Chapter 838 – Silver Battle Spirit

…

…

…

The transformation of the body continued for another hour. With a series of cracking sounds, the heaven-step Demon God Bone and the sea serpent crystal shattered into powder. All of the various energies twisted together, completely blowing up the tower that the seclusion chamber was located within!

Dust and smoke rose from all over. When the flying stones finally settled, Lin Ming’s seclusion chamber was completely revealed in plain sight of all the spectators, leaving behind only the Sky Lock Array around it.

The entire sky with filled with endless thunder. And within the array formation, everything had turned into a sea of brilliant gold.

All of the martial artists cast their eyes towards the Sky Lock Array. Most of them weren’t able to see through the blazing light within.

However, some martial artists with high cultivation were able to clearly see what was happening inside. All of them were left dumbfounded.

What was going on?

As these high cultivation martial artists’ faces twisted with strange expressions, the other martial artists impatiently asked them, “What is it?”

“Lin Lanjian… has disappeared!”

“What!?” This observation left all of the martial artists stricken, “He disappeared!?”

“There is nothing left behind. No bones, no blood fog, in that array formation there is only some sort of golden energy!”

Normally, when a martial artist crossed Life Destruction, the first three stages were calamities of the body. Their body would disintegrate and then reform from its fundamental essence, creating a new flesh and blood spirit body of true essence.

When the body decomposed, this didn’t mean that everything would decompose. There were vital body parts that were left over. For instance, the brain, spine, skeleton, and for martial artists that had unstable foundations, even their heart, lungs, and several other major internal organs would remain.

Without a doubt, the more one’s body broke down, the more dangerous it would become!

Especially the brain and spine; those were related to a martial artist’s soul and where their spiritual sea was located. The structures and relations between these structures were incomparably complex. Once any one of them was damaged, it would be extremely difficult to repair. No matter how talented a martial artist was, when they crossed Life Destruction their brain would always be protected by energy so that they weren’t affected by the explosion of energy.

Otherwise it would be very easy to damage one’s spiritual sea, or it could even lead to instant death.

Even when a body decomposed, it didn’t disappear. Rather, it disintegrated into a rain of blood that fused with their own energy, imprisoning all of this in a small area. This energy would provide a formation outline for the soul and a new being would be born within this primordial soup of life.

This primordial soup of life was similar to the amniotic fluid within a mother’s womb. From afar, it actually looked like a deep crimson blood fog.

But in Lin Ming’s seclusion chamber, his head and skeleton had all disappeared, leaving nothing but an endless golden energy. Everything else had vanished!

If this situation were to happen to other martial artists then that meant one thing; something had gone awry in their process of Life Destruction and their body had completely disintegrated, leaving not even ashes behind!

“Lin Lanjian died…” A Revolving Core realm martial artist gulped, speculating that such a ridiculous turn of events had happened.

“It can’t be!”

“This is too big of a joke!”

Everyone made this conclusion in their minds. Even if they found this unbelievable, the facts were placed in front of them.

The eternally rare number one talent Lin Lanjian, who had reached rank 280 on the Destiny Decree with just a late Revolving Core cultivation and also obtained the title of ‘Death God’, had actually died while crossing the first stage of Life Destruction!

This was the world’s greatest farce!

“Since ancient times, even peak Emperor level talents have fallen from the skies. They can die in mystic realms, in life or death battles with others, or can even be assassinated by other major powers. But who has ever heard of this cause of death, dying while crossing the first stage of Life Destruction? This is too bizarre!”

“Did the Asura Divine Kingdom secretly plot something? Why would Lin Lanjian fail Life Destruction?”

“Don’t be silly. The Forsaken God Clan are not idiots. Do you see that great array above the Elders Palace? It is said that array is called the Sky Lock Array and it was passed down from ancient times. It could defend against the attack of even a Divine Sea Supreme Elder. Then again, do you think that the Asura Divine Kingdom really fears Lin Lanjian? If they send out some of the masters they have hidden then defeating Lin Lanjian wouldn’t be difficult at all!”

Most of the martial artists present simply felt this was incredulous. But they also couldn’t find any other explanation for what was happening in front of them.

Shibai had always been hiding around the edges to make sure that no one disturbed Lin Ming as he crossed Life Destruction. The energy within the Sky Lock Array was simply too wild and tyrannical. Even though Shibai had broken through to the Divine Sea, he still couldn’t stay within. After all, he wasn’t the Eightfall Thunder Emperor.

As Shibai looked at the golden sea of energy, his expression remained calm. This was because he could feel that Lin Ming’s fires of life were still burning with an incomparable effervescence.

Lin Ming didn’t encounter a problem nor did his body disappear. He had completely turned into a body of source energy, perfectly fusing with that golden lightning and becoming one!

For an ordinary martial artist, their flesh and blood would turn into primordial soup of life. After being baptized by energy they would then reform their body. During this there would always be incomplete parts of their transformation. For instance, large pieces of flesh, body fluids that had clumped together and so on.

And there was no need to mention disintegrating their brain or spine; those were completely untouched by the transformative energy.

Thus, the so-called decomposing the body and reforming a ‘spirit body’ was only a relative term. When one spoke of a ‘spirit body’, that was in truth only 70-80% of their body, leaving the rest as their mortal body.

A relatively poor Life Destruction martial artist might have a 60% spirit body, whereas a peerless talent might have a 90% spirit body. That was already the highest peak.

Once they reached a higher boundary, these mortal body portions would become constraints to a martial artist. When they fought, these parts of their body would become weaknesses!

In the Sky Spill Continent, there was no one able to do what Lin Ming could. With the support of the Heretical God Sprout, he completely fused his body with the energy even as he tempered every single cell with the power of thunder!

Even his soul and will underwent a baptism of thunder.

At this time, within the sea of golden energy, the battle spirit in Lin Ming’s spiritual sea was also withstanding being tempered by thunder.

Although Lin Ming’s physical body had already melted away, his consciousness was acutely clear. He could precisely make out the movement of energy in the golden sea as well as feel all of his cells exchanging energy with their surroundings.

In that moment, Lin Ming felt as if he were standing on a higher realm above the world of mortals, aloof and haughty with the fate of all grasped in his hands.

Indifferent, calm, and without the slightest hint of emotion; this was the perspective of a divine god.

‘Does the life of an energy body come close to a divine god? Or is a divine god similar to an energy body type of existence?’

A thought inexplicably flashed through Lin Ming’s mind. A so-called divine god should be an existence close to the peak of martial arts, or perhaps an unrivalled powerhouse that had already traced the peak. For instance, the ‘Evil God’ that had created the Heretical God Force.

But as for what the peak of martial arts was like, he had no idea what sort of concept that would be. He could only guess what would possibly happen upon reaching that step. Would his body then be constituted completely of source energy?

As Lin Ming was thinking of these things, he suddenly felt a burst of stabbing pain from the depths of his soul.

The battle spirit violently trembled, as if something were trying to break free from within it!

‘Mm? Could this be… the battle spirit is evolving!?’

When a martial artist first comprehended their battle spirit, after successfully forming it, they could only let it grow on its own. The earlier one comprehended a battle spirit, the more potential for growth their battle spirit had. This was because every time a martial artist’s cultivation increased, this would subtly manifest a change in their battle spirit.

Now that Lin Ming was crossing Life Destruction, his battle spirit was about to take another step forwards!

Lin Ming naturally couldn’t miss out on this opportunity. With a thought, the seals on the heavily protected fifth jade box began to unravel.

As the seals were undone, the wood spirit jade box immediately disintegrated into nothing. What was left over was the contents of the box, an exceptionally clear and vibrant purple crystal the size of a fist, along with several smaller fragments around it.

This was the Twinlife Thunder Crystal!

As the vessel that a Thunder Source was bred within, a Twinlife Thunder Crystal only appeared once every several hundred million years or even billions of years. Even within the Realm of the Gods, such a treasure could only be found through a stroke of destiny.

By concentrating the power of his will, the Twinlife Thunder Crystal floated in the air as it began to melt together with Lin Ming’s spear-shaped battle spirit.

Peng!

The Twinlife Thunder Crystal completely shattered, turning into countless translucent purple crystal shards that shimmered with a bright luminescence. These shards evenly distributed themselves all over the spear-shaped battle spirit.

In that instant, an energy beyond description suddenly erupted like a volcano. Above Lin Ming’s spear-shaped battle spirit, countless purple Dao patterns began to appear!

As these Dao patterns glowed and rippled, they seemed incomparably mystical, as if they contained the Source Laws and the charm of the Great Dao. Compared to the chaos stone engravings, they had arrived at the same result from different paths!

The reason that the Twinlife Thunder Crystal was able to temper the will was because it had existed for billions of years, bearing witness to the infinite changes through the endless years of the universe. Bit by bit, the thunder energy carved itself into the Twinlife Thunder Crystal, reflecting and manifesting the most essential changes in energy.

And once these changes were engraved into the battle spirit, the source energy would fuse together with the battle spirit and temper the will.

A soul-tearing pain caused Lin Ming’s consciousness to suddenly tremble. The energy body containing his fires of life violently rocked as it was sealed in the array formation. In such a situation, as soon as Lin Ming lost consciousness he would immediately lose control of his energy body and disperse. At that time, there really wouldn’t be anything left of him.

Pain of the soul was far more unbearable than pain of the flesh. But Lin Ming had practiced martial arts for many years by now, and especially with the experiences of absorbing the soul fragments of the Magic Cube, he had experienced agonizing pain of the soul several times already. Now, his determination and mental resiliency were already as hard as iron.

He stubbornly defended his mind, pouring the endless energy essence surrounding him into the battle spirit, letting the purple Dao patterns freely wrap around it and having it withstand a baptism of the Great Dao’s charm.

The Dao patterns destroyed and created, washing through every single inch of Lin Ming’s battle spirit. Slowly, the spear-shaped battle spirit lengthened and became increasingly dense. After a quarter hour, the bronze color began to fade away, revealing a touch of silver white radiance!

Although this radiance was weak, Lin Ming was astounded as soon as he saw it!

Silver battle spirit!

By crossing Life Destruction and in addition to the baptism of the Twinlife Thunder Crystal, his battle spirit had unexpectedly crossed over bronze perfection and stepped directly into the silver level!

A bronze battle spirit and a silver battle spirit were separated by a large boundary. Lin Ming had originally estimated he would need to cross another three or four stages of Life Destruction before being able to cross it. He never imagined that with the help of the Twinlife Thunder Crystal, he would be able to break through that barrier at just the first stage of Life Destruction!

The battle spirit trembled. The silver brilliance was like the cold light of a moon that came falling to the earth. At that moment, the spear-shaped battle spirit seemed to fuse into the void, turning this part of the world into an everlasting and eternal existence.