Arc 16Chapters 376–400
No recap yet.
No recap yet.
Lin Mo obtained the Danqing Painting Scroll from Mu Yu in Divine Wood City and left the Primordial Antiquity Ruins, but the passage of time began to decay the token and scroll as he departed. He suspected that only the space inside his Treasure Gourd could preserve the scroll.
Lin Mo returned from the Primordial Antiquity Ruins with the Ancient Painting Scroll as the High Priest and one hundred thousand evil spirits advanced toward Buddha Hand Peak. He began inscribing the Big Dipper Sword Formation patterns, leaving the fate of the Western Region dependent on his work.
Lin Mo and his allies ambushed the evil spirit incarnation and Yao Qing in the sky above the Endless Marshlands. After several powerful cultivators joined the battle, Gu Youfang arrived and asked Lin Mo if they were ready to begin.
The cultivators launched a coordinated assault on the evil spirit man, but his body quickly healed and he escaped their combined attacks with no apparent loss of strength. Xue Qingcheng warned Lin Mo that the Big Dipper Sword Formation was their only remaining hope of stopping the calamity.
Lin Mo used the Big Dipper Sword Formation to trap the evil spirit man and Yao Qing, while they burned the White Bone Altar and their own life force to resist. Xue Qingcheng’s divine soul attack accidentally helped the evil spirit escape its incarnation, but the sword light struck Yao Qing as the chapter ended.
Lin Mo and his allies killed Yao Qing, but the Evil Spirit escaped as black mist despite their efforts. They recovered the White Bone Altar, and Lin Mo’s World Tree blood began to suppress the evil will inside it, leaving open the possibility that he could claim the artifact.
Lin Mo and his allies prepared to hunt the wounded evil spirit again, then traveled with Hai Dafu to the Deep Sea Stone Formation to reunite with the refugees from the Eastern Isles. There, Hai Beier used the Conch Horn and considered asking Lin Mo to help contact Cao through his spore clone.
Lin Mo returned to the Deep Sea and reunited with Hai Beier, his family, and Azure Cloud Sect elders. Luan Xiuping gave him a beast-hide diagram that might lead to the Seven Baleful Nether Venerable's Sealing Grounds.
Lin Mo investigated how to break the Tai Sui Gate’s Soul-Control Secret Art and considered using gourd spirit spring water to cleanse its victims. He found a note in the Azure Emperor’s Pharmacopoeia suggesting that a Year-Infant Fruit could substitute for missing ingredients in the Nine-Turn Demon-Cleansing Pill.
Lin Mo discovered that Senior Cao’s matured seaweed clone had reproduced a pattern matching Dantai Jingyu’s divination, suggesting Cao was still alive but trapped somewhere. After investigating Cao’s birthplace with Hai Dafu, Lin Mo conjectured that the undersea currents might lead to the Other Planes.
Hai Dafu explained that the Spirit Origin Continent was Senior Cao's homeland and opened a plane passage so Lin Mo could travel there. Lin Mo entered the passage, protected by the Spirit Tortoise Shell Armor, as Hai Dafu held it open.
Lin Mo discovered a vast population of giant turtles feeding on seemingly endless seaweed in the Spirit Origin Continent and suspected they were descendants of the Eastern Isle Old Turtle. After following their leader for three days and two nights, he reached a human-inhabited island that was itself an enormous turtle.
Lin Mo met the Super Giant Turtle and learned that the Spirit Origin Continent had been devastated by a fiend and its Evil Spirit Clones. The continent’s few survivors depended on the aging Turtle Ancestor, while Lin Mo recognized that its Evil Soul Seals resembled the corruption affecting Xun Bin and the Sword Sect’s Ninth Elder.
Lin Mo learned that the Spirit Plant Temple held nine Starry Ancient Swords and set out to retrieve them, revealing his World Tree bloodline and promising to return within three days. Elsewhere, a blue-robed cultivator disguised as an eerie young man killed his companion while pursuing the swords.
Lin Mo continued killing soul slaves in the Ancient Ge Mountains while disguising himself, but the evil spirits linked their life auras and ordered them to kill anyone suspicious. A soul slave recognized Lin Mo’s impersonation of Guo Xiong and attacked him with a giant mountain.
Lin Mo was exposed when the Heavenheart Sunflower Gall failed to mimic a soul slave’s altered life aura, but he killed the attacker and uncovered the red mist’s role in identifying him. As he resolved to face the Spirit Plant Temple alone, an alluring female soul slave attacked his mind with a sound-wave ability.
Lin Mo broke free of Hu Niangzi’s charm and fought back against the Nascent Soul middle-stage cultivator with his treasures and wood techniques. After transforming into a Wood Spirit Incarnation, he formed a weakened Big Dipper Sword Formation and cut Hu Niangzi in two.
Lin Mo captured Hu Niangzi’s nascent soul and brought her into the Treasure Gourd’s world, where he forced her to reveal what had happened at the Spirit Plant Divine Hall. Her account left him facing a Hundred-Flower Nether Venerable who was likely as powerful as a first- or second-layer Spirit Transformation cultivator.
Lin Mo learned that the Hundred-Flower Nether Lord and two Nascent Soul Late Stage cultivators guarded the Starry Ancient Swords, then resolved to steal the swords rather than confront them directly. After killing Hu Niangzi, he prepared a formation and used her corpse as bait to draw the soul slaves into an ambush.
Lin Mo confronted the Soul Slaves who gathered around Hu Niangzi’s corpse and wiped out hundreds of them with golden vines. After sparing three Golden Core Soul Slaves who retained some humanity, he set off for the Spirit Plant Divine Hall.
Lin Mo attacked Hundred-Flower Nether Lord at the Spirit Plant Divine Hall, hoping to reach the nine Starry Ancient Swords. The two white-robed elders sacrificed themselves in a fiery explosion that engulfed Hundred-Flower Nether Lord, leaving the battle’s outcome uncertain.
After two white-robed elders sacrificed themselves to cripple the Hundred-Flower Nether Lord, Lin Mo recovered nine more Starry Ancient Swords and used the Big Dipper Sword Formation to destroy the enemy. The eighteen swords then fused into nine brand-new longswords before him.
After fusing the Starry Ancient Swords and killing the Hundred-Flower Nether Lord, Lin Mo faced the Spirit Origin Continent’s expulsion and prepared to return to the Divine Continent. He left the tall old man a golden vine as a way to call for help, then contacted Hai Dafu from the plane barrier.
Lin Mo returned from the Spirit Origin Continent and warned Hai Dafu, Xue Qingcheng, and Hai Beier that evil soul seals threatened cultivators across the Divine Continent. He set a plan in motion to mass-produce Nine-Turn Demon-Cleansing Pills and left with Xue Qingcheng to hunt the evil spirit incarnation.
Lin Mo used his World Tree bloodline to search the Southern Frontier for the Evil Spirit Incarnation, while he and Xue Qingcheng awkwardly discussed their relationship. He found the incarnation in an underground chamber about seven million li away and set off with Xue Qingcheng to confront him.