Chapter 535: Unexpected Gains

The sixth layer of the abyss had reached its end—this was the final point. Ye Feng, who had subdued Luo Yan, did not leave immediately.
In the first five layers of the abyss, each layer had yielded significant gains, so it was impossible for Ye Feng to leave the seventh layer empty-handed. Although he had already achieved his greatest gain—Gold Medal enforcer Luo Yan—he also took the old man’s storage ring. Yet, it was not in Ye Feng’s nature to leave without plundering everything here.
“Old Luo, are there any treasures in this layer?” Ye Feng asked without hesitation. With the death of that old man who mastered the laws of the undead, the other undead creatures here naturally bowed respectfully before Luo Yan, too afraid to move.
“There should be quite a few. The weakest among the powerful ones who fell here were at the Saint Venerable level, and there were even a few at the Supreme Saint level. Their storage rings should still be intact. But I’ve been fighting that old man all these years and really haven’t paid much attention to such material possessions.” Luo Yan paused for a moment. “However, I know that old man must have had many hidden treasures. He probably took everything from his undead creatures, including my storage ring and burial items.”
“Can your detection ability find out where those things are?” Ye Feng asked.
“I can’t. He must have used arrays and restrictions to seal them away.” After a while, Luo Yan shook his head, clearly having failed to find anything. “As long as the master refines his Soul Golden Pearl, he should be able to obtain his memories and know where those things are.”
“Refining that thing will take some time. It’s a pity this abyss will close in just a hundred years—there are still over ninety years left.” Ye Feng shook his head helplessly. “I originally planned to leave earlier, but it seems I’ll have to cultivate here.”
After sending a message to Long Tian and the others, informing them that he would be entering seclusion so they wouldn’t worry, Ye Feng stepped into the Cultivation Realm. He also arranged for Luo Yan to stay in the Flowing Palace, which accelerated time by a thousand times, because only there could the spiritual energy at the required level be provided. Since Ye Feng’s Cultivation Realm had not yet reached the Saint class, it was naturally useless for Luo Yan.
In fact, with his body’s strength equivalent to that of a mid-tier Saint artifact, he could only withstand a soul strength at the Saint Venerable level. To improve further, either his physical strength or his cultivation level would need to increase.

Ye Feng wasn’t in a hurry to absorb that Soul Golden Pearl either; he planned to wait until Ye Yan had consumed that Hell Magma and his cultivation level had improved. But now the situation was completely different—he had to absorb that Soul Golden Pearl and take in the old man’s memories to obtain his secrets. Just as Ye Feng was about to boost his cultivation by consuming pills, a message came from Ye Yan: “In at most three days, you can reach the Saint Spirit level, and your physical strength will also rise to that of a top-grade sacred weapon.” Hearing this, Ye Feng became completely unhurried. Three days was enough time for him to wait. He closed his eyes, organized his spoils from this battle, and categorized them, feeling even more delighted. Only then could he calm down and continue working on the formation. Although he had hit a bottleneck with the laws and secret patterns, the formation itself wasn’t yet problematic. Three days, even with the ten-thousand-fold time acceleration of the Refinement Realm, was merely a blink of an eye for Ye Feng, who was deeply immersed in designing the formation. Suddenly, Ye Feng felt something inside him breaking apart. He knew his cultivation was about to break through. As expected, the meridians in his body burst like breached dams and then began to reshape themselves. His dantian expanded by more than a hundred times, and even the planet and vortex inside it grew several times larger. The originally white vortex also took on a faint golden hue. If Ye Feng’s meridians had been like small streams before, they were now like mighty rivers, expanded by more than a hundred times. Ye Feng never imagined that the gap between the Saint level and non-Saint levels could be so vast. What surprised him the most was that not only had his cultivation risen to the early Saint Spirit stage and his physical strength become that of a top-grade sacred weapon, but his soul height had also increased slightly—from 2,999 meters to 3,000 meters. Though it was just an increase of one meter, it meant his soul strength had reached the mid-stage Saint Venerable level. “Is this the power of the Saint level?” Ye Feng marveled, feeling the sudden surge of power within him as he looked at his arms. After being distracted for a brief moment, he regained his focus. “I broke through even before finishing absorbing Ye Yan’s magma. I wonder how much more my cultivation will increase once I’ve absorbed it all. Never mind that for now. I need to absorb that Soul Golden Pearl first to see how much my soul strength can grow.” “It really was a great place we went to, Ye Yan and I!” Ye Chen and his three clones had just returned from other ruins not long ago, and the four of them gathered together, laughing secretly.

“Yes, just a few days ago my soul strength rose to the Saint Venerable level, and today it has reached the Saint Spirit level. What kind of cultivation speed is this?” Ye Lei was also somewhat envious.
“We’ve explored several ruins over the past few years, but unfortunately, our total gains still fall short of yours,” Ye Han, who was usually quiet, couldn’t help but sigh. As duplicates, they naturally knew what Ye Feng and Ye Yan had gone through during this time.
Meanwhile, Ye Feng, still inside the Cultivation Realm, had no time to pay attention to what his duplicates were discussing, as his entire focus was on the Soul Golden Pearl floating in his sea of consciousness.
After nearly twenty years of absorption, the Soul Golden Pearl had shown almost no change. If it weren’t for the increase in its height from 3,000 meters to over 4,000 meters, Ye Feng would have felt discouraged. Although he had gained many benefits, he knew it would be difficult for him to obtain that old man’s treasure in the short term.
“The absorption speed is still too slow…” Ye Feng sighed. “Is there any way to speed it up?”
Just as this thought crossed his mind, he felt a vibration in his dantian.
Looking at his dantian, he saw the pale golden vortex trembling slightly.
“Could it help with the transformation?” Ye Feng was stunned. Only then did he remember that this object was originally formed from that black crystal that could devour everything, which gave him some confidence.
He directed the pulling force of the vortex in his dantian toward the Soul Golden Pearl in his sea of consciousness, causing his dantian to boil instantly. Ye Feng could clearly see a stream of pale golden energy winding its way onto the Soul Golden Pearl, circling it several times before wrapping around it. At the same time, another stream of energy extended out and pulled toward his navel.
In just a few breaths, Ye Feng felt a surge of abundant soul energy flowing into his soul from his navel.
He realized that with the help of that vortex, his absorption speed had increased by more than ten times.
Ye Feng’s soul expanded like a balloon. In just over a decade, its height surpassed 10,000 meters, reaching the strength of a Supreme Saint.
Another hundred years later, its height reached 100,000 meters, reaching the middle stage of the Supreme Saint level.
A thousand years later, it reached 1,000,000 meters, reaching the later stage of the Supreme Saint level.
Ten thousand years later, it reached 10,000,000 meters. At this height, its soul strength had reached the peak of the Supreme Saint level. Yet the Soul Golden Pearl had only shrunk by one-tenth.

After 120,000 years, Ye Feng finally absorbed all of those Soul Gold Beads. At 99,999,000 meters, he was just one meter away from reaching 100 million—once that happened, the soul would automatically turn golden and shrink to human size. This information came from the residual memories of the Soul Gold Beads.

If it had been the Soul Gold Bead from that old man’s peak period that Ye Feng absorbed, breaking through to a higher realm wouldn’t have been difficult. But the problem was that the old man had expended a great deal of his soul energy in that battle, leaving only half of it. After being shaken by the Flowing Palace within Ye Feng’s body, another 20% was lost, leaving only 30% of his soul energy—yet this remaining energy was of the purest kind, which explained why it was so easily absorbed.

Having 30% of soul energy was already enough to bring Ye Feng close to a breakthrough state, which was quite impressive.

Ye Feng wasn’t frustrated by this. He simply shook his head with a wry smile. He discovered he had an unexpected gain as well—the Dark Domain’s Necromancy Law, at the eighth stage of perfection.

He never expected to inherit the old man’s Necromancy Law intact. Initially, he thought he might inherit it, but in a incomplete form that would require him to cultivate on his own to become stronger. Instead, he got this unexpected reward. Now, the undead creatures here could all be put to use. With the eighth-stage perfection of this law, he could control undead beings at the peak of the Supreme Saint level. Inside his dantian, there also appeared a large black planet.

Without overthinking it, Ye Feng searched through the old man’s memories for the location where the treasure was hidden—this had been his original goal.

“It’s hidden here…” Ye Feng quickly found the treasure’s location, just a few hundred meters away from Luo Yan’s tomb, which was beyond anyone’s expectations. But Ye Feng soon understood why the old man had placed the treasure there—he considered Luo Yan to be part of his treasure too. Placing it a hundred meters away was to prevent Luo Yan from detecting anything unusual. The old man’s skill in formations was indeed high; even with Luo Yan’s abilities, he failed to notice such a treasure trove right above his head. If Luo Yan had known, he would have stolen all the treasures immediately, which would have pleased the old man despite causing him pain.

Even Ye Feng was stunned when he saw the formation. He thought his skills in formations were good, but he couldn’t figure out how to solve it. After observing it for a while, he shook his head helplessly and used the hand seals from the old man’s memories to unlock the formation.

Although the formation had many layers, it was very small, only the size of a palm, which explained why it was hard to detect. After disassembling the formation, Ye Feng saw only a storage ring, exactly as he remembered. All the treasures left by the more than 1,800 powerful warriors here were contained within this ring. What excited Ye Feng the most was that, according to his memories, there were two similar treasure-hiding sites in the Holy Realm, with even greater collections than this one… “Hehe, once I get to the Holy Realm, all those treasures will be mine…” Ye Feng smiled inwardly.