26: Nine Cauldrons Refining Soul

When Lin Yuan's vision cleared, a cold sensation traveled up from the soles of his feet. He was standing on an ancient and massive bronze platform. The metal ground was bone-chillingly cold, and the complex runes engraved upon it seemed to possess life, breathing with a faint, eerie light in rhythm with some mysterious cadence.

In the center of the platform, nine massive cauldrons, as towering as mountains, floated in the void. They were arranged in a perfect circular array. A heart-stopping torrent of energy flowed across the bodies of the cauldrons; merely gazing at them made one's Soul tremble!

"The Ultimate Trial of the Second Heaven: Nine Cauldrons Soul Refining!"

A grand and cold voice, like the will of the Universe itself, rumbled and echoed throughout the boundless starry sky. Every syllable caused the bronze platform beneath their feet to hum and vibrate: "Step upon the Nine Cauldrons, refine the Divine Soul! With each cauldron passed, your Mental Energy will undergo a qualitative sublimation! However, remember this—"

The voice suddenly turned sharp, like a cold wind from the Nine Hells scraping across the Soul: "This is a purgatory of life and death! In the first cauldron, thirty percent of those in history have perished! In the second cauldron, ninety-nine percent are eliminated! Five days from now, during the Mental Energy test, only the top ten thousand will be able to enter the Third Heaven!"

Before the voice had even faded, Lin Yuan's figure shot toward the first massive bronze cauldron like an arrow from a bowstring! At the mouth of the cauldron, cyan Soul Fire flickered like a venomous snake, and the space at the edges of the flames was scorched, twisted, and blurred. Without the slightest hesitation, he stepped inside!

Hiss—!

The Soul Fire seemed to have caught the scent of a delicacy; it instantly came alive, transforming into countless cyan fire snakes that coiled crazily around him. It did not burn his Physical Body but instead drilled directly into his glabella, fiercely licking and incinerating the Origin of his Sea of Consciousness!

"Aaaaah—!"

A shrill, miserable scream exploded from not far away at almost the same moment! An Ultimate Realm Expert fell to his knees, clutching his head tightly with both hands. Strands of blood emitting a golden radiance seeped from his seven orifices!

Even more terrifyingly, at his glabella, his skin and bones were making unbearable "crack" sounds. Beams of blinding golden light were shooting out from the fissures—a sign that his Sea of Consciousness was collapsing and his Divine Soul was about to disintegrate!

Lin Yuan was enduring the same boundless agony of his Divine Soul being torn apart and roasted over a blazing fire! But his tenacious will was like a rock. Amidst the intense pain, he keenly captured the violent yet pure tempering power deep within the Soul Fire.

He endured the pain, sat cross-legged, and sank his consciousness into his Sea of Consciousness. He actually took the initiative to guide that destructive Soul Fire, constructing a spiraling passage within his churning ocean of spirit! The violent energy was forcibly organized and guided, turning into a tempering fire that forged his Mental Energy Origin over and over again!

Three hours felt like three years of torment. When Lin Yuan stepped out of the first cauldron, his aura was even more condensed and restrained, and his Mental Energy had soared from 270 stars to 300 stars! The barriers of his Sea of Consciousness had become significantly tougher!

However, the scene before him made his pupils contract sharply—the bronze platform, which had been packed with people, was now nearly one-third empty! Among the survivors, many lay collapsed on the ground like mud. Without exception, all of them had a charred, twisted Soul Fire mark branded on their glabella, emitting wisps of smoke, their spirits utterly withered.

"It's... it's only the first cauldron!"

"That fire... it burns directly on the Soul..."

"I can't do it... let's end it here..."

Just then, a staggering figure stumbled out of an adjacent massive cauldron. Purple Rakshasa had a streak of blinding golden blood hanging from her crimson lips, her aura chaotic. She looked at Lin Yuan with resentment and a hint of suspicion: "Heh... you bumpkin from the Xuanmu District, your Mental Energy..."

Her mockery came to an abrupt halt, as if she had been strangled by the throat, because she clearly saw that deep within Lin Yuan's glabella, the circulating purple-gold light was even more solid and profound than her own! An invisible sense of oppression made her heart tremble.

The second massive crimson cauldron seemed to be cast from solidified magma, with dark red veins like living blood vessels floating on its surface. Merely approaching it, a mental pressure so heavy it was suffocating descended with a boom. The air seemed to have turned into viscous lead and mercury, and every breath pulled at the pain in his Soul.

"That famous Prodigy from the previous batch... perished in this cauldron..."

"A hundred times the Divine Sense pressure... it's not something a human can endure..."

The discussions were filled with despair. More than half of the Cultivators chose to sit down on the spot, their faces ashen, completely abandoning the thought of continuing the challenge.

Lin Yuan took a deep breath and stepped into the crimson cauldron!

Boom!

It was as if he had instantly fallen into a bottomless abyss! An invisible, unimaginably heavy pressure squeezed in crazily from all directions! His Sea of Consciousness was like a fragile bubble thrown into a ten-thousand-ton hydraulic press, instantly deformed by the pressure!

The surface of the "substance" that made up his spirit body let out a groan of being overwhelmed, cracking open with shocking fissures! The intense pain felt like billions of steel needles stabbing into his Soul simultaneously!

"Grandmist Evolution, Nine Spirals Stabilize the Sea!" Lin Yuan roared in his heart! Deep within his Sea of Consciousness, that strand of Primordial Purple Qi erupted with a boom, instantly separating and circulating, constructing nine layers of nested, slowly rotating, dazzling star spirals within the violently shaking Sea of Consciousness! The terrifying pressure that was enough to crush stars was layered, guided, and dispersed by this exquisite structure!

Six hours, every second of which was a race against annihilation. When Lin Yuan stepped out of the second cauldron, covered in blood as if he had been fished out of a pool of blood, the scene on the bronze platform could only be described as "tragic and inhumane"!

Looking around, the figures that had originally been packed densely were now reduced to a sparse few hundred people! Although many Cultivators had barely managed to save their lives, their eyes were hollow and dull, like walking corpses; clearly, the Origin of their Divine Sense had suffered irreversible, heavy damage, and they were completely crippled.

"Not... not even one in a hundred survives..."

"Inside the cauldron... I heard the shrieks of ten thousand ghosts devouring Souls..."

The voices of the survivors carried uncontrollable trembling; the arrogance they once held as kings of the Ultimate Realm had long been crushed to pieces by boundless fear.

Lin Yuan's Mental Energy had climbed to 350 stars! He scanned the area and noticed Bai Li, who was leaning against the cauldron wall, gasping for breath not far away. This proud daughter of heaven from Yuqing Palace had her moon-white robe completely soaked through with cold sweat, clinging to her exquisite curves, her face pale as paper; she had clearly reached her limit.

When she raised her head with difficulty and met Lin Yuan's calm gaze, a complex emotion, mixed with shock and disbelief that could not be concealed, flashed for the first time deep within her cold, clear eyes.

"The third cauldron..." Bai Li's voice, carried through Divine Sense, was noticeably weak and contained a trace of imperceptible fear. "The Inner Demon Tribulation... it will manifest the deepest, most terrifying nightmare within your heart... striking directly at the soft underbelly of your Soul... are you... really going to go?" The slight tremor in her transmission exposed her deep wariness of this cauldron.

Lin Yuan's answer was a silent and firm stride. He walked straight toward the third massive cauldron, which was entirely golden and exuded a psychedelic halo. A seven-colored vortex rotated at the mouth of the cauldron; merely making eye contact with it made one's Soul turn upside down and one's consciousness blur.

Stepping inside, time and space were inverted!

The scent of grass in the training field, the warm touch of the sunlight—everything was suffocatingly real. Inside the Spirit Martial Hall of the Xuanmu District, Mu Qingge was standing with her back to him, instructing the students on practicing basic sword forms. That familiar back, the fresh fragrance of vegetation permeating the air...

"Lin Yuan?" Mu Qingge suddenly turned around, a gentle smile blooming on her face that was warmer than the sun and capable of melting all ice. "What are you daydreaming about? Come over here and help me see where this 'Flowing Wind and Returning Snow' form needs improvement..." Her voice was crisp and melodious, carrying unreserved trust and closeness.

The scene twisted and collapsed without warning! Blood gushed out like a fountain from Mu Qingge's chest, instantly staining her simple white dress red! She looked down in disbelief at the cold, blood-dripping sword blade that had pierced through her chest. When she looked up at Lin Yuan again, those bright eyes were filled with endless pain, confusion, and... a trace of questioning.

"Why..." Her voice was as faint as a gossamer thread.

"This is the price for the ridiculous power you seek!" A humanoid figure shrouded in thick, dark shadows grinned hideously behind Lin Yuan and violently pulled back the blood-stained sword. Mu Qingge collapsed to the ground like a broken doll. "Everyone you care about, everything you cherish, will all... vanish into smoke because of your greed! Who will be next? Hahaha!"

Heart-rending pain, monstrous rage, and the intent to destroy everything instantly engulfed Lin Yuan!

"A realistic enough illusion, pointing straight to the heart..." Lin Yuan's voice rang out at this moment, unusually calm, terrifyingly calm. In his eyes, a point of purple-gold light suddenly lit up, like the first ray of light after the creation of the world! "Unfortunately—"

"Grandmist as a sword, severing all falsehoods!"

Within his Sea of Consciousness, the dormant Primordial Purple Qi erupted suddenly, transforming into billions of purple-gold sword beams condensed to the extreme! These sword beams contained the supreme dao rhyme that could pierce through all falsehoods and sever all obsessions!

Wherever the sword light passed, that deep Inner Demon Tribulation illusion, which was enough to make countless Prodigies sink and collapse, let out "hissing" wails like ice thrown into the blazing sun, disintegrating inch by inch and turning into nothingness!

Three cauldrons of heart refining, breaking through illusions to return to the truth. When Lin Yuan stepped out of the third golden cauldron, his Mental Energy had violently broken through to 420 stars! And the scene on the bronze platform at this moment was like a Shura ghost realm—there were fewer than a hundred survivors left!

Purple Rakshasa looked like a mad demon, crazily scratching her own arms with her fingernails. Her flesh was blurred, deep to the bone, and she let out unconscious roars. It wasn't until a certain moment that she shuddered violently, a glimmer of clarity returning to her eyes, only to be immediately drowned in immense pain and shame.

Bai Li was kneeling on the ground, her body convulsing and retching violently, as if she wanted to vomit out her very Soul. Further away, a black-robed man with a cold aura was holding a pitch-black dagger, expressionlessly slicing open the flesh at his glabella inch by inch, blood dripping, as if trying to dig out the thing inside that was driving him mad...

Lin Yuan's gaze turned toward the fourth massive cauldron, which shimmered with silver light. On the surface of the cauldron, countless twisted, painful, wailing human face reliefs constantly appeared and disappeared, as if imprisoning the desperate memories of billions of living beings.

"The fourth cauldron... Memory Purgatory..." Bai Li's voice, hoarse like sandpaper rubbing, came from behind. She was barely supporting her body, her eyes lingering with immense fear. "It will force you... to relive over and over... all the most painful, most unwilling-to-remember past... Every memory... carries a primal curse... enough to... completely destroy your will..." She looked at Lin Yuan as if looking at a warrior about to step into a true Hell, or... a madman.

Lin Yuan's footsteps did not stop; he stepped into the silver cauldron.

Boom!

Countless shattered fragments of time, like poisoned blades, carried the most primal and intense emotions of pain, regret, and despair, stabbing fiercely into his Sea of Consciousness! The helplessness of being bullied in childhood, the heart-rending pain of a loved one's passing, the fear of facing death countless times, the coldness of betrayal...

These memories, which he had buried deep in his heart, were now brutally dug out, wrapped in a thousand-fold impact of negative emotions, crazily tearing at his spirit body! The "light" that made up his spirit body began to dim and disintegrate rapidly, like a candle in the wind!

At the critical moment! Deepest within his Sea of Consciousness, that strand of Primordial Purple Qi seemed to be stimulated by the extreme pain; it suddenly collapsed and rotated, transforming into an ancient, vast, purple-gold furnace emitting an endless sense of smelting!

"Grandmist Furnace, Refine!"

Lin Yuan's will roared! He no longer resisted; instead, he took the initiative to throw those memory fragments carrying endless pain, like firewood, fiercely into that Grandmist Furnace! The furnace fire roared and surged! The pain was forged, the memories were purified, and the Impurities were burned away! The purest power of the Mental Energy Origin flowed out from the furnace instead, nourishing his spirit body that was on the verge of collapse!

Seven days of purgatory, turning suffering into strength! When Lin Yuan stepped out of the giant silver cauldron once again, his aura had become even more harmonious and profound, and his Mental Energy had not decreased but instead risen, reaching a staggering 500 stars!

Outside the cauldron, only three tottering figures remained:

All of Bai Li's fingernails had been torn back, leaving her fingers a bloody mess; she had clearly endured unimaginable struggles within the illusion.

Purple Rakshasa's signature demonic purple hair had now turned completely withered and deathly pale!

And that black-robed man, Nether Spring, was left with only a gaping, pitch-black hole in his left eye socket, from which black blood continuously seeped—he had actually gouged out that eye himself after it had fallen into madness and become uncontrollable!

"You..." Bai Li's voice was broken and fragmented. Looking at Lin Yuan's almost unscathed state, her eyes were filled with extreme shock and a trace of bewilderment, "...You actually... came out... without a scratch?"

Nether Spring's only remaining eye stared fixedly at Lin Yuan. That gaze was like a viper in the abyss—cold, venomous, yet carrying a trace of fanatical excitement at discovering prey.

The corners of his mouth curled into an extremely ugly arc, and he let out a hoarse laugh: "Heh heh heh... Interesting... It seems this boring trial... finally has a little... fun that can pique my interest..."

Climbing the Purgatory, every step stained with blood.

The subsequent trials increased in cruelty at a geometric rate:

The Fifth Cauldron: Consciousness Split! One's spirit is forcibly torn into hundreds of pieces and simultaneously cast into different space-time illusions—be it as an emperor, a beggar, or a Yao Beast... One must maintain their one true self amidst the impact of countless identities and scenes. A moment of carelessness, and one's consciousness would completely dissipate, turning them into a walking corpse.

The Sixth Cauldron: Time Turbulence! Falling into a bizarre vortex of time, fragments of the past, present, and future collide crazily; one second you are elderly and frail, the next you are a newborn. You must anchor your "present" self within this ever-changing, logic-defying space-time, or be exiled by eternal time, leading to the exhaustion of your Divine Soul.

When Lin Yuan successfully stepped out of the Seventh Cauldron, his Mental Energy was like a divine weapon forged through a thousand hammerings, reaching a terrifying 800 stars! Every step was taken over invisible corpses.

The moment he stepped into the Eighth Cauldron, Lin Yuan found himself in an endless, ancient battlefield filled with Death Qi! Corpses were piled like mountains, and tattered banners fluttered in the silent, bloody wind.

"Roar—!" The earth-shaking sounds of slaughter tore through the dead silence! Tens of thousands of spirit warriors clad in broken armor and wielding decaying weapons, like an undead army returning from Hell, locked onto Lin Yuan simultaneously!

Their killing intent condensed into substance, transforming into blood-colored thunder rolling and roaring across the sky, illuminating the entire battlefield in a scarlet hue!

"Kill—!!!" "Devour the intruder!!" "Defeat them! Or become our eternal nourishment!" The cold, ruthless proclamations echoed over the battlefield.

The first warrior, wielding a giant axe and carrying a gale that could tear the Soul apart, had already struck down toward the top of Lin Yuan's head!

Lin Yuan instinctively wanted to dodge, but was shocked to discover that in this pure mental battlefield, his "movements" were more than ten times slower! All physical Laws were ineffective; reaction, speed, and strength all depended on the intensity and application of Mental Energy!

Puchi! Unable to dodge in time, his mental left arm was severed at the shoulder by the giant axe! A sharp pain originating from the source of his Soul, far exceeding physical injury by a thousand times, instantly swept through his entire body! Lin Yuan let out a muffled groan, his mental body fluctuating violently.

"Cannot fight head-on! Must use skill to break strength!" As the thought flashed through his mind, purple light erupted in Lin Yuan's eyes! His vast Mental Energy no longer condensed into a form, but instantly split and extended, transforming into billions of purple-gold threads, thinner than hair yet incomparably tough!

These threads, like a living spider web, spread silently and precisely pierced into the glabella of every charging spirit warrior—the location of their core mental Origin!

"Soul Devour!" The purple-gold threads vibrated crazily, like greedy roots, and began to forcibly extract and devour the pure Mental Energy of those warriors! With every warrior devoured, the Mental Energy Lin Yuan had consumed was replenished a little, his mental body became more solid, and that mental web expanded by another fraction!

This was a war of attrition so long it was despair-inducing! Lin Yuan's web of Mental Energy was constantly damaged, repaired, and expanded under the impact of countless warriors... He was like a vortex in the center of the battlefield, devouring the endless army of the undead. The sharp pain in his mental body never ceased, and his will hovered on the verge of collapse countless times, only to be forcibly pulled back!

For nine full days and nights! When the last warrior charging with a spear let out an unwilling roar while entangled in the purple-gold threads, then turned into pure specks of mental light and was completely absorbed by Lin Yuan, the entire ancient battlefield fell into dead silence.

Lin Yuan's mental body stood proudly, condensed more than a hundred times compared to when he entered! The Mental Energy value had reached a staggering 920 stars! Its density was comparable to ten-thousand-year black iron, indestructible!

As Lin Yuan walked toward the last giant cauldron, which was pitch-black all over and seemed capable of swallowing all light, the gazes of the few survivors on the platform focused on him as if they were tangible.

This cauldron was like a singularity of the Universe. On its surface, nebulae were constantly being born, expanding, collapsing, and annihilating in a recurring cycle, emitting a Chaos aura that froze the Soul and originated from the very beginning of all things!

"That is... the aura of Chaos?!" Bai Li exclaimed in shock. She had struggled to approach at some point and had grabbed Lin Yuan's sleeve tightly, her voice filled with unprecedented fear and urgency: "Touching Chaos will cause your Divine Soul to directly annihilate! Return to nothingness! Since ancient times, those who have passed the Eighth Cauldron number no more than the fingers on two hands, and never... never has anyone dared to step into this Ninth Cauldron! That is... a true dead end!" Her fingertips were white from the effort, and her eyes were full of dissuasion.

Lin Yuan stopped, his gaze sweeping calmly over Bai Li's bloodshot, fearful eyes, then looking at the black Chaos cauldron that swallowed everything. He gently but incomparably firmly pulled his hand away from Bai Li's.

"My Dao," his voice was not loud, but it resonated like a great bell, striking the hearts of everyone, "is to forge ahead; even if it is Chaos, it shall be my sustenance!"

One step, and he stepped in!

It was as if he had been instantly thrown back to the "Nothingness" before the birth of the Universe! There was no time, no space, no Karma, only the most primitive, violent, and disorderly Chaos energy! They were like billions of frenzied ancient Vicious Beasts, crazily tearing, twisting, and assimilating Lin Yuan's mental body at the most microscopic level!

Even more terrifying was the impact on the cognitive level—here, the concept of "I" became blurred, the meaning of existence was dissolved, and ordinary Cultivators would be completely lost in an instant, their consciousness dissipating into the Chaos.

"Chaos..." Lin Yuan's consciousness was like a small boat in a raging sea amidst the tidal wave of Chaos, yet it always held onto a trace of clarity. "It was originally... born and bred... from the Grandmist..."

An incomparably bold, almost insane thought arose!

He no longer tried to condense his mental body to resist the omnipresent erosion of Chaos, but instead... he completely let go of his own mental will and the Origin of his Sea of Consciousness, like a seed! He actively merged into that violent torrent of Chaos!

"Root in Chaos, use Grandmist as a guide... Transform!"

His mental Origin transformed in the Chaos into an extremely tiny seedling that emitted an unyielding purple-gold radiance! The seedling's roots were no longer limited to the concept of a "Sea of Consciousness," but crazily extended and took root into the boundless Chaos all around!

The Chaos energy, violent enough to annihilate stars, was greedily absorbed and devoured by these seemingly fragile roots! Immediately after, the Primordial Purple Qi circulated within it like the most exquisite converter, forcibly tempering and transforming the violent, disorderly Chaos energy into the purest, most original Mental Energy, continuously feeding and nourishing the seedling!

The seedling swayed in the Chaos, yet it grew... at a speed visible to the naked eye!

The Mental Energy value began an unprecedented, crazy surge: 950 stars... 1000 stars... 1100 stars...!

The moment Lin Yuan's consciousness re-condensed from that "Nothingness" of Chaos and returned to "Existence," a Mental Energy as vast as a sea of stars instantly filled his entire Sea of Consciousness! Finally, it stabilized at a number that made the Nine Heavens tremble—1200 stars!

And from the deepest part of the Chaos, there seemed to come a faint, satisfied sigh filled with ancient will.

Having completed the Nine Cauldron Soul Refining, Lin Yuan sat quietly on the platform to adjust his breath, like a reef after a storm. During this time, a few scattered Cultivators who were unwilling to give up or had an inflated sense of themselves tried to challenge higher-level cauldrons, but the results were without exception.

Either they were ruthlessly rejected by the giant cauldron, their light dimmed and their spirits severely damaged; or... they turned into tiny, poignant specks of golden light, like burnt-out stars, completely dissipating into the Void Realm—their Divine Soul destroyed!

On the fifth day, a huge Soul-Testing Stone, pitch-black all over and covered with mysterious patterns, slowly descended from the Void Realm like a tombstone of a deity!

The test began, and the results triggered bursts of unbelievable exclamations: "Purple Rakshasa of the Nether Hall, 480 stars!" "Bai Li of Yuqing Palace, 500 stars!" "Nether Spring of the Shadow Pavilion, 520 stars!"

When Lin Yuan's figure walked calmly toward the Soul-Testing Stone, the entire platform fell into instant silence! All eyes focused on his hand, which he slowly raised.

His palm pressed against the cold stone surface—Weng—!!!

The entire Soul-Testing Stone was like dead water into which a pebble had been thrown; it first trembled violently, then erupted with a buzzing sound like a landslide or a tsunami! Immediately after, pure golden light, blinding and seemingly capable of purifying all filth, erupted like a volcano that had been suppressed for hundreds of millions of years! The golden light soared into the sky, illuminating the entire bronze platform as if it were cast from gold!

The patterns on the surface of the Soul-Testing Stone flickered crazily, and the value representing mental strength soared like a wild horse off its leash, instantly crushing everyone's cognitive limits: 800... 1000... 1100... Finally, the blinding golden light on the stone surface fixed on a number that made all Souls freeze—1200 stars!

"This is impossible—!" Purple Rakshasa screamed, losing her composure, and a precious Jade Slip in her hand was crushed into powder!

Bai Li staggered back several steps, her beautiful eyes wide, muttering in a daze: "Nine Cauldrons... He actually... passed all nine cauldrons..." The shock completely crushed her usual coldness.

In Nether Spring's only remaining eye, bloodshot veins instantly covered it, and the killing intent, intense enough to turn into substance, was almost about to burst out: "This child... must not be left alive! Must..."

Boom! The sky was torn apart again! The Heavenly Stele, radiating eternal majesty, descended with a crash! This time, the inscriptions on the stele were not golden light, but a scarlet color, like newly congealed blood, emitting a thick, bloody stench!

[First Place: Lin Yuan, 1200 stars] [Reward: Base combat power +300 stars! Nine Cauldron clearance extra reward: Base combat power +200 stars!]

[Second Place: Nether Spring, 520 stars, Reward: Base combat power +200 stars]

[Third Place: Bai Li, 500 stars, Reward: Base combat power +150 stars]

Majestic power poured into his body again. Lin Yuan's mind stirred slightly, and he scanned the data panel: [Peak combat power: 17807 stars]!

Amidst countless gazes interlaced with extreme shock, bone-deep fear, and undisguised greed and killing intent, Lin Yuan slowly raised his head, looking toward the entrance to the Third Heaven, which floated in the higher firmament and emitted an even more ancient and mysterious aura. The corners of his mouth curled into a meaningful arc, and flames of eagerness burned in his eyes. "It is getting... more and more interesting."