Chapter 136: Heavenly Spirit Ring

Several months later, at the border of Blood-Demon Valley.

Jiuyou had completely destroyed the sinkhole Teleportation Array upon his departure. Five or six years had passed, and the area remained a desolate, abandoned ruin. It seemed no one had visited in all that time.

With an array Grandmaster, repairing the Teleportation Array wouldn't be entirely impossible.

To Jiuyou, however, it no longer mattered much. With his current strength, safely traversing Blood-Demon Valley wouldn't be difficult as long as he acted carefully. But just to be safe, he still planned to elevate his strength another notch first.

Upon arriving, Jiuyou set up several arrays, entered the massive cave estate deep within the sinkhole, and sat down cross-legged.

He inspected the Storage Pouches of the two Azure Sun Sect Nascent Soul elders one by one.

They were shockingly poor. Their combined spirit stones barely amounted to a few thousand, their magic treasures were perfectly ordinary, and they lacked a single decent ancient treasure. For dignified Nascent Soul cultivators to be even shabbier than rogue cultivators—he wondered how they had managed to keep up appearances for the past thousand years.

Jiuyou shook his head, casually sorting and storing away the miscellaneous items.

Perhaps others would consider them heavenly treasures, but to him, they were worthless. Utterly worthless. Still, no matter how small a mosquito was, it was still meat; it was better than nothing.

However, just as he was checking the final Storage Pouch—the belongings of the white-haired elder—his fingertips brushed against something strange.

He took it out and laid it in his palm.

It was a white, palm-sized ring, lustrous and entirely pale. Its surface was carved with dense, intricate, bizarre runes. It felt warm and smooth to the touch, yet he couldn't identify the material. Having lived for nearly a thousand years and seen countless heavenly treasures, Jiuyou had never encountered such a peculiar crafting material.

It didn't seem like a standard magic treasure, nor did it look like an ancient treasure. It faintly carried the aura of a Spirit Treasure, yet its grade simply didn't reach that level.

He scrutinized it for a moment and tried injecting a sliver of magic power.

The white ring trembled slightly and slowly levitated, revolving around him at a steady pace. As it spun, one side drew in the spiritual energy of heaven and earth, while the other gently exhaled the absorbed energy, merging it into his meridians like a trickling stream.

Jiuyou's heart stirred. He immediately closed his eyes and circulated his cultivation method, feeling it carefully. A moment later, he opened his eyes, a rare hint of surprise flashing in their depths.

Releasing this item during cultivation more than doubled his speed of absorbing spiritual energy. If used in combat, his magic power recovery rate would also increase by nearly forty percent. Furthermore, it operated on its own, requiring no extra mental effort to control.

Whether for bitter closed-door cultivation or life-and-death struggles, this item was an exceptionally rare supreme treasure.

He activated the ring again, testing it repeatedly. Every single time, the effect remained completely stable, without the slightest degradation.

Jiuyou fell silent for a moment, his fingers gently tracing the runes along the ring. A ripple of emotion finally appeared on his face.

Judging by this efficacy, the item's grade had likely surpassed the scope of an ancient treasure and touched the threshold of a Spirit Treasure. Could it be... an Imitation Spirit Treasure?

The guess made his heart give a slight jolt.

Whether in the Heavenly Abyss Sea, Lingchuan, or Ganzhou—which he had stepped foot in later—he had annihilated no small number of sects, yet he had never seen a single Imitation Spirit Treasure.

Back in the Heavenly Abyss Sea, the only Spirit Treasure he had ever seen was the Demon Purification Platform, and it had only been a damaged Heaven-grade Spiritual Treasure. Even so, the aura emitted by just a single fragment of it had been enough to leave him breathless.

That alone was enough to show its preciousness.

To think he had gotten his hands on one so easily...

If he had possessed this item back then, why would he have been stuck at the Nascent Soul Early Stage for hundreds of years?

He looked down at the ring in his hand, then at the empty Storage Pouch, and shook his head. For that white-haired elder to guard such a supreme treasure yet remain at the Nascent Soul Early Stage was truly a reckless waste of heavenly gifts.

Jiuyou did not lament the thought any further. He casually snapped the ring onto his wrist and urged his magic power. The ring automatically retracted its spiritual light and clung tightly to his skin, looking no different from an ordinary accessory.

The item was extremely convenient to use. Just like the Hundred-Mile Inch Hairpin in his hair, it could be activated at any time without the need for tedious refinement.

He combed through the ancient manuals of the Azure Sun Sect once more. Unfortunately, the texts held little record of this item, not even leaving behind a name. Successive generations of high-level Azure Sun Sect figures had likely concealed it deliberately. Aside from the white-haired elder, probably not even that middle-aged man knew of its existence.

Jiuyou pondered for a moment before suddenly smiling.

"Since it belongs to this seat anyway, no one should object to me giving my own treasure a name."

He raised his hand, his fingertips gently brushing the ring on his wrist.

"Since you can absorb the spiritual energy of heaven and earth for my use, I will call you—the Heavenly Spirit Ring."

The ring faintly lit up before falling silent again, as if tacitly accepting the name.

Inside the cave estate, Jiuyou sat cross-legged, his expression calm. Yet a trace of satisfaction clearly danced in his dark green eyes.

Picking up an Imitation Spirit Treasure for nothing meant this trip to the Azure Sun Sect had not been in vain.

Jiuyou's gaze then fell on Gu Qing's Storage Pouch.

He opened it, sent his Divine Sense inside, and began rummaging through it at an unhurried pace.

The first thing he pulled out was a cloak-like ancient treasure, entirely dark green and as light as a cicada's wings.

He injected his magic power to test it. The cloak unfurled in the wind. It could wrap around him to form a green screen, be thrown out to block attacks, or even bind an enemy within it. Its toughness was excellent, and its defense was formidable.

Though it couldn't compare to a top-tier ancient treasure like the Golden Luo Bowl, it was still a rare life-saving artifact.

Jiuyou casually stored it in his Storage Pouch and continued searching.

The next item made him raise an eyebrow slightly.

It was a pitch-dark disk. Its surface was carved with densely packed runes, yet they were dim and indistinct, as if covered by a layer of dust.

Jiuyou probed it carefully with his Divine Sense but couldn't make heads or tails of it. Just like the Heavenly Spirit Ring, its material was unknown and its origins a mystery.

He could at least glean a few clues from the Heavenly Spirit Ring to deduce its grade, but this disk completely eluded him. He tried injecting his magic power, but the disk showed no reaction, acting like a dead object.

Jiuyou pondered for a moment before an idea struck him. He brought the disk close to the Heavenly Spirit Ring on his wrist and simultaneously drove his magic power into both.

The runes on the disk flickered for an instant—an incredibly brief instant. The light flashed and died, and there was no further movement.

It was like spotting a familiar silhouette years later—thinking it was her and running over, only to realize you had mistaken her for someone else, leaving you with a secret pang of heartbreak.

Jiuyou withdrew his hand, his gaze sweeping back and forth between the disk and the Heavenly Spirit Ring. There had to be some connection between the two. He just hadn't found the method to unlock it yet. For the time being, he put the disk away, saving it to study slowly in the future.

Finally, he pulled a somewhat tattered ancient manual from the Storage Pouch. The pages were yellowed and the corners curled; it was clearly quite old. Five characters were written on the cover: "Daoyang Ten Palaces Art."

He had originally only intended to skim through it, but unexpectedly, after reading just a few pages, he felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity. He stopped flipping, furrowed his brow slightly, and pulled out the copy of the Qingyang Nine Gates Art he had obtained from those two men earlier from his own Storage Pouch.

Laying the two cultivation methods side by side, the comparison was clear at a glance. The pathways for circulating the techniques, the flow of spiritual energy, and even many of the critical nodes were identical, almost as if cast from the same mold.

But the Daoyang Ten Palaces Art was obviously far more complete and profound.

The Qingyang Nine Gates Art was nothing more than its simplified version.

Jiuyou closed the ancient manual, tapping his fingertips lightly against the cover.

"Daoyang Ten Palaces Art."

He muttered the name under his breath. He remembered how, back in Thousand Leaf City, Shang Ming, the Grand Supreme had mistakenly assumed his Golden Sun True Flame was the Nine Yang True Fire and had mentioned the Daoyang Sect.

Daoyang Sect. Daoyang Ten Palaces Art. Heavenly Sun Supreme One. Golden Sun True Flame. Azure Sun Sect.

These clues were slowly weaving together into a single thread. What was the connection between them?

He put the ancient manual into his Storage Pouch, tapping his fingertip twice against the Heavenly Spirit Ring on his wrist.

"Daoyang..."