The Secret Way of Immortality

Ren Qing headed towards the depths of the earth.

Since there was a hidden passage in the Secret Pavilion, perhaps he might find some unexpected gains; at worst, losing a wisp of his soul if he encountered danger.

The hidden passage was full of stairs, clearly carved by hand, with traces left by fingernails in many places.

Ren Qing's divided soul was semi-corporeal, capable of sensing temperature.

There was air circulating in the hidden passage, and it wasn't as humid as he'd imagined.

Ren Qing didn't know how long he had been walking, but he felt that after reaching hundreds of meters underground, the surrounding space became wider.

He discovered that the hidden passage had measures in place to prevent outsiders from entering.

Many key nodes on the stone walls were affixed with profound and mysterious spirit talismans, presumably to be activated at any time to collapse the cave.

Ren Qing had a superficial understanding of talisman-making through the art's secret manuals.

He only knew that the Wuwei Taoist Temple's spirit talismans had to use the saliva of the Heavenly Dao Worm as the main material; saliva was also another name for drool.

Ren Qing removed a few spirit talismans; even if the inscriptions were weathered and might not be activated, it was always good to be on the safe side.

Then, he continued to delve deeper, and soon arrived at the end of the hidden passage.

He had expected a rather crude cave, but to his surprise, there was a small temple, just like the City God Temple outside.

Ren Qing opened the door of the small temple, and what greeted his eyes was a large number of coffins.

There were densely packed rows of them, numbering over a hundred, but the edges were sealed with rivets, making it impossible to see whether there were corpses inside.

Besides that, a statue stood in the center of the temple, but its appearance was extremely ordinary, like a mortal among the masses in the mundane world.

Ren Qing took a deep breath, and his divided soul tried to borrow the power of the main soul, then forcibly pulled out the rivets on the coffin.

It took quite a bit of time to open the lid.

A skeleton lay in the coffin, without any flesh or blood remaining.

Ren Qing's gaze swept over the skeleton, and its unique structure made him couldn't help but examine it closely.

The skeleton's spine was slightly curved outward; an ordinary person should have twenty-four ribs, but it only had six, and they were exceptionally slender.

However, the spine was relatively sturdy, as if nutrients were concentrated there.

He could imagine the appearance of the skeleton before its death: its abdomen was bulging high, like a pregnant woman in her tenth month.

Words were inscribed on the back of the coffin lid, the style of writing slightly elegant, yet with a forceful quality.

'Liu Lv from Liu Family Village, never cultivated, attempted to help him enter the Tao using the Prison Guard Method, died in the 2543rd year of the Heavenly Dao.'

The Prison Guard Method should refer to the cultivation technique of the Prison Guard Hall.

Ren Qing opened another coffin; the corpse inside was almost identical to Liu Lv, with six slender ribs.

The inscription on the coffin lid was slightly blurred.

'Wang Sangou from Jingzhou City, never cultivated, attempted to help him enter the Tao using the Prison Guard Method, died in the 2511th year of the Heavenly Dao.'

Ren Qing, not believing in evil, opened several more coffins; the corpses were all the same, and their identities were similar.

Could it be that after cultivating the Wuwei Taoist Temple's entry-level technique, the body's transformation would be inherited through reproduction?

A distended abdomen, wouldn't that be a physique that makes it easier for the Heavenly Dao Egg to parasitize...

If Jingzhou completely became an appendage of the Heavenly Dao Worm, I'm afraid it would be impossible to find a pure human being in the long run.

The cultivators in the hidden passage tried to get mortals to cultivate the Prison Guard's technique, but all failed, and they were eventually buried here.

Ren Qing turned his head to look at the statue, and couldn't help but mutter to himself, "How desperate would one have to be to respect mortals as gods..."

He inexplicably felt a sense of solemnity in his heart.

Ren Qing cupped his fist and saluted the statue, as a way to offer salvation to the souls of those mortal cultivators who died because of the Heavenly Dao Worm.

Then, he continued to open coffins, trying to find more information on the lids, only to find that a third of the coffins contained only ashes.

'Li Catch from Mubai Town, never cultivated, attempted to help him enter the Tao using the Beast Pen Method, gained some success, died in the 2613th year of the Heavenly Dao.'

"Beast Pen Method..."

"Is that the unique technique of the area marked as Beast Pen on the map?"

Ren Qing's mind stirred.

Since the monks in the temple were constantly researching the Beast Pen Method and the Prison Guard Method, there should be a copy left here.

He immediately began searching and soon found something.

Several tattered books were pressed under the statue's feet.

Ren Qing grabbed the statue with both hands and slowly lifted it up, afraid of damaging the books.

It could have been done in a few minutes, but he insisted on spending half an hour, and even felt a sense of exhaustion after taking out the books.

There were a total of five secret manuals; judging by the wear and tear, they had been flipped through countless times.

As soon as Ren Qing's palm touched the secret manual, the information stream reacted, indicating that the content of the technique was complete.

Four of them were the Prison Guard Method; he didn't look at them carefully and put them away in the stomach prison.

The last secret manual, as expected, was the so-called Beast Pen Method.

[Deity Possession]

[Created by the Supreme Heavenly Devil, cultivation requires...]

Ren Qing stared at the information stream, when suddenly he sensed danger and instinctively looked up, and then felt a sharp pain in his neck.

By the time he realized what had happened, his main body woke up from a nightmare, his whole body soaked in sweat.

In the dark room, in front of him was the familiar iron door.

Ren Qing touched his neck, his brain still faintly throbbing with pain.

How could he have imagined that his divided soul would inexplicably be lost in the Wuwei Dojo, indicating that there must be a strange object in the Secret Pavilion.

Perhaps it was the Heavenly Dao Worm that climbed onto the lotus leaf.

Ren Qing carefully recalled the memory before his death, and finally locked onto the statue.

However, he had touched the statue, and the information stream had not moved, indicating that it was just an ordinary dead object, not related to a cultivator.

At this time, Ren Qing's head became dizzy, and he fell asleep in the military tent.

Soul damage is more painful than physical injuries; it's like a billion ants tearing at the flesh.

By the time he woke up, he didn't know how much time had passed.

Ren Qing's condition became very listless, his eye sockets sunken, his lips pale, and the strength of his whole body seemed to have been drained.

He sat cross-legged and began to visualize the Nameless Method, only then suppressing the soul's injuries.

Then, Ren Qing opened his eyes, his brows furrowed tightly.

It would take about a month or so for the soul to recover; since there was a strange object in the Secret Pavilion, the variables that would arise in such a long time would be too great.

He didn't want to wait idly, and directly opened the iron door and walked outside.

Ren Qing was just about to attract the Non-Poison Soul, when Li Fangtan took the lead and said, "Why don't you leave the Stomach Within Stomach? This place is not suitable for cultivation."

"It's okay for me, and besides, I came here because I offended a Yin Messenger Realm cultivator."

Li Fangtan stopped talking.

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Originally, he intended to have Ren Qing pass on the letter, but thinking about how he had been in the Stomach Within Stomach for more than ten years, his relatives and friends might not even be alive.

Ren Qing ignored him and focused his gaze on the end of the corridor.

The Non-Poison Soul was walking over, and when it saw that it was Ren Qing waiting for it, the speed of its approach suddenly became a bit hesitant.

Before the Non-Poison Soul could turn around, Ren Qing took out the Broadsword and rushed over.

The cold light exploded.

The blade drew a graceful arc, directly shaving off the skin on the back of the Non-Poison Soul.

Ren Qing sheathed the Broadsword.

The Non-Poison Soul fled in a sorry state.

Ren Qing, without regard for the Little Man in a Bottle floating behind him, used a small knife to pry out the eyeballs on the toad skin and stuffed them into his mouth.

The eyeballs turned into heat in his stomach, flowing throughout his body and being absorbed by his soul, feeling as refreshing as drinking ice water in the hot summer.

Ren Qing's damaged soul recovered for the most part, and it wouldn't take many days to fully recover.

He was about to visualize the Nameless Method, striving to re-conceive the divided soul as soon as possible, but noticed the flickering Little Man in a Bottle.

Ren Qing said sincerely, "Senior, I suffered from cultivation deviation and injured my soul, that's why I resorted to this strategy."

"..."

The Little Man in a Bottle disappeared into the wall.

After Ren Qing returned to the house, he visualized the Nameless Method without delay; there were still some remnants of the eyeballs in his stomach, and he couldn't waste them.

When he opened his eyes again, the injuries to his soul had already healed.

He let his divided soul enter the Wuwei Dojo; fortunately, it didn't appear in the Council Hall, but in front of the Secret Pavilion.

Otherwise, he would have to find a way to cross the water again.

Ren Qing didn't rush to the hidden passage, but directly took out tools and began to dig graves.

The graves with inscriptions on the tombstones contained the corpses of Wuwei Taoist Temple's outer disciples, which were relatively normal.

They all died after attempting to cultivate the Prison Guard Method and the Beast Pen Method.

However, the graves with blank tombstones were different; when opened, they contained the corpses of old men wearing Taoist robes.

The old men had white hair and youthful faces, their skin still elastic, and they didn't even emit the slightest stench of corpses, only lacking blood.

Ren Qing touched them with his palm.

The information stream surged.

[Heavenly Dao Child]

[Age: 1134]

[Lifespan: 5 years]

[Techniques: Dao Dao Dao (Wuwei Dojo), Deity Possession (Possessed by Heavenly Devil)???]

[???]

Ren Qing was stunned for a few breaths.

Why was the Heavenly Dao Child hastily buried in the Secret Pavilion? He was the one who created all the known inner techniques of the Wuwei Taoist Temple.

Ren Qing focused his attention on the techniques mastered by the Heavenly Dao Child, not expecting to find the Deity Possession technique, which was the Beast Pen Method.

[The Deity Possession technique was created by the Supreme Heavenly Devil, cultivation requires using the body as firewood to ignite the spirit flame of the soul, and absorbing the remnants of the Heavenly Devil, abandoning the body to refine the soul to be able to cultivate it.]

Ren Qing was slightly disappointed, because the Deity Possession technique didn't seem to have anything special about it; similar techniques wouldn't be difficult to find.

And how could it be related to the word Beast Pen, no matter how you think about it.

He suppressed the distracting thoughts in his heart and continued to dig, choosing graves with blank tombstones.

After opening seven or eight coffins in a row, they all contained the corpses of the Heavenly Dao Child without exception, and they all revealed the same information.

As for why there were so many corpses, it was likely related to the Beast Pen Method.

Ren Qing understood that the strange object in the Secret Pavilion that killed him was indeed the Heavenly Dao Child, who was likely already insane.

The Heavenly Dao Child established the Wuwei Taoist Temple in his early years, and then tried to break away from the Heavenly Dao Worm in his later years, which seems to have led to the destruction of the sect.

Were the Wuwei Taoist Temple's techniques created by him personally, or was it a means for the Heavenly Dao Worm to spread the Heavenly Dao Egg through his body?

Ren Qing was more inclined to the latter.

He hesitated for a moment, then decided to retrieve the secret manuals of the techniques in the hidden passage, at worst he would lose his divided soul and reload the save.

Moreover, Ren Qing felt that the Heavenly Dao Child had not directly attacked, indicating that there was still room for exploitation.

He hugged a corpse of the Heavenly Dao Child and walked towards the hidden passage, while constantly being vigilant, trying to make as little noise as possible.

[My greatest strength is that I always fill the pits I dig.]

Thanks to Douyu for the reward.