Chapter 20 : Chapter 20
Chapter 20: The Great Mercy Divine Palace and the Golden Stratagem Immortal Sect
Skill points poured into the Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art all at once.
【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】: 5 (Resettable)
...
【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】: 10 (Resettable)
After adding ten points in one breath, Ning Ri could not help freezing for a moment...
It was not maxed out?!
At the same time, after sensing it for a while, he found that he still could not create a new split soul for himself.
That meant he had not learned enough yet!
No wonder Elder Zhou had said that under normal circumstances, Qi Refining disciples could not learn even the simplified version of 【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】.
For other Qi Refining skills, ten skill points would already max them out, but here there was not even the slightest reaction.
At that thought, he instinctively added more points, pushing it straight up to twenty.
Only when his remaining balance dropped to 7 did he finally stop with a frown—
Even twenty points were not enough to max it out?!
Ning Ri’s heart skipped a beat—
He had always assumed that ten skill points was the cap for any skill.
So he had been full of confidence, thinking that once his cultivation rose further in the future, he would directly evolve sleep out of existence, achieving “no sleeping, no eating, no holidays.” Then, after subtracting the time spent joining a sect, doing missions, and looking for cultivation methods, if he averaged eight hours of blade practice a day, that would be 16 points a day, and 1,600 points in a hundred days.
As long as he had enough cultivation methods, becoming immortal in a hundred days would not be a dream.
Now it seemed things were not that simple at all!
If the Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art required this many skill points, then there was no need to mention higher-level cultivation methods.
That being the case, he would have to research whether there was any way to improve the efficiency of his blade grinding later on.
Then Ning Ri formed the hand seals and circulated 【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】.
At ten skill points, the Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art had remained completely inert.
But after twenty skill points were poured into it, Ning Ri finally felt that he had achieved what Zhou Heng had described—
He could create a small split soul now!
But...
As he circulated 【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】, Ning Ri’s expression changed slightly...
Hm?
Something was off...
Buzz—
As Ning Ri formed the spell formula, he instantly felt as though his consciousness were splitting apart. Yet the process brought no pain whatsoever, and it was extremely fast, taking no more than one or two breaths.
Right after that,
Ning Ri felt as though his soul had gained an additional layer of protection.
This was 【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】!
However, the Defying Heaven Sect’s soul-splitting art was, after all, merely a means of resisting anomalies and protecting oneself, so it could not leave the body and move freely. It was different from the true soul-splitting arts of the cultivation world.
But after the split soul was successfully formed, Ning Ri discovered something strange—
his split soul did not seem quite the same as the Defying Heaven Sect’s, either!
Because he found that what he had split out was not a tiny split soul for ride-hailing, nor was it the soul shell Zhou Heng had described for resisting anomalies...
It was an entirely new split soul!
And it also possessed third-level Qi Refining cultivation!
According to the cultivation method description for the Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art, the Patriarch who created this technique had originally modeled it after the cultivation world’s soul-splitting arts, creating another self.
That other self had the same strength as the main body, and the same soul.
But this “new self” had not been created to increase strength, nor for battle, but to serve as a second life.
There were many methods in the cultivation world for giving oneself a second life, such as substitute puppets and ancestral life-lamps. But while such methods were useful against ordinary powerful enemies of the cultivation world, they were useless against the Heavenly Dao.
If the Heavenly Dao wanted to kill you, then even if you had a substitute puppet or something similar, you would still die on the spot.
That was why this Patriarch had created the art: to deceive the Heavenly Dao.
When he could no longer contend against the Heavenly Dao, this Patriarch would let his second life confuse the Heavenly Dao and die in place of his true self.
If the Heavenly Dao was successfully fooled, then the true body would survive.
So strictly speaking, 【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】 ought to have been called 【One More Life】, like Contra’s up up down down left right left right BABA.
Only, it was obvious that the extra-life art had not succeeded.
Even so, after many years of development, it had still turned into an excellent spell for resisting anomalies and getting free rides!
But now...
As Ning Ri looked inward at the other self within him, his heart trembled—
Holy shit!
The thing the Patriarch had failed to accomplish seemed to have... succeeded with him?!
Then,
Ning Ri studied it for a while. From what he could sense, his split soul had exactly the same strength as his main body, but to his regret—
the strength of the split soul and the main body could not be stacked together!
He threw two punches, but there was no situation where third-level Qi Refining plus third-level Qi Refining became sixth-level Qi Refining.
Then,
a thought suddenly struck Ning Ri. He reset 【Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art】, only to discover that the split soul instantly collapsed and returned to his main soul.
Ning Ri could not help showing a trace of disappointment—
He had thought that after successfully resetting the points, the split soul would remain. If that had been the case, then would that not have meant he could gain infinite extra lives? But the facts proved that his idea had been wrong.
He could only obediently restore the twenty skill points and create the split soul again.
And right now, Ning Ri had no way of verifying whether his split soul could actually deceive the real Heavenly Dao.
But that was not really something he was in a position to consider at the moment anyway. The first thing he needed to think about was ride-hailing.
Buzz—
After the spirit formula entered the summoning jade slip of 【Golden Stratagem Mileage】, the jade slip immediately began to tremble slightly. Then, a line of text floated out from it:
“Honored guest, 【Golden Stratagem Mileage】 is rejoicing at your arrival!”
“As this is our first meeting, you may use our service free of charge. We hope Golden Stratagem Mileage will bring you a pleasant experience!”
Seeing that, Ning Ri revealed the smile of someone who had successfully freeloaded...
The ride-hailing range of Golden Stratagem Mileage covered the entire cultivation world.
The reason it could achieve this was not because of the craftsmanship of the jade slip or the power of some spell, but because of an “anomaly.”
The Golden Stratagem Immortal Sect controlled a type of anomaly called 【Great Mercy Divine Palace】.
Even now, Ning Ri still did not know what 【Great Mercy Divine Palace】 was actually used for. He only knew that 【Golden Stratagem Mileage】 was one of its functions.
And it was precisely because the essence of Golden Stratagem Mileage was an anomaly that the Defying Heaven Soul-Splitting Art could deceive it!
After Ning Ri waited for a moment...
Whoosh—
A streak of light suddenly shot through the sky above, moving as swiftly as thunder and lightning.
But the instant it rushed to Ning Ri’s front, every bit of noise vanished, and not a shred of force leaked out.
He descended slowly, without harming Ning Ri in the slightest or causing him any discomfort.
That alone was enough to show that this person’s control over power had already reached the realm of Subtle Precision, so strong it was downright terrifying.
The one who landed before Ning Ri was a golden-robed man with a powerful aura, holding a long spear.
Golden robe, as the name implied, meant it had truly been refined from gold itself. It gleamed brightly enough that Ning Ri had no choice but to narrow his eyes—
And then, the newcomer spoke in a clear voice, “Hello, I am Luo Ke of the Golden Stratagem Immortal Sect. May I ask where you wish to go, and how I should address—”
Before he could finish, his tone suddenly changed, and he exclaimed in surprise:
“Hm?! Aren’t you Little Friend Ning Ri?!”