"Bring out your devilish armor, Brother Han," Xian Xian said as she turned to Han Li with a solemn look on her face.
Han Li naturally had no objections to this. As such, he flipped a hand over to produce a jade box that was around a foot in size, upon which were plastered a pair of restriction talismans.
He swept a sleeve over the box, to remove the talismans and its lid, and a burst of black Qi immediately surged forth from within in a frenzy.
Within the black Qi, a suit of purple armor that was around half a foot slowly emerged.
Not only was it extremely sinister in appearance, there were several spikes protruding from the shoulder and knee sections of the armor. On top of that, its entire surface was filled with black patterns, and it was emanating immensely powerful devilish Qi. However, there was a large hole on the chest of the suit of armor, and the surrounding area was riddled with cracks, clearly indicating that it had been severely damaged.
Xian Xian's expression changed slightly at the sight of the black Qi surging forth from the suit of armor, and she waved a hand through the air to conjure up a translucent light barrier before pointing a finger at the box from afar.
The purple suit of armor drifted slowly toward the formation at her behest, seemingly having been summoned by some kind of invisible power.
Before the suit of armor reached the center of the formation, Xian Xian raised a hand to cast a silver incantation seal, which disappeared into the copper cauldron in a flash.
A dull clang akin to the toll of a large bell instantly rang out from within the cauldron, and the black and azure flames burning around it instantly swelled to sweep up the suit of armor and draw it into the cauldron.
Immediately thereafter, a string of rumbling booms akin to thunderclaps rang out from within the cauldron, following which the intricate black patterns on it surface began to flash and glow.
At the same time, black Qi began to surge throughout the entire formation down below, and faint silver runes emerged from various locations all over the formation. As soon as these runes appeared, they surged toward the cauldron in a frenzy before vanishing into it.
After that, Xian Xian began to chant something in a low voice again while making a hand seal. The ground near the formation began to tremor violently, and piercing yellow light suddenly flashed from its four corner, following which a yellow stone platform emerged from each corner.
These platforms were around 10 feet tall each, but all of them were extremely smooth, and there was a small black flag standing on each of them.
Around the flags were containers of all shapes and sizes, and Han Li's expression changed slightly upon seeing this before quickly reverting back to normal.
As Xian Xian continued to chant her incantations, the four flags swelled to 50 to 60 feet in size, and only then did Xian Xian withdraw her hand seal as she turned to Han Li, and said, "Let's begin, Fellow Daoist Han. During this repair process, all you have to do is listen to my instructions and inject your magic power into those four devilish flags in a timely manner."
"No problem," Han Li immediately replied with a quick nod. A pleased smile appeared on Xian Xian's face upon hearing this, and she pointed a finger up at the formation plate hovering in mid-air again. A long cry immediately rang out within the formation plate, following which countless incantation seals surged forth, all of which disappeared into the dark clouds up above. The grey Qi emanating from the walls also began to permeate through the air, and within mere moments, Han Li and Xian Xian were both inundated by this grey Qi. Time passed by slowly, and three days flew by in the blink of an eye.
The doors of Xian Xian's shop were abruptly flung open, and a humanoid figure strode out from within before hailing a beast-drawn carriage and departing in an unhurried manner.
At this moment, within the spatial rift in the shop, Xian Xian was standing at the edge of the formation, staring blankly at the copper cauldron up ahead.
The surface of the cauldron was riddled with countless thin cracks, and the formation down below was also in a very sorry state with a small section of it having been completely destroyed.
The black crystals embedded into the ground around the formation had all been reduced to powder, and in the air above Xian Xian, the Kirin projection had shrunk down to only around a foot in size.
Both Xian Xian and the Kirin wore contemplative looks on their faces, seemingly in deep thought about something.
After a long while, the Kirin projection finally sighed, "That suit of devilish armor most likely has some history behind it; there's no way that something like that would've happened when repairing a suit of armor belonging to a normal Heavenly Devilish Monarch."
"Indeed. After the suit of armor was repaired, it drew the spiritual sense from a devilish being of another realm, and that being almost manifested a devilish body using the devilish Qi gathered here," Xian Xian replied as a hint of lingering fear flashed through her eyes.
"It's a good thing that Han brat possesses Divine Devilbane Lightning and was able to disperse the devilish Qi that was gathering. Otherwise, we'd be in a lot of trouble," the Kirin projection mused in a grim manner.
"Seeing as that devilish being was able to force its spiritual sense through to this realm from an alternate realm, it most likely possesses powers comparable to a true spirit being. Could it be that there's more than meets the eyes with this suit of armor? But after repairing the suit of armor, and I didn't discover anything amiss with it," Xian Xian said with furrowed brows."There wasn't enough time for me to identify anything, either. If we'd known this earlier, you should've never given this suit of armor away. After repairing it, you could've fabricated an excuse to keep it, then use some other treasures to reimburse him instead," the azure Kirin projection suddenly said.
"I did indeed want to do that. However, even though he seemed quite calm when dispersing that devilish Qi, I could sense that if I were to refuse to hand the suit of armor over to him, he would've most likely killed me on the spot without any hesitation. His powers are virtually comparable to that of holy race beings, and I've used up almost all of my life-saving treasures in the Golden Devil Mountain Ranges, so there's a very good chance that I would've died had he turned on me," Xian Xian replied with a wry smile.
"It's a pity that I exhausted so much of my energy in the Golden Devil Mountain Ranges as well. Otherwise, if we were to draw on the power of the spatial restriction here, it's not impossible that the two of us would've been able to force him to leave the armor here," the Kirin projection also said in a rather gloomy manner.
Xian Xian's expression changed a few times before she finally took a deep breath, and said, "So be it. No matter how powerful that suit of armor is, the fact of the matter is that it's a devilish treasure, so there's no way I would've been able to use it anyway. As such, it wouldn't be worth offending such a powerful being to try and keep it."
The Kirin projection was silent for a moment before heaving a resigned sigh. "Hehe, it's good that you can think that way. I guess we'll just have to concede here. As for whether the secrets behind that suit of armor will eventually be unveiled, that'll be up to his luck. It's just a pity that you'd missed out on the opportunity to make use of that suit of armor in the future."
"With you by my side, will I have a shortage of opportunities?" Xian Xian chuckled, seemingly having already come to terms with the current situation.
"That's true. What you're missing now aren't opportunities. Instead, you have to advance your cultivation base as quickly as possible. Otherwise, you won't be able to grasp any opportunities that you encounter anyway. By the way, did you find the thing that I asked you to search for?" The Kirin projection suddenly changed the subject.
"Not yet. It's said that only a few holy race old monsters know of its whereabouts, so it'll be quite hard to track down," Xian Xian replied with a troubled look on her face.
"You'll have to find a way. Without that thing, you won't even be able to enter those ancient ruins," the Kirin projection urged.
Xian Xian was silent for a moment before replying, "I'm well aware of that. I'll see if I can buy or borrow it from one of the juniors of those old monsters."
Just as Xian Xian and the Kirin projection were discussing their future plans, Han Li was on his way back to his cave abode.
He was seated with a calm expression on his face in the beast-drawn carriage, but he was actually nowhere near as calm as he looked.
Never would he have thought that repairing the suit of devilish armor would have led to such a perilous situation.
All of a sudden, he reached a hand up into his other sleeve and grabbed onto a lukewarm object.
This was a jade box that the newly repaired suit of Heavenly Devilish Armor had been placed into, and he'd plastered over 10 restriction talismans all over the box.
Han Li's stored the jade box with his finger, and he couldn't help but recall back to the scenes that had unfolded in Xian Xian's spatial rift.
The first half of the armor's repair process had been quite smooth, but a series of issues began to arise during the second half of the process. These were issues such as the formation suddenly ceasing to function for no reason, and cracks appearing all over the cauldron, also due to no discernible reason. Thankfully, the two of them were able to resolve these issues.
However, never would they have thought that just as the final repair procedure was about to be completed, an extremely powerful burst of spiritual sense suddenly forced its way into the spatial rift, then immediately surged toward the suit of devilish armor.
Due to how abruptly everything had happened, Xian Xian was momentarily rooted to the spot.
Thankfully, this wasn't the first time that Han Li had witnessed inter-realm spiritual sense of this nature, and he immediately dispelled it using his Divine Devilbane Lightning.
Generally speaking, even if a burst of inter-realm spiritual sense were to fail to achieve its objective, it could still immediately tear through space and escape. However, perhaps the owner of the spiritual sense was intent on obtaining that suit of armor, or perhaps they didn't think two Spatial Tempering Stage beings would've been enough to pose a threat to it. In any case, as opposed to retreating, the burst of spiritual sense plunged into the pure devilish Qi within the formation, then tried to manifest a devilish body.
Of course, Han Li wasn't going to allow it to get its way. Thus, he released all of the Divine Devilbane Lightning within his body at once, striking the devilish being with a devastating barrage.
The devilish being was naturally unfathomably powerful, and even a wisp of its spiritual sense that hadn't manifested into a devilish body could withstand a dozen or so bolts of Divine Devilbane Lightning with ease. However, hundreds of arcs of golden lightning had been unleashed at once by Han Li, and the devilish being's spiritual sense didn't even get a chance to cry out before it was zapped into nothingness.
Through that event, both Han Li and Xian Xian were made aware of the fact that this suit of devilish armor seemed to be far more powerful than they'd originally expected.
Han Li had obviously also identified the hesitation in Xian Xian's eyes at the time, and even though his expression remained quite calm, he was ready to attack at a moment's notice if she tried to go back on her word.
As a result, even though Xian Xian was clearly extremely reluctant to part with the suit of devilish armor, she could only look on as Han Li stored it away into a jade box.
Thus, Han Li's impression of her improved slightly once again, but he didn't stay there for much longer. After extending a few words of gratitude to Xian Xian, he left her spatial rift before departing on a beast-drawn carriage.
And thus, the story came full circle. He was currently sitting in the carriage while stroking the jade box up his sleeve, and he was becoming more and more curious toward this suit of devilish armor.
