Calm Before the Next Storm

Han Li extended two fingers and deftly picked up one of the beads, bringing it close to his eyes.

After staring at it for a moment, he placed the bead back and slowly closed his eyes.

An image from the jade slip surfaced in his mind.

A fist-sized, five-colored bead radiating light, surrounded by a dozen or so smaller floating beads.

These smaller beads were identical to the one in Han Li's hand.

Han Li was not unfamiliar with the five-colored bead faintly visible within the radiant glow. It was the Heaven-Mending Pill that had flown out from the Void Heaven Cauldron.

This peculiar image was one of the few illustrations in the jade slip that came with no explanation, looking mysterious and suspicious.

When Han Li had first glimpsed this image in the Cumquat Pavilion, he had been naturally shocked beyond measure.

This was precisely why he had been willing to part with an extra Talisman Treasure to trade for the jade slip from Gu Yu. Otherwise, according to his original intention, a single bottle of pills would have been more than enough.

Besides this one, the other unexplained illustrations in the jade slip depicted equally bizarre objects.

Some were items resembling magical tools or treasures; others seemed to be demon beasts or ghostly entities. But none of them were things Han Li had ever seen before.

Considering that the Heaven-Mending Pill was among them, these strange images were surely all items of extraordinary significance.

Han Li committed these images to memory. Perhaps, one day, he would encounter some of the other objects.

He would then treat them with the appropriate gravity.

But right now, looking at the beads in the box, Han Li was indeed a bit troubled.

There was no doubt that these five-colored beads were closely related to the Heaven-Mending Pill; otherwise, they wouldn't have appeared in the same image.

Considering that these beads were refined from the cremated remains of Extreme Xuan, and that Extreme Xuan had once possessed a Blood Jade Spider...

Could it be that this other wayward disciple of the old Profound Bone Devil had also entered the Void Heaven Palace back in the day and consumed a Heaven-Mending Pill?

That would explain why his bones had turned five-colored after death, and why, after being burned by fire, they had condensed into these beads.

Based on Han Li's extensive experience with consuming pills, it was highly likely that the pill's medicinal power had not been fully refined, or that the power was too potent, requiring the pill to be recondensed and refined after ingestion.

If that was the case, then perhaps these beads were the true Heaven-Mending Pill!

Why else would they be depicted so prominently in that image?

Using a cultivator's body as a cauldron to nurture pills was rarely used in the current cultivation world, but Han Li had witnessed such a thing before.

The Black Fiend Sect's "Blood Coagulation Five Elements Pill" was one such extremely bloody and overbearing method.

However, all of this was just Han Li's conjecture. He would not be rash enough to consume them immediately.

After thinking it over, he left the secret chamber and made his way to the insect room.

The current insect room was far from the simple setup in Heaven Star City. Han Li had excavated five interconnected stone chambers of varying sizes.

Two of the chambers were used to cultivate two different batches of Gold Devourer Beetles.

One batch consisted of the tens of thousands of beetles that had displayed great might in the Void Heaven Palace, devouring a great number of Iron Fire Ants. The other batch was the nearly thousand carefully selected beetles that Han Li had brought from his Heaven Star City cave dwelling. Han Li deliberately kept them separated.

Speaking of which, perhaps because they had devoured so many Iron Fire Ants, the tens of thousands of beetles seemed to have begun a new phase of evolution and reproduction. Some had already started to devour each other. This was an unexpected pleasant surprise for Han Li.

The remaining chambers were distributed as follows: one housed Han Li's sole surviving Blood Jade Spider; one housed the Crying Soul Beast, which did nothing but sleep all day; and the final one contained the Golden Silk Silkworms that Han Li had collected in the Void Heaven Palace.

The Blood Jade Spider required no explanation. But as for the Crying Soul Beast! Although Han Li possessed the Soul Summoning Bead, he still felt a lingering unease and had not dared to refine it. He had put the matter aside for the time being.

After all, the beast seemed perfectly normal for now.

As for the Golden Silk Silkworms, Han Li had not collected them on a whim. These spirit insects were also on the famous Strange Insect List.

Although their ranking was very low, far below even the Blood Jade Spider, only occupying the bottom of the list, this type of Golden Silk Silkworm was a rare spirit beast among cultivators, capable of a secondary evolution.

Given enough time, they had a high chance of evolving into a type of flying insect called a "Flame Mirage Moth." This moth was incomparable to what the Golden Silk Silkworm was at its current level. It was ranked seventeenth on the Strange Insect List and possessed an innate ability of illusion and transformation.

Just how powerful this ability was, the information was vague. It seemed that even in the ancient times, people rarely saw this insect, so no clear explanation existed.

However, for the Flame Mirage Moth to be ranked so highly, even if the information was not entirely accurate, it was surely an extraordinary being.

That was why Han Li, ignoring the strange looks from the other old monsters, had collected these half-dead Golden Silk Silkworms back then.

But, as they had been abandoned without hesitation by Wan Tianming, the silkworms truly did not have much spiritual power left and seemed on the verge of death.

After obtaining them, Han Li had fed them "Spirit Nourishing Pills" and other rare medicines, but could only barely maintain a thread of life. Their condition was getting worse and worse.

Seeing this, Han Li was at his wit's end.

Now, with an idea forming in his mind, he went directly to the insect chamber where the Golden Silk Silkworms were kept.

He peered through a window that had been enchanted with a restriction spell, and his brow furrowed.

The emerald-green silkworms were all lying motionless on the floor of the room, like dead things.

If he could not still sense the faint, almost intangible spiritual aura on them, he would have thought they were truly dead.

Without further hesitation, Han Li entered the chamber.

After circling the strange insects a few times, he selected the largest male and female pair, the ones that seemed to have a bit more vitality.

He then took out the jade box, fed one of the five-colored beads into each silkworm's mouth, and exited the insect room.

Han Li's idea was simple.

Since these insects seemed beyond saving, he might as well use them to test the effects of the beads.

The reputation of the Heaven-Mending Pill was so great that its properties were bound to be miraculous.

If these beads were truly the genuine Heaven-Mending Pill, as he suspected, then even if they couldn't save the silkworms, they couldn't make the situation worse.

Of course, if the silkworms displayed any adverse reactions after ingestion, Han Li would naturally ignore these beads from then on.

In the following days, he also attended to the special matter of the Nine-Bend Spirit Ginseng.

This was his key hope for forming a Nascent Soul in the future; he had to protect it with the utmost care.

At the center of his medicine garden, Han Li marked off a small plot of land.

He then used several sets of restricted array flags he had refined to encircle this piece of land, making it impenetrable and turning the ground within it into something like metal or stone.

Only then did he feel at ease transplanting the main body of the Nine-Bend Spirit Ginseng into the plot.

As for the incarnation of the Nine-Bend Spirit Ginseng, a white rabbit trapped in a jade box, Han Li had no intention of keeping it imprisoned for long.

After all, even an incarnation, if separated from the main body for too long, could have an effect on it.

Han Li brought the jade box, covered in various talismans, beside the spirit ginseng's main body in the garden. He then tore off the talismans.

Before he could even open the box, a beam of white light shot out, circled once, and plunged into the spirit ginseng beside it, disappearing without a trace.

Seeing this, Han Li couldn't help but smile knowingly.

It seemed that after being captured once, this rabbit incarnation was thoroughly frightened and had grown even more timid.

However, staring at the main body of the Nine-Bend Spirit Ginseng, Han Li was pondering a thought.

He wondered if the green liquid from his small bottle could have any miraculous effects on this ginseng.

He had entertained this idea ever since he first obtained the spirit ginseng.

But right now, he needed the green liquid for many things. This test was not an urgent matter.

Besides, what if using the green liquid caused the Nine-Bend Spirit Ginseng to suddenly gain a great increase in power, undergoing a mutation, and escaping from the formation?

Wouldn't that make him regret it for life?

This was not an ordinary plant or tree but a legendary immortal herb with an incarnation. It was better to be cautious.

With this in mind, once he had settled the Nine-Bend Spirit Ginseng, Han Li left it alone.

As for the green liquid he had just produced, Han Li used it all to accelerate the growth of the Spirit Nourishing Wood, one of the Three Great Spirit Trees.

Although it was only a small root segment, Han Li believed that given a few years, a ten-thousand-year-old Spirit Nourishing Wood would reappear.

Originally, Han Li had planned to study the Void Heaven Cauldron next, to see if there was any other way to open it.

However, a small section of rib bone he had inadvertently pulled from his storage pouch sparked a temporary interest in him.

Recalling how this rib bone of the old Profound Bone Devil had remained completely unharmed even under that terrifying Asura Holy Flame, it was surely extraordinary.

Han Li lay on the bed in his sleeping chamber, holding the gleaming, crystal-white object, examining it with an expression of intense curiosity.