Ancient God Inheritance (I)

Jiang Lin shook his head and stopped dwelling on it.

Feeling the mysterious power within his body, Jiang Lin no longer hesitated and called out inwardly.

"System, begin the inheritance."

[ Ding! ]

[The "Ancient God Art—Incomplete" inheritance has been activated. Please enter the Inheritance Space.]

The next moment, a dark gold gate appeared before Jiang Lin. Before he could react, it directly sucked his soul inside.

When Jiang Lin opened his eyes again, an endless, dim starry sky lay before him.

At the end of that starry sky stood an ancient giant tens of millions of zhang tall. Its body had been forged from countless stars, and it exuded an ancient, desolate aura. Nine brilliant purple star points were branded upon its brow!

"Th-this is an Ancient God?"

"And a Nine-Star Ancient God at that!"

With the system's help, Jiang Lin was able to see the Ancient God's full form. His eyes were filled with shock, and his face was utterly stunned.

After a long while, Jiang Lin finally came back to his senses. But immediately afterward, a question arose in his mind.

"According to the original novel Renegade Immortal, a Nine-Star Ancient God corresponds to a cultivator from the Nirvana Scryer realm to the early Nirvana Shatterer realm of the third step. How could a God King of the Douluo God Realm possibly compare?"

"Could it be that this inheritance item isn't it?"

Jiang Lin looked around, but there were no other Ancient Gods here. Suddenly, his gaze sharpened as he noticed the purple star points on the Nine-Star Ancient God's brow.

Of the nine dazzling purple star points, the first five shone far more brightly than the last four. Moreover, compared with the solidity of the first five, the last four were much more illusory, like mere clusters of light.

"Could this Ancient God have suffered some accident, leaving only the inheritance from One-Star Ancient God to Five-Star Ancient God within this Ancient God Body?"

"If that's the case, it makes much more sense. Though a Five-Star Ancient God's combat power far surpasses that of a God King in the Douluo God Realm, according to the system's evaluation, it is indeed still at the Dark Gold Three-Star level."

After clearing away his doubts, Jiang Lin followed the system's prompt. With a thought, his figure drifted toward the Ancient God's brow, and before long, he merged into it.

When Jiang Lin opened his eyes again, he found himself before a boundless Sea of Death, where ninety-nine deep-blue ice crystals floated in the air.

"Those are the Ancient God's Memory Crystals? Is this the space of the Memory Inheritance?"

A trace of solemnity appeared in Jiang Lin's eyes. Although most of the ninety-nine Memory Crystals were illusory, even the remaining ones would take him a long time to absorb.

Only after he completely absorbed them could he be considered to have completed the first step of the inheritance.

"Luckily, time outside is frozen while receiving the inheritance. Otherwise, by the time I complete this first step, who knows how much time would have passed outside."

"Come on, let's begin absorbing these Memory Crystals!"

Jiang Lin arrived at the center of the Sea of Death and sat cross-legged. With a thought, he drew the nearest Memory Crystal toward himself and absorbed it into his body.

The next moment, when Jiang Lin opened his eyes again, he discovered that he had become a young Ancient God named Cang Xu. Before he could adapt, he felt an immense pressure bearing down on him.

Before him was a deathly black expanse, while all around him were mantle rocks pressed tightly against his body.

As the crust shifted, those mantle rocks continuously squeezed him. If Jiang Lin's soul had not been tempered to extreme toughness when he fused the Pure Yang Flame and the King's Power Sword, the boundless pain alone would have crushed him unconscious in an instant!

At some point, under the enhancement of Cang Xu's Ancient God body, Jiang Lin finally managed to adapt to the surrounding environment. Only then did he have the chance to examine Cang Xu's memories.

Very quickly, disappointment appeared in Jiang Lin's eyes. There was not much useful information in Cang Xu's memories, because from the moment Cang Xu was born, he had been directly cast by the elders of his clan into this cultivation planet called Xuanlan.

Though several thousand years had already passed, aside from circulating the Ancient God Art day after day to absorb the planet's origin, he had done nothing else.

"Forget it. I'll take it slowly."

Jiang Lin stopped thinking about it and began cultivating completely, just as Cang Xu had.

Cultivation knew no years. After an unknown amount of time, the Ancient God Power within Cang Xu's body accumulated continuously. Finally, after he completely absorbed Xuanlan Star's origin, Cang Xu's body instantly expanded to more than a hundred zhang tall!

Cang Xu then left the planet's core for the first time and arrived upon the surface, which had become utterly barren and filled with deathly energy.

Next came the Ancient God's first bodily reconstruction. Only by completing this step could Cang Xu become a true One-Star Ancient God!

More than ten years later, the Ancient God Power within Cang Xu's body finally reached its critical point. Then, as the Ancient God Art circulated, boundless agony descended.

Cang Xu's flesh began to shatter outward inch by inch. This was complete disintegration at the level of origin!

Now that Jiang Lin had become Cang Xu, even though his soul had already been tempered to the limit, he still could not bear it. Very quickly, his mind reached the brink of collapse!

Yet the bodily reconstruction had only reached its halfway point. If Jiang Lin's mind truly collapsed, then his soul would completely disperse within this segment of Cang Xu's memories!

"No, I absolutely can't die! I have to hold on—Sister Dragon is still waiting for me outside!"

Jiang Lin gritted his teeth and desperately protected the final trace of clarity in his heart.

But soon, the ever-increasing, tearing agony drowned him.

Just as Jiang Lin's mind was about to shatter completely, a mysterious purple glimmer instantly enveloped his soul. In the blink of an eye, his soul, once covered in cracks, was completely restored. Not only that, under the support of that purple glimmer, Jiang Lin's soul became several times stronger than before!

"Th-this is the Favor of the Goddess of Luck?"

Jiang Lin understood at once and immediately sped up the bodily reconstruction process.

His soul was now completely unafraid of the agony that was about to come.

After an unknown amount of time, Cang Xu's body was finally reconstructed. An Ancient God Mark bearing a flickering purple star point slowly condensed on his brow.

"Hoo—"

"I finally made it!"

Jiang Lin slowly let out a breath. But just as he was about to adapt to Cang Xu's newly born Ancient God Power, the space before his eyes suddenly shattered piece by piece, and the Memory Inheritance space floating above the Sea of Death appeared before him once again.

"The first Memory Crystal has finally been fused. This counts as truly taking the first step toward merging with the Ancient God Inheritance, right?"

A trace of emotion appeared on Jiang Lin's face, but his gaze soon became resolute again.

Then, under Jiang Lin's guidance, the second Memory Crystal drifted toward him.