Tianlong lit an oil lamp and sat on a cattail hassock.
There was a pitch-black skull in his hand. It's jaw missing.
The black colour of the skull wasn't natural but rather something it acquired after being soaked in the blood of others.
Looking at it, he felt a sense of ancient past. Just from the toughness and the evil air surrounding it, he could feel that its owner must have been a peerless figure. He felt a little sentimental.
"Was it a human's or a demon's?" He muttered.
"Can't say …neither does it matter. After death, what difference is there between a king and a beggar?
"The mortals can barely live past a hundred years. Their ambitions bound by their lifespan, relations, and fears.
"Glory, wealth, beauty all are depravity, death is their only foil. Only after achieving true immortality can one shed the mortal coil.
"But an eternal life without any emotion …does it even have any notion?
He muttered in confusion as he looked at the skull.
After heaving a deep sigh he dispelled these thoughts from his mind. Such concepts were still too far for him.
He focused his attention back on the item. Evidently, old Zhan's master had discovered it in an ancient graveyard. After seeing the inscription on it and its age, he decided to keep it.
"Flesh Indulgence art"
These words were inscribed on top of the skull. The script didn't belong to the human race or the demon race but rather the devils.
Among the various races, all of them possessed their own system of cultivation, scriptures and language. However, these cultivation systems soon got unified and a common method of cultivation was proposed. The language they spoke also got mixed up and soon a new language that was universally accepted was formed.
These ancient writings were gradually lost in the river of time and the remnants became a symbol of the past. The individual races preserved what they had left and treasured them as a symbol of their struggle and heritage.
He had learnt the demonic script of the roc clan, but his understanding was shallow. The writings of the ancient demon race didn't only messages, but also power. True demons were considered to be the spirit of the world, it was only natural that their language resonated with heaven and earth.
The ancient devil races similarly had a script of their own. Walking the path of slaughter, their bloodthirsty and cruel disposition was reflected in their language. It was considered to be the best language for weaving curses and killing spells.
Long Qianmei was extremely interested in learning the devil script. She went to various devil clans in her youth and had the fortune of learning a few characters here and there.
Although she couldn't impart all of her knowledge to Tianlong due to various reasons like cultivation requirement and dao oaths that prevented her from divulging information to others, she still taught him some basics.
Fortunately, he didn't need to use most of his knowledge. He had already seen these characters in the memory of old Zhan. After all, it was recording the cultivation art of old Zhan, so how could he be unfamiliar with it?
As he read through the text, he felt admiration for the creator of this art. Sadly, some part of it was unreadable and a greater part was missing.
"Flesh Indulgence art" this merit law belonged to one of the side branches of the corpse devil race.
The cultivation art required one to devour the flesh and soul of others and refine their blood into elixir. Once they consumed the flesh and the blood, they would get some of the cultivation of the deceased human.
As they accumulated more and more death qi inside their body, they would be able to change their physique into that of a corpse devil. Once they reached the Jade core realm, they would no longer be restricted to humans and can devour all other creatures, they'll also be able to cultivate corpse qi.
A method of refining bone puppets from humans was also detailed. It required one to transfer some of the spiritual consciousness of their victim to one of their bone and refine it. Once they collected six hundred eighteen such bones, they could refine it into a bone puppet.
After carefully reading the cultivation art, he shook his head in pity.
"Sadly, the cultivation technique can only guide someone till the late Yin Yang Cleansing realm. The rest of the part is missing…
However, despite its incompleteness, there were two aspects of it that he found interesting. The first one was its ability to devour other's cultivation base and the second was the bone puppet refining method.
However, after careful consideration, he discarded the idea of refining a bone puppet. He was reminded of that black gas released from the bones.
"This method of puppet refinement is too vicious! By infusing some of the soul consciousness inside the bones, they are practically torturing their soul even after death!
"The path of cultivation is bloody, killing is inevitable. But unless there's a bone-deep enmity between the two parties, one should let their opponent's soul rest and reincarnate after their death. Let all conflicts end in this life…
Even devils who killed people like scything flax had their own principles and bottom lines.
"As for this ability to absorb Qi refining cultivation base, it reminds me of my own Roc Transmogrification art! Both of them devour the cultivation of others.
"However, there's a key difference between them. One is used for body refining and the other for Qi refining…
Tianlong kept the skull down and stroked his beard.
Next, his gaze fell upon the pot on which old Zhan used to refine human blood.
With a wave of his hand, the pot came in front of him. As he removed its lid, a thick bloody smell assaulted his senses.
Retrieving a few drops of the blood, he gulped it down and rotated his cultivation base. The blood entered his system and slowly diffused into strands of spiritual energy. However, unlike the previous times, he could feel the spiritual energy moving inside his meridians instead of blood.
"This method is so inefficient! There isn't twenty per cent of the cultivator's energy inside this blood!"
He was initially excited about finding a cultivation technique that was similar to his Roc transmogrification art. Due to being similar to each other, he would've needed less time to cultivate both of them.
However, there were a few defects in the art that made him unable to do so. Only after he got rid of those flaws, would he be able to get a mutual agreement between the two cultivation techniques.
His eyebrows creased as if he was lost in thought.
Finally, looking at the strapped old Zhan who had a confused expression on his face, he came to a decision.
Bringing the man in front of him, Tianlong made the man sit in front of himself.
He touched the forehead of old Zhan and sent his spiritual sense to invade the other's spiritual consciousness. After being scoured by Tianlong, it had turned blurry and extremely weak.
The spiritual consciousness of a person was linked to the soul. Once someone's spiritual consciousness was destroyed, they lose their individuality and sense of self.
Tianlong's consciousness invaded the blurry space and started to remove the residual will of old Zhan.
Eight hours later, Tianlong opened his eyes and released a foul breath of air. Immediately, old Zhan who was sitting in front of him also opened his eyes. There was no confusion in his eyes like before. His soul had been completely wiped clean. He was now just a puppet.
Tianlong took some pills to recover his spiritual sense and cultivated for an hour.
"Zhan Damian, just like how you used other's bones and spiritual consciousness to refine a puppet, I'm also similarly refining your consciousness and body into my puppet!
"They say experiencing something is better than seeing it ten thousand times. You were once half a step from Yin Yang cleansing so I'll use your body to experience the same thing again and forge my own path. You'll be my first Qi refining vessel!
Currently, old Zhan was just a puppet. Anyone could invade his mind and make him do whatever they wanted. Unfortunately, Tianlong couldn't brand old Zhan with a slave brand as it would required soul power beyond his current cultivation realm.
Next, he invaded old Zhan's spiritual consciousness and directed him to drink a little bit of the blood elixir.
Tianlong observed with rapt attention as the blood elixir was being refined. His spiritual consciousness was divided between controlling the actions of old Zhan and observing how spiritual energy flowed inside the meridians.
For Tianlong, watching old Zhan cultivate gave him insights into his own cultivation.
Both his cultivation technique and old Zhan's depended on devouring others. One of them devoured demons despite being a demon and the other one devoured humans being a human himself. In a sense, they were both similar.
He carefully observed how the human blood was broken down into strands of spiritual energy and how the residual would turn into a black impurity. Although most of it was expelled, some of it still mixed with the blood.
This was one of the major flaws of the cultivation method he had detected. As a demon whose bloodline was their source of talent, having impurity in blood was like crippling oneself.