warriors and Devil Dwellers would wait for a long time after fusing with one Dripping Blood Stone before continuing to fuse with the second one. This was to give the body a good buffer and also to take advantage of this period to fully integrate the power brought by the Dripping Blood Stone.
Nonetheless, Ou Yangming was different. In just a short month’s time, he had fused with 99 Dripping Blood Stones.
If those Ancient Devil Warriors knew about this, they would be scared half to death.
Ou Yangming relied on his strong willpower to hold on until he met this threshold.
The previous ones were fine as there were not any bottlenecks. As long as he persevered, he would succeed. However, it was different this time. If he could not perfectly control his strength, he would probably fail no matter how many times he tried.
“What should I do?” Ou Yangming did not look too good.
If he wanted to perfectly control his strength, he would probably need a long period to train. Or, he could only use his body’s strength to experience many life-or-death battles until he could control every cell in his muscles.
Either way, he would need time.
What Ou Yangming lacked the most at this moment was time.
He could not waste any more time in this place. 3 years. At this point, there were only 2 more years left.
Ou Yangming had to quickly increase his strength and return to the real world to prepare for the arrival of the great calamity.
He thought for a long time but still could not come up with a solution.
“Do I really need to take it one step at a time?” Ou Yangming did not look too good.
If there was sufficient time, he would lay a solid foundation. He could not do it now.
Ou Yangming swallowed another pill. After a long while, his expression eased up.
When he raised his hand, he suddenly saw the ring on his finger. It was left behind after killing the Nine-sworded Ruler.
He had been running around in the Spiritual Realm and did not have the time to check what was inside. Now that his body was injured, and he could not fuse with another Dripping Blood Stone, he could take a good look at what was inside.
This ring was the interspatial treasure of the third-step conferred Ruler, the Nine-sworded Ruler.
All of his belongings were probably here. How much did a third-step conferred Ruler have?
This was something that only those who had reached that boundary would know.
Moreover, the Nine-sworded Ruler was a powerhouse from the Third World. That was an even more ancient civilization era. There might be some treasures inside that could solve Ou Yangming’s predicament.
Thinking of this, Ou Yangming’s eyes burned with passion.
The ring was also a Taoist Tool. Ou Yangming used his blood to make it recognize its owner.
Luckily, the process was very smooth. The Nine-sworded Ruler was already dead, so this ring had become an object without an owner.
After a while.
Ou Yangming could feel that his mental power and the ring had an indistinct connection.
When he used his mental power to probe into it, the space of the ring was very large. He could not even see the end of it at a glance. It was much larger than the space inside his Long Feather Band.
There were a lot of things inside, big and small, so much so that it was like a treasury.
Some of these things belonged to the Nine-sworded Ruler, and some were the resources that the Heavenly Path Alliance had given to him. Now, all of them belonged to Ou Yangming.
Ou Yangming looked carefully.
These things had been classified before. The outermost things were many and miscellaneous, so they were not precious…
Of course, they were only not precious for figures on par with the Nine-sworded Ruler. If one were to take them to the Great Wide World, any one of them would be considered a precious treasure.
The deeper Ou Yangming looked, the more precious the items became.
In the beginning, he could see some High Grade and Fine Grade magic treasures, as well as all sorts of rare spiritual herbs.
Toward the end, those items were almost gone.
Ou Yangming saw 5 Taoist Tools.
These Taoist Tools were smithed with special materials. Ou Yangming did not know the composition of these materials at all. It was very likely that they were ores unique to the Third World. Apart from these Taoist Tools, there were also a few precious divine herbs. These divine herbs were on par with the Mystic Ice Jade Fruit.
“There really are good things!”
Ou Yangming’s face was filled with joy. Although it was within his expectations, he was still very excited to see so many treasures.
Behind those items, there was a box.
Ou Yangming’s gaze gradually became serious.
Since it was placed at the back, it must be some incredible treasure.
If one were to rank these treasures, this was probably the most precious thing inside the ring, at least to the Nine-sworded Ruler.
Ou Yangming spread out his hand and withdrew his mental power from the ring.
In reality, a box made of ancient wood appeared in Ou Yangming’s hand. The box’s surface was carved with exquisite and ancient patterns, making it look historical. Of course, the important thing was not the box. The young fellow guessed that there must be some exceptional treasure inside this box.
With a crack, the box opened.
Ou Yangming was greatly disappointed. There was actually a section of a hand’s bone inside.
The white bone looked ordinary, filled with an ancient aura. Ou Yangming had a thousand thoughts in his mind, but he had never thought that this thing would appear.
He had used the Soul-sucking Art, but he had not seen any introduction about this hand bone from the Nine-sworded Ruler’s soul fragments.
This thing might be very precious. After all, its location determined its value. Despite that, it had no effect on Ou Yangming at the moment. Moreover, he did not know what this thing was for.
Feeling slightly disappointed, Ou Yangming put the box back into its original place and searched the ring again.
From the Nine-sworded Ruler’s side, Ou Yangming knew that there were plenty of blood essences of Ancient Demons inside the ring. They were left behind by the Ancient Demons that the Heavenly Path Alliance had once massacred in the Third World. It was also the Nine-sworded Ruler’s condition for a deal with the Demon King. The blood that the Demon King drank was only less than a tenth of what the Nine-sworded Ruler had brought.
The blood essences of the Ancient Demons were not as important as the Taoist Tools and divine medicines, but there were plenty of them.
Furthermore, Ou Yangming had coincidentally obtained from the Nine-sworded Ruler a method to devour the blood essences.
The Nine-sworded Ruler had gone to destroy more than 20 small worlds. He had originally planned to rely on the Humans’ blood essences to devour a portion of the Ancient Demons’ blood essences to restore his strength.
He had killed so many people mainly because the blood essences of the Ancient Demons were too violent. Unless it was a Demon King, if a human were to directly devour them, it was very likely that one would go mad and make a big mistake.
With countless blood essences from humans, the Nine-sworded Ruler could calm down the violent blood essences of the Ancient Demons. This way, the danger would be greatly reduced.
It was a pity that he had coincidentally met Ou Yangming in the Spiritual Realm.
This was also Ou Yangming’s luck. With the methods of the Third World, even the injured the Nine-sworded Ruler still had a great chance to recover. Once he succeeded, there would be another consequence.
Ou Yangming’s mental power searched through the ring. He had made this Taoist Tool recognize him as its master, so his mental power could instantly appear anywhere in the ring.
Very quickly, Ou Yangming found those things. A few bottles and jars were placed beside a large pile of junk, looking very inconspicuous.
These inconspicuous things were the blood essences of 10 billion Ancient Demons.
The massacre of the Third World’s Heavenly Path Alliance was much more bloody than the suppression of the Ancient Demons in the Great Wide World. These things did not belong to the Nine-sworded Ruler but were given to him by the Heavenly Path Alliance for ease of movement. To the Ancient Demon King, they were rare good things.
In actuality, the Nine-sworded Ruler did not have the right to use them without permission but because of his injuries, he could not care too much.
Ou Yangming took out a small bottle. The bottle was like ceramic, and it was only the length of his index finger. He opened the stopper on it.
A violent smell of blood instantly filled the surrounding air.
The blood essences of the Ancient Demons contained a lot of resentment. If it was a Venerable One or even a Ruler with weaker mental power, they would have been scared out of their wits.
It was just a small bottle but if its content was poured out, they could definitely drown an entire city.
“The blood essences of the Ancient Demons and the Dripping Blood Stones should be able to be used together.”
Ou Yangming clearly knew the cultivation technique of the Nine-sworded Ruler.
The name of the cultivation technique was called the Sky-devouring Technique. It sounded domineering, and it could be used to devour the blood essences of all living beings in the world. Having said that, if it was a foreign race, there would be some restrictions.
“Let’s try using the blood essences to recover my strength first.”
Ou Yangming’s physical condition was very bad at the moment. Of course, he was still 100 times better than the injured Nine-sworded Ruler. Since the injuries of the Nine-sworded Ruler could be recovered with the Sky-devouring Technique, Ou Yangming’s small injuries were not a big deal.
Of course, this was just an attempt by Ou Yangming.
If it was possible, he would carry out the next step of the experiment.
Silently chanting the technique in his heart, Ou Yangming suddenly inhaled like a raging dragon. The blood essences in the bottle flew into the sky. They seemed to have turned into a blood dragon in the air, circling around him rapidly. The dense blood and Qi seeped into his body.
The effect was immediate. In just a short while, Ou Yangming felt as if he had eaten a big tonic pill. His body was filled with power. His little injuries quickly disappeared with the return of blood and Qi.
This was not the most important thing. When Ou Yangming absorbed the Ancient Demons’ blood essences, he had thought about the consequences. That being said, after he absorbed them, he found that the side effects did not seem to exist at all.
The blood essences were perfectly compatible with him. They did not have the repulsive force mentioned in the Nine-sworded Ruler’s soul fragments.
“What’s going on?” Although it was a good thing, Ou Yangming still had a puzzled look in his eyes.
“Isn’t it only the Demon King who won’t reject the Ancient Demons’ blood essences?”
Ou Yangming was definitely not an Ancient Demon. He rolled his eyes twice and quickly thought of the reason.
