novelraw Chapter 483: Begging the Senior for a Helping Hand!
Chapter 483: Begging the Senior for a Helping Hand!
The one who called out was Su Qing Wan. She had been Bai Yuan’s friend for many years, and when she saw him at death’s door, she could not help blurting a warning. Yet before her words had faded, the chain beneath her feet began to sway in small arcs, so she hastily gathered her mind and silently recited her heart technique.
Thanks to Su Qing Wan’s reminder, Bai Yuan forcibly suppressed his panic and agitation, and before long the swinging arc gradually diminished. Escaping from the brink of death, he felt only relief.
Everyone else, having confirmed that the people they cared about were safe, drew back their gazes and looked to the front, only to be stunned to find that Yu Zhao had already walked into the very depths of the sea of fire and had become a tiny black speck at the limit of sight.
Lu Jiu Yuan stiffened: [Between the two of us, who is the Void Refinement cultivator? How is it that inside the Eye of Bifang, Yu Zhao still presses me down a head?] With doubts and dissatisfaction churning in his chest, he quickened his pace. Yet he had barely taken a few steps when the chain beneath his feet began to sway in protest, forcing him to slow. By the time he looked up again, Yu Zhao had vanished.
Taking the lead, Yu Zhao was not nearly as carefree as Lu Jiu Yuan and the others imagined. She had entered the Eye of Bifang with another task upon her. As she went deeper, she could feel her soul undergoing a slow metamorphosis, a subtle change that moistened things without a sound. Without careful attention it would have been hard to detect. But Yu Zhao wanted more.
She spoke into the blazing deep: “Bifang Senior, this junior Yu Zhao begs you to lend me a hand and remove the fetter that has been forcibly bound to my soul.”
Yu Zhao was not at all certain Bifang would respond. Bifang guarded an entire realm and even granted special boons to cultivators who entered its eye, by all accounts a being of vast, tolerant heart. The chain here was the will of Bifang. Perhaps through her thoughts it could sense her sincerity.
Her voice echoed through the sea of fire. After a long silence, she could only shake her head with a bitter smile. She had indeed been too fanciful.
Since that was so, she could only wager.
In the instant she set her resolve, Yu Zhao severed her connection to the Array Token. The barrier that had been circling her shattered at once, and the surging sea of fire rolled over her like a tide, sealing all paths of retreat. She poured all her spiritual power into guarding her body and withdrew every defense around her soul. Her plan was to restore her link to the Array Token in the very next breath after the flames scorched her soul. She was betting that within that single breath, the Otherworldly Flame would burn away her connection to the Jade Ruyi.Yet the moment the fire licked her soul, Yu Zhao regretted it. She had not expected soul-fire to hurt so much. The pain exceeded what her body could bear, and in terror she found she could not reestablish the link to the Array Token.
Just as she thought she would perish in the flames, a long, clear cry sounded in her mind. The Antler Imprint, which had lain dormant in her Sea of Consciousness for so long, suddenly flared to life and shut the Otherworldly Flame out.
Yu Zhao seized the opening and reactivated the Array Token. Another cry rang out. From the depths of the sea of fire came a low, resonant hum, as if answering the voice of an Auspicious Beast. In the next instant, a pillar of blazing fire shot skyward from the fiery sea and became a colossal phantom of a Divine Bird. With its wings spread, it blotted out the sky, its outline overlapping the silhouette of the Divine Mountain. It beat its wings, and a wave of searing flame swept forth and wrapped Yu Zhao within.
Heat closed over her, as if she were inside a furnace, yet curiously she did not feel scalded, only a gentle, pervasive warmth. That power coursed once through her body, then sank into her Sea of Consciousness and went straight to the depths of her soul.
The next moment, the Jade Ruyi on her chest began to tremble wildly. At last she sensed the almost imperceptible yet unbreakable thread that connected the Ruyi to her soul. No wonder she had never detected it. That faint verdant strand was nearly fused to her soul and could scarcely be separated.
A sharp cry split the air. Yu Zhao’s mind went momentarily blank. Her body wavered, and she nearly toppled from the chain. Then a mighty force crashed against her soul again. Agony like tearing swept through her. Her awareness snapped into ice-cold clarity, and she nearly cried out aloud. She bit hard on her lower lip and let the warm blood trickle down without a sound, her fingernails driving into her palms without her even noticing. Compared to pain of the soul, pain of flesh was nothing at all.
She did not know how long it lasted. Her soul went numb, her body nearly lost feeling, and when she had almost given up hope of severing the bond, the Jade Ruyi suddenly detached on its own and floated before her eyes.
Yu Zhao stared, stunned, then joy surged up like a spring. At last, she was unbound from that accursed Jade Ruyi. Probing herself again with care, she widened her eyes in delight. Her soul was not merely stronger by a little. It had grown more solid, and even her Sea of Consciousness had expanded by nearly half. The burning torment of the Otherworldly Flame vanished without a trace, as if it had never been.
Just as she thought all was done, a tongue of flame leapt up from the sea below and in a flash wrapped the Jade Ruyi. Bifang’s Otherworldly Flame could burn all under heaven, to say nothing of a cultivator’s tool. The Jade Ruyi melted before the naked eye into a limpid, crystalline liquid. Before Yu Zhao could react, that liquid surged forward and enveloped her from head to toe. A cool power flowed through her seven apertures and finally merged completely with her soul.
When the last trace fused, Yu Zhao jolted. Before her eyes arose the scene of a woman refining an artifact. The piece upon the Artifact Refining furnace was exactly the Jade Ruyi that had melted. Unfortunately, the woman’s face was hidden behind a ghastly mask, only a pair of eyes leaping with firelight exposed. Yu Zhao stared without blinking, trying to glean more from the woman’s every move, but the scene burst like a bubble and vanished, leaving only emptiness.
Regret pricked at her. She had a strong intuition that this person was closely connected to the Auspicious Palace. If she learned the woman’s identity, she might dig out the secrets of the Auspicious Palace.
Helpless to pursue it now, she drew in her thoughts and returned her attention to herself. Casting her Divine Sense inward, she was delighted to find her cultivation had already broken through to mid Divine Transformation. Not only that, but her body too had changed. Once, nourished day after day by the Jade Ruyi, her skin had been fairer than snow, so delicate as to be merely ornamental. Now, beneath her fingertips, her skin held a toughness she had never known, as though tempered into an unbreakable armor that even a thousand blades could scarcely mark.
Surprise upon surprise exceeded every expectation. She bowed into the flaming depths and spoke with sincerity: “My thanks to the two Seniors for granting me this.”