Demonic Arts and Immortal Techniques Refine Jade Crab, Creation Struggles to Settle Five Elements Method

On the Colorful-Luan Spirit Ship, Heng Hua had his mind ape circulate the Creation's Epoch-Reunion Art to restore his qi while he focused on crafting a puppet.

With two minds in one body, he could naturally divide his attention between two tasks.

That was the advantage of the Creation's Epoch-Reunion Art. While the main body attended to other matters, the mind ape could keep the technique running, never idling for a single moment.

The palm-sized golden disc was densely fitted with dozens of thumb-sized gears. As Creation true qi flowed through it, the disc creaked and whirred.

After he mounted the crab demon's eight jade crab legs, the base plate automatically crawled across the table.

Heng Hua then fashioned a crystalline, translucent crab shell from jade and fitted it over the frame.

Finally, he repaired that pair of great claws.

"Young Master, no matter how I look at it, this mechanical beast doesn't seem capable of matching a Foundation Establishment Realm cultivator, does it?"

"It isn't finished yet. What are you rushing for?"

The crab demon's remaining great claws had been shattered by Xiang Feng. Looking at the fragmented wreckage, Heng Hua brought his hands together and silently chanted an incantation.

The moment Xiaoyu heard the first few words, her expression changed. She instinctively glanced toward the door.

The girl furrowed her brow, displeased, and could only secretly console herself. It's fine. This isn't an evil art, not an evil art.

Gray streams of qi rose from Heng Hua's fingertips, adhering the fragments together piece by piece. Once the two great claws had been reassembled, a pale golden sheen flowed along their cracks, tracing two strange spell-totem patterns.

Demonic Dao totems.

Xiaoyu's face darkened. She wanted to speak, yet stopped herself, struggling for a long while before finally enduring it.

"Don't worry. I know my limits. Besides, this isn't an evil art. It's merely an unorthodox spell with the tiniest connection to the Heavenly Demon Secret Art."

Xiaoyu sighed.

There was not much she could say.

She understood that this was an immortal technique Young Master had adapted by drawing upon the Heavenly Demon Secret Art. Driven by immortal true essence, it not only cleansed away the strange, sinister aura of heavenly demons, but also blended in the essence of immortal mirage arts.

Yes, it was immortal, not demonic... not demonic...

After repairing the great claws, Heng Hua assembled them again.

At this point, the crab puppet was complete. It was a palm-sized mechanical crab of green jade.

As the puppet base plate operated, the jade crab scuttled sideways across the table. Its movements were stiff, however, and it had only a single crawling pattern.

"Xiaoyu, help me catch some crabs from the water. I want to add some vitality to it."

"Young Master, the Heavenly Demon Form-Melding Art you improved truly has nothing to do with evil arts. But Vitality Form Refinement is a genuine evil technique. Young Master, forgive me, but I cannot obey."

One taboo of Yanshi Puppetcraft was using blood sacrifices to grant puppets vitality. Human puppets used human sacrifices. A crab puppet would naturally use crabs for blood sacrifice.

Heng Hua said helplessly, "It isn't a human puppet. It's only a crab."

The old master had long instructed them that if he ever used an evil art, they were to inform him without fail.

Today, he would use crabs and lower his bottom line. Tomorrow, he would use corpses; the day after, he could use living enemies.

That was how bottom lines were lowered, step by step.

Xiaoyu refused to yield even an inch, meeting Heng Hua's gaze.

Heng Hua glared back. Though she felt a little intimidated, she forced herself to say, "I'll tell Hengshou and have him come persuade you."

Seeing her about to leave, Heng Hua sighed.

"You and Hengshou were helpers Mother chose for me. You're House He people, not Fu Family people. Why are you so obedient to the old master's words?"

In the end, Heng Hua knew right from wrong. He understood that Xiaoyu meant well, so he simply softened.

"On this matter alone, Hengshou and I will follow the old master's arrangements. Young Master, evil arts affect the mind. You absolutely must not touch them."

Other matters could be compromised on, but one's bottom line could not be yielded.

Xiaoyu and Hengshou had sworn together that they would never allow Young Master to be tainted by evil arts.

"Forget it."

Heng Hua picked up the remaining Bright Moon Pearls he had obtained the previous night.

Creation true qi wrapped around the Bright Moon Pearls, making them float around the jade crab. Black qi surged from Heng Hua's palms as he crushed the pearls one after another, injecting the river clam demon's essence into the crab puppet.

"Then this young master will use another technique."

Seeing Heng Hua employ another demonic Dao secret art, Xiaoyu was still unwilling. Yet she barely held herself back and did not continue butting heads with him.

As long as it didn't cross into evil arts, it was fine. As long as it wasn't an evil art, it was fine...

But when she thought of all those secret arts Fu Henghua cultivated, Xiaoyu's head ached a hundred times over.

"Those people really were something else. Of all places, they had to hide their cultivation techniques and secret arts among mortal books. Wasn't that simply putting them there for people like Young Master to cultivate?"

"That will do."

After Heng Hua finished casting the spell, the jade crab was visibly more spirited. It crawled down from the table and moved back and forth through the room.

"But this jade crab still looks inferior even to a Foundation Establishment—"

Whoosh—

One of the jade crab's legs aimed at Xiaoyu, and a leg-sword shot out like a gust of wind.

Xiaoyu hurriedly swept her sleeve, knocking aside the leg-sword, only to see three more leg-swords flying toward her in rapid succession.

The girl's thoughts fell into disarray as she hastily cast spells to deal with them.

In the end, Heng Hua was the one who recalled the weapons.

"Well?"

"It can only launch sneak attacks in the dark. It cannot confront cultivators head-on."

Xiaoyu estimated that even a Foundation Establishment cultivator like herself, who was not skilled in battle, could defeat this jade crab puppet after calming down. Even an ordinary maid on Coiling Dragon Island might be startled at first, but could gradually defeat it once she composed herself.

"Young Master cut down too much on materials. This crab shell is merely a piece of green jade. A casual palm strike could shatter it."

"That's why it still needs further processing. But for now, it will barely suffice."

Heng Hua held the jade crab in his palm and secretly hid the mind ape inside it.

The primary purpose of creating the crab puppet was to provide the mind ape with a vessel.

After sending Xiaoyu off to watch over Fu Heyi, Heng Hua held the jade crab and rose to pace around the room. He tested moving with both minds at once, estimating how long the mind ape could remain outside.

After the time it took to burn one stick of incense, the mind ape still showed no fatigue, as if it could remain housed within the jade crab for a long time.

Heng Hua was overjoyed. "The Soul-Hosting Spell I carved into the crab shell really works. In the future, with the mind ape controlling the puppet, I can pass it off as a Foundation Establishment Realm puppet, and no one will discover the truth."

Letting the jade crab move around at his side, Heng Hua turned to calculating the Creation's Epoch-Reunion Art.

Within his Niwan Palace, a Five Elements Divine Mountain wreathed in five kinds of qi suppressed the mind ape. Then a holy monk came from the west, unsealing Five Elements Mountain and releasing the mind ape. At Eagle Sorrow Ravine, the mind ape subdued the intention steed, refined Samadhi Fire, and entered the Intention Steed Realm...

The mind ape could not settle; the intention steed galloped in all directions.

The two were originally the chaotic thoughts of the human heart.

In the Intention Steed Realm, much as in the initial Spirit Embryo Realm, the mind ape and intention steed formed into two externalized thoughts. Because these thoughts were restless and wild, stirring heart-fire, they could accelerate cultivation in the True Flame Realm.

Heng Hua was in no hurry to complete the calming Bodhi Heart-Cultivation Method. He intended to use the turbulent thoughts of the mind ape and intention steed to quickly break through the True Flame Realm. Once he reached the Mysterious Embryo Realm, he would use calming techniques to suppress the heart-fire, turning it into the fires of literary and martial dragons and tigers, refining Golden Core jade liquid.

Yet Heng Hua still had not figured out exactly how to cultivate in the Mysterious Embryo Realm.

"By rights, I should use the master and four disciples, together with the intention steed, to form the foundation of the five elements. Then, through the innate Five Elements Dao formed by Five Elements Divine Mountain, I can forge a Great Dao Golden Core."

Heng Hua had even worked out a rough outline for the later Golden Core Realm.

Five Villages meant the five viscera, the abode of the five elements.

Using Five Elements Mountain to correspond to Five Villages Temple, and the Ginseng Fruit's "mystery of immortality" as a metaphor for the Great Dao Golden Core. Master and disciples gathered together, the five elements returned to one. After enduring the Four Sages' Chanxin Trial and passing the tribulations of inner demons, one could forge a Great Dao Golden Core and step through the gate of the immortal Dao of longevity.

But the prerequisite Mysterious Embryo Realm—how to use the master and disciples to correspond to the five elements—had Heng Hua stumped.

"Golden Lord, Wood Mother, and Earth Granny are not difficult to understand. Only Tang Monk and the intention steed make it hard to determine water and fire."

As stray thoughts surged in his mind, the mind ape within the jade crab once again showed signs of agitation.

Heng Hua opened his eyes and caught the jade crab in his hand. "Eight Trigrams Furnace."

Qian, Kan, Gen, Zhen, Xun, Li, Kun, Dui.

The eight trigrams manifested and transformed once more into a great furnace, swallowing the mind ape.

Once the mind ape had settled, he housed it in the jade crab again.

He raised his head and looked toward the sundial timepiece.

"An hour has passed? It's time to go restore the water map."

Holding the jade crab in one hand and pushing open the door with the other, Heng Hua walked to the bow and said, "Third Brother, I've recovered. I'll help restore the lo—"

His gaze darkened as he saw Fu Xiangfeng drinking tea with a red-clothed youth.

Water-and-fire cultivation method, solid Dao foundation, True Flame Realm.

A second glance revealed a protective treasure robe made of fire-cloud brocade and profound ice silk, boots made from dragon hide, and a wooden sword on his back made from millennium peachwood—spirit-wood grade.

This person had an extraordinary background. He needed to be careful.

Heng Hua's mind raced as he approached with a smile.

"Brother, who is this young friend?"