Blackie’s huge eyes stared at the Kaiyuan Deer Cauldron and it asked, “What, you want to give it to me?”
Zhang Ruochen glared at him and said, “There’s something I want to study with you.”
“What?”
Curious, Blackie flapped its wings and flew onto the Kaiyuan Deer Cauldron. It stuck in its big head and looked inside the cauldron.
The next moment, Blackie yelped and quickly retracted its head. Its fat body shook violently and lost balance, falling heavily from the cauldron.
“Zhang Ruochen, where did you get so many Trifoot Carnivorous Insects?” Blackie asked, frightened. “You didn’t even warn me. Did you want to kill me?”
“So you know what they are,” Zhang Ruochen said.
“Of course.”
Blackie climbed up from the ground. Feeling embarrassed, it stomped on the ground that it had fallen onto before saying, “Trifoot Carnivorous Insects are a legendary and ancient insect. According to legends, they were born from the badlands of the Hell World. These insects are known for gnawing through a Supreme Saint’s Immortal Saint Body, but I know that they can evolve to the extreme and even eat a god’s corpse.”
Zhang Ruochen walked to the side of the Kaiyuan Deer Cauldron and whacked the side. A Trifoot Carnivorous Insect was forced out and landed on the ground.
The grain-sized black insect had three sharp legs and two teeth.
“Zhang Ruochen, are you crazy? Why did you free it?”
Blackie shrunk to the size of a fist and flew into a distant corner.
Poof, poof!
The Trifoot Carnivorous Insect was clearly furious. Its eyes turned red and it flew toward Zhang Ruochen as a dark streak of light.
Sword light flashed and the Abyss Ancient Sword was out.
Plop!
The blade hit the Trifoot Carnivorous Insect and sent it flying into the stone wall.
Sticky black liquid leaked from the insect, eating away at the stone wall. The wall sizzled and a basin-sized crater appeared.
The Trifoot Carnivorous Insect fell to the ground, hissing softly.
Zhang Ruochen studied that Trifoot Carnivorous Insect and instantly gasped. The Abyss Ancient Sword could easily cut a Ten-thousand-pattern Saint Weapon, but it only left a shallow cut on the Trifoot Carnivorous Insect’s abdomen.
In fact, the cut was quickly healing.
“Its defensive abilities are so scary.”
Zhang Ruochen lifted the Trifoot Carnivorous Insect back into the Kaiyuan Deer Cauldron with the sword tip.
Blackie flew back and smirked. “The Abyss Ancient Sword is sharp, but it’s not easy to cut through a Supreme Saint’s Immortal Saint Body, right? But the Trifoot Carnivorous Insect can gnaw through it, so you can imagine how strong they are.”
“Do you know how to control them?” Zhang Ruochen asked.
Blackie instantly had a proud expression. “How can I not? Trifoot Carnivorous Insects are powerful, but they have low intelligence. I have a Thousand Insect Record. It includes how to control all sorts of insects, taming and using them.”
Two beams of light shot out of Blackie’s eyes and into Zhang Ruochen’s.
A moment later, the content of the Thousand Insect Record appeared in Zhang Ruochen’s mind.
He closed his eyes and read the book in his mind. He had to lament how many strange insects the universe had.
It wasn’t only one thousand. There were more than 100,000 kinds.
The Thousand Insect Record had an explanation about the Trifoot Carnivorous Insects, including how to raise and control them.
“So, I must carve my own spiritual brand inside their bodies to control them with my Spiritual Power.”
The first step was to refine the spiritual brand that the Assassin Heavenly King left in them.
Zhang Ruochen formed a three-foot-wide fireball with Divine Fire Jingmie. It flew under the Kaiyuan Deer Cauldron and started burning.
It burned for two days and three nights.
After checking, the spiritual brands inside more than 270 of the Trifoot Carnivorous Insects in the cauldron were all refined.
Blackie’s eyes grew greedy. It got close to Zhang Ruochen and chuckled. “It’s very annoying and time-consuming to carve a spiritual brand on the Trifoot Carnivorous Insects. How about you have me do this annoying task?”
“You want to raise these Trifoot Carnivorous Insects?” Zhang Ruochen asked.
“Your time is precious, but I’m so bored…”
“Okay, I’ll give them to you.”
Zhang Ruochen had to cultivate Spiritual Power, as well as the Dragon and Elephant Prajna Palm, Luo Water Fist Technique, Sword Eight, Time Sword Technique, Way of Space, and Way of Truth, while also studying the Rules of Saintly Way. He indeed had no time to raise the Trifoot Carnivorous Insects too.
Actually, he’d already decided to hand them to Blackie so he could deal with them.
Blackie was overjoyed, but he instantly had a hesitant expression again. “It’s easy to raise them, but what do I feed them? What do I use? Hehe, Zhang Ruochen, how about you give me a divine bone? I’ll use it to create an insect hive.”
Zhang Ruochen did have some divine bones, so he chose a bigger one and tossed it at Blackie.
He stopped caring about this. Zhang Ruochen entered the time and space crystal and took out a Six Desires Ancient Pill. He placed it before him.
The pill was placed inside a golden lotus. It looked like a lotus seed that had a fresh fragrance.
Poof!
Rings of ripples appeared on the pill. Six tiny golden people projected out. Like six golden Arhats, they sat in a circle.
That was the pill spirit of the Six Desires Ancient Pill.
The biggest difference between an earth and heaven divine pill was that it had a pill spirit. It had a mind and could attack strongly by itself.
As soon as the six Arhats appeared, they roared at the same time. Six Spiritual Power attacks became one, resonating with each other, and rushed at Zhang Ruochen.
If he wasn’t at Level 55 yet, he might be a bit afraid. But now, he didn’t care about their attack at all.
“Go back.”
With a wave of his sleeve, he sent strong Spiritual Power flying out.
Boom!
The attack by the six Arhats was forced back by Zhang Ruochen’s Spiritual Power.
They even let out pained cries and hid back in the pill.
Zhang Ruochen picked up the Six Desires Ancient Pill and swallowed it, using Divine Fire Jingmie to refine it.
The pill was made after collecting humans’ seven emotions and six desires.
As he kept refining and absorbing it, the strong power of the six desires transformed into spiritual thoughts. They kept tempering Zhang Ruochen’s own spirit while enriching it.
Half a month later
Zhang Ruochen had refined around 40 to 50% of the first Six Desires Ancient Pill. His Spiritual Power improved greatly. It reached the peak of Level 55 and was at the bottleneck.
It was evident how strong the Six Desires Ancient Pill was.
Now, Zhang Ruochen took out the second Six Desires Ancient Pill and swallowed it.
When the second pill’s power exploded completely, Zhang Ruochen put his all into breaking through the bottleneck.
This time was extremely difficult. Strong pill power darted chaotically around him and all sorts of thoughts attacked his saint heart. It caused his heartbeat to keep getting faster.
Three times faster, four times, five…
Soon, his heartbeat was ten times faster than usual.
At the same time, extreme pain flared in his head. It was like his head was about to get crushed by an invisible force. His consciousness was blurring.
The power of the two Six Desires Ancient Pills were bursting out inside him without stop.
I must stay awake, or else the power of the six desires will lose control and crush my spirit. My mind will break apart.
Zhang Ruochen bit on his tongue and dug his nails into his palm. He used the pain to stimulate himself and try to stay clear-headed.
His Spiritual Power could only change by enduring the painful tempering process.
Work hard. He must persist.
The process was extremely painful. All of Zhang Ruochen’s muscles and meridians were pulled taut and his heartbeat was even 30 times faster than usual. His saint heart was about to break out of his body and fly out at any time.
This lasted for one day and night. Then a boom sounded in Zhang Ruochen’s heart.
Boom!
Breaking past the last bottleneck, his Spiritual Power reached Level 56.
A small whirlpool formed in his heart. It absorbed the power of the Six Desires Ancient Pill. In the span of a breath, more than half of the mighty medicinal power inside him was absorbed.
The whirlpool’s speed slowed down gradually.
The pain disappeared as the Six Desires Ancient Pill was absorbed. It was replaced with an unprecedented comfort. He felt very pleasant.
He made a breakthrough in Spiritual Power, but Zhang Ruochen kept his eyes closed. He sat cross-legged on the ground and continued to refine the remaining Six Desires Ancient Pill power.
He spent a few more days before completely absorbing the power of the two Six Desires Ancient Pills.
Now, his saint heart was completely calm. His heartbeat returned to normal while his Spiritual Power was now in the middle of Level 56.
“Spiritual Power split into two.”
Whoosh!
Two shadows flew out of Zhang Ruochen, forming two Spiritual Power copies that were identical to him.
Each copy had Level 55 Spiritual Power.
“Two into four.”
A clone split from the two copies. Instantly, there were four copies and each one had Level 54 Spiritual Power.
“Four into eight.”
“Eight into 16.”
“Sixteen into 32.”
“Thirty-two into 64.”
Sixty-four Spiritual Power copies appeared, filling the time and space crystal. Each one had Level 50 Spiritual Power. It was equal to 64 Spiritual Power Saints.
This was Zhang Ruochen’s current limit. If he continued splitting, he would be unable to control them. The clones would split apart into dense Spiritual Power thoughts.
Of course, Zhang Ruochen still wanted to try.
“Sixty-four into 128,” he uttered.
Boom!
The 64 Spiritual Power clones all exploded into specks of light.
Each speck of light was a Spiritual Power thought.
“As expected, I must reach Level 57 to have 128 Spiritual Power clones.”
He smiled wryly and collected all the Spiritual Power thoughts back into his heart.
Next, he made 64 clones again and released them outside the time and space crystal. They appeared in the Moon Goddess Dojo.
It was as if he suddenly had 64 pairs of ears and eyes.
Sixty-four different information streams converged toward him.
Sixty-four identical Zhang Ruochens suddenly appearing in the dojo frightened many maids in lower realms.
Cultivators whose Spiritual Power hadn’t reached Level 50 yet couldn’t tell that the clones were fake, so they thought that it really was Zhang Ruochen.
