Divine Sense Secret Art, Foundation Establishment Late Stage

"Ah!"

A scream from the Black-robed Man suddenly rang out in the air.

From his lower body up to his abdomen, everything had vanished.

His aura had weakened to the extreme.

Most importantly, the Blood-colored Talisman in his hand had already been activated.

A great amount of blood suddenly poured from his body into the Blood-colored Talisman at high speed.

The entire talisman blazed with blood-red light.

An expression of utter terror immediately appeared in the Black-robed Man's eyes.

With his severely injured body in its current state, he simply no longer had the strength to provide the fuel needed to activate the talisman.

In only a few moments, what remained of his body had turned into a dried corpse.

And the talisman, which had only been half activated, seemed to have lost its continued supply of blood. It gradually fell silent once more, reverting into a talisman with a blood-red sheen on its surface.

Whoosh!

A hand stretched out from the air and snatched up the talisman before it could fall.

It was Ji Haoyuan.

His figure flickered.

In an instant, he had swept away every Storage Pouch, including those of Han Pengshan and the other two.

Immediately afterward, a ball of flame fell upon the three corpses.

In the blink of an eye, they were all reduced to ashes.

Some time later.

Ji Haoyuan returned to Ganyang Mountain of the Ji Family.

He then went straight into his own Cave Mansion in the Back Mountain.

After spending some time, Ji Haoyuan erased all the imprints on Han Pengshan's and the others' Storage Pouches.

When he opened the Storage Pouches one by one, his eyes immediately lit up.

For no other reason than that the contents of the three Storage Pouches truly gave him quite a surprise.

The Spirit Stones alone numbered a full ten thousand when the three Storage Pouches were combined.

Well, well.

With this haul alone, he had earned back all the Spirit Stones he had spent before—and then some.

Next were the three spirit artifacts the trio had used earlier.

A dark-golden sickle, six black-glinting blades, and the Bewildering Flute.

Especially the Bewildering Flute.

Once its tune was played, it could seal a cultivator's Spiritual Sense and numb their seven apertures.

Had the cultivation technique he practiced not been superior, with spiritual power capable of protecting his body, blocking the Bewildering Flute's attack this time would truly have taken some effort.

That was also the main reason he had chosen to kill that man first.

Besides these, Ji Haoyuan noticed that all three Storage Pouches contained the same item, and in no small quantity.

It was a mineral material known as Taiyin Spirit Copper.

The greatest use of this mineral was in forging the formation tools for a Spirit Gathering Array.

It could also be used to forge Gold attribute magical artifacts.

It was considered a mineral material of considerable value.

Especially once its quantity reached a certain scale.

Something was wrong!

Looking at the Taiyin Spirit Copper in the Storage Pouches, Ji Haoyuan immediately realized that something was amiss.

If only one of the three had possessed a certain quantity of Taiyin Spirit Copper in his Storage Pouch, that could still be explained.

But all three Storage Pouches contained Taiyin Spirit Copper, and not in small amounts.

That was clearly abnormal.

Could it be that these fellows had discovered a mineral deposit that specifically produced Taiyin Spirit Copper?

It was not impossible.

If that was truly the case, then the Han Family...

Ji Haoyuan's eyes narrowed slightly.

This was a mineral resource in no way inferior to the Ji Family's Cloud Iron Ore Vein. From a certain perspective, it was even more valuable than the Cloud Iron Ore Vein.

It seemed he would have to have someone keep a close eye on things and investigate it thoroughly.

At present, the Ji Family and the Han Family could be said to have formed a blood feud.

If possible, he certainly would not mind snatching food from a tiger's mouth.

Compared to that, the origins of Cultivator Zhu and Cultivator Wei were still not particularly clear.

However, based on Ji Haoyuan's earlier observations, those two clearly carried a bandit-like air about them.

Could they be the leaders of two rogue cultivator gangs?

He would also have to send someone to investigate them properly later.

Temporarily setting these thoughts aside, Ji Haoyuan resumed taking stock of the items in the three Storage Pouches.

Hmm? This is...?

Suddenly.

Ji Haoyuan's gaze fell upon an item inside Cultivator Wei's Storage Pouch—the blue-robed man's Storage Pouch.

With a thought.

A Jade Slip appeared in Ji Haoyuan's hand.

He pressed the Jade Slip against his forehead.

Once Ji Haoyuan had finished reading its contents, a look of delight finally appeared on his face, impossible to suppress.

This was actually a secret art related to cultivating Spiritual Sense.

It was called the Phantom God Stab.

After cultivating it, one could not only bewilder enemies and cause them to enter a certain illusion, but also form cone-like spikes to attack an enemy's Spiritual Sense.

In the current Cultivation World, this was absolutely an exceedingly precious secret art.

Even a Golden Core Sect like the Crimson Cloud Sect might not possess a similar Divine Sense Secret Art.

Its only shortcoming was that this Divine Sense Secret Art known as the Phantom God Stab was incomplete.

It contained only about one-third of its full content.

Moreover, it was relatively scattered and lacked a coherent system.

But that was only natural when he thought about it.

How precious were Divine Sense Secret Arts?

For the blue-robed man to possess such an incomplete Divine Sense Secret Art was already exceedingly rare.

Fortunately, this incomplete Divine Sense Secret Art was not a problem for Ji Haoyuan.

In fact, an incomplete Divine Sense Secret Art was better.

Otherwise, given the power of the Phantom God Stab, if the blue-robed man had truly possessed its complete contents—

Once he had cultivated it, the earlier battle might well have encountered some twists and turns.

With that thought, Ji Haoyuan put away the Jade Slip, intending to deduce it later and try to complete the missing portions.

Afterward.

He took the Blood-colored Talisman from Cultivator Zhu's Storage Pouch—the Black-robed Man's Storage Pouch.

After sensing it briefly, Ji Haoyuan knew that it was a blood talisman used for escape.

It required half of one's own Essence Blood to activate.

The price was great, but there was no denying that once this talisman was successfully activated, even an ordinary Foundation Establishment Late Stage Cultivator would find it difficult to catch up.

It could more or less be considered a trump card for preserving one's life.

Unfortunately, the Black-robed Man had not been decisive enough at the time.

By the time he had wanted to use this Blood Burning Escape Talisman, he no longer had the opportunity.

Just like that.

Once Ji Haoyuan had finished taking stock of everything in the Storage Pouches, he stopped wasting time and began this period of secluded cultivation.

First.

He used the Lava Vermillion Fruit to cultivate his not-yet-perfected fire-attribute spiritual power to completion.

This process took Ji Haoyuan a little over half a year.

Afterward.

He spent another half year continuing to temper, purify, and refine his fire and earth spiritual power.

Only when both types of spiritual power could be refined no further, purified no further, and had reached their limit, peak, and perfection did Ji Haoyuan finally begin to charge at his cultivation bottleneck.

Crack—crack—crack—

Just as he had expected, Ji Haoyuan encountered no great obstacles in this breakthrough.

In less than a year, he successfully shattered the bottleneck of the Foundation Establishment Late Stage and broke through from the Foundation Establishment Middle Stage to the Foundation Establishment Late Stage.