A Record of a Mortal's Journey to Immortality: Immortal Realm

"The timing of Scarface's death is far too suspicious, but this does confirm to me that he was the one who put those Heart Pitting Insects into my room. Having said that, it appears that he was only doing someone else's bidding," Han Li mused.

"Regardless of whose instructions he was carrying out, someone capable of acquiring Heart Pitting Insects is definitely not to be looked down on. It looks like you may have some major trouble on your hands, Fellow Daoist Li," Toxic Dragon mused with tightly furrowed brows.

"Are you afraid of getting swept up in my mess, Fellow Daoist Toxic Dragon? In that case, we can revoke our earlier agreement," Han Li said with a smile.

At the moment, Han Li could only think of two people who he had bad blood with in Green Goat City, namely Chen Yang and Scarface. However, if the former wanted him dead, then he would've already been dead and buried long ago, while the latter was now dead himself, so the case had run cold.

"Not at all, Fellow Daoist Li," Toxic Dragon chuckled. "Of course I'm afraid of trouble, but this agreement is too important to me to invoke. In fact, as a show of my sincerity, I'll issue you some of the beast cores that I promised you now."

"In that case, I'll teach you the acupoint opening method that I mentioned before, and after that, I'll use my spiritual sense to remedy your faulty profound acupoint. I don't know how many treatments it's going to take, but as long as you follow through on your promises, I'll be sure to see things through to the end," Han Li said.

"Deal!" Toxic Dragon replied with a pleased nod.

Around an hour later, Han Li returned to his room, then pulled out the ten Tarot Beast Cores that he had received from Toxic Dragon out of his sleeve. After that, he devoured one of the beast cores before commencing his cultivation of the Wingform Ascension Arts.

……

During this time, Han Li had taken part in many arena battles, and his powers had been steadily growing in the process.

Most of the profound points that he had earned had been redeemed for beast cores, and that was also supplemented by the beast cores given to him by Toxic Dragon, amounting to quite a significant number, all of which had been used up in his cultivation.

However, the more progress he made, the slower progress became.

The more profound acupoints that he opened, the more starpower required to open each additional profound acupoint, and there was a limit to the amount of starpower in a single Tarot Beast Core, so he had to consume many such beast cores to open just a single profound acupoint.

Even so, he had already opened forty-nine profound acupoints up to this point, and this was an absolutely unheard of rate of progress.

While his rapid progress was a good thing, it was also a cause for concern.

After all, if someone were to discover just how rapidly he had been progressing in his bodily refinement, then that would undoubtedly lead to a disaster for him.

In a very timely stroke of fortune, one day roughly two years ago, Han Li had just finished a battle and trudged back to his room in an exhausted manner to find that his Heavenly Star Shell had been destroyed.

However, nothing had been moved in his room, and nothing had gone missing. The only thing that had changed was that the leg bone of an unknown scaled beast had appeared in a corner of the room.

A passage of text had been engraved onto the beast bone, and it was truly like a blessing from the heavens.

The passage of text contained a secret technique that taught one how to use starpower to close profound acupoints.

The inscriptions appeared to be quite fresh, and the handwriting was also a little rough, indicating that whoever had made the inscriptions had done so in a hurry.

At the end of the passage of text were two words: "destroy immediately".

Han Li followed the instruction without any hesitation, crushing the bone into powder after memorizing the secret technique.

It was unclear who had left this beast bone in his room, but in Han Li's mind, he was certain that it had to have been Daoist Xie.

As for how Daoist Xie had found out that this was something that he needed and how Daoist Xie had managed to sneak the bone into his room, those were just questions that he would have to ask Daoist Xie the next time they met.

The secret technique was quite simple, and it didn't take long for Han Li to master it, following which he closed his six latest profound acupoints, and to this day, everyone was still under the false impression that he had only opened forty-three profound acupoints.

……

At this moment, a battle between a gladiator and a C tier scaled beast was taking place in the ninth area, and thunderous cheers were ringing out across the spectator stands.

"Shadow, Shadow, Shadow..."

All of the spectators were chanting a certain name, and on the battle platform was a massive Black Scaled Elephant that was riddled with wounds, currently in the process of charging at a spear-wielding young man.

The man was none other than Han Li, and the bone spear that he was wielding was rather peculiar in that the tip of the spear was almost equal in length with its shaft, and it was shimmering with faint starlight.

It appeared to be a spike from some type of scaled beast.

The Black Scaled Elephant appeared to be charging forward with tremendous power, but in reality, its footsteps were a little clumsy, and its long tusks were aimed directly at Han Li like a pair of spears.

Han Li also had some blood on his body, but he was looking quite casual and relaxed.

In the face of the oncoming Black Scaled Elephant, Han Li crouched down slightly, and the profound acupoints on his legs lit up as he sprang up into the air.

In the blink of an eye, he appeared directly in front of the Black Scaled Elephant, which seemed to have been caught completely off guard, and it whipped its trunk viciously at Han Li at such an incredible speed that the majority of the spectators in the stands were only able to see a blur flash through the air.

Not only was the Black Scaled Elephant's trunk incredibly fast, it also possessed tremendous strength, and its scales were even more resilient than its body. If Han Li were to receive a direct blow from the attack, then the consequences would be catastrophic.

However, right as the trunk was about to make contact with Han Li, the profound acupoints on his legs lit up once again, and he curled up into a ball, then stomped down onto the sweeping trunk to send himself flying horizontally through the air.

At the same time, he plunged his bone spear into the side of the Black Scaled Elephant's face, and the spear resembled a sharp scythe, slicing all the way along the elephant's face before tearing a huge gash into its abdomen.

A massive torrent of blood came gushing out of the wound, staining half of the entire platform red.

The Black Scaled Elephant stumbled forward a few more steps, then collapsed to the ground with a massive thump.

Han Li immediately pounced on this opportunity, leaping high up into the air while raising his spear above his head. The muscles on his arms bulged as all of his forty-three profound acupoints lit up in unison, and he hurled the spear through the air like a javelin.

A loud shrieking sound rang out, followed by a loud crunch, and the spear pierced straight through the Black Scaled Elephant's head before plunging deep into the battle platform, following which Han Li also landed on the elephant's back.

"Shadow, Shadow, Shadow..."

……

The outcome of the battle was already decided, and the atmosphere in the entire arena was completely ignited as everyone erupted into thunderous cheers.

There was a covert VIP booth on the mountain face above the spectator stands, and an imposing black-robed man was standing with his hands clasped behind his back, silently observing the unfolding scene.

The man was none other than Du Qingyang, and he was looking at Han Li from afar as he murmured to himself, "Looks like the cultivation art that you're using greatly enhances your speed. How interesting.

After that, he made his way out of the VIP booth and returned straight to his cave abode.

Around an hour later, Hu Bi hurriedly arrived outside a conference hall of the city lord's cave abode, and before he even had a chance to declare his own arrival, the heavy doors of the conference hall swung open inward on their own, following which an authoritative voice ordered from inside, "Come in."

Hu Bi didn't dare to hesitate, and he hurriedly entered the hall to discover that there were already four people seated at the long table inside.

On the left were a bald man and a thin elderly man, both of whom were also hunting party captains, just like himself, while on right were a square-faced young man and a man with his hair tied up with a hair tie, both of whom were captains of city guard squads.

As for the main seat directly facing the entrance of the hall, that was occupied by Du Qingyang.

"Hu Bi pays his respects to City Lord Du," Hu Bi said with a respectful bow.

At this moment, Du Qingyang was playing with a strange black stone statue with three heads and six arms, and he gave a nonchalant nod, indicating for Hu Bi to sit down.

"I've summoned all of you here today to tell you that you can begin setting up the Sinha Blood Array," Du Qingyang declared as he sat up a little straighter.

Everyone's expressions changed slightly upon hearing this, and they all appeared elated as they hurriedly replied in a respectful manner, "Yes, City Lord Du."

"Now that we're getting close, I have some finer details to lay out, so make sure you listen up and don't make any mistakes," Du Qingyang said, and everyone nodded in response.