For the next three months, Jiang Hai spent every day cultivating in the blood pool inside the underground chamber hall of the Seventeen Altar.
The blood pool was merely an ordinary pool. What was truly remarkable was the mysterious statue of the Demon Empress above it. The statue had been carved from a stone Jiang Hai had never seen before, with a soul tool array inside. However, the stone could block the probing of the Glazed Heart Mirror, so Jiang Hai had been unable to uncover its secrets.
Every day, the Blood-Clothed Elder dropped a blood-red pill into the statue's mouth, filling the crimson liquid in the pool with a strange blood-red energy.
With the combined assistance of this blood-red energy and the soul power refined within the Bronze Coffin, Jiang Hai's soul power increased visibly each day.
The rapid growth of his strength made Jiang Hai forget some of his outside concerns and concentrate on cultivating.
Whenever he meditated under the influence of the Demon Empress's projection, Jiang Hai perceived the passage of time as exceptionally brief.
In the blink of an eye, nearly three months had passed. An aura surged through Jiang Hai's body, and his soul power advanced once more, finally reaching level 60. All he needed now was to fuse with his next soul ring, and he would become a true Six-Ring Soul Emperor.
However, after reaching level 60, sixty percent of his soul power had already turned liquid. At this stage, raising his soul power by even one level was extremely difficult. Even with the combined assistance of the Bronze Coffin and the blood pool, he had taken a full three months to break through-and that included his first absorption of the pool's liquid, which had brought him straight to the middle of level 59.