Aspiring to the Immortal Path
chapter-662

The Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor was dead.

Moments before dying, he had been able to glimpse the clear skies below.

But in the end, he wasn't able to last until that moment, dying right before he could escape the Astral Winds.

It had to be said that this Fiend Emperor had truly been powerful and terrifying.

Even though Tang Jie had awakened his latent strength, even though he had comprehended the Dao of Destruction, he had still been a level below the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor.

He had only been able to win because of the Astral Winds.

The Astral Winds had weakened the Fiend Emperor's Divine Will, reduced the number of methods available to him, ground away at his defenses, and made him much weaker overall. And at the same time, they made Tang Jie stronger.

Without this geographic advantage, Tang Jie would have never been able to create this miracle.

In this aspect, the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor could not be said to be wrong that a Celestial Heart had never beaten a Divine Division. The massive gap in strength between the two was not so easily filled. This was why Tang Jie had said that he hadn't beaten him, only killed the Fiend Emperor.

But at the same time, Tang Jie knew that he actually wasn't that far away from catching up to the Violet Palace Realm.

This was because his avatar was still at Heart Demon and his original body hadn't attained mastery of the Diamond Body.

In the future, just one of these two improving would put him on par with Violet Palace, and both would let him surpass it.

He was bound to break the precedent one day, truly accomplishing this miracle. Even if his miracle today had been due to external factors, tomorrow, he was definitely going to recreate it within his own strength!

After leaving the Astral Wind layer, Tang Jie put away the remaining half of the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor's corpse.

The Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor had refined his fiend pellet into the Deathless Heaven Pearl, which had been used in the earlier battle, and half of his body had been destroyed by the power of Destruction, so Tang Jie gained much less than expected from killing this giant centipede.

Of course, even half of a Divine Division great fiend's corpse was enough to make countless people envious. One piece of its flesh was equivalent to countless spirit medicines. But considering everything that he had paid for it, Tang Jie felt like it still wasn't worth it.

As if in response to his thoughts, a light pop came from Tang Jie's body.

The Herding Yang Pearl had shattered.

After its last bit of energy had been used, the Herding Yang Pearl had shattered from the overload.

Tang Jie sighed. Without this divine treasure, he would no longer be able to use the three-headed, six-armed form, and he would lose one of his Ten Extinctions.

As he was sighing, he felt a special pulse of energy in his body.

Tang Jie didn't think much of it at first, but he realized that there was something different about this energy: it was identical to the energy that had come from the Herding Yang Pearl.

"This is the energy of the Herding Yang Pearl!" Tang Jie blurted out.

Although the pearl had shattered, its energy still lingered in his body. Not only that, without the restraint of the Herding Yang Pearl, this energy was even greater than before, so not only did Tang Jie not lose access to his three-head-six-arm form, he could go up to four heads and eight arms, and the boost to his strength would increase from three times to four times.

But this would be the last burst from this energy. Once Tang Jie reached his maximum power, this energy would begin to fade away, disappearing from his body.

I can't let it disappear! Tang Jie thought to himself.

No matter what, he had to keep it around so that he could study it and grasp its Divine Connection.

Divine Connections were incredibly powerful, and they could only be learned after reaching Violet Palace.

But the shattering of the Herding Yang Pearl had caused its energy to flow through his body, giving him a chance.

The core of a Divine Connection was the Divine Will, which linked with the world to unleash its power, hence its name. Tang Jie's Divine Will was far from reaching the requirements to use a Divine Connection, but the Divine Connection of the Herding Yang Pearl was different. It absorbed power and used it to strengthen the user, which was why he could frequently use it despite being at Celestial Heart. As for most of his other divine treasures, Tang Jie was only able to use them to a limited extent, unable to draw out their full power. This was why he didn't use any divine treasures other than the pearl. After all, he had many treasures at his disposal, and if he could use them, there would have been no need to put them all in the Treasure Cosmos diagram.

The Herding Yang Pearl's special property allowed one to use it at Celestial Heart, and if he could grasp this sliver of energy, he might be able to learn a Divine Connection before his time.

This was definitely a wonderful thing. After all, the function of the Herding Yang Pearl was just too important to him.

Tang Jie unleashed all of his strength to analyze this energy so that he could comprehend it before it completely faded away.

Thus, right after comprehending the power of Destruction, Tang Jie began to frantically focus the Dao of Wisdom on studying the power of the Herding Yang Pearl.

Overheating his mind twice in one day was a heavy burden, even for Tang Jie, and if he did this poorly, he might even turn himself into an idiot.

But Tang Jie was confident that he wouldn't.

It was the same explanation as last time. This world seemed to have some mysterious fortune power that protected everyone.

As the Dao of Wisdom turned, he rapidly analyzed this energy, comprehending the entire method behind the Divine Connection's existence.

Compared to a supreme Great Dao like Destruction, this Divine Connection was actually very simple. And because Tang Jie had used this one so much, he was already somewhat familiar with how it worked.

Thus, the process of deducing the Divine Connection was much smoother than imagined, and Tang Jie managed to completely comprehend it before the energy completely disappeared. As for the price, he didn't even bleed a drop of blood, let alone get turned into an idiot. He just felt a little dizzy, which he recovered from after only a few moments of rest.

Once he had finished deducing the Divine Connection, he used it, absorbing the last bit of energy and condensing it into a drop. This was the Divine Connection Seed.

The Divine Connection Seed was a product of compromise for when one's cultivation was not enough. One could think of it as a replacement for the Herding Yang Pearl, making up for the strength that Tang Jie lacked. In normal circumstances, there was no need for some Divine Connection Seed.

Tang Jie could absorb power through the seed and thus use the Three Heads, Six Arms Divine Connection. No, if he cultivated it, he could even make it more powerful, so one could say that Tang Jie had benefited from this mishap and grown even stronger than before. On the other hand, as Tang Jie had just grasped the Divine Connection, it would take some time to reach the original power of the Divine Connection. He could only maintain two heads and four arms, doubling his strength.

But at least he had kept the Ten Extinctions Blade.

After doing this, Tang Jie exhaled and then smiled. "This really is a world brimming with fortune."

He had awakened his latent strength, comprehended the power of Destruction, and even grasped a Divine Connection. Everything was telling him that he was one lucky guy.

But for the same reason, Tang Jie had a strange feeling—when there were too many coincidences, they stopped being coincidences.

Then if he was too lucky, was it really luck anymore?

Tang Jie didn't know, but he found this world more and more interesting.

For the same reason, he somewhat understood why the fiends of this world were so strong.

Humans were creatures that were extremely dependent on organization and systems, and cultivators were no exception. In society, they could transcend the system, but they couldn't do the same in cultivation.

Everything had its method and steps. Tang Jie had understood this all the way back when he was at the Basking Moon Sect.

In comparison, fiends were disorderly when it came to cultivation. They lacked systems and primarily relied on talent and instinct to grow stronger.

When comparing systematic cultivation to non-systematic cultivation, the latter clearly had greater demands on one's luck, which was why fiends had been able to grow stronger than humans here. While many humans were inexplicably able to open their Jade Gates and Spirit Eyes, the fiends were able to come upon many lucky opportunities that allowed them to make advances in cultivation.

The Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor was a most outstanding example. He had inadvertently obtained the Imperial Ember Lotus Mantra, which allowed him to get all the way to the rank of Fiend Emperor. In terms of lucky encounters, he had probably encountered just as many as Tang Jie.

Tang Jie could only shake his head and smile at the thought.

He put the Fiend Emperor's corpse into the diagram and then called out Yiyi and Tutu.

Tutu could move quickly, so he had it go and find the puppet, after which he flew down together with Yiyi.

Midway, they encountered a group of humans coming from the other direction. It was none other than Liu Yunshan's group.

Tang Jie went over to them.

Everyone was stunned when they saw Tang Jie coming over.

Shentu Yuan expressed delight, shouting, "Brother Tang, you're still alive! You actually survived!"

Everyone thought that Tang Jie wouldn't be able to come back alive after luring away the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor.

Divine Division great fiends were far too terrifying, and many people would have chosen to take on the 18 fiend kings over a single Divine Division great fiend. After all, the former had the possibility of being divided and conquered, whereas there was just no hope of defeating the latter.

Thus, everyone had considered Tang Jie a hero like Sun Shuming.

Tang Jie's return was both a shock and a delight.

Liu Yunshan called out, "What about the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor?"

Tang Jie thought it over, but he decided not to say that he had already killed him. He only said, "The ability of the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor to cast arts with a thought was too terrifying and powerful. I was just no match for him, so I ultimately had to escape."

"You could escape the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor's pursuit?" The others didn't quite believe him.

Tang Jie thought to himself, You don't even believe I could escape him, so would telling you that I killed him scare you to death?

But he sternly said, "Of course I couldn't escape him, but don't forget that I'm a body cultivator. My body can last longer than his, so I fled into the Astral Wind layer. Using the Astral Winds as a cover, I was able to escape. While the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor is powerful, he knows how dangerous the Astral Winds are. After some hesitation, he chased after me, but as Divine Will can't go very far in the Astral Winds, he lost my trail, allowing me to escape."

It sounded reasonable. After all, they had a limited understanding of what the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor was capable of. Thus, they all breathed a sigh of relief for Tang Jie and praised his daring and ability. To escape alive from the Silver Eyes Fiend Emperor was no disgrace, but rather something worth admiring.

Tang Jie then asked where Sun Shuming was.

They told him what Sun Shuming had chosen to do.

He had already guessed that Sun Shuming was planning to take his enemies down with him, but he still couldn't help but give a melancholy sigh after hearing of his heroic death.

Whenever the country was in peril, heroes would emerge.

Sun Shuming had definitely been one of them.

Considering all that this old man had sacrificed for the country, he decided to be generous and not seek the reward for killing a Fiend Emperor from Fengshan.

After grasping the situation, Tang Jie said, "If that's the case, I'll be taking my leave first."

"Where are you going?" Ice Phoenix asked.

"To the Blackwater River, to find Withering Yin Grass," Tang Jie replied.

While the Inkcloud Abyss had been destroyed, the Blackwater River was still there. If he missed this chance, he could put an end to any hopes he had of finding Withering Yin Grass.

Liu Yunshan cautioned, "It's best if you don't go. The Nether Gate will need at least two hours to disappear, but the ghosts it released won't be going back. Although those ghosts will ultimately disperse across my Verdant Cloud Domain and will eventually be exterminated by the fiends and humans, at least for now, that world below is a world of ghosts."

"I will try to find the Withering Yin Grass as quickly as possible." Tang Jie did not plan to change his mind.

Ice Phoenix anxiously said, "The Blackwater River is so big, and it's crawling with ghosts. How are you going to find the Withering Yin Grass?"

Tang Jie smiled. "It will all depend on my luck. It just so happens that I've discovered that this is a fortunate world. My luck is particularly good, so I'm sure I'll find it."

Everyone looked at each other, wondering how this world that was almost completely conquered by fiends could be considered fortunate.