Chapter 0656: The Ice Immortal Ridge Changes Again
While Ning Cheng worried about the Purple Yin Spirit Spring in the Eternal Night Domain, Ji Luofei finally reached the periphery of the Ice Immortal Ridge.
Ji Luofei only knew about the place called Ice Immortal Ridge, but she had never come here before. She only knew that this place remained frozen throughout the year, and no one could peer into the situation inside.
As Ji Luofei stood outside the Ice Immortal Ridge at this moment, she saw a three-foot-wide and ten-feet-tall crack. However, when her Spiritual Consciousness tried to sweep inside, she couldn’t see anything at all. The ice inside seemed to freeze her Spiritual Consciousness solid.
Did this crack lead to the heart of the Ice Immortal Ridge? Ji Luofei looked at the crack in ice in front of her, which looked like the mouth of death, and subconsciously shuddered. She didn’t know if going in was the correct choice or not.
In addition to the terrible cold coming from the depths, this crack also gave off a strong feeling of many good things just beyond it.
While Ji Luofei still kept hesitating, a few Daoist shadows quickly passed by from her side and rushed into the Ice Immortal Ridge’s crack.
Ji Luofei suddenly felt ashamed for hesitating after seeing others weaker than her rushing inside without pausing. She had made up her mind to go inside and even prepared herself mentally to stay inside the Ice Immortal Cave for a period before coming here. But she finally wavered when she stood at the entrance of the Ice Immortal Ridge, yet she also felt inappropriate not to go inside due to fear.
At this moment, Ning Cheng’s voice and smiling face once again appeared in Ji Luofei’s mind. Seeing that, a steady and calm expression suddenly appeared over her face and with a flash of her body, she disappeared into the crack of this icy mountain.
After entering, Ji Luofei immediately felt horrifying layers of cold wrap around her, which forced her to crazily burn through her Celestial Essence while moving deeper inside.
This crack within the Ice Immortal Ridge seemed endless, and even though Ji Luofei rushed inside with all her might, she only encountered an occasional fork down the path. Some of these forks led to walls of impenetrable ice while some led to icy lakes. It was just that everything inside was utterly frozen. A snowy white colour seemed to cover everything the eyes could see.
To Ji Luofei’s surprise, no matter for how long she kept moving, no matter how fast she ran, apart from the occasional fork, she seemed like the only living being in this place.
Ji Luofei kept flying for several days, but she did not encounter any cultivation resource, nor any secret places. Two more days later, she felt her Celestial Essence started to go out of control. It felt as if something within her body had begun to turn into a flame that wanted to consume her from the inside out.
This feeling of burning came from her body’s meridians. It felt like she would end up burned to ashes because of this flame the next moment.
At this moment, Ji Luofei’s cultivation, including her Celestial Essence and Spiritual Consciousness, felt like they had transformed into buckets of oil that then fed the flame within her body. It seems that the higher her cultivation, the more oil she produced.
“Poof…..” As the terrifying fire swept through Ji Luofei’s Zifu, her Zifu instantly cracked. The impact was so massive that she could not help but spit out a mouthful of hot blood. The hot blood immediately stained the surrounding ice. Even though the blood contained a high temperature, it still could not melt the surface of the ice.
Undoubtedly, the flame burning within her body was difficult to endure. But Ji Luofei still thought of Ning Cheng, remembering the tenderness and gentle feeling she felt when she and Ning Cheng were together. However, this made the flame in her body burn more fiercely, causing the temperature of her body to rise exponentially.
After spitting out another mouthful of blood, Ji Luofei’s eyes flashed with despair. She finally understood what was happening to her.
She was succumbing to the devilish flames. One had to know that although she had advanced from the Celestial Novice Realm to the Celestial Bridge Realm in just five years, it was done by forcibly absorbing large amounts of Celestial Essence Gas. But from the looks of it, despite her talents and qualifications, her foundation finally could not keep up with such a huge increase.
If it hadn’t been for the past few days of rushing through the Ice Immortal Ridge, which had forced her to stimulate her Celestial Essence to its limits, the devilish flames that had ignited within her body might not have arrived this quickly. However, it would have definitely erupted sometime in the future.
Ji Luofei gave out a heartfelt sigh. She wanted to improve her cultivation as soon as possible, and for that had absorbed a large quantity of Perpetual Moon Pills and even swallowed other medicinal pills without abandon. She had utterly forgotten the fundamental principle of advancing too quickly. If it were someone else with the same cultivation resources, it would have taken fifty to even five hundred years for others to consume it all. Yet she had forced herself to absorb it all within five years.
Although her cultivation method was formidable and could easily absorb these resources, her body couldn’t assimilate it thoroughly and was now crumbling apart.
“Dear, it looks like I’ll be leaving first….” As Ji Luofei spoke this sentence in despair, she looked back at the endless icy path behind her. She knew that there was a fork in the icy road behind that led into an icy lake.
Although this icy lake was inside the Ice Immortal Ridge, it had not frozen. However, the glacial lake had a bone-chilling mist that covered it, which was several times colder than the surrounding ice.
For Ji Luofei, rather than being burned to death by the devilish flames raging in her body, she would rather take the initiative to jump into the icy lake, which gave out a dense aura of death. She could feel the death aura because the glacial lake was just too cold and this chilling temperature induced the deathly aura.
Ji Luofei had just fallen into the lake, which could quickly freeze even a Body Refining Cultivator to nothingness when the chill immediately infiltrated Ji Luofei’s body. When this icy chill encountered the burning Celestial Essence flame within her body, it mysteriously gave off a very comfortable feeling to Ji Luofei.
As the devil flame and the icy chill continued to erode and fuse, the devilish flames within Ji Luofei’s body gradually weakened. However, the fusion of this ice and fire also reduced her cultivation. Her cultivation gradually but quickly lowered from the Celestial Bridge Realm to the Celestial Gatherer Realm as she sank to the bottom of the frozen lake. However, the decline in her cultivation still didn’t stop there and continued to grow weaker and weaker.
When Ji Luofei felt the chill, her heart sank once again after experiencing a moment of life. Although the icy cold had helped in counteracting the devil flames that had ignited within her due to her heart devil, it had also caused her cultivation to decline. Moreover, without the heart devil flames, she would not be able to resist the cold for long.
Maybe in a moment or three, instead of being burned to ashes by the devilish flames, the cold within this icy lake might just turn her into dust.
“Bang…..” At this moment, Ji Luofei felt her feet hitting the bottom of the lake.
An iron gate appeared within the range of her Spiritual Consciousness. Ji Luofei, who was frozen purple all over, immediately struggled to rush towards the door and gave it a hard push. Contrary to her expectations, the iron door opened without any restrictions or obstructions.
……
After Ji Luofei pushed open the door, the Ice Immortal Ridge experienced another change. The Ice Immortal Ridge that had cracked open slowly started to close up. Many cultivators who wanted to enter the Ice Immortal Ridge quickly withdrew on seeing this and watched the crack slowly close.
As for those cultivators inside the Ice Immortal Ridge, they saw the left and right ice walls starting to move towards each other, causing the space in between to grow smaller with each passing moment.
At this point, all the cultivators inside the Ice Immortal Ridge started to panic and quickly wanted to get out of this place. However, even if they pushed their speed to the limits, they still could not move faster than the speed with which the two ice walls closed in on each other.
Just at the moment before the two sides closed in on each other, the cultivators inside finally understood why none of the cultivators, who had entered the Ice Immortal Ridge in the past, managed to come out. The ice walls on both sides were extremely hard, even a cultivator in the Heaven Seated Realm could only watch himself or herself squished into a bloody ice sandwich by the ice walls.
When the Radial Immortal Star’s Ice Immortal Ridge had opened again after a long time, it had attracted a lot of attention just like the last time. However, this time, it had only opened by a sliver before closing up. Even the timing was a lot shorter than when it had opened in the past. In just a few days since its opening, the crack completely closed up, as if it never existed. As for the cultivators who entered the Ice Immortal Ridge, none of them came out just like the last time it opened.
……
Ning Cheng had no idea that Ji Luofei had entered the Ice Immortal Ridge or that she had succumbed to the devilish flames and had jumped into the ice lake. He still thought about ways to improve his cultivation as soon as possible. Maybe once he figured out a way to obtain more Perpetual Moon Pills or even Permanent Essence Pills, he could then enter the Mysterious Yellow Bead for cultivation.
However, since he had not yet obtained the Wood Origin for the Mysterious Yellow Bead, it would end up exposing the Mysterious Yellow Bead once he entered it to cultivate, just like the last time. Ning Cheng pulled at his hair in distress before finally clenching his fists. If it did not get exposed, then it was ok, but if exposed, he would immediately use the Starry Sky Wheel to escape. He can’t continue wasting time like this.
He had ended up using the millions of Perpetual Moon Pills continuously for around five years along with the Mysterious Yellow Origin and a lot of other medicinal pills. But in the end, it still couldn’t help him break out of the Heaven’s Mandate Realm, or even reach the full-circle of Heaven’s Mandate Realm. Although this speed might look extremely fast to others, it was just too slow for Ning Cheng. He truly couldn’t go on like this.
A middle-aged man with a long beard walked into the lobby of the wooden residence, which immediately resulted in all the cultivators seated inside to stop talking. The next moment, all the cultivators simultaneously stood up and held up their cupped fists. Ning Cheng also quickly stood up and imitated the gesture. He didn’t need to use his Spiritual Consciousness to gauge the cultivator who had just walked into the lobby. Just with his eyes, he could tell that this cultivator was at least an expert in the later stages of the Life and Death Realm, or maybe even a powerhouse in the Eternal Realm.
Su Baijiao and Duan Gantai walked side by side just behind this man and followed him into the residence.
“This Su Youqinghong truly feels grateful for all these distinguished guests to specially make time to come to my Su Clan and partake in the wedding of my little girl Baijiao. To express the gratitude of my Su Clan, and on behalf of my little girl Baijiao and son-in-law Gantai, I would like to propose a toast to all of you…..” As the man, who claimed to be Su Youqinghong, finished speaking, he raised his hand and took out a jug. In the same motion, he opened the spout.
The rich aroma of quality wine instantly filled the entire hall. Just the aroma from the wine gave people an indescribable lingering sensation. This definitely was a good wine. Even those fellows who did not know anything about wine could tell that this wine was of the highest quality.
Ning Cheng immediately thought of ‘None to depend on’ wine. He had always wanted to drink a jar of the real ‘None to depend on’ wine, but because of his constant running around for cultivation, he simply never got that chance.
Duan Gantai brought out another jug and a wine glass while Su Baijiao went among the guests and personally presented each of the guests with a wine glass for the toast. A few moments later, a wine glass soon arrived at Ning Cheng.
Ning Cheng reached over to the wine glass presented to him by Su Baijiao; however, he did not expect Su Baijiao to brush her hand by his fingers gently. Although it looked like an accidental touch, Ning Cheng knew that Duan Gantai had seen it.
Duan Gantai already felt pissed about him. Now that Su Baijiao did such a thing, it would truly be strange if that Duan Gantai didn’t see it. Regardless, Ning Cheng did not feel any fear towards Duan Gantai. But at the same time, he had a feeling that Si Baijiao had done this intentionally.
Just when Ning Cheng thought that Duan Gantai would lock in on him with his murderous intent, he suddenly saw a smile over Duan Gantai’s ugly-looking face, without any form of discomfort whatsoever. It felt like the man in front of him was not the same man he met in the previous hall.
Ning Cheng kept wondering about the change in Duan Gantai’s temperament. However, when Duan Gantai and Su Baijiao were about to head over to the next cultivator for the toast, Duan Gantai’s murderous intent slowly started to seep out. Ning Cheng breathed a sigh of relief seeing this. Although he felt a bit perplexed about the matter, this fellow really was akin to a dog that couldn’t change its nature of eating shit.
However, this place also had Su Youqinghong, an influential expert; as such, even if Duan Gantai could conceal his murderous intent from others, he couldn’t hide it from Su Youqinghong. Ning Cheng secretly shook his head. Could a fellow really have such an insecure heart?
When Su Baijiao’s hand brushed past Ning Cheng’s finger, she had left behind a Spiritual Consciousness message, which rang out in his ear a moment later, “Meet me at Eternal Night City’s Perpetual Sand Rest Stop tomorrow night. I have something that you need.”
How does Su Baijiao know what he needs? Ning Cheng looked up in shock and found that Su Baijiao was about to finish with her ceremonial toasts.