Chapter 276: Century-long Seclusion

A year flew by in the blink of an eye.

Inside his secret chamber, Han Li sat with his legs crossed, and his Mantra Treasured Axis was slowly revolving behind him while radiating dazzling golden light, and there were countless golden runes surging rapidly over its surface.

One of the Time Dao Runes on the Mantra Treasured Axis suddenly began to flash, and all of the golden runes around it lit up before converging into the Time Dao Rune.

The dull Time Dao Rune immediately began to light up at a rate that was discernible even to the naked eye, and after just a few seconds, it was restored to its former state, but the other Time Dao Runes were still a dull gray color.

Han Li opened his eyes, and he was overcome by a sense of relief at the sight of the recovered Dao Rune.

Just as he anticipated, it was possible to recover his Time Dao Runes, but it seemed that every single one of these Time Dao Runes was going to take around a year to recover, which meant that it was would take over a century to recover all 108 of the Time Dao Runes on the Mantra Treasured Axis.

His cultivation was most likely going to be severely hampered during this time, but that couldn't be helped.

In any case, a century was nothing more than the blink of an eye to Han Li, and he could take this time to carefully ponder the eight-and-a-half-sentence mantra that he had heard.

During this past year, he wasn't able to make much progress in this endeavor, but he was becoming more and more confident that he would be able to glean some useful things from the mantra given sufficient time.

Additionally, he could also use this time to nurture some pill refinement ingredients.

With that in mind, he flipped a hand over to produce a jade box, which contained the six or seven pill recipes that he had obtained from Ping Yaozi. Two of those recipes were for pills that were fit for mid-True Immortal cultivators to consume, one of which was for the Growth Bearing Pill, while the other one was for a pill called the Jade Balance Pill.

After examining the ingredients on the pill recipes, he discovered that none of them were all that precious or rare, but they had to have been very advanced in age before they could be used in the recipes.

He had already spent the majority of the Immortal Origin Stones and spirit stones that he had saved up from completing Transient Guild missions on pill refinement, and even though he still had some left, it was nowhere near enough to purchase sufficient pill refinement ingredients for both recipes.

My priority is to restore my Time Dao Runes, so for now, I'll use the spirit liquid produced by the Heaven Controlling Vial to mature spirit plants instead of using them to manifest crystals.

Han Li's Mantra Treasured Axis had been severely affected by the event that had taken place a year ago, but his Heaven Controlling Vial hadn't been impacted at all, so he could still use it to mature spirit plants as usual.

With that in mind, Han Li rose to his feet and emerged from his secret chamber, then summoned a communication array plate before casting an incantation seal onto it.

Moments later, Meng Yungui and Sun Buzheng arrived in the main hall of the cave abode, then extended a collective salute toward Han Li, who was seated beside the stone table.

"We pay our respects to Elder Li!"

"I will be going into seclusion for some time. During this time, I need you two to go out and secure some ingredients for me. Here is a list of the ingredients I want."

Han Li handed each of them a jade slip that contained a list of ingredients from the two pill recipes as he spoke.

The two of them accepted the jade slips, then inspected its contents with their spiritual sense, upon which surprised looks appeared on both of their faces.

Most of the ingredients listed in the jade slip were very precious, and they weren't going to be easy to find.

"I know that the ingredients won't be easy to collect, but this is not an urgent matter, so take your time. All you need to do is find me a sufficient amount within the next century, and if you make any progress during that time, you can bring what you've collected back to me at any time."

Han Li pulled out a pair of storage pouches that were filled with spirit stones as he spoke.

The two servants were quite relieved to hear this, and they accepted the storage pouches before promptly departing.

Following their departure, Han Li also returned to his secret chamber.

Over 100 years passed by in the blink of an eye.

During this time, some events had taken place in the Bell Toll Mountain Range, and there were some new arrivals, while others had departed, but this was nothing out of the ordinary for the Bell Toll Mountain Range. As long as the 13 Golden Immortals of the sect were still present, the foundation of the sect would still be intact.

The Crimson Dawn Peak was quite a secluded place to begin with, and it was becoming more and more dormant. Additionally, Han Li always liked to keep a low profile, so everyone eventually forgot about him, and he barely received any visitors.

Of course, even if anyone did come to visit Han Li, they would discover that the Crimson Dawn Peak was closed to all visitors.

It was very common to see a True Immortal going into seclusion for centuries, and for some True Immortals who were attempting to make important breakthroughs, even seclusions that lasted thousands or tens of thousands of years were quite commonplace.

During his seclusion, Han Li barely left his cave abode at all, spending the majority of his time pondering the eight-and-a-half-sentence mantra that he had heard from the portly monk over and over again.

The only times that he would stop to take a break were when Sun Buzheng or Meng Yungui returned with seeds of certain ingredients listed on the two pill recipes, and Han Li would instruct his giant ape puppet to plant those seeds according to his needs.

Inside the secret chamber, the air had become stagnant, and even the tiny dust particles in the air seemed to have become completely still.

Han Li was seated with his legs crossed, and his Mantra Treasured Axis was slowly revolving behind him. All 108 of the Time Dao Runes on its surface had lit up, and they were giving off powerful law fluctuations.

Moments later, he withdrew his hand seal, and the Mantra Treasured Axis behind him vanished into his body amid a flash of golden light.

It was as if some type of restriction had suddenly been lifted, and speed of the air flow in the secret chamber returned to normal, while all of the dust particles also began to drift freely again.

"It's finally all recovered," Han Li murmured to himself, then rose to his feet and made his way out of his secret chamber.

The sky above the Crimson Dawn Peak was bright and clear, just like his current mood, and the sun was hanging high up in the sky, basking the snow-covered mountain in a warm glow.

Han Li emerged from his cave abode, then flew up into the air as a streak of azure light, intending to travel to the valley that he often frequented to test out the new abilities that he had gleaned from the eight-and-a-half-sentence mantra, but he noticed out of the corner of his eye that Meng Qianqian and few of his other servants were gathered on the spirit fields on the mountain.

Thus, he flew over to them before descending out of the sky, and the group of servants hurriedly extended respectful salutes upon spotting him.

Han Li waved a dismissive hand in response, then cast his gaze toward his mountain guardian beast up ahead.

Ever since he adopted this beast, he hadn't paid it much attention, mostly leaving it to be looked after by his servants, but to his surprise, it had reached the mid-Body Integration Stage.

However, what had caught his attention wasn't the Two-headed Griffin. Intead, it was the strange azure bird straddled atop one of its necks.

The bird had a huge head and a disproportionately slender neck. Its body was close to 20 feet in length and covered in countless arrow-like feathers, and there was a fleshy pouch that was over five feet in size hanging in front of its chest.

It was casually straddled atop the Two-headed Griffin, which was countless times more massive than itself, looking around like a proud general riding atop his noble steed.

However, the bird seemed to have been startled by Han Li's arrival, and it flapped its wings in alarm as a hint of fear flashed through its eyes.

Only after receiving a reassuring glance from Meng Qianqian did it settle down, but it was laying itself flat against the Two-headed Griffin's back while covering its head with its wings, peeking out at Han Li through its feathers.

"Is that Featheryearn?" Han Li asked as he turned to Meng Qianqian.

"That's right," Meng Qianqian replied with a smile.

"It's only been 100 years since I last saw it, and it's already close to the Nascent Soul Stage," Han Li remarked with an impressed look in his eyes.

"Indeed. Its appetite is absolutely enormous, and that probably has something to do with its fast progress. I haven't fed it any spirit plants or pills outside of the wind-attribute spirit plants from the fields, but it would occasionally sneak out of the Crimson Dawn Peak, and I don't know what it's been eating during its outings," Meng Qianqian said as she took a glance at Featheryearn.

Han Li pointed at the Two-headed Griffin, which was laying on the ground with a rather bored look on its faces, and he asked, "What's the deal with these two?"

"Featheryearn once snuck out of the Crimson Dawn Peak two years ago, and as it was coming back, it was being hunted by a Deity Transformation Stage demon beast. At the time, the mountain guardian beast swooped in to eat that demon beast and save Featheryearn, and the two of them seemed to have become friends after that," Meng Qianqian explained.

"I bet it went out to hunt for other demon beasts, but ended up biting off more than it could chew and almost became prey for something else instead," Han Li remarked with an amused smile. "By the way, have your brother and Sun Buzheng not returned yet?"

"They already came back seven or eight years ago, but both of them seemed to have encountered some opportunities during their outing, and not long after they came back, they went into seclusion to attempt breakthroughs to the Deity Transformation Stage.

“Both of them are still in seclusion right now, and all of the spirit plants they brought back have already been planted in the fields. Oh, I almost forgot, they also brought back these seeds as well," Meng Qianqian replied as she handed a storage pouch to Han Li.

Han Li accepted the spiritual sense and inspected its contents with his spiritual sense. He then made his way over to the spirit fields and was quite pleased by what he saw.

Meng Yungui and Sun Buzheng had brought back a lot of seeds and spirit plants during their outings, enough for several dozen batches' worth of pill refinement ingredients.

This was not an easy task for them at their current cultivation bases, so it was clear that they had been very diligent.

"They did a good job. I may be going into seclusion after this, so they may not get to see me when they come out of seclusion. Here are two vials of pills for cultivation base stabilization, make sure to give these to them in my stead," Han Li said as he tossed a pair of pill vials to Meng Qianqian.

Meng Qianqian hurriedly caught the vials before extending a grateful curtsey toward Han Li as she said, "Thank you, Elder Li."

Han Li gave her a dismissive wave, then reached toward the spirit fields with azure light glowing from his hands.

The earth began to tremble slightly, and over 100 spirit plants of different colors were enveloped by azure light before being uprooted from the ground. There were still droplets of dew on their leaves and dirt clinging to their roots as they rose up into the air before flying toward his cave abode.

These spirit plants weren't of a sufficient age to be used, so they had to be transferred to the medicine garden in his cave abode to be matured using the spirit liquid from the Heaven Controlling Vial.