Seeking Immortality in a Bizarre World-Chapter 493 - 488 Mysterious Instrument Coordination, Lifespan Hex Wheel_1

Chapter 493: Chapter 488 Mysterious Instrument Coordination, Lifespan Hex Wheel_1

Jia Ren finished touring the Spirit Medicine Garden and then made a trip to the Bizarre Garden.

Within the Bizarre Garden, the most eye-catching features were seven tall fruit trees, three of which bore fruits resembling old men. The fruits shaped like old men exuded a sinister aura, giving off an impression of malevolence. It was as if they were elderly, evil versions of the Ginseng Fruit.

Besides those, there were bell flowers that produced incessant crying and laughing sounds, fruits with chunks of flesh growing on them, and most astonishingly, a green jujube tree with a... cabinet growing on it.

Compared to a typical Spirit Medicine Garden, the atmosphere of the Bizarre Garden was overwhelmingly spectral.

The elderly, evil version of the Ginseng Fruit was the Longevity Trickster Fruit.

Initially, he had exchanged for three Longevity Fruit Trees from the Sect, and later acquired four more, increasing the total to seven. The Second Nascent Soul had contacted some familiar vendors, and more Longevity Fruit Trees were scheduled for delivery after some time.

The other cabinet-shaped jujube tree was a Cabinet Bizarre, obtained by the Qichu Kingdom when they set up a Bronze Strange Gate to capture Bizarre Demons. This was the most powerful Bizarre Demon Jia Ren had obtained; it had nearly escaped his grasp several times and had dealt him severe injuries. After obtaining it, the task of researching the corresponding Bizarre Object was handed over to the Xuan Beast Avatar.

The more powerful the Bizarre Demon, the more stringent the conditions for producing a Bizarre Object. There had been no progress until he obtained a Fifth-Rank Spirit Jujube Tree in the Jiao Dragon Secret Realm, which finally proved to be a compatible host. The Bizarre Object transformed from the Cabinet Bizarre, much like the Longevity Trickster Fruit, grew slowly. After forty years, it had finally taken a preliminary shape.

Soon, he would be able to refine the corresponding Mysterious Instrument. Jia Ren was filled with anticipation for this Mysterious Instrument.

After scanning the Cabinet Bizarre Tree, he turned his gaze towards a man-eating flower on the side that kept opening and closing its mouth. This man-eating flower differed from ordinary ones. It had a huge floral disc with a large, belly-like structure beneath it and craned its ’head’ around as if desperately searching for food.

No Bizarre Objects existed near the Man-Eating Hungry Peculiar Flower. Anything that grew nearby would be devoured by this creature within three breaths.

This thing is ripe, ready to be refined into a Bizarre Object or a Bizarre Talisman...

The Man-Eating Hungry Peculiar Flower’s abilities were geared towards suppressing Bizarre Demons, which were extremely rare in the Mysterious Realm. Since Jia Ren resided within the Lingbao Sect, he had no Bizarre Demon afflictions to worry about, so this item was not a priority for refinement. The Material Fusion Technique and refining golems took far higher priority than making Hungry Bizarre Talismans or Mysterious Instruments. 𝓯𝓻𝒆𝙚𝒘𝓮𝙗𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝒍.𝙘𝓸𝙢

"Notify me immediately once the Cabinet Bizarre Tree has matured!"

Before leaving, Jia Ren picked a ripe Longevity Trickster Fruit, carefully placing it inside a special box designed to contain malevolent auras, preventing the Bizarre Demon’s power from leaking out. He had previously refined the Longevity Gui Talisman but, until now, had not had the chance to test it. Using the Longevity Gui Talisman came with risks, and Jia Ren considered it too wasteful to use recklessly. He had always been reluctant to test it.

This time, he took the Longevity Trickster Fruit, intending to try refining it into a Mysterious Instrument. The Bizarre Talisman was powerful but ultimately a consumable, not usable for long. In contrast, a durable Longevity Bizarre Instrument was what he truly desired.

What kind of Mysterious Instrument should I craft?

Sword, bell, pagoda, knife, hammer... For a moment, images of numerous treasures flickered through his mind, but none seemed suitable. Once activated, such a treasure would cause indiscriminate harm, so none of these artifact types satisfied him.

Wait, why am I thinking of using it myself?

I plan to refine golems next. A Mysterious Instrument that the golem can operate will suffice, combining the golem with the Mysterious Instrument.

Not only that, but Mysterious Instruments can also work together.

For instance, crafting a Mysterious Instrument like the Raging Storm Peculiar Flower Needle. It would instantly eject tens of thousands of Bizarre Needles. If used directly, most cultivators could dodge them, rendering it incapable of inflicting effective damage.

What if he used the Cabinet Bizarre Instrument in coordination?

The Cabinet Bizarre could ignore distance, transferring objects and attacks. If the Raging Storm Peculiar Flower Needles were sent... inside an enemy’s body and then triggered, how could the enemy possibly block them? They would undoubtedly bear the full brunt of its power.

Unleashing the Raging Storm Peculiar Flower Needles might be satisfying in the moment, but retrieving them would be far more troublesome. After a moment of hesitation, Jia Ren discarded this idea.

As someone... prone to laziness, overly intricate Mysterious Instruments took too much time to refine. Besides, refining them required meticulous attention and consumed extra energy.

Jia Ren soon had another idea.

Craft a wheel, preferably with serrated edges like saw blades. Send it into an enemy’s head via the Cabinet Bizarre, then activate it. The sensation must be thrilling. It would possess the dual effects of reducing lifespan and inflicting lethal damage, with neither effect being compromised. It would be best to include a tracking effect to pursue the enemy, ensuring both the lifespan-reduction and damage effects were maximized. Even without the Cabinet Bizarre to complement it, the instrument would still unleash its intended power.

With this concept in mind, Jia Ren began to design the corresponding Mysterious Instrument. Thanks to the successful refinement of the Longevity Gui Talisman, crafting a similar type of Mysterious Instrument became extremely straightforward. The Treasure Refining Inscriptions were modified based on the Lifespan Hex Wheel’s design, aiming to maximize this Mysterious Wheel’s effects.

Jia Ren multitasked, studying the Lifespan Hex Wheel while simultaneously enhancing the Proficiency Level of the Material Fusion Technique. The Material Fusion Technique had to reach a Technique-Nearing-Dao Level for optimal efficiency.

Time flew by, and in the blink of an eye, two years had passed.

The Lifespan Hex Wheel was the first to be completed. It was a palm-sized, blood-red wheel with eighteen sharp, serrated edges, each with a corresponding blood groove—a truly chilling weapon. In the center of the blood-red wheel was the image of a cold, sinister old man; whoever it set its gaze upon felt as though they were plunged into an ice cellar.

Its power is much weaker than the Longevity Bizarre’s, only effective against cultivators lacking Evil-warding Treasures.

Let’s test the effect.

The Longevity Gui Talisman was a consumable; activating it meant one precious Talisman was used up. The newly refined Lifespan Hex Wheel was not as potent as the Longevity Bizarre or the Longevity Trickster Fruit. However, its advantage, similar to the Longevity Bizarre itself, was a constant lifespan-reduction effect that could be maintained over a long period. Using the Lifespan Hex Wheel, Jia Ren did not have to worry about wasting a valuable Talisman.

Find a Spirit Fish to test its power.

The Xuan Beast Avatar arrived at the river in front of the Cave. Its presence attracted a large number of Spirit Fish, who thought it was feeding time again. In an instant, numerous fish heads popped out of the water, their eyes filled with almost human-like anticipation.

At feeding time, the Fathead Fish was always the most enthusiastic, proactively swimming over. As the veteran fish that had followed Jia Ren the longest, it received the best treatment and the most rations; none of the other Spirit Fish were qualified to compete with it.

Today, however, the Fathead Fish was not the favored one. The Xuan Beast Avatar’s gaze swept past it, toward the other Spirit Fish in the river. The Spirit Fish thought their chance to perform had arrived and enthusiastically moved forward, presenting their heads. Unfortunately, they were unaware they were about to become the unlucky test subject.

"You, then!"

The Xuan Beast Avatar fixed its gaze on the most enthusiastic blue Spirit Fish, a regular at meal times, second only to the Fathead Fish in appetite.

It was time to save on rations!

The anticipated Ancestral Fish Sage Pill did not appear. Instead, a hand formed from Spiritual Power forcibly seized it and lifted it into the air. Only at this moment did the Spirit Fish realize something was amiss. It struggled, attempting to escape the Demon’s Palm. Alas, it was already too late.

Let’s switch to a different location for the experiment.

Jia Ren glanced at the nearby gathering of Spirit Fish and decided not to conduct the test there. Their master was kind-hearted and didn’t want the Spirit Fish under his care to witness a kinsman’s gruesome death, fearing it would cause them to grieve and shed sorrowful tears from empathy for their kind.

"Go!"

The Xuan Beast Avatar hurriedly moved away from the danger zone, remotely controlling the Lifespan Hex Wheel to avoid being affected by the Bizarre Demon’s power and reducing its own lifespan. The Suppressing Demon Divine Light formed a suit of Suppressing Demon Divine Armor around Jia Ren’s body. It then retrieved the Lifespan Hex Wheel from the Sea-and-Mountain Bag specially prepared for Mysterious Instruments and controlled it to shoot out.

WHOOSH!

A blood-red discus shot out. It didn’t fly like a bolt of lightning but instead gradually approached the Spirit Fish. He first needed to test the range of influence of the Lifespan Hex Wheel’s bizarre power. The intention was to conduct an experiment, not just to kill a fish.

Jia Ren multitasked, controlling the Lifespan Hex Wheel while simultaneously using the Soul Source Devil Eye to observe. The Soul Source Devil Eye was an impressive Divine Skill that allowed cultivators to observe the essence of things and obtain more precise data. This was also an essential Divine Skill for conducting experiments.

"Within thirty zhang, lifespan is reduced by ten years per breath."

"Within twenty-seven zhang, lifespan is reduced by twenty years per breath."

...

"Within three zhang, lifespan is reduced by a hundred years per breath."

Jia Ren quietly observed, recording the test data.

This Spirit Fish only endured one round of testing before its lifespan was exhausted. Its Scale Armor fell off, and its eyes became cloudy. Before the Lifespan Hex Wheel could retract, it seemed to have lived an entire lifetime, rapidly aging to death.

Within three zhang, its power is the greatest.

As long as the Lifespan Hex Wheel could be maintained near an enemy within three zhang for ten breaths, a thousand years of lifespan would be lost. No Divinity Transformation Stage Cultivator could last twenty breaths. Void Refining Stage Cultivators could last at most forty breaths. The same would apply to Integration Realm and Mahayana Realm cultivators, proportionally.

This treasure was quite good, but its downside was a small area of effect and short duration of action. It could not be compared with the Longevity Bizarre. If it was used in conjunction with the Soul-Shaking Bell for control, few could withstand the combination with the Lifespan Hex Wheel.

However, reaching the Divinity Transformation Stage itself already required a vast amount of time. Who could live for another two thousand years on top of that? Having over a thousand years of remaining lifespan at that point was already impressive; the actual time one could withstand the wheel would be even less.

This item is utterly unscrupulous when used against elderly cultivators; it is rightly called the ’gift of death.’ Elderly cultivators already had little lifespan left. With a hundred years reduced in a single breath, how many breaths could they withstand? Even a Mahayana Realm Cultivator with little lifespan remaining would drop dead on the spot upon contact with the Lifespan Hex Wheel.

Jia Ren had initially felt the effect was somewhat lacking, but upon reflection...

The Tian Yuan Shou Fruit, capable of adding a thousand years to one’s life, cost as much as one billion Lingbao Sect Contribution points, and it wasn’t even guaranteed one could exchange for it. The Earth Origin Fruit was equally precious and perpetually out of stock. Ordinary Lingbao Sect Cultivators could only hope to exchange for the Ren Yuan Shou Fruit, which added a hundred years to one’s lifespan and cost one million Lingbao Sect Contribution points.

These types of lifespan-extending treasures couldn’t be consumed indefinitely to stack lifespan; for the same type of treasure, one could consume it three times at most, and the life-extending effect would diminish with each subsequent use. Extending one’s lifespan was difficult. Even for Lingbao Sect disciples, adding a hundred years came at a hefty price. For cultivators of smaller sects, achieving longevity was even harder. Obtaining a Longevity Fruit, which increased life by thirty years, was no easy task for them, let alone the Ren Yuan Shou Fruit that added a hundred.

Even if they consumed a Ren Yuan Shou Fruit, when facing the Lifespan Hex Wheel, it would only allow them to withstand it for one extra breath. And even if they were lucky enough to escape with their lives, the lost lifespan could never be regained.

Upon further consideration, the Lifespan Hex Wheel was indeed a precious treasure.