Nine Transformations of the True Spirit.

Time stands still in the mountains; those who cultivate themselves know no years.

In the blink of an eye, nearly twenty years have passed.

For a Nascent Soul cultivator with a lifespan of two thousand years, twenty years is just a blink of an eye, merely a period of secluded cultivation.

In the cultivation room, moonlight streamed through the long skylight, falling like frost and enveloping Chen Yuan and the boulder beneath him.

The boulder gleamed with a faint light, and the rhythmic changes in light and shadow seemed to mirror Chen Yuan's own practice of breathing exercises as he sat cross-legged atop it.

Chen Yuan's aura surged and undulated slowly, vast and boundless, filling the spacious cultivation room.

Under the isolation of the formation, Chen Yuan's aura did not leak out in the slightest. However, if any low-level cultivators below the Core Formation stage were present, they would have their souls shattered simply by feeling this pressure.

The meditation room was completely silent, as if time itself had vanished.

But as the pure white moonlight gradually dimmed and turned into brilliant sunlight, Chen Yuan's aura slowly subsided, and he opened his eyes, ending this period of seclusion.

The luster of the boulder gradually subsided. Chen Yuan smiled slightly, stood up and stepped down from the boulder. With a flick of his sleeve, he stored this strange boulder, capable of drawing upon the power of the stars in the heavens, into his inner space.

He had refined the last cultivation pill in his hand, and it was finally time for him to emerge from seclusion.

In the past twenty years, he has only left this training room twice.

Once a year, he receives a starlight infusion, which he directly draws upon the power of the stars in the heavens through the skylight he carved out, thus tempering his physical body.

Twenty years of almost uninterrupted cultivation finally brought him to the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm.

His physical body also broke through the bottleneck that had blocked countless demon generals, making him comparable to a high-level demon general. Among the demon races of the lower realm, few could match him.

Chen Yuan's cultivation and strength underwent a dramatic transformation in just twenty years, all thanks to the treasures of the eight royal families.

After arriving at Fulong Island, Chen Yuan refined 133 cultivation pills, including 37 Body Tempering Pills, which he has already refined.

For the demon race, bloodline and physical body are fundamental. They will try every means to refine the body-tempering herbs into pills to temper their bodies.

However, the demon race is far from being as proficient in cultivation arts as the human race, and can only rely on human alchemists to refine pills.

The alchemy tradition in this world was left behind by ancient cultivators from the human realm tens of thousands of years ago, and has become incomplete and fragmented over the long years.

The demon race once planted a soul restriction on all humans, and the alchemy tradition was once cut off. Even after the restriction was lifted, much was still lost.

Therefore, the alchemists of the eight major demon sects possessed far fewer pill formulas than cultivators in the human realm, and many spiritual herbs could not be refined into pills.

In addition, the eight royal families obtained different body-tempering herbs, many of which, although recorded in pill formulas, could not be combined to make a batch of pills.

They can only be planted in the spirit herb garden for now, and then refined into pills later when other spirit herbs are obtained.

The other three-thousand-year-old and five-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs were preserved for this reason, and eventually ended up in Chen Yuan's hands.

However, this is also because the eight royal families have a long history and profound heritage, and the demon race has a long lifespan, which is why these spiritual herbs have been left behind.

If it were one of those demon generals who had luckily transformed into human form, they would not know anything about alchemy.

They will simply swallow all the spiritual herbs they obtain to enhance their physical cultivation.

Most of the medicinal power contained within will be wasted.

The eight royal clans are called the demon race, but after tens of thousands of years, they are not much different from the human clan sects with orderly lineages. The only difference is that one focuses on cultivation techniques and supernatural abilities, while the other focuses on bloodline and physical body. Naturally, they would not tolerate such waste.

However, the eight royal families could not have imagined that cultivators from the human realm would cross over again, and all the resources they had accumulated over the long years would have been used to benefit others.

After refining these body-tempering pills, Chen Yuan, along with the annual starlight infusion and the power of the stars drawn down by the boulder, successfully broke through the bottleneck in his physical body ten years ago.

Now, when he fights Kun Chenglie again and activates the three kinds of true spirit blood, his physical strength will be comparable to that of a perfected demon general, almost reaching the limit under the restrictions of the laws of the lower realm.

Even if Kun Chenglie were to take out another drop of Kunpeng's true blood and unleash the full power of the Cangming Halberd, he still wouldn't be able to win, but he wouldn't be defeated as easily as before. At the very least, he could hold out for several days and nights.

The Cangming Halberd is only a hair's breadth away from the Tongtian Spiritual Treasure, and the spatial destruction power contained within it has already faintly broken through the limitations of the laws of heaven and earth.

Only another equally powerful true spiritual force, or a powerful divine ability unleashed by a cultivator at the Void Refinement stage, can rival it.

The Body Tempering Pill, made from three-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs, contains a violent and immense medicinal power, making it quite difficult to refine. It took Chen Yuan ten years to refine just thirty-seven pills.

Before he could refine all the Body Tempering Pills, the ten-year deadline he had agreed upon with Qin Wuyai and the other two had already arrived.

Left with no other option, he went to Jinluo Island and proposed postponing the event for another ten years.

The three were nearing the end of their lifespans, and their cultivation had long since stagnated. They were eager to ascend to the upper realm, and upon hearing this, they were quite dissatisfied.

They can afford to wait ten years.

Moreover, based on the strength Chen Yuan displayed when facing Kun Chenglie, he had already surpassed that of a mid-level demon general.

Now that they have three more spiritual treasures and divine weapons, the Cangming Halberd is even more extraordinary. Even a high-ranking demon general would probably not be afraid of it.

The four of them were able to return to the Spirit Realm smoothly thanks to Chen Yuan's power, so they agreed.

However, what the three did not expect was that Chen Yuan still had hundreds of cultivation pills that he had not yet refined, and ten years was still not enough.

Three years ago, the appointed day arrived again. The four of them gathered on Golden Snail Island. Chen Yuan took out six extremely rare high-grade spiritual materials and one hundred and fifty top-grade spirit stones, asking the three of them to wait another ten years.

This time, however, the three refused to agree and insisted on ascending to the upper realm immediately.

However, Chen Yuan had already refined 70% of the pills and was only a hair's breadth away from the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm, so he refused to give up.

In the end, it was Qin Wuyai who spoke up and agreed to wait another five years. Cangsong Daoren and Lu Wangquan also reluctantly agreed.

Chen Yuan got his wish and returned to Fulong Island to continue his secluded cultivation. His cultivation finally broke through to the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm, and he still had more than thirty pills left.

He didn't waste these pills, but after his cultivation broke through, the effects of pills for the early stage of the Nascent Soul realm were greatly reduced.

After refining everything, Chen Yuan's cultivation level only increased slightly.

He has refined countless pills, having studied tens of thousands of pill formulas, and his alchemy skills are now highly refined.

Although I have never refined a mid-stage Nascent Soul pill, I can roughly estimate its medicinal power.

For a mid-stage Nascent Soul cultivator, especially Chen Yuan, whose true essence is exceptionally pure, four or five early-stage Nascent Soul pills are equivalent to one mid-stage Nascent Soul pill.

If we include the spiritual herbs used to refine these two pills, then using early-stage Nascent Soul pills for cultivation would be a losing proposition. It would be better to use them to exchange for other spiritual herbs and treasures.

However, since cultivation pills were too precious, Chen Yuan did not want to waste them, so he refined them all.

After putting away the boulder, Chen Yuan did not leave the cultivation room. Instead, he took out the items stored in his internal space and the mustard seed ring and carefully checked them.

He stored all the truly precious treasures, such as three-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs, five-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs, and top-grade spiritual materials, in his internal space, making them extremely difficult for others to take away. Other items were kept in his mustard seed ring.

After annihilating the eight royal clans, Chen Yuan reaped a great harvest, especially the thousand-year-old and three-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs.

However, he had previously refined a large number of elixirs, using up 90% of the three-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs, reducing the number of herbs from nearly a hundred to fifteen.

Most of them were not enough to make a batch of pills, and there were also a few spiritual herbs that Chen Yuan could not identify.

More than 300 thousand-year-old spiritual herbs were obtained, but some were used as auxiliary medicines when refining Demon Essence Pills and Body Tempering Pills, leaving more than 230 herbs.

The most precious among them were more than thirty body-tempering spiritual herbs, but their effect on Chen Yuan's current physical body was negligible, and they were not refined into pills.

Five-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs are extremely rare in the lower realm, but Chen Yuan only obtained three from the Fiend Tiger Clan, plus three from the Spirit Control Sect's secret realm, for a total of only six.

However, there was one plant with twelve petals, a green spiritual flower as green as jade, with a drop of crystal-clear dew on each petal. Chen Yuan had not yet identified what kind of spiritual herb it was.

"It seems this matter still needs to be addressed by Qin Wuyai..."

Chen Yuan murmured to himself as he put all the spiritual herbs away again.

Qin Wuyai once gave him a compendium of spiritual herbs, which recorded tens of thousands of kinds of spiritual herbs, including many rare pill formulas. It was equivalent to a legacy of alchemy, from which Chen Yuan benefited greatly.

However, for a cultivator who descended from the upper realm and was skilled in alchemy, this guide to spiritual herbs seemed rather mediocre.

Moreover, this illustrated guide to spiritual herbs lacks recipes for pills from the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm onwards, and only a handful of spiritual herbs aged five thousand years or older are listed, suggesting that it has been deliberately omitted.

Chen Yuan's cultivation has reached the mid-stage of the Nascent Soul realm, and he is about to ascend to the upper realm. He needs a more comprehensive guide to spiritual herbs and more Nascent Soul stage pills, and even Void Refinement stage pill formulas.

These things can only be obtained from Qin Wuyai.

As Chen Yuan's thoughts raced, he looked at the top-grade spirit stone shrouded in spiritual energy in front of him, and the top-grade spiritual materials sealed in a wooden box with a sealing talisman attached.

Although he gave Qin Wuyai and the other two 150 top-grade spirit stones, he still had as many as 869 top-grade spirit stones in his possession.

All three types of top-grade lightning-attribute spiritual materials have been used up, and all of them have been used to refine the Purple Kui Thunder Drum and drumsticks.

These two treasures thus truly became one, and were extremely remarkable even among top-tier magic weapons.

If Chen Yuan carefully nurtures it for thousands or tens of thousands of years, there is a considerable chance that it will be promoted to a spiritual treasure.

There are three kinds of top-grade spiritual materials left in the space, and eight kinds of other top-grade spiritual materials left. Although this is much less than when Chen Yuan came to this world, it is still a rather astonishing number among Nascent Soul cultivators.

Chen Yuan had refined almost all the pills, but he still had a few bottles of level 8 and 9 demon essence pills he brought from the human realm, as well as many pills he obtained from the secret realm of the Yu Ling Sect, ranging from Qi Refining stage to Nascent Soul stage. These were some of the pills that Chen Yuan had casually kept from the Yu Ling Sect's inheritance for future use.

Among them were many pills with unique effects, including the Golden Wind Jade Dew Pill and other Nascent Soul Elixirs that helped one overcome the three tribulations of the Nascent Soul stage, but the most precious of all were two bottles of Heavenly Demon Blood Purification Pills.

This is a unique elixir of the ancient Yuling Sect, which can purify the bloodline of demon beasts and is an important means for the Yuling Sect to cultivate spirit beasts.

The Heavenly Demon Blood Purification Pill in Chen Yuan's hand was refined with three-thousand-year-old spiritual herbs, and it had a significant effect on even demon generals.

However, bloodline is the foundation of demonic beasts, and this kind of pill has many limitations. It can only purify impure royal bloodlines and more mediocre bloodlines.

It has negligible effect on those with purer royal bloodlines, and absolutely no effect on descendants of true spirits.

Otherwise, Chen Yuan would have already refined it or let the little red snake swallow it.

Chen Yuan originally did not know what a royal family of demon beasts was. It was only through the inheritance of the Spirit Control Sect that he learned about the origin of the royal bloodline.

As the name suggests, the royal bloodline is the bloodline that once gave birth to a demon king, but this demon king is not a human demon king in human form, but a Void Refining Demon King from the upper realm.

The demon race is based on bloodline. The stronger the ancestral bloodline, the stronger the innate supernatural powers and the greater the potential.

The eight royal families of this world, including the Golden Feathered Eagle family of the human world, have all produced Void Refinement Demon Kings in the past.

Above the royal bloodline, there is also the holy bloodline that once gave birth to demon saints, that is, demon cultivators in the Integration stage.

The reason why the Jiaolong and Kunyu clans are stronger than the other six royal clans is not only because they can better utilize human cultivators, but also because their bloodlines are more powerful.

These are the legendary bloodlines of the Holy Race, which even surpass the bloodlines of the Royal Race.

As for the Great Sage of the Demon Race, who is equivalent to a Mahayana cultivator in the human race, their strength is already close to that of a True Spirit. They can no longer cultivate to such a level simply by relying on their bloodline.

However, the Yuling Sect was ultimately just a sect in the lower realm, and its records of Great Sages and Demon Saints were extremely vague, so Chen Yuan didn't know much about them either.

At times like these, Chen Yuan would feel a sense of helplessness.

The "Nine Revolutions of True Spirit" in his hand is a cultivation method that leads to true immortality and is an unparalleled inheritance.

However, it only records the method of refining the blood of the true spirit, as well as several powerful supernatural abilities on how to use the blood of the true spirit.

There are no records of anything about the upper realms, the characteristics of various realms, or the methods to break through realms—all of which are of utmost importance to a cultivator.

Perhaps the great being who left this cultivation technique in the jade pendant did not think that someone capable of cultivating the "Nine Revolutions of True Spirit" would be troubled by such a "trivial matter".

Chen Yuan sighed softly, raised his sleeve and flicked it, and all the spirit stones, materials, pills and treasures in front of him disappeared and were stored in his internal space and mustard seed ring.

He glanced at the still-sleeping red snake on his wrist and shook his head helplessly.

The little red snake has been asleep ever since it underwent its tribulation.

Chen Yuan and the crimson snake were connected in spirit, and Chen Yuan knew that the snake was digesting the enormous power it had absorbed from the void.

Normally, after the Candle Serpent hatches, it enters a new interface and leaves the dangerous void.

Once mature, they will enter the void, devour the power of space, and transform it into the power of time, after which they rarely leave.

However, when the little red snake was young, it followed Chen Yuan into the spatial storm and absorbed a massive amount of spatial power, but it was difficult to control it. Otherwise, it would not have had such a difficult time when it was undergoing the tribulation of lightning.

It will take at least a hundred years for it to fully digest the power within its body and truly unleash the strength of an eighth-level Candle Serpent.

Chen Yuan believed that, given the mysterious and unpredictable nature of the power of time, even though the little red snake's cultivation level was still low, it could still play a significant role in combat.

He got up and left the cultivation room, went into the hall, took out a sound transmission talisman, put it to his lips, silently said a few words, and then released it.

The sound transmission talisman passed through the cave's array, creating ripples, and flew out of the cave.

With a gentle wave of his hand, Chen Yuan dispelled the formation, and the two thick stone doors of the cave slowly opened, but sunlight still could not penetrate the long passage to shine in.

Chen Yuan sat in the main seat and waited patiently. Half an hour later, a cultivator in a green robe strode in, stopped in front of Chen Yuan, and bowed deeply: "Junior Liu Kaiyang greets Senior!" (End of this chapter)