Devouring Furnace

The instant the Blood Devouring Banner flew from his grasp, Lu Chen swept over like a phantom, hooked the banner pole with his blade, spun, and retreated.

"You dare..."

Blood Owl's eyes nearly split with rage as he formed a hand seal and detonated the remaining Blood Puppets.

Hundreds of streaks of blood light came hurtling over like meteors. The moment they entered thirty feet around Lu Chen, the suddenly unfurled Qi and Blood Domain crushed them into bloody mist.

The furnace's ghostly glow swept across the battlefield, drawing all the wreckage littering the ground into its depths.

Lu Chen toyed with the dimmed Blood Devouring Banner. "Let's see what good stuff you can refine."

"Damn it!" Blood Owl's furious roar faded farther and farther away, while dread filled his heart.

He had encountered Lu Chen earlier, but had returned to camp on urgent business. He had never expected this brat to be so powerful.

The Blood Devouring Banner—a Mid-grade Spirit Artifact—had fallen into the other party's hands just like that. It was utterly infuriating.

The Myriad Manifestations Furnace shook violently, and the wailing of the vengeful spirits within the banner gradually died away.

What finally surfaced was not the Blood Jade he had expected, but a pitch-black fragment.

Lu Chen blinked.

A Law Fragment.

He took out an external furnace and merged it into the fragment.

The furnace shuddered, and the spiritual energy around it surged into it like a raging torrent.

"Holy shit, it can devour automatically!" Lu Chen stared wide-eyed.

This external furnace had not only transformed into a Mid-grade Spirit Artifact, but had also gained the ability to devour automatically.

With a thought, Lu Chen drew the external furnace into his body.

In an instant, dense mist wrapped around him.

Lu Chen's gaze flickered.

He could use it to replenish energy in ordinary times.

In other words, he no longer needed to fight monsters specifically to replenish his energy.

It could save him a great deal of time.

"Then I'll call it the Devouring Furnace!"

Of the three external furnaces he had refined so far, two had developed traits of their own.

One was the Asura Furnace, and one was the Devouring Furnace.

Furthermore, the energy they stored could be shared between them.

After resting for half a day and restoring himself to peak condition, Lu Chen continued deeper into the Blood Fiend Battlefield.

As he passed over a low hill piled high with white bones, he suddenly stopped.

Seven black shadows emerged from the void. The two in the lead wore black robes embroidered with gold, and the Golden Core pressure around them crashed down like collapsing mountains.

"Brat?" The cultivator on the left sneered, his bone staff blazing with ghostly blue flames. "Hand over the Ancient Demon Remnant Limb, and I'll leave you an intact corpse!"

Clearly, the fleeing Blood Owl had already shared the news.

"Where did you people get such confidence?" Lu Chen was almost angered into laughter.

The Ancient Demon Remnant Limb had remained here for years. They had lacked the ability to obtain it, yet now they wanted to rob the one who had.

Were their brains full of shit?

Before his words had faded, the cultivator on the right formed a hand seal and summoned three carrion-bone demon vultures.

The vultures' wings whipped up a foul wind, while venom condensed into an arrowstorm and poured down.

Lu Chen lightly tapped off the ground, pushing the Wind and Thunder Steps to the limit. His body became an afterimage that slipped through the rain of arrows.

The Soul Severing Saber carved an arc through the air. Its blade aura swept out like a blood-red crescent moon, and three vulture heads flew away in response.

"You're courting death!" The two Golden Core cultivators flew into a rage, their bone staff and long halberd striking together in a burst of blinding Spiritual Light.

The formation patterns on the ground suddenly flared. Thousands of blood spikes burst from the earth, trapping Lu Chen in the center.

They had actually arranged this in advance.

"Is that all you've got?" Lu Chen sneered as the Devouring Furnace suddenly inverted.

Ghostly light poured from its mouth like a black-hole vortex. The blood spikes shattered inch by inch, transforming into pure energy that surged into the furnace.

Borrowing the momentum, he spun and drove his right fist, carrying the might of the Earth Shattering Collapse Fist, at the cultivator on the left.

The air exploded wherever his fist wind passed.

The cultivator hastily raised his bone staff to block, but his face changed drastically the instant they made contact.

Cracks spread across the staff like a spiderweb before it exploded on the spot.

The remaining force of the punch did not diminish, blasting the entire man into the rock wall.

As shattered stones rattled down, the Asura Furnace had already swept his corpse into its flames.

"You're next." Lu Chen turned toward the halberd-wielding cultivator. Three clones split from the furnace and formed a triangular encirclement.

The man recoiled in terror, but the Qi and Blood Domain crushed him so thoroughly that he could not move an inch.

Four streaks of blade light crossed and fell. His Golden Core and magical artifact alike were ground into fragments.

The remaining five Foundation Establishment cultivators were scared out of their wits. They crushed escape talismans and fled as streaks of light.

Lu Chen did not pursue them. Instead, he swept the two Golden Core cultivators into the Myriad Manifestations Furnace and refined them together.

The soul energy of the two surged into his sea of consciousness, greatly strengthening his divine soul as his soul flame slowly burned.

The next two days passed without incident.

Lu Chen slew quite a few Blood Fiend Fierce Demons, including no shortage of third-rank demon beasts.

He collected several third-rank demon cores.

As for Golden Core fragments, he had far more of those.

Before coming here, he had killed ten Golden Core experts at Tianyu Academy and collected ten fragments.

Adding those he had killed here, he now had eighteen.

"Hm?" He suddenly frowned.

He stood at the edge of a swamp.

Rotting leaves lay soft as a carpet, while the surroundings were silent and fraught with hidden danger.

Then, a woman's sobs drifted over on the wind, mournful and heartrending.

Lu Chen's eyes narrowed. The Soul Severing Saber swept out, cleaving a gap through the mist with its blade aura.

A woman in blood-red robes knelt beneath a dead tree, cradling an infant's remains in her arms.

She raised her head, revealing Han Qingxue's face. Two trails of bloody tears ran from the corners of her eyes. "Why did you kill my child..."

An illusion!

Lu Chen's mind shook violently, and memories surged over him like a tide:

In the Lu Family dungeon of Chixiao City, Lu Ran had grinned viciously as he carved out Lu Chen's heart Essence Blood;

At the beast arena of Cangwu City, the searing pain of demon beast fangs tearing open his chest...

"Break!" he roared, and the furnace in his qi sea exploded with blazing flames.

The illusion shattered like colored glass. Countless vengeful spirits shrieked as they condensed into a giant palm that slammed down.

Lu Chen neither dodged nor retreated. The Devouring Furnace opened wide and swallowed the giant palm whole.

Pure soul energy entered his sea of consciousness.

His soul flame surged violently and was completely ignited.

Peak ninth level of the Qi Surge Realm.

Lu Chen carefully sensed his condition. He could clearly feel that the heavenly punishment for his breakthrough would arrive soon.

He swept his gaze around, then abruptly looked up.

Nascent Soul pressure suddenly descended from overhead.

Ji Wujue arrived atop a Bronze Chariot, tearing through the clouds.

A hunched old man followed at his side, his withered hand gripping a string of white bone prayer beads.

"Old Monster Feng'an, capture him alive." Greed filled Ji Wujue's face. "This heir wants his furnace!"

The old man bared blackened yellow teeth in a grin, and the prayer beads erupted with pale ghostfire.

The ground split open with a boom. Nine Golden Core Corpse Puppets burst from the earth, ghostly green soul flames burning in their eye sockets.

Lu Chen sneered and turned through the air with the Wind and Thunder Steps, deliberately luring the Corpse Puppets toward the Fierce Demons deep within the swamp.

The Devouring Furnace inverted and spewed flames. The demon horde instantly erupted into chaos and battled the Corpse Puppets in a tangled mass.

Old Monster Feng'an formed a hand seal to control the Corpse Puppets, but Lu Chen seized the opening.

The Soul Severing Saber, wrapped in soul flame, came crashing down. Ji Wujue raised his halberd to block, yet the lingering blade aura still sliced away a large chunk of flesh from his left shoulder.

"Little bastard!" Old Monster Feng'an was enraged beyond measure. With a flick of his hand, he threw out a skull.

The skull rapidly swelled, opening its mouth to devour Lu Chen.

"Perfect!" Lu Chen laughed loudly, and his soul flame condensed into a giant net that instead covered the ghostly face.

While it struggled, he transformed into a streak of light and fled deep into the tide of Fierce Demons, leaving only a long howl echoing across the heavens:

"You want the furnace? Catch up to me first, then we'll talk!"

"Chase!" Ji Wujue's eyes were bloodshot, and killing intent boiled around him.

A dignified peak Golden Core cultivator had nearly lost an arm. What humiliation!

The Bronze Chariot transformed into a long rainbow and gave chase.

With Lu Chen's current extraordinary battle prowess, he could fight Old Monster Feng'an.

But he faintly sensed that the old thing had a killing move.

And there was also a peak Golden Core cultivator watching him like a tiger eyeing its prey.

The other party was very likely Ji Wujue, the second heir of King Yanbei.

But were there really only two of them?

Retreating first was the wiser choice.

But he had vastly underestimated their greed for his furnace. They clung to his heels and pursued him relentlessly.