Han Laomo was able to refine his skills largely due to the protagonist's halo and his powerful backing, which suppressed his flaws. However, even so, later in the Immortal Realm, he suffered a backlash from his bloodline, nearly costing him his life.
The True Spirit Nine Transformations is different. This technique's rank comes directly from the Immortal Realm, far surpassing the Twelve Transformations of Awakening Insects, and it's a mature cultivation method. There's no issue of backlash. However, the prerequisites for cultivation are unimaginably complex and difficult.
Putting everything else aside, true spirit blood simply cannot exist in the mortal realm. Even some demonic beasts that claim to possess true spirit bloodline have such diluted blood that it's completely ineffective. The Nine Transformations of True Spirit requires true, mature-level true spirit blood.
------------
Chapter 547 Crystallized Golden Thunder Bamboo
The Tianyuan Sect seemed to have already considered this. Because within that white jade bottle lay the True Spirit Blood that Lu Xuan needed—the blood of a mature Rahu.
Luo Hou is one of the most powerful and rebellious spirits in the mortal world. Han Yu, the author of the original novel, had several encounters with such spirits, but it seems he never obtained their blood.
Many true spirits possess spatial abilities. However, Luo Hou's is exceptionally different. In the spirit realm, there exists a Netherworld, roughly the size of a small world, said to be the transformation of a fallen Luo Hou. In the mortal realm, Old Demon Han also mistakenly entered this small world within Luo Hou's body. Therefore, Luo Hou's spatial abilities are primarily focused on creating independent small worlds. And this is precisely what Lu Xuan needs.
The small world within Lu Xuan's body is currently undergoing an evolutionary process. To accelerate this evolution, Lu Xuan has even stopped activating it. However, the world's evolution is far too slow. Therefore, this small world calls itself a realm, but Lu Xuan's control over it is not complete.
The main issue is that this thing wasn't originally his; it was just something that happened to be connected to him. Over the past few centuries, he's barely managed to gain some authority, but he's far from having complete control. Moreover, the laws of the world are imperfect, and changing them is impossible.
Now, Lu Xuan felt his opportunity had arrived. If he could successfully cultivate the Nine Transformations of the True Spirit with the help of Luo Hou's blood and gain Luo Hou's abilities, he might be able to gain initial control over that small world.
The third item on the platform, that wisp of silvery-white dust, was a magical artifact. Lu Xuan had never seen its material before. But the fact that it was displayed here so solemnly meant it was undoubtedly of the same level as the other two.
Lu Xuan tried to put the object away, but discovered that a specific refining method was required to collect the clump of silver sand. He had seen this before. Generally, only the most powerful and rarest spiritual treasures required such a specific refining method.
Without hesitation, Lu Xuan set up a defensive formation around him and began the initial refining process.
The technique has three levels; only after mastering all three can one fully control this magical treasure. However, to use it initially, mastering the first level is sufficient.
Using the Heavenly Treasure has its limitations. Mastering it initially requires a Nascent Soul stage cultivation level. It places extremely strict requirements on a cultivator's mana and spiritual sense. Only Lu Xuan, whose cultivation far surpasses others of his level, was able to cultivate the first level in the late Nascent Soul stage.
A few days later, Lu Xuan opened his eyes. He had now gained a basic understanding of this powerful spiritual treasure.
This magical artifact is named Heavenly Purification Sand, a name that suits it perfectly. It is crafted from a type of star crystal. This material is only created by chance under extremely special conditions, when the light of stars in the sky and the spiritual energy on the ground intertwine. It can be described as solidified starlight.
The Heavenly Pure Sand is a fluid state. It combines offense and defense, and can freely change into various forms. Of course, this is only the most basic effect of this magical treasure. Its true effect is the ability to plunder the spiritual energy of other magical treasures.
Indeed, this seemingly pure and flawless magical artifact actually leans heavily towards demonic power. Once an opponent's magical artifact is enveloped by this artifact, its spiritual energy will rapidly dissipate. The Heavenly Pure Sand, on the other hand, can absorb the spiritual energy of the opponent's magical artifact to strengthen itself.
This effect is simply a divine weapon for combat. Unless the opponent's magic weapon is far superior to the Heavenly Purification Sand in level, they will definitely suffer a great loss once they engage in battle.
This is only the first level of effect. If the second level is mastered, the magic weapon can directly extract a cultivator's essence. At that point, its destructive power will be even more terrifying. The third level involves drawing upon the power of the celestial bodies to unleash a special divine ability called Starfall.
Lu Xuan wasn't sure about the specific effects, but he figured that as the ultimate move of this Heavenly Treasure, it should give him a pleasant surprise.
Besides the three items on the high platform, there were also many lesser-grade magical treasures and elixirs in the main hall. Lu Xuan took them all as well. This was his biggest gain from the ruins of the Spirit Misty Garden. Most of the buildings that followed were already empty. Almost everything with spiritual energy had been swallowed up by the spatial rifts.
After looting the building, Lu Xuan left and headed off to other places.
Without a doubt, the items in the main hall should be considered the sect's ultimate collection. It's just a pity that only one item is missing. However, Lu Xuan noticed a problem: although this small world was quite large, the spiritual energy fluctuations were far weaker than he had imagined.
Logically, this enclosed little world should be extremely rich in spiritual energy. Such large sects all possess their own spiritual veins. As long as the spiritual veins remain, the spiritual energy will be inexhaustible. However, this little world appears to be devoid of spiritual energy. Even though Lu Xuan is in the core area, it still feels similar to some places in the human realm. For a large sect in the spirit world, this is extremely poor.
Of course, he understood this after he found the Spirit Garden of the Tianyuan Sect. It wasn't that the spiritual energy in this world was insufficient, but rather that most of it had been absorbed—absorbed by the various spiritual plants and herbs in the Spirit Garden.
Although the spiritual veins in this small world could continuously generate spiritual energy, they had begun to dry up over the long course of time. However, the plant-like spiritual creatures, with their much longer lifespans, continued to absorb the surrounding spiritual energy. Over countless years, while the spiritual veins depleted, the spiritual energy within these plants had become incredibly abundant.
Interestingly, the vast majority of the spiritual plants showed no signs of developing sentience. Lu Xuan had noticed this issue before. The same was true for the Fallen Demon Valley outside. Although it wasn't an independent small world, it was a closed space. Most of the spirit beasts inside were exceptionally powerful due to the passage of time, but their intelligence was very weak.
It seems that in such a closed world, it is difficult for truly highly intelligent spirit beasts to emerge. This is probably a limitation caused by a flaw in the laws of nature.
But this made everything before him all the more valuable. After all, Lu Xuan rarely hunted spiritual herbs with sentience for medicinal purposes. It gave him a feeling of cannibalism. This was perfect; he didn't have that psychological burden. These things could easily become a source of inner demons.
Because there were no other living creatures, these spiritual plants grew unchecked. Even the thorny bushes that served as a fence had become tough enough to be used as a top-grade wood-type spiritual material. And the golden expanse inside the spiritual garden was so dazzling that it blinded Lu Xuan.
Golden Thunder Bamboo, the entire garden is filled with it. And these Golden Thunder Bamboo have been growing here for who knows how long. From head to tail, they have developed a golden crystalline color. They seem so alive, the branches and leaves as if they were carved from a piece of golden crystal.
------------
Let me tell you something.
I don't know how to bring it up. To put it simply, I lost my second child. A complete and utter breakdown for an adult!
------------
Chapter 548 Entering the Forbidden Area Again (Updates Resumed)
Lu Xuan wasn't sure if the Golden Thunder Bamboo had a life limit. But the Golden Thunder Bamboo before him had undoubtedly grown to its extreme.
Whether it was due to reaching the end of its lifespan or something else, the Golden Thunder Bamboo before him had now transformed into something resembling a crystal sculpture. Lu Xuan could no longer sense the vitality of these Golden Thunder Bamboos. However, he could still feel a pure and incredibly vast power of warding off evil with divine thunder contained within them.
As his innate divine power, Lu Xuan was naturally very familiar with the Evil-Repelling Divine Thunder. However, he still couldn't imagine to what extent these Evil-Repelling Divine Thunders had accumulated over the long years.
He reached out and gently touched the golden thunder bamboo in front of him. A wisp of golden lightning flickered between his fingers and the bamboo.
Lu Xuan could sense a destructive power hidden within that wisp of golden lightning. The Evil-Repelling Divine Lightning was never a gentle force. This divine power was essentially created to annihilate its opponents. It only earned the name "Evil-Repelling Divine Lightning" because it was more effective against demonic energy.
These Golden Thunder Bamboos clearly couldn't be harvested using normal methods. Lu Xuan wasn't in a hurry; he could sense that this small world was still relatively stable. Therefore, he had enough time to slowly plan for these treasures. However, the fact that he hadn't seen Old Demon Han yet was somewhat strange to Lu Xuan.
As the chosen one, Han Laomo was probably hiding somewhere, taking pills and leveling up. Lu Xuan didn't care and continued to scavenge for useful things around him.
Those crystallized golden thunder bamboos had never been seen in the human world, or even in ancient books. Lu Xuan dared not collect them rashly, for fear of destroying these rare treasures of heaven and earth. He could only remain calm and study their characteristics little by little.
In the end, Lu Xuan discovered that these Golden Thunder Bamboos were dead. Or rather, they were no longer growing organisms. All their vitality and spiritual energy had contracted, merged, and finally solidified into their current state.
In a sense, this could even be described as a manifestation of the laws condensed from the spiritual essence of the Golden Thunder Bamboo. In reality, the Golden Thunder Bamboo itself isn't yet qualified to condense a manifested law. Despite its exceptional rarity in the mortal realm, it's still insufficient to condense laws.