Nine Star Hegemon Body Art

“Big brother Long Chen, I’m sorry,” said Ling-er, almost crying.

“You managed to succeed in refining the pills the very first time. That’s amazing enough. There were nine changes in the flame that you didn’t control properly. Don’t panic. Take it slow. We still have plenty of time.” Long Chen’s heart sank. The more nervous Ling-er was, the easier it was for her to make mistakes. She was unable to even bring out her normal alchemy skills.

Although Ling-er was smart, she was nervous and under pressure. If he expressed any panic, she would only panic more.

Long Chen pointed out the few mistakes that she had made in her refinement, putting on a relaxed air.

Ling-er started her second refinement, keeping a mind on the corrections. Long Chen continued to sense his surroundings. 

A scene appeared in Long Chen’s mind. It felt like he could see an endless black river flowing rapidly. At the edge of this river was a small hole. The side of the river had been pierced, and a whirlpool had formed there.

Long Chen was like a speck of dust spinning within that whirlpool.

“If I’m sucked into the bottom of the whirlpool, I’ll be inside the black river.” Long Chen’s heart skipped a beat.

That black river that he sensed was endless. The whirlpool that he was in was like a drop in the ocean compared to it, while he was like a speck of dust compared to the whirlpool.

A pair of lightning wings appeared on his back and he tried to pull out of the whirlpool.

“You’re crazy. You’ll only get sucked in faster. You’re also using up your energy!” shouted Evilmoon.

“This is the only option.” Long Chen continued trying to charge out. But every time, he was sucked back in. He started panting. Within this spatial flow, his spiritual yuan was dropping quickly.

Taking a deep breath, Long Chen tried charging out once more. A wave suddenly struck him, sending him flying into the air.

Long Chen was flung into the distance and smashed into an invisible wall. He coughed up a mouthful of blood, feeling like his body would collapse. But he was delighted. He had finally managed to escape the core of the whirlpool. 

He could now be considered to be on the outer edge of the whirlpool. He did his best to continue swirling around this outer edge, moving at an arc to avoid being sucked back into the bottom.

At this moment, Ling-er finished her second refinement. There was improvement. There were three low grade pills and the rest were middle grade.

“Good, keep going. There were three areas with some mistakes. I’ll share the energy here with you. Absorb the death energy here and it will cause the Heart Corroding Bone Rotting Death Spirit Pill’s quality to soar. Work hard, Ling-er. You’re doing amazing,” encouraged Long Chen.

The Heart Corroding Bone Rotting Death Spirit Pill required the laws of death to be refined properly. On the Martial Heaven Continent, refining it required the cooperation of the Heavenly Daos to absorb their death energy.

Although Long Chen had his black soil that possessed death energy, it wasn’t pure death energy. It also contained the Dao of Ruin and the air of decay. Stripping those away for the death energy was not efficient.

There was also the death energy of the Yin Yang Immortal Grass, but that was lacking the element of the law that he required.

This black hole was perfect on the other hand. Its death energy was like a sea filling this world. This was a pit of death, and extracting the laws of death from this place was very simple.

There was so much of it that he needed to control how much he used. As he expected, with the death energy, Ling-er’s refinement resulted in nine high grade pills. There was even one that showed signs of reaching top grade, delighting her.

“Excellent! Ling-er, it’ll be up to you today!” Long Chen didn’t hold back with his praise. He was also excited. He took one of the pills and swallowed it.

Medicinal energy exploded inside of him. The death energy that had been suppressed as much as possible within his body seemed to awaken.

“Demonic pills really are amazing. Although it’s just high grade, it’s incredibly effective.” Long Chen was delighted.

However, he then let out a startled cry. The spatial pressure suddenly increased, drawing him deeper into the whirlpool.

Long Chen’s lightning wings spread as he tried to charge out. However, after two attempts, he no longer had the spiritual yuan for a third attempt. 

Fortunately, these two attempts had gotten him a bit further from the core. He could relax ever so slightly, although he had yet to reach the same distance.

“In the remaining time, I should have enough for one more attempt.” Sensing the little bit of spiritual yuan that he had left, Long Chen’s heart turned cold. Everything was up to Ling-er.

He began devouring the Heart Corroding Bone Rotting Death Spirit Pills one by one. The death energy within his body slowly awakened, but it still didn’t have enough energy to suppress the life energy.

The death energy had been compressed to the pinnacle, while his life energy had reached a level of saturation at ninety percent, making it difficult to force it back.

If he wanted to break this equilibrium, he would need his death energy to explosively force the life energy back. The only thing that could provide his death energy with that power was the Death Spirit Pills.

Another furnace of pills was finished, this time resulting in three top grade pills. Long Chen was delighted that Ling-er had finally got the hang of refining this pill. 

“Ling-er, keep working hard. It’s all up to you!” Long Chen cried out excitedly, sending in more death energy into Ling-er.

Ling-er replied confidently and continued refining.

Evilmoon finally understood what Long Chen was doing. “Little fellow, you’re quite smart. You want to make a breakthrough in this place. Once your death energy resonates with this place’s death energy, it will have less effect on you.”

“Why else would I say that I’m unlucky? If I had reached the third step, I wouldn’t be sucked into this place. I would have easily escaped,” said Long Chen helplessly.

With his life energy taking up ninety percent of his body, and this place being filled with death energy, he felt a much greater drag. But if he reached the third step, he would be like a fish in water swimming away. Raising the death energy inside of him was the only way to escape this predicament.

“Even if you reach the third step, having been sucked into this place, you won’t be able to escape. The crack is easy to enter but difficult to leave,” sighed Evilmoon.

“What? Why are you trying to jinx me?!” cursed Long Chen. “Haven’t you ever heard that when you get to a mountain, there will always be a way through?”

Long Chen cursed Evilmoon. Even if it didn’t encourage him, it shouldn’t be discouraging him. Was that what a comrade did? As for Evilmoon, it didn’t feel like it had said anything wrong.

Long Chen continued consuming the Death Spirit Pills. His death energy began to rumble, forcing back his life energy. After consuming the three top grade pills, Ling-er finished her next furnace of pills. This time with six top grade Death Spirit Pills.

Long Chen began consuming them two at a time. With the help of these medicinal ingredients, his death energy truly started to push back.

Ling-er also grew more experienced, in the end refining full furnaces of top grade Heart Corroding Bone Rotting Death Spirit Pills.

BOOM!

His death energy reclaimed its territory, and his life and death energy finally reached an eighty-twenty proportion. 

With death energy thrumming within him, Long Chen attempted to fly out once more. This time, he reached the outer edge of the whirlpool in one leap.

“Hahahaha, success! Ling-er, we succeeded!” Long Chen cried out in mad joy.

Just as he had predicted, when the death energy within his body grew, the resistance of this flow lessened. In one go, he reached the point that he had needed three attempts to reach before.

Ling-er was even more excited than Long Chen. She continued refining the Death Spirit Pills. After consuming a hundred pills, Long Chen’s body rumbled once more.

“As expected, fortune is found within danger. I’ll break through to the third step of Netherpassage right here.”

Long Chen gradually came to be able to control his body within this flow of space as his death energy grew. He called back the Demon Moon Furnace and began to refine pills himself.