206: Chapter 206 The Eye of the Underworld, Life Story

Purple flames circled around his eyes, casting a faint, eerie nocturnal fire in the darkness.

That purple flame was not True Qi, but the manifestation of pure Divine Soul power.

Chen Ran had consumed the residual Divine Soul power of Shen Jixuan, even though the latter had already lost much of his Divine Soul upon death.

However, what remained was at the Peak of the Return to Truth Realm, combined with the Soul Power previously enhanced by the Soul-Reaping Blood Evil Blade.

His current Divine Soul strength had directly surpassed the limits attainable by the Return to Truth Realm.

Chen Ran guessed it was at least comparable to a Martial Artist at the Early Stage of the Innate Realm.

As the purple flames ignited, when he opened his eyes again, the world seemed to pause, and everything around him stopped in place.

Chen Ran froze, observing carefully, only then realizing that the world had not stagnated; rather, his own reaction speed had become too fast.

The shadows of burning candle flames, the branches and leaves swaying in the breeze, and the insects dancing in the night sky...

Everything seemed as if it had been slowed down by several times.

"What is this... Bullet Time?"

Chen Ran thought of the abilities of protagonists in the movies he watched in his past life; they seemed to have similar powers.

He rose and lightly tapped the ground, instantly flashing to the side of a tree in the courtyard.

He reached out and gently touched the trunk; the next moment, the entire tree shook with a boom, and a cascade of leaves fell from the branches.

Clap.

Following a thunderous crack in mid-air, the cascading leaves transformed into a Dragon-like vortex that returned to his hand.

"A bit interesting."

Chen Ran released his hand, and the leaves in his grasp fell to the ground with a rustle.

After the Nether Soul Heart Sutra reached Minor Achievement, it could awaken its first layer of effect: Nether Eye.

The Nether Eye is an ability of the awakened Divine Soul, capable only of observing Qi and form, seeing through the flaws of the Physical Body, and predicting an opponent's punches, kicks, weapons, and Moves.

Although it could not yet achieve the effect of interfering with others' minds, this ability was already quite Heaven-Defying.

Imagine that in a battle, if someone could see through all your Moves, you would be at an inherent disadvantage.

"However, the consumption of Soul Power is also terrifying."

Chen Ran sighed slightly, feeling his Divine Soul rapidly depleting, and had to close the Nether Eye first.

"It is a good time to see what clues are in the memories."

Chen Ran returned to the room and sat cross-legged on the bed.

Because the incident in the prison happened suddenly, he did not have time to fully digest the memories of Shen Jixuan.

Now that he had plenty of time, Chen Ran closed his eyes, slowed his breathing, calmed his heart, and entered his Sea of Consciousness.

...

As the Cultivation Technique that Shen Jixuan had practiced for hundreds of years, Chen Ran, from his cultivation memories, also roughly understood why this technique was called a Dao-Abandoning technique.

The life of Shen Jixuan was simple; he was born into a top martial arts Family of the previous Great Zhou dynasty, with abundant Family wealth and outstanding personal talent.

At ten, he cleared the first three Realms of martial arts; at his coming-of-age ceremony at twenty, he had cultivated to the Aperture Condensation Realm; at twenty-four, he reached the Return to Truth Realm; and finally, at thirty, he stepped into the Innate Realm.

He became the youngest Return to Truth Realm Martial Artist in the history of Great Zhou.

As long as he cultivated steadily, breaking through to the Grandmaster Realm was a certainty.

But until one time, when Shen Jixuan was flipping through the Family martial arts manual, he accidentally discovered a Cultivation Technique from the ancient era.

According to the cultivation method of such ancient techniques, after a Martial Artist enters the Innate Realm, they can open the Bridge of Heaven and Earth.

At this time, they can draw in the surrounding Heaven and Earth Essence, converging it into the bridge, serving as a foundation for breaking through to higher Realms later.

But the Heaven and Earth Essence in this world had already gone extinct; even with supreme talent to break through to the Grandmaster Realm, one would only fall into a desperate situation of being unable to advance further and exhausting one's Lifespan.

Thus, Shen Jixuan went mad; he did not believe that with such high talent, he would be trapped in his Realm and die after hundreds of years.

The Nether Soul Heart Sutra was a Demonic Path Cultivation Technique created by Shen Jixuan after he scoured the supreme arts of a hundred schools and found that he still could not break through this barrier, relying on his own complete understanding of the Dao to seek a Breakthrough.

Since there was no Heaven and Earth Essence in the world, he would try a different path: to introduce the Divine Soul into the Bridge of Heaven and Earth!

In order to attempt a Breakthrough to a higher Realm.

The good news was that he succeeded; the Divine Soul and the body are originally one, so there was no rejection, and it very smoothly became the bridge between him and the Heaven and Earth.

The bad news was that he failed.

Even if the Divine Soul could serve as a bridge, because it occupied the position of the Bridge of Heaven and Earth, no matter how he cultivated in the future, he could not break through to the Grandmaster Realm.

Moreover, because the Realm was fixed, the Divine Soul had also stabilized.

If he wanted to pursue the highest Realm, he could only increase his Soul Power through the Demonic Path method of extracting souls, and Shen Jixuan embarked on a path of no return.

By using Demonic Path methods to wantonly slaughter civilians and extract their souls, he ultimately committed monstrous crimes, drawing a Grandmaster to personally intervene and suppress him, locking him in the prison.

And in the end, Shen Jixuan discovered a version of himself with better talent in the prison, developed the intention of Possession, and ultimately died.

On the bed, Chen Ran opened his eyes faintly and whispered to himself:

"Dao-Abandoning, Dao-Abandoning... it means abandoning the Great Dao."

"If he had not run into me, he might have really been able to continue living until his Divine Soul Lifespan was exhausted and he died."

In short, even if it was only a part of the memories of Shen Jixuan, Chen Ran had to sigh; looking at the experiences of Shen Jixuan, he was much more ruthless than that Demon Sound Sect true disciple, Que Wuhua.

He could truly be called a hero of the Demonic Path...

(One chapter today; I have been suffering from a splitting headache recently, and I am a bit dissatisfied with the plot as it progresses, so I am taking some time to rethink the concept.)