Chapter 639: The Immortal Heart, Forged Through A Hundred Trials

It operated at breakneck speed, faster than anything Li Fan had experienced since he began cultivating the Heart Refinement Sutra.

As if some hidden circuit had been switched on, the Xuanhuang Heart Refinement Sutra's efficiency shot up by a factor of hundreds, maybe thousands.

If his previous attempts had been like a plodding donkey dragging a millstone, the Xuanhuang Heart Refinement Sutra had now become a roaring, thundering machine, devouring the countless bizarre experiences flooding his mind.

It righted wrongs. It purified the source.

Ice-cold water poured over his head, dousing the searing heat completely.

Li Fan began to shake off the madness and confusion.

This...?

In an instant, he understood what had just happened to him, and his mind shuddered.

He had never expected the backlash from the complete "Chaos" to be this horrifying. Once fully manifested, it was exponentially more powerful than the half-formed practice run he had nearly executed before. The completed "Chaos" was a qualitative leap forward. Its might could no longer be compared to the fragmented version.

If the backlash alone is this terrifying, then its actual effects...

Li Fan forced his trembling body and spirit to steady, then looked up at the sky.

Where the rain and the bodies had been falling, the images seemed to twist. Like an invisible hole, the rain and corpses vanished the instant they drew close, gone without a trace. But after devouring that uncanny rain, the twisted void seemed to shrink in range. The two effects balanced each other, canceling out.

Finally, when no more raindrops fell from the sky, the influence of "Chaos" vanished as well.

A bedraggled figure fell from the air. It was Yin Shangren.

His body had turned translucent. He stared at Li Fan, disbelief frozen on his face. He tried to say something, but when he opened his mouth, no sound came out. He looked down at himself, as if some understanding had struck him, and stopped his futile attempts.

His body grew fainter, but there was no fear of death on his face. Only relief and release.

Moments later, Yin Shangren vanished from the world entirely.

Li Fan didn't pause to celebrate his narrow escape. Driven by a growing sense of crisis, he forced himself to suppress his injuries, activated A Single Hand Veils the Heavens, pushed his escape technique to its limit, and fled the area.

Not long after Li Fan left, a vast, unimaginably large divine sense descended. The scenes of the nearby seabed began to reverse, as if time itself were flowing backward, replaying what had happened.

But just as Li Fan's figure was about to appear, a crack formed out of thin air. Then a second, a third... countless fissures appeared in rapid succession. The vision was thrown into disorder, then shattered like a mirror, restoring the scene to normal.

The divine sense lingered for a long time, as if in contemplation. Then it swept silently across the entire Congyun Sea, but found no anomaly. Finally, it sank back into complete stillness.

At this time, Li Fan had not yet returned to Congyun City. He dug a piece of ore from the seabed beneath his feet, feigning joy as he stowed it in his storage ring. He kept up the act of mining in that spot for a while longer, waiting until the sense of crisis in his heart had fully subsided before letting it drop.

Just now, as he'd been rushing back to Congyun City, a sense of crisis unlike any before had slammed into him. His heart hammered against his ribs, as if heralding his own death and the dissolution of his Dao.

He hadn't had time to think. First he'd dissolved the disguise of A Single Hand Veils the Heavens, then activated the Arcana True Spirit Transformation, instantly morphing into a different cultivator. He'd pretended to be a miner, digging for ore on the seabed.

His premonition had been accurate. Moments later, he'd sensed that he was being watched. He'd forcibly suppressed the tremor in his heart, acting as though he'd noticed nothing at all.

It had been a close call, but he had ultimately evaded detection.

"Chaos". The Xuanhuang Heart Refinement Sutra. The bizarre Rain of Returning Selves. And now this immeasurably vast divine sense. On his way back to Congyun City, Li Fan kept circling back to the connections between these things.

If I hadn't used "Chaos", there would have been almost no way to shake off that strange rain. The only path left would have been to Return to Truth.

But I never expected that "Chaos" could actually eliminate the rain.

In Li Fan's view, Yin Shangren and the rain that brought countless identical corpses were strikingly similar to the Oddities of the Xuanhuang World. Both were utterly illogical, rules existing outside the rules. Yet this kind of Oddity, supposedly unchangeable and imperishable, had been resolved by "Chaos."

What does this mean?

Li Fan kept replaying the moment the Rain of Returning Selves had disappeared.

"Chaos...”

It wasn't so much resolved as "Chaos" added to "Chaos", canceling itself out?

His heart stirred, and in that instant a bold conjecture surfaced.

Could it be that the root of all the Oddities in this world comes from this “Chaos"?

Once the thought appeared, he couldn't suppress it. At the same time, an inexplicable fear seized him.

The power of "Chaos" I saw on the stone in the White Mist seemed to have been nearly exhausted by the passage of time. But there's no doubt it was the culprit that destroyed that Lost Domain.

If it were the original "Chaos" that still retained its full power...

Li Fan's eyes narrowed.

And it seems there are powerful beings in the Xuanhuang World who are extremely concerned with this "Chaos". The moment they sense its aura, they descend to investigate.

I'll have to avoid using it as much as possible from now on, unless it's a life-or-death crisis.

As someone who had formed his Nascent Soul with the Five Elements Grotto-Heavens, Li Fan's recovery abilities were terrifyingly strong. By the time he returned to Congyun City, his injuries had healed completely, with no sign of abnormality remaining.

And the glimpses of myriad lifetimes that had flooded his mind had all been absorbed and resolved, thanks to the Xuanhuang Heart Refinement Sutra operating at full capacity.

What Li Fan found strange was that, going by past experience, absorbing so many stray thoughts should have nourished and strengthened his soul. But from that moment until now, he hadn't felt the slightest increase in the power of his divine soul.

Could it have been used instead to repair the invisible wounds within my soul?

Filled with puzzlement, Li Fan examined himself carefully. The operating speed of the Xuanhuang Heart Refinement Sutra had gradually returned to normal, but he could sense keenly that the Sutra was somewhat different. The feeling was like some evolution had been completed, and yet not fully realized.

A thought stirred within him. Driven by instinct, he opened Return to Truth's interface and fixed his gaze on the technique description.

The Xuanhuang Heart Refinement Sutra, which had originally sat at the top of the list, had changed its name without a single sign.

Xuanhuang Immortal Heart Sutra (Incomplete).

Li Fan's pupils constricted abruptly, and his heart shook with immense force.

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