More than twenty days later, the inside of the light barrier became calm and peaceful, with the violent winds and thunder nowhere to be seen. A pair of silver wings had appeared. The Thunder Roc’s bones served as the foundation, while materials from other spirit beasts were used as flesh and blood. The power of wind and thunder was then transformed into feathers.
Just like that, a pair of wind-and-thunder wings had been formed!
The wings appeared to be complete, but in reality, the power of wind and thunder contained within each feather had only just taken form and was not yet stable. As such, even though the three demon beasts led by Feng Xi had already expended the majority of their magic power, they gritted their teeth and continued to channel wind and thunder spiritual power into the light barrier, fearful that all of their efforts would go to waste.
However, as Feng Xi did this, he was feeling rather gloomy. He had thought that by trading for three drops of spirit liquid from other demon beasts, he had taken sufficient precautions against excessive magic power expenditure. Never did he think that the amount of magic power required to refine these wind-and-thunder wings would far exceed his expectations. Fortunately, it appeared that he would just barely be able to make it to the end if he were to expend some of his origin Qi. Otherwise, if the treasure refinement were to fail as a result of this, he would have no one to blame but himself.
Right as this grade-nine demon beast was lamenting his fortune, he suddenly detected a hint of abnormal spiritual Qi fluctuation within the refinement room. It was very faint and had only appeared for a short moment, but it was extremely pure.
Feng Xi’s expression changed slightly as his cold gaze swept through the room before settling on Han Li’s body, and his face immediately darkened.
Han Li’s expression changed drastically as he forced a smile onto his face. However, the demon beast was glaring at him with a cold expression, and his face was completely devoid of emotion.
“Hand it over,” the demon beast said in an wooden voice.
“What would you like me to hand over, Senior?” Han Li asked with an even more strained expression.
An unnatural look appeared on his face as he subtly slipped one of his hands into his sleeve.
Feng Xi narrowed his eyes as a cold light flashed within his pupils. All of a sudden, he raised a finger without any explanation, and a ball of scintillating white light appeared on his fingertip, flashing erratically.
Han Li was standing within the spell formation, and he was initially rather bemused by this sight, but he immediately let loose a bloodcurdling cry before collapsing onto the ground. His limbs spasmed uncontrollably as his face turned dark and purple, and it was clear that he was in excruciating agony.
“Hmph! You brought this upon yourself!” A vicious look flashed over Feng Xi’s face as he turned his cold gaze toward a small vial that had fallen out of Han Li’s sleeve.
A peculiar look appeared on his face as he made a grabbing motion, and the small vial instantly flew into his hand.
“The feeling of having the Wind Imprint Technique activated isn’t very pleasant, is it? You didn’t appear to have much magic power left just then, but now, your magic power has been replenished significantly. It seems that this vial must contain some type of spirit medicine. Fellow Daoist Li, were you planning to take advantage of our severely depleted magic power to replenish your own spiritual power and escape?” the demon beast asked as he cast a cold glance toward Han Li.
Han Li had just risen to his feet as the demon beast had ceased its spell, and his face immediately turned deathly pale upon hearing this, as if his scheme had been exposed.
“You’re quite a cunning one. Let me see what’s in this vial. I’ve never heard of anything aside from the 10,000-year spirit liquid that can replenish spiritual power instantly,” Feng Xi murmured to himself as he inspected the small vial before tossing it lightly in his hand.
“I’ve never heard of anything like that, either. However, perhaps this will come in handy for us,” the flood dragon opposite him said with a curious expression.
He and the turtle demon were still constantly injecting incantation seals of different colors into the bone wings to accelerate the solidification process of the wind and thunder power. Even though he appeared to be in a slightly better state than the turtle demon, he had also expended a lot of magic power and was only just barely holding on.
Feng Xi was initially rather taken aback to hear this, but then his heart stirred as he removed the lid of the vial. An extremely pure spiritual Qi wafted out of the vial, and he first took a glance into the vial before giving it a light sniff. A peculiar look then appeared on his face.
“What is it?” the turtle demon asked in an impatient manner.
“You tell us,” Feng Xi said as he turned to Han Li with an indifferent expression.
“It’s spirit liquid formed by diluting a drop of 10,000-year spirit liquid,” Han Li replied in a reluctant and dejected manner.
“What? This is also 10,000-year spirit liquid?” the turtle demon exclaimed with elation upon hearing this.
Among the three demon beasts, his magic power was the most severely depleted, and he had no confidence that he would be able to hold on until the end, so he was naturally overjoyed to hear this.
“Hmph, there has to be something else mixed into this, right? It’s light green in color, and there’s a bit too much wood-attribute spiritual Qi,” Feng Xi said as he took a closer look at the small amount of liquid in the vial, and a hint of suspicion appeared in his eyes.
“I mixed in some aged spirit medicines, and I cultivate a wood-attribute cultivation art, so of course I’d want as much wood-attribute spiritual Qi as possible,” Han Li explained with a wry smile, and he was being completely truthful on this occasion.
Feng Xi furrowed his brows upon hearing this and was just about to ask some further questions when the turtle demon began to yell loudly.
“Brother Feng, throw the spirit liquid over here and let me have a taste! As you know, even though we’re just barely holding on, we’re overdrafting our own origin Qi to do so, and our cultivation bases will regress as a result. I have to replenish my spiritual power.” The turtle demon was rather concerned that Feng Xi would refuse, so he was becoming quite anxious.
“Of course I’m aware of that, but this spirit liquid…” The humanoid demon beast was still rather hesitant.
“Brother Feng! Even from this distance, I can sense the extremely pure spiritual Qi within that vial; there’s no mistaking that it’s 10,000-year spirit liquid. Even if something has been done to this spirit liquid, do we have anything to fear from poison? On top of that, my true form is a flood dragon that has consumed all types of poison. If there really is poison in this vial, there’s no way I wouldn’t be able to identify it,” the flood dragon said after a brief silence.
It appeared that he also didn’t want to continue to expend his origin Qi.
“Hehe, I almost forgot about your poison identification talents, Brother Flood Dragon. In that case, I’m also running a little low on magic power, so let’s split the liquid in this vial evenly among the three of us. That way, we won’t have overdrafted too much of our true origin Qi by the time this treasure is successfully refined,” Feng Xi said with a smile before tipping his head back and drinking just over a third of the liquid in the vial. He then tossed the vial to the flood dragon with a smile.
As a grade-nine demon beast, he certainly wasn’t afraid of poison, and the spiritual Qi contained within the liquid was clearly the real deal, so he naturally wasn’t going to pass up on this opportunity.
The flood dragon didn’t say anything as he accepted the vial before drinking half of the remaining liquid, then tossing the vial to the turtle demon.
The turtle demon immediately drank all of the spirit liquid before casually discarding the vial.
Soon, all three of them could sense their magic power beginning to recover, and they all heaved a simultaneous sigh of relief. All of the suspicion in Feng Xi’s heart also completely vanished.
However, right at this moment, the flood dragon turned to Feng Xi with a vicious look in his eyes, and transmitted his voice to the demon beast. “This human has no more use to us now that the treasure refinement has progressed to this stage. Let me kill him; it’s very grating to have a human watching on from the side.”
As soon as his voice trailed off, he turned a cold gaze toward Han Li, and a sharp killing intent flashed within his eyes.
“Don’t touch him for now! Even though we won’t require wood-attribute spiritual Qi in the next few days, it’s better to err on the side of caution. We’ll kill him after the spirit wings are completed,” Feng Xi said in an indifferent manner as he also cast a nonchalant glance toward Han Li.
“Fine, I’ll let this human live for a few more days,” the flood dragon grumbled in a displeased manner, but he still repressed his killing intent and agreed to the proposition.
Han Li could only see their lips moving slightly and was naturally unable to hear what they were saying. However, he could sense the malice in their eyes as they appraised him, and his heart sank as he was able to roughly guess what they were talking about.
A chill ran down his spine as he thought of something that made his expression become even more strained. All of a sudden, he sat down with his legs crossed without any explanation and slowly closed his eyes, appearing as if he had resigned himself to his fate.
The three demon beasts were rather taken aback to see this, but they paid no further heed to Han Li as they turned their attention toward the spirit wings up above.
In reality, Han Li’s heart was thumping violently. He was slowly summoning his Green Bambose Cloudswarm Swords within his body, releasing fine golden lightning arcs that were as thin as silk, and he was controlling them to ensure that they didn’t erupt. He was then using the evil suppression divine lightning to form a dense net of golden threads that encased the Wind Imprint Technique that the old demon beast had planted within his body, wrapping it in layer after layer like a silkworm weaving a cocoon.
There was no way that Han Li would be able to refine the Wind Imprint Technique with his current cultivation base, and the evil suppression divine thunder wouldn’t be able to completely eradicate it, either. However, he was quite confident that he would be able to temporarily trap it to prevent it from being activated, drawing upon his experience in suppressing the Auric Essence.
At this moment, the turtle demon had only recovered less than half of his spiritual power, but he was still able to continue injecting spiritual power into the light barrier with ease. As he glanced at the flood dragon, it seemed that he had thought of something, and he was just about to say something when his expression suddenly changed. A peculiar look flashed through his eyes as he stopped casting his incantation seals, and he plummeted toward the ground. His mouth was wide open, but he was completely unable to produce any sound.
A shocking scene then ensued. The demon beast’s abdomen suddenly swelled up in a grotesque manner, followed by its head and its limbs, as if a malicious spirit had been born within its body and was trying to burst out of its skin.
The flood dragon and Feng Xi’s expressions changed drastically upon seeing this, and both of them immediately thought of the diluted spirit liquid in Han Li’s vial.
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