Chương 354: Refining the Dao heart

Qiu Yushi's pupils shrank as he took in what he was seeing and tried to process it. Around him, the other nine deities floated in frozen shock as they stared ahead blankly as well. A body was floating in the dark space, surrounded by a weak blue glow. The ten deities could clearly sense an exaggeratedly pure essence from that glow, but it was similarly exceedingly weak. The main focus was the body. The face was completely bloodless as blood oozed from the facial apertures.

The hair was scattered in the space, body was shriveled and the chest was a bloody mess. No one would believe that he was alive. But astonishingly, he was. His frail heartbeat could be heard by the group of ten clearly in this space that amplified the tiniest sound. None of them recognized the face... none except one. Bai Zijun's pupils were shrinking and expanding as his killing intent began to erupt. How could he forget this face?

This was the person he longed to kill in his dreams, the person who killed his younger brother. Long Feng! Bai Zijun's breathing became haggard as he struggled to control himself. Some things didn't make sense. How exactly was Long Feng here? And how was he still alive? This place was practically an ocean of ominous aura! Bai Zijun himself was suddenly suppressed to roughly rank six Imperial realm! They all had the same questions with slight twists.

"Who the hell is that? Bai Zijun! Where is the Dao heart?! Did you f*cking like to us?" Situ Hong exploded with anger and roared without thinking, glaring at Bai Zijun. Bai Zijun glanced at him coldly.

"Fool. How am I supposed to know that? Aren't we all coming in here together?" Before Situ Hong could erupt even more, Qiu Yushi floated over and paused before them.

"Both of you should cease all arguments till we leave. I won't be repeating myself." Situ Hong grimaced and forcefully calmed down, unwilling to go against Qiu Yushi here. Bai Zijun focused his attention on Long Feng with a mix of killing intent and shock flickering in his eyes.

"How is this possible? He is but a mere Imperial. He should've been refined long ago!" He muttered lightly. He swept his gaze across the body and narrowed his eyes when he noticed the weak blue glow penetrating through Long Feng's chest. A glint instantly flashed through his eyes.

"All of you listen. The Dao heart is still here." He shouted, drawing their attention. He then pointed a finger at Long Feng's body.

"It's inside his body."

"What? Are you messing with us?" Situ Hong snorted. Bai Zijun ignored him and continued.

"My best guess is that it is refining him. I don't know how stupid he is to have entered this place, but this should be the process of getting refined as my uncle said. In a short time, he will be absorbed by the dao heart." Qiu Yushi frowned and sensed closely before nodding.

"Indeed. I can send an extremely powerful essence within his body, much stronger than even mine." Zhou Zheng drew closer with renewed excitement in his eyes.

"What do we do? Rip the kid apart and take out the Dao heart?" Bai Zijun rolled his eyes at him.

"Go ahead. Don't blame me if you end up getting refined as well." He replied, pouring cold water over Zhou Zheng's excitement.

"Right now, we're no much different from Imperials ourselves. If we approach it recklessly, we would end up in grave danger as well." Qiu Yushi briefly explained.

"Well what do we do then? We have no idea how long the refinement would take. There's only several hours until the Inheritance ground closes and we'll be sent out!" Someone uttered frustratedly. Everyone turned to Bai Zijun, waiting for him to speak up. Bai Zijun's face scrunched up as he snapped.

"I'm just as confused as you all." Situ Hong snorted but didn't dare to say anything in fear of starting an argument and enraging Qiu Yushi.

"I have an idea." Qiu Yushi slowly spoke, drawing everyone's eyes to himself.

"Our main focus now shouldn't be to acquire the heart. We should first find a way to take it out with us. If we can somehow seal it within his body and take the body out with us, that should work." The others exchanged glances and nodded instantly.

"That's a great idea. But how exactly do we go about sealing him? I don't suppose any of us here is a soul cultivator right?" Situ Hong questioned. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. This placed them in another dilemma. Without a soul cultivator or a person who specialized in sealing arts, then they wouldn't be able to seal Long Feng's body perfectly. The heart could still escape.

"Alright that won't work. Let's just use the most direct method." Situ Hong moved his cold have to the suspended body.

"We directly interrupt the refinement. I don't believe that there won't be any effect on the heart. We might weaken it even more and increase our chances of succeeding." Everyone stayed silent for a few seconds after his suggestion before they began to nod.

"Right now, we're all very restricted. Plots won't work. Let's just go over and pool our energies and essences together into a single attack and direct it into the heart in his body. At the same time we should try not to destroy the body. Perhaps the refinement process can't be stopped until the body is destroyed. That way, the Dao heart might not be able to resist our attacks." Yang Qian proposed.

"Makes sense. Complicated techniques like refinement can't be easy to disrupt, and if disrupted can cause great backlashes. If our guesses are correct, then we hold the complete upper hand in this situation. Erasing the Dao heart's consciousness should be much easier." Zhou Zheng nodded. Bai Zijun frowned at this change in his expectations, but he had no other idea. He was happy to leave the body intact. It would be even better if Long Feng could survive through it all.

That way, be would take him out and inflict the most extreme torture on him till he begged for death. Only that could ease the guilt he felt towards his younger brother.

"Let's do it." He agreed. Qiu Yushi swept his gaze across them all and nodded.

"Fine. But remember, do not underestimate it. Remain fully alert to avoid being caught off guard." He warned. None of them took his words to heart. The situation was clearly to their advantage. What could possibly go wrong? The ten youths flew towards the suspended body and surrounded it silently. Staring at the youthful face so close, Zhou Zheng blinked as he seemed to have recognized this face from somewhere, but he couldn't really place a finger on it.

Bai Zijun's eyes were filled with suppressed killing intent as he stared at Long Feng's pale face. It was all he could do to suppress his instincts and stop himself from smashing him on the spot. The killing intent he had towards Long Feng could only be quenched with the latter's death. Bai Zijun managed to keep his killing intent hidden, but he didn't notice Qiu Yushi's narrowed gaze on him.

Qiu Yushi could sense the suppressed killing intent and he couldn't help but move his gaze between this foreign unconscious youth and Bai Zijun. Was there a prior grudge between them that he didn't know of?

"Alright everyone. Gather your true essences before me. I'll channel it as an attack." Qiu Yushi said after they all finished observing the body. Following his directions, they all pooled their remaining essence, forming a ball of true essence before Qiu Yushi. He joined his own essence into the ball, nearly doubling it's size. Extremely powerful fluctuations of energy occasionally erupted from the ball as he took control over it.

"Alright everyone, this is it. Keep the flow of the essence to deliver a single deadly attack." He alerted them all before he sent the ball of true essence into Long Feng's chest. His perception went along with the ball of essence to control it while regulating the flow of the essence the others were releasing. He finally glimpsed at the so called refinement process that was going on within the body. Wild fluctuations emerged in Qiu Yushi's mind as his face paled with disbelief.

For the very first time, he was able to see the entire picture, what was actually going on within the body. While it looked calm from outside, it was anything but calm inside the body. He easily recognized the Dao heart as the light blue orb surrounded by crystalline blue essence. Just from the transcendent aura it emanated, all of his doubts were cleared. This could only be a Dao heart without a hint of doubt. The Dao heart was frantically trying to break free from a frightening devouring force that suppressed it.

Even with the essence surrounding it, it was slowly getting pulled towards the Dantian of this body. Qiu Yushi nearly couldn't believe his eyes. This was definitely a refinement process, but they got it all wrong. The Dao heart wasn't the one doing the refinement. Instead, it was about to be refined! The appearance of the ball of true essence as well as Qiu Yushi's presence startled the Dao heart. A wild panic exploded from it as it's struggles weakened for a split second.

While Qiu Yushi was dazed, the horrifying devouring force strengthened once again and took advantage of that split second to pull the Dao heart much closer to the Dantian. Regardless of how the Dao heart struggled, it couldn't break free. The most it could do was force a standstill and make the devouring force unable to pull it into the Dantian. Qiu Yushi's mind was shaken by this. What exactly was this force? This was a Dao heart! Not some run down the mill object.

No matter how weak it was, it still contained the fundamental state of a Dao realm master! How was it losing so much? Then his eyes widened in alarm.

"Stop! We're helping him!" He shouted at the others as they kept infusing their essence into the ball. The ball of the essence was already approaching the Dao heart. Right now, the Dao heart had forced a delicate balance. But that meant the slightest change could make it be devoured cleanly. The others paused and stared at Qiu Yushi in confusion, waiting for him to explain his alarm. From his expression, they instinctively knew that something wasn't right.

"He's trying to refine the Dao heart! All of you, try to control your essence and stop the attack from hitting the Dao heart, otherwise we'll be helping him accomplish his goals!" Qiu Yushi roughly explained shortly with a hoarse voice. Their expressions all changed at the same time as disbelief filled their hearts. He was... refining the Dao heart? None of them was as shocked and terrified as Bai Zijun. His mind literally blacked out for a second as he tried to digest what he heard.

"Impossible! How can a mere Imperial refine a Dao heart! This can't be possible!" He fiercely rejected the thought in his mind. At the same time, he tried to disperse his true essence through the faint link he still had to it. He would rather die than help someone to refine the Dao heart, not to mention Long Feng whom he itched to kill. Infact, all of them would prefer to die than to watch the Dao heart get absorbed by someone else right under their noses, especially when it was with their help.

Unfortunately, despite their fast reactions, they were still too late. The ball of true essence smashed into the Dao heart, breaking through its essence protection and causing a suppressed blast of energy. The blast was suppressed because their original intent was to weaken the Dao heart without killing the vessel, Long Feng. That was the only reason his body didn't directly crumble from the blast of true essence. The ten of them had unknowingly helped him while keeping him alive at the same time.

The Dao heart was greatly impacted by the attack, weakening it to a great extent. The devouring force took this opportunity and exploded with a single burst of force that nearly devoured Long Feng's heart. If it had lasted for a few seconds, then Long Feng himself would crumble and be devoured into his Dantian. Luckily, it didn't even last a second. The Dao heart was completely unable to resist and it was devoured straight into the Dantian and swallowed by the revolving cyclone. Everything instantly froze.

The ominous aura rapidly faded away while the dark space began to crumble, revealing a wide room. The devouring force appeared to have exhausted itself and reached its limit after devouring the Dao heart. The spirit cyclone froze completely under extreme pressure that came from having devoured energy that far surpassed it's capacity. The ten disciples watched blankly as the blue glow completely faded from around Long Feng's body, then as the space crumbled.

A second later, they were all floating in the air inside a massive room. All of these pointed that the Dao heart which was supporting the dark space was really gone! None of them could react for a long time as they simply stared at Long Feng's body blankly. Then understanding set in. They had helped him to successfully refine the Dao heart while keeping him alive! This realization could drive anyone insane with rage, and they were no different.

"Argh! Damn it! Damn it!" Situ Hong was the first to explode with rage. He gathered whatever was left of his energy into his fist and slammed it into Long Feng chest, sending Long Feng's body crashing into the ground.

"I will kill you! You damn bastard! You..." Situ Hong suddenly coughed up a mouthful of blood purely out of his rage and humiliation. He charged forward again, ready to deliver another punch. But suddenly, the room began to shake fiercely as though an earthquake had struck. From outside, the entire giant palace was shaking and crumbling slowly, having lost the core holding it together.

A bright beam of light engulfed the entire room and everyone inside it was teleported out of the inheritance ground and back to the serene heaven mystic realm. Right before they were forcefully teleported, Bai Zijun's soulless eyes recovered and were filled with killing intent as he glared at Long Feng's body. Not just him, each of the top ten outer peak disciples surged with killing intent as they stared at Long Feng, including Qiu Yushi. And just before they vanished, they all noticed a minor detail.

Long Feng's fingers suddenly twitched slightly as a dim blue glow emerged from his body and surrounded him like a shell. That was all they noticed before they were all sent to various locations in the mystic realm.