Cultivation is just so scientific!

Chapter 1552: Chapter 822: Inner Demon (Part 2)

He shouted loudly, wanting to vent, but there was no target for his anger, and his fury had nowhere to be released.

“I am a Great Power, I am a Great Power!” His eyes gradually turned red, muttering the same words.

Maintaining the existence of the thundercloud became his obsession; apart from the obsession, his Dao heart was lost.

Why must a Half-step Great Power seclude themselves? Besides the process of integrating oneself with the Grotto Heaven, which makes it impossible to venture outside, it is because the Half-step Great Power, being in a nascent state of integration with their Grotto Heaven, is at the most vulnerable period for their temperament.

Secluding oneself, residing within one’s own Grotto Heaven, without contact with the external world is the best way to address the temperament being affected, and it is the wisdom accumulated by cultivators over countless years.

In the face of life and death, Yang Xing’s Dao heart finally collapsed, plunging him into a state of demonic instability.

The matter of heart demon invasion becomes more dangerous with higher realms.

His heart and mind, influenced by the heart demon, turned his pure white Nascent Soul to black, and his consciousness was replaced by the heart demon at that moment.

The black Nascent Soul flew out of the body, plunging directly into the thundercloud.

Although it was an outbreak of the heart demon, the sole obsession still influenced the heart demon’s actions; the heart demon continued to maintain the presence of the thundercloud.

Under the influence of the heart demon, however, the existence of the thundercloud became reliant on the power of the heart demon, not Spiritual Energy.

Li Shiming did not know what had happened within the Grotto Heaven; he found that the drawn Spiritual Energy had become exceedingly thin.

“Something is wrong, the rate at which Spiritual Energy is decreasing is too fast!” He frowned and said.

Previously, there was a Half-step Great Power actively inciting its own Spiritual Power Pattern to support the thundercloud, and the amount of Spiritual Power Pattern within a Half-step Great Power is vast as the sea; even maintaining the state of thundercloud could last for several months.

Li Shiming had considered spending a long time slowly extracting Spiritual Energy; anyway, once everything was normal here, as long as he left a Late-stage Golden Corpse to watch over, he could leave to attend to his matters.

But he never expected that the process of extracting Spiritual Energy would be so rapid. How long had it been, and the Spiritual Energy inside the Grotto Heaven was already almost gone?

In fact, he miscalculated the size of Yang Xing’s Half-step Great Power Grotto Heaven and didn’t account for what Yang Xing was facing.

Due to his actions, Yang Xing fell into the heart demon, and also because there were no destructible targets in the Grotto Heaven, even if the heart demon was generated, it had nowhere to vent, letting the heart demon replace Yang Xing, maintaining the existence of the thundercloud in another form.

After a few more two hours, Li Shiming, through the drawn Spiritual Energy, confirmed that the Spiritual Energy in the Grotto Heaven was indeed nearly nonexistent.

He was curious about the current state of the Half-step Great Power; it was very simple to check the state of the Half-step Great Power, just send a trace of Divine Sense into the Grotto Heaven to see what was happening.

For a normal Great Cultivator, doing so is extremely dangerous.

Divine Sense is a part of a Great Cultivator’s spirit, and if attacked and injured it equals a mental trauma.

However, Li Shiming had a hundred and ninety-one brains, and he didn’t need to use the main brain and also had Spirit Pills to heal the mental trauma of Great Cultivators; even if one brain’s spirit was traumatized, it would merely require that brain to rest for a period and be unusable for a while.

His curiosity growing heavier, he couldn’t bear it anymore, using one brain’s Divine Sense to probe into the Grotto Heaven.

“Ah!” As soon as Divine Sense entered the Grotto Heaven, it encountered a black mist, and the Divine Sense was corroded by the black mist.

It was thanks to the quick retraction of Divine Sense that not too much was lost.

But the spirit pain transmitted from that brain made him involuntarily cry out.

“What is the situation?” Li Shiming recalled the situation detected by Divine Sense, his face full of puzzlement.

If this Half-step Great Power was from the Demon Sect, the scene in the Grotto Heaven could be explained.

But this was a Half-step Great Power from the Yuqing Sect; how could the Grotto Heaven be like a Demon Cave?

“No, it’s a heart demon!” He quickly negated his previous judgment, realizing what the earlier feeling was.

This was not his first encounter with a heart demon; the long unsummoned Venerable Huijing was controlled by him due to a heart demon encounter.

He promptly determined what trouble the Half-step Great Power encountered; apparently, his Spiritual Energy extraction caused the Half-step Great Power to go into demonic instability.

He showed a smile, finally having avenged a great grievance.

A Half-step Great Power losing control over themselves in such a manner was indeed surprising.

Li Shiming thought of the heart demon; he was the cultivator least worried or afraid of heart demons.

Because he had a Heavenly Ghost, a special Spiritual Pet, and the Heavenly Ghost was the nemesis of heart demons, which had been demonstrated long ago.

He summoned the Heavenly Ghost residing in Great Cultivator Luo Pei’s body, yet he hesitated before giving the order to the Heavenly Ghost.

Sending the Heavenly Ghost into the Grotto Heaven to eliminate the heart demon, if it really was a heart demon, the danger for the Heavenly Ghost was minimal.

But if it was a trap intentionally set by the Half-step Great Power, then the Heavenly Ghost would be in danger.

Li Shiming recalled the black mist encountered when Divine Sense entered the Grotto Heaven, along with that spirit-corroding sensation, reaffirming his judgment.

He sent the Heavenly Ghost into the Grotto Heaven, his brain remaining in the Heavenly Ghost’s body to prevent unforeseen events and facilitate directing the Heavenly Ghost’s response.

The Heavenly Ghost, entering the Grotto Heaven, encountered a mass of black mist.

Through the Heavenly Ghost’s perception, this was black mist generated by a heart demon, entirely composed of negative emotions.

The Heavenly Ghost flew into the black mist, which seemed oblivious to it.

Which was normal, as the Heavenly Ghost’s shell was the skin of the Heavenly Demon, belonging to the most special and highest-ranked beings among spirit-based creatures.

Li Shiming, through his contract connection with the Heavenly Ghost, shared its perception.

He discovered the Heavenly Ghost had an innate sensitivity to heart demons, finding its location immediately upon entering the Grotto Heaven, even isolated by the black mist.

As the Heavenly Ghost was about to pounce ahead, Li Shiming ordered it to stop.

The Heavenly Ghost only perceived the heart demon and did not pay attention to other aspects.

But Li Shiming keenly sensed the presence of the Thunder Rules ahead, and from the shared perception through the Heavenly Ghost, realized this was the sole Thunder Rules in the entire Grotto Heaven; other rules were absent.

Using one rule to support the entire Grotto Heaven likely marked the first step of Grotto Heaven’s formation.

He did not realize that originally, there were many rules present; unfortunately, he extracted Spiritual Energy too harshly, preventing those rules from sustaining.

At this moment, Li Shiming thought of another matter, that some ancient records stated a Half-step Great Power’s Grotto Heaven would collapse after their fall.

He could no longer sense the life force of the Half-step Great Power, the only remaining entity being the heart demon. Why did the Grotto Heaven still exist?

Moreover, if the Thunder Rules also disappeared, would the Grotto Heaven still remain?

The peculiar scene in the Grotto Heaven likely marked a first occurrence in the Cultivation World.

Half-step Great Power Yang Xing was too unfortunate, being tasked by his sect during a critical seclusion period.

Encountering Li Shiming sealing the connection of the Grotto Heaven to the outside world, and using a Formation to extract its internal Spiritual Energy, Yang Xing was eventually forced into demonic instability.

Upon the heart demon forming due to demonic instability, Yang Xing’s last obsession was to maintain the existence of the thundercloud, ensuring the presence of the Thunder Rules.

After the heart demon formed, lacking a target of destruction, it was influenced by the obsession, maintaining the existence of the thundercloud in its own way.

Because the heart demon was a spirit existence, it maintained the thundercloud using spiritual energy, also possibly due to the role of obsession, or some unknown reason, the Thunder Rules were indeed stabilized by the heart demon.

During this period, Yang Xing, as a Half-step Great Power, had in fact fallen, replaced by the heart demon.

The Grotto Heaven, which ought to have perished with Yang Xing, was miraculously preserved due to the support from the source-sharing heart demon, not perishing alongside him.