The Soul Refining Pearl could be considered an illustrious treasure of the cultivation world.
It originated from High Antiquity, and was said to have been developed by a cultivation sect known as the Soul Sect. The Five Gods Faith of latter days was said to have sprung from the Soul Sect.
The Soul Sect specialized in raising souls, refining souls, seizing souls, and transplanting souls, and their spell arts were strange and bizarre. But this sect was not in itself an evil sect.
They researched souls primarily in search of eternal life.
While cultivators could achieve long lives, it was difficult for them to achieve eternal lives. Even those Titans who cultivated to the Immortal Platform Realm would at most be able to live for several thousand years, far from true immortality.
Although there were arts for reincarnation and possession, they all had limitations, and one had to at least be at the Violet Palace Realm to use them.
But whether it was reincarnation or possession, the physical body was destroyed while the soul remained.
Without a physical body, a soul found it very difficult to exist for long in the world. It would either dissipate or become a ghost, and thus, at the death of the physical body, the soul had to find something to attach itself to as quickly as possible.
But such vessels were hard to find. Not only did it require a suitable body, the soul of the body would also resist. Without its original strength, even if the possessor had been a peerless Titan, they were not guaranteed victory against the original owner. As for reincarnation, there was the risk of not getting back one’s memories.
Thus, no one was willing to use these secret arts unless they absolutely needed to.
In search of eternal life, the Soul Sect had researched soul transplantation to reduce the dangers and requirements for reincarnation and possession. The Soul Hell had been created for this purpose.
Initially, its purpose had been to store souls, so it had been called the Soulstore Pearl.
The Soulstore Pearl allowed the Soul Sect to temporarily store the souls of the dying so that they could slowly search for a suitable vessel, thus resolving the problem of the waiting period. Besides that, the Soulstore Pearl could nourish and strengthen the soul, providing better conditions for possession.
But in the end, the Soulstore Pearl was a failure. While the Soul Sect had succeeded in creating the Soulstore Pearl, they found it to be an extremely wicked item. The soul within would go through excruciating pain, and extended torment would have the soul turn into an existence akin to a ghost, devoid of rationality and utterly insane. This was precisely why people later on called it the Soul Refining Hell.
Not long after that, the Soul Sect sealed the pearl and forbade anyone from using it.
The matter should have ended there, and since it was a failed product, no one paid this object any mind.
But surprisingly, a traitorous disciple appeared among the Soul Sect. This man was none other than the infamous Soultaker True Lord.
Of course, the Soultaker True Lord was truly nothing more than a minor disciple of the Soul Sect at the time, only at the Mortal Shedding Realm. But this Mortal Shedding Realm disciple managed to sneak into the Pavilion of Heavenly Foresight and steal many of the Soul Sect’s treasures, including the Soulstore Pearl.
The Soul Sect sent large numbers of experts in pursuit, but the traitor managed to escape them, even killing a few of them, one of them being a Celestial Heart elder. The Soulstore Pearl put on a glorious show in all this, becoming the Soultaker True Lord’s ultimate weapon. It was from this pearl that the Soultaker True Lord received his name.
And no one had expected the Soultaker True Lord to improve the Soulstore Pearl and make the Mindseizers.
Mindseizers were the extremely vicious creatures born from the souls that had completely lost their rationality in the long torment of the pearl. Once released, the Mindseizers would instinctively attack any life nearby and attempt to possess them.
Possession normally required many preparations, but Mindseizers didn’t need this and disregarded all the risks. This was because Mindseizers wouldn’t even mind turning into dust if they could escape the Soul Refining Hell.
This was precisely why this sort of fiend actually had a very low, almost nil, chance at possession. Their possessions were more like moths rushing at a flame.
But in the possession process, the victim had to fight back to rebuff the Mindseizer. And this meant that they couldn’t focus on external battles.
When the Soultaker True Lord attacked during this time, it would often be to impressive effect.
And if the possession succeeded, the possessed person would become a devil, a most powerful and savage existence, but also because of their fear of the Soulstore Pearl, they would be obedient to the owner of the pearl.
From then on, the Soulstore Pearl became the Soul Refining Pearl, a most infamous treasure.
But while the Soultaker True Lord was ruthless and fierce, he slowly began to lose ground against the pursuit of the Soul Sect and ultimately died while battling on the ocean. His body was lost in the ocean, together with more than half of his treasures, and the Soul Refining Pearl went missing.
The Soul Sect was also badly wounded after this campaign, and not long after that, its enemies destroyed it, and the method for creating the Soulstore Pearl was lost.
But today, thousands of years after it had been lost, it had inexplicably ended up in Tang Jie’s hands.
Tang Jie couldn’t help but emotionally sigh as he looked at the Soul Refining Pearl.
This pearl embodied too much bloodshed and murder, and the gruesome storms it had stirred had become tales told throughout history.
Not even Tang Jie knew if owning it was a blessing or a curse.
But regardless, this pearl was bound to be of great help in his current situation. The records on the pearl said that the method for using it was extremely simple. Anyone that could understand how to make spiritual energy flow through one’s meridians could use the pearl.
Thus, Tang Jie took the pearl and transferred his spiritual power to it. He saw the lynx soul in the Soul Refining Pearl turning around, groaning and screaming. Tang Jie quickly felt a warm current flowing out of the pearl.
Tang Jie tried to guide this warm current into the fiend soul, and a moment later, the lynx stopped moaning and calmed down. It would occasionally twitch a little, as if reminding Tang Jie that the pain still existed.
After a little while, the lynx soul stopped moving completely, seemingly frozen. By this time, less than half of the warm current remained, but no more could be forced into the soul.
Tang Jie stopped controlling the warm current and lightly shook his hand. The lynx soul lengthened like a gel and flowed out of the pearl into Tang Jie’s hand, but it was no longer vicious. It was like a gelified lynx toy.
Tang Jie knew that this was most likely one of the functions of the Soul Refining Pearl: soul congealing.
Through the improvements of the Soultaker True Lord, the Soul Refining Pearl possessed the two abilities of soul refining and soul congealing.
Soul refining was to refine souls, to temper the souls captured within the pearl through demonic fire.
As the Soul Refining Pearl had been modified by the Soultaker True Lord, the Soul Hell was much more terrifying. So long as sufficient spiritual energy was provided, an endless sea of demonic fire could be produced to melt down and refine the soul.
After forty-nine days of refining, a soul would either break and be melted into Soul Dew or would hold out and become a fiend.
The former was a valuable material while the latter were none other than the infamous Mindseizers!
Soul congealing was the exact opposite. Materials were absorbed and inserted into the soul, creating some strange object. The exact effects would depend on the material absorbed and the soul being refined.
The Soul Refining Pearl had previously absorbed an entire block of Softscent Jade, which was exactly what was needed for soul congealing. The warm current Tang Jie had felt was none other than the absorbed essence of the Softscent Jade, and so Tang Jie had only needed to apply a little effort to congeal the lynx soul.
But the pearl had no record for how to use the congealed fiend soul, and Tang Jie didn’t know either. No matter how he messed around with it, the congealed soul did nothing. He ended up spending quite some time, ultimately to no avail.
And now that it had lost its soul, the pearl had once more entered its previously frightening state, shaking Tang Jie’s soul. Fortunately, he had come ready this time, and he stored the pearl in a jade box.
As he put away the Soul Refining Pearl, he heard Yiyi call out, “Big Brother, the fiends are coming!”
She had been hiding near the mountain stream ever since she had planted the Alarm Gate Banner, her task being to keep watch on Fragrant Store Cave.
Tang Jie and the Green Hill Sect disciples had been engaged in a rather fierce battle, and Fragrant Store Cave had heard the commotion and was sending reinforcements.
“How many?” Tang Jie asked.
“It seems like all three fiend generals are coming, but I don’t see a fox.”
“Understood.” Tang Jie turned and left.
By this time, Qin Zhou’s group’s battle with the fiends was coming to an end.
While there had been many fiends, all of them fearless and brave, Qin Zhou was a Mortal Shedding Realm cultivator. After a hard battle, he and the fierce little tiger had finally succeeded in exterminating all the fiends.
They were all rather tired from this battle. Chen Yao wasn’t even able to stand, dropping on his butt.
Zhang Chengyun shouted, “Let’s hurry and get out of here. If that lynx comes back, we won’t have any hope of escaping.”
Ling Jing was alarmed. “What about Tang Xuan?”
Zhang Chengyun answered, “He went to fight with the lynx, so he might already be dead. What are you still worried about him for?”
“No!” Luo Yin loudly protested. “He helped us draw away that lynx fiend. We can’t just sit here and leave him be! We should go and find him!”
“You’re crazy! The battle has already started, and the reinforcements from Fragrant Store Cave could arrive at any time! If we don’t leave now, the situation might change for the worse!” Zhang Chengyun frantically said.
“So you plan to abandon Tang Xuan?” Ling Jing questioned. “Senior Brother, don’t forget that he saved us.”
Qin Zhou was immediately frozen in indecision. He knew that Tang Jie had drawn away the lynx fiend and was probably dead, but trying to go back and help was too dangerous. For a moment, he didn’t know what to do.
As he hesitated, a howl of wind came from the distant forest.
Everyone paled, believing that this was the lynx. Having not taken the chance to escape, they would undoubtedly be caught by the lynx. All of them despaired, with only the little tiger excitedly pouncing in the direction of the noise.
Tang Jie’s figure appeared in the distance, walking toward them.
His body was covered in many bloodstains from the battle, but he appeared unpanicked, his face calm and collected. It was like he had recently butchered a chicken or a sheep.
The five of them stared in shock, not daring to believe their eyes.
“It’s him… He’s alive?” Qin Zhou murmured.
“What about the lynx fiend? Where is it?” Chen Yao asked.
“You’re so dumb! You need to ask?” Luo Yin pursed her lips. “Look at him! It’s clear that he was chased by the lynx. That being the case, the lynx fiend must be dead.”
“How’s that possible? This is a Mind Opening fiend we’re talking about here! Even Senior Brother Qin might not be able to beat it!”
But whether they believed it or not, the truth was right in front of them.
As Tang Jie casually walked over, Qin Zhou bitterly said, “In the end, we underestimated him. It turned out that we were the ones who didn’t know our strength!”
He asked himself if he could beat the lynx in a one-on-one battle and knew that he stood little chance. Even if he won, he would be severely injured. Seeing how relaxed Tang Jie was, there would have to be something wrong with Qin Zhou if he didn’t understand the gravity of his error.
Tang Jie came over and casually tossed a Whiteroot at Qin Zhou.
“What do you mean by this?” Qin Zhou was startled.
“One life, two pills,” Tang Jie replied.
Startled, Qin Zhou finally understood what Tang Jie meant.
It was clear that Tang Jie had come for his reward.
It was no wonder Tang Jie had said all that before this. It turned out that it wasn’t the Green Hill Sect disciples collecting the protection fee, but him collecting from the Green Hill Sect.
Once he got what Tang Jie was saying, Qin Zhou couldn’t help but internally sigh at how they had brought this on themselves. He nodded and said, “Alright. If one Whiteroot is three, then since Brother Tang saved our five lives… ten more pills.”
He took out a bottle of pills and threw it at Tang Jie. “This bottle has five Harmonic Threshold Breaking Pills. The remaining eight will have to wait until we return to the sect.”
Tang Jie replied, “Five is enough for me. I’ll remove the four that Luo Yin and Ling Jing owe. For the remaining four, you can pay up with something of equivalent value.”
These words let Qin Zhou know that he had probably heard their conversation, including how Zhang Chengyun wanted to abandon him, how Qin Zhou had hesitated, and how Luo Yin had firmly objected. This was why he had removed the pills that Luo Yin and Ling Jing owed.
Qin Zhou couldn’t help but sigh again.
He thought of himself as a chivalrous warrior who upheld justice, but his hesitation today was neither chivalrous nor just. He didn’t even compare to the resolve of a girl. He was filled with remorse and shame, and he proceeded to throw Tang Jie several more pill bottles. “Young Master Tang, thank you for your righteousness. We were blind back then, and I hope that you will not take offense.”
“I’m just a student, so how could I take offense?” Tang Jie lightly said.
“You’re really just a student?” Qin Zhou was flabbergasted.
“Mm.” Tang Jie nodded. The Green Hill disciples looked at each other in speechlessness.
Tang Jie said, “The fiends from Fragrant Store Cave are coming. Why aren’t you going already? Or do you want to pay me more protection fees?”
Qin Zhou’s group became fearful and did not dare to linger, immediately turning around and running.
After running a few steps, Luo Yin turned around and saw that Tang Jie was still standing there.
She shouted, “Tang Xuan, are you not going?”
“I’m taking a different path,” Tang Jie replied. “This will make it easier for you to escape.”
The others didn’t suspect anything and quickly left.